The lineup of people who will ultimately steer the Grand Trunk project forward is set.
Whether it's a "dream team" or is lacking in diversity, depends on who you ask.
At Tuesday night’s Stratford city council meeting, the members of the committee were picked and due to the large number of applicants, and how qualified every applicant was, council approved the establishment of five working groups to assist the committee.
In all, it comprises 13 committee members, eight chairs, five working groups and two coordinators for the Ad-Hoc Grand Trunk Renewal committee.
Membership is comprised of residents with a professional background in economic development, development, accounting, education, theatre, design, law, and land use planning. They are tasked with getting development of the large downtown Stratford property moving along.
Mayor Martin Ritsma will also serve on the committee, which reports to Chair and former mayor Dan Mathieson.
By and large the committee members appointed, who are not getting paid for their time, are the recommended applicants by city staff and Mathieson. Barb Cottle and Nick Flanagan were the only approved amendments, displacing Patty Walker Mann and Steve Cooper, respectively.
A few other proposed amendments were shot down, with discussion largely around whether or not “nitpicking” was the best thing to do in a long and difficult project.
Coun. Jo-Dee Burbach had the most proposed amendments. She clarified that her changes were not due to any issue with individual applicants recommended by city staff and the committee chair.
“When I look at the recommended list, I was looking at it with the lens of some diversity and a bit more equity and inclusion – and looking at what people bring to the table, their perspectives, their ages, their position in life. So some of these recommendations are based on trying to diversify what's not a very diverse slate.”
For instance, Burbach said, all except one of the recommended appointments were over age 50. The vision for the Grand Trunk property will have an impact on multiple generations and should have representation on its committee from multiple generations.
Coun. Brad Beatty, who moved accepting the recommendations from the chair and city staff outright, said the list was picked and recommended as a whole and that should be taken into consideration.
“It’s a dream team that we’re assembling here,” Beatty said. “I think the recommendation that we have for all these (positions) … needs to stand as is.”
Coun. Mark Hunter agreed.
“I do have a concern about starting to nitpick every decision that is presented before us,” Hunter said. “This project is going to be massive … I don't want to go through the design process and say, ‘well, what if we move this window there? What if we put a tree in that place? This could be a 300-year project, if we do it that way. We do need to have some efficiencies.”
On the other hand, Coun. Taylor Briscoe had concern over rubber-stamping a list without providing opinions and input as a council. That is the responsibility of council and they need to be accountable for decisions that are made.
In other words, Briscoe said, council cannot abdicate their responsibility.
Coun. Larry McCabe agreed, saying that the process is part of the job of being on council.
“The expectation of the public is that their council would weigh in on these recommendations,” McCabe said. “Certainly it's not clear to me that the expectation was that we would just look at them. It doesn't seem to me that provides any oversight of the process, which I think that that's why we're here. So in my mind, this is this is the process. It’s messy.”
Hunter later clarified that his goal isn’t to abdicate responsibility, but to streamline the process.
Like the committee, the chairs for the working groups were largely appointed from the recommended list. The only change came from McCabe’s motion to add Andrew Hilton as co-chair of communications, advocacy, and civic engagement.
Committee members approved:
- Barb Cottle, citizen at large
- Andy Bicanic, development
- Franklin Famme, economic development
- Stephen Mitchell, accounting
- Trudi Jonkman, Stratford Lakeside Active Adults Association member
- Georgia Neely, youth
- Mark Vandenbosch, education
- Ron Dodson, theatre
- Nick Flanagan, designs
- Paul Parlee, legal
- Melanie Hare, land-use planning
Approved working group chairs:
- Karen Haslam and Herb Klassen, partnership
- Melanie Hare, vision, planning, and architecture
- Franklin Famme, real estate, legal and finance
- John Kastner and Andrew Hilton, communications, advocacy, and civic engagement
- Steve Cooper, infrastructure, environmental
Additionally, Alan Kasperski and Ray Harsant were approved as the two working group coordinators.
The working groups will be filled out with other committee applicants that haven’t been selected yet.
City CAO Joan Thomson said there were 59 applications. After talking to the chair of the ad hoc committee, Thomson said the right thing to do is work from the list of applications that have already been received.
"If we had to go back out and advertise again, it will slow down the process.”
