Welcome to Your Kamloops!

Thoughts on the Kamloops Daily News...

Back in April, I shared some thoughts on the Kamloops This Week coverage of city council. My intention then was to also write a bit about the other media outlets that cover your council. Today, I wanted to share some thoughts on the Kamloops Daily News.

• Michele Young, who regularly covers council for the daily news, is very well schooled on the issues having had the beat for a number of years. She and her family sometimes even become part of the debate on issues such as heritage conservation.  I think she works dutifully, but I sometimes wonder if she is getting a little bored with city hall. If I were to guess, I would say she is a centrist, neither right or left wing.
  
• The formidable Mel Rothenburger, long one of the deans of Kamloops journalism and also a 2 term former Mayor, knows even more than Michele about city hall. I respect him greatly, but also think he might be a little empathetic with local representatives. He knows what its like. I don't often find a lot of nuance in his stuff, but his breadth of knowledge and experience informs his pieces - they are important to read. Another Liberal centrist type voter, I would again guess.
• Cam Fortems is my favourite "green" reporter in Kamloops.
• The Daily News typically does not support council travel but have generally been supportive of innovative ideas and approaches to local government.
• I guess my real bugbear with all media these days, whats been going through my head quite a bit, is how conflict and bold statements (with or without substance) really are what get headlines. Life is a often painted with great swaths of grey, this black and white stuff which gets the top billing, often does not help move debates further.

"Friend of the Prostitutes"

Thats was Radio NL's Jim Harrison called me as we ran into each other, figuratively, at the CIBC parking lot downtown. Well, Jim, helping street level prostitutes exit the trade or take it into an escort agency or home helps a lot of people. I wear your words proudly.

Welcome Radio NL Readers...

On May 29th, Radio NL will be broadcasting my editorial explaining the value of my attending the Personal Democracy Forum. In the editorial, I welcome people to visit here for a full report on the conference. Here is the report.

I will update progress on action resulting from the conference as it happens.

Thanks Chris Foulds...

Its pretty awesome when we get the editor of a local paper to actually engage in the comments on Your Kamloops. First time ever. Thanks Chris Foulds for explaining some of the process of putting together a newspaper.  I welcome all members of the media to engage in the comments. Heck, even if you want to write a guest post.

Chris' comments here.

Technology and Democracy Conference...

A few months ago, I decided to look for a conference I could attend that would educate and inspire about the effects technology and the Internet have on democracy and governments. I want to continue to use technology to better represent all of you. I want to contribute to conversations about how to best use technology within city hall.

I have a bit of a track record in these issues. From 2000 to 2005, I ran an Internet training business. And, for most of that same time period, I was honoured to get to know many local and regional technologists while sitting on the board of a now defunct Kamloops technology industry association.

I found a conference. And I am excited and nervous about attending. The Personal Democracy Forum seems to be the gold standard of North American tech democracy conferences. The keynote this year is a Pullitzer Prize winning journalist interviewing the CEO of Google. But that may be just glitz and glam. The real meat of the learning will probably take place in the different conference sessions and the 2nd day "unconference" where the attendees take over the event.  I have found some really interesting projects run by speakers and attendees - for example, neighborhood web forums enabled by front porch forum and thorough run throughs of important issues of the day through debateopedia.

The conference and unconference will be held in New York City the Friday and Saturday. And, frankly, I am nervous about what people will initially think once they read the words New York City. I think I am spending your money wisely. Here is the rough breakdown of my expenses on this trip:

• Return bus ticket to and from Vancouver: $109
• Return Plane Ticket to NYC: $529.85
• 2 Nights Hotel NYC: $406
• Conference Fee: $364.72
• Meals and Transport in NYC: $150
• Total: $1559.87

Open to any thoughts!

Kamloops This Week Coverage of City Issues...Some Thoughts...

I initially decided to write this post out of some frustration. A week or so ago, Markus Ermisch, Kamloops This Week (KTW) reporter and a fellow I like, called me about a comment I made here about how the city could save money and make money. He asked me if the comment I made about the city parks, rec and culture department meant that I had little confidence in department director Byron McCorkell. I didn't like the question. I said nothing was further than the trust.

Today, I regret my initial motivation to share thoughts on Kamloops This Week. I want today to share thoughts on KTW coverage from a more centred and balanced place. I fully support Markus in asking tough and prickly questions.

I sometimes say that we go through a whole council meeting, debating many different issues, asking a lot of different questions, making comments, etc. Then, we open up the papers, tune in the radio, turn on the tv - and find out what actually happened.

