One Richmond councillor called the council term goals presented to them at Monday’s committee meeting as “same old, same old,” saying they were similar to the last two councils’ goals.
Coun. Carol Day said the approach to creating them is always the same with council filling out a survey and then they end up with the “same regurgitated goals.” She said she looked back at 2011 and 2014 goals, and there wasn’t much difference.
“It’s the same cookie-cutter categories that just don’t say anything,” Day said. “I think what we have is a housing crisis and just about every goal that we have, every statement we have should somehow take us back to that key issue.”
“We’re chasing people out of Richmond and we need to focus everything on that primary goal (housing),” Day added.
In addition to housing, she said the environment and transparency should round out the top three priorities and suggested council sit down with staff in a workshop format to hash out the goals.
The “broad goal themes,” as listed in a staff report to council, were a safe and resilient city, a sustainable and environmentally conscious city, one community together, an active and thriving Richmond, sound financial management, strategic and well-planned growth, a supported economic sector and an engaged and informed community.
Coun. Bill McNulty said the city they’ve been elected to govern is complex and they’re responsible to the public.
“We could put a little bit more meat into the goals,” McNulty said, adding, for example, under the goal of “safe and resilient city,” they could put in the city needs five more community policing stations or include some specific housing goals or a goal to raise a specific dike.
“We might not achieve that goal, but it’s there,” he said.
In response to McNulty, however, Mayor Malcolm Brodie confirmed with staff that specifics will come back to committees and council meetings, with subsequent discussions based on broad term goals. Each item that comes to council is identified as falling under a term goal, Brodie added.
Coun. Kelly Greene suggested the document be called “term strategy” rather than goals.
“That informs people that this is a strategic document rather than an operational document,” she said.
Greene echoed Day’s comments that she was disappointed at how much the document looked like the term goals from 2014-2018.
“It’s basically the same but with new titles,” she said, adding she didn’t disagree with some, but would like some new ideas also.
Coun. Michael Wolfe, however, said advisory groups and others were waiting for council’s direction on their goals.
“My big concern is if this gets delayed any further – we’ve been on for eight months - many of the advisory committees are waiting for that direction,” he said.
Coun. Linda McPhail said she felt council should move ahead and then when they get annual updates, they can ask to add or delete goals throughout their term. She pointed out that there would be a preamble and that could include something about affordable housing being a high priority.
When Day reiterated her point about having three precise goals to focus on, Brodie argued it would be too restrictive.
“I believe (…) the seven goals that we have capture the main headings and then within that are more elaboration,” Brodie said, adding “I certainly don’t want to be hemmed in by three goals which I may agree with entirely or I may not.”
Greene’s amendment was the only one made to the document. It is on the agenda for Monday’s council meeting.