Reporters have a tough job. They have to sit through all the stuff I mention in the paragraph above, sift through it all, and decide what issues are relevant and important to convey to their readers. They have toask tough questions of others and of themselves. They have very limited time to write and limited space to display their stories.

An additional huge responsibility for city hall reporters: their stories have huge influence on how people feel about city hall activities. So, I think that their challenge is to offer as accurate portrayal as possible.

So, with those overall thoughts in mind, here are some specific thoughts on Kamloops This Week coverage of city issues.

• Markus is go getter. Some of his work educates me about city hall activities or issues I did not know about before. And I appreciate that.
• I wish Markus would do less of the easy, lowbrow stuff. An example: comments I made about outsourcing at a Council meeting were relayed to Jim Sinclair, president of the BC Federation of Labour. Of course, Sinclair slammed me. Not too surprising, but a front page story. And did it really help people understand the issue of outsourcing?
• From Markus' reporting, and from the commentary of KTW editor Chris Foulds, I would surmise they are coming more from the traditional right of centre perspective. This of course is balanced by Dale Bass' social issues commentary.
  

I could probably come up with more thoughts. But, lets keep it short, simple, and sharp as I can make it today. And this post is meant as a start of a conversation, not the end. I might update my thoughts from time to time.

Kamloops Daily News, Radio NL, and Broadcast Centre - now that I have commented on KTW, I guess I have to make this post the first in a 4 part series.

To my friends at Kamloops This Week

Hey MarKus and Chris - thanks for reading the site. I will be very soon sharing some of my thoughts about your coverage of city issues in these pages. Stay tuned...

My 2006 Travel Expenses - OK or too much?

I spent $4612.03 of taxpayer money attending conferences in 2006. I had the second highest expenses on Council.  I really tried to take in as much relevant education as possible, and I believe it has made me a better representative and decision maker.

But, what is much more important is what you think.

This week our expenses for 2006 were made public and a mention was made of my second highest travel expense. But, in the end, I see getting good education for myself as good value for my constituents. And, I would not be surprised if I get close to the $5000 limit again in 2007.

I wonder, though, if people see my spending on these conferences as just a boondoogle, or if they also see value in me educating myself on issues that seem to be very important and networking with people who can help tackle these issues in Kamloops.

Here is a adobe acrobat pdf file 
Download my_2006_travelexpenses.pdf
with my detailed expenses and the conferences I attended in 2006. I would be really interested in your thoughts. Am I doing the right thing trying to maximize educational opportunities or is it too much?

Am I spending your money wisely?

Still Scratching my Head over This Headline...

This headline grabbed my attention. I think it was meant to - but I think it certainly fails in the "truth in reporting" category. How in the world can the Kamloops Daily News headline reporters make such a statement with a straight face? If you read the article the headline titled, you would find out that an unscientific survey was done and people who filled the survey out were mostly against a full or partial pesticide ban. You would have also read that the city has received a petition urging us to restrict pesticide use - signed by over a thousand people.

I guess the great thing about such a headline is that it  gets people talking, even mobilizes them.

Debt versus Tax: Media Reactions Interesting

This week, we also had our first formal meeting about the 2007 city budget. We spoke mainly about bigger capital projects - construction, infrastructure repair, etc.  We were also presented a list of projects city staff had decided to defer. We were also asked for direction of whether we wanted to tax for the projects or if borrowing the money was a better idea. We decided that borrowing the money was more logical, as these projects would also benefit citizens of the future and that they should pay a share as well.

I spoke in favour of putting more priority on pedestrian upgrades.

I have to be honest that I did not hear the NL Radio/The River or CIFM / B100 news clips about the budget session. Angelo Iacobucci from Radio NL arrived quite late into the discussions. I am not sure if the CIFM / Broadcast Centre Rep was there.

I'd have to say that between the two newspaper reporters, Michele Young at the Kamloops Daily News did a better job on reporting the discussions. She put together quite a good summary actually, I thought.

Marcus Ermisch from Kamloops This Week devoted a lot of his story to a supposed argument between Councillor Pat Wallace and myself about the pedestrians versus drivers issue. I didn't see an argument, just a real good discussion.   I don't think Pat and I fought at all - we never have so far, and very likely, never will.  But, then again, I am not sure if I was coming across as calm as I meant to, on Tuesday. But even if Pat and I were arguing, I am not sure how that was the real story. If it seemed we were fighting every meeting, maybe I could see it.  Anyhow, I think Marcus (who is a great journalist generally) wasted space when he could have related much more important information in his article.