Public meeting on school closures April 30.

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• Public meeting on school closures April 30.
• Secret meeting harms public interest.
• March 6, 2012 Council report.
• Peer review of developers' studies is vital.
• KCVI closing threatened.
• Building permits.
• School closures possible ?
• New committee on near campus neighbourhoods.
• Council report on transit, affordable housing.
• Reporting sewer problems.
• Strategic priorities 2011 – 2014.
• New advisory committee.
• AMO report.
• MCPI report.
• Sydenham capital projects 2011 – 2014.
• Garbage and recycling.
• Glover's 2011 committees.
• Links.
• Biography.
• Archive
  • “Battle of Barrack Street” starting. - March, 2012
  • Ejecting Occupy. - March, 2012
  • K-ROCK report. - March, 2012
  • 2011 tax rate increase. - March, 2012
  • Queen's Park way behind the times. - November, 2011
  • Glover critiques Ontario leaders. - November, 2011
  • “Heads and beds” and Dalton McGuinty. - November, 2011
  • Tax fairness sought from Queen's Park. - November, 2011
  • Town and gown and Providence, Rhode Island. March, 2011
  • Town Gown strategic plan. March, 2011.
  • McGuinty discusses tax policies in Kingston speech, fails to address “heads and beds” tax reform. March, 2011.
  • Eric Folsom selected as Kingston's first Poet Laureate ! March, 2011.
  • Poker Run economic impact report grossly overstates spectator count; staff report to focus on sustainability. March, 2011.
  • Bill Glover's 2007 – 2010 Council record - October, 2010
  • Taxes and the economy - September, 2010
  • 2010 election pledge - September, 2010
• Contact Bill Glover.

Town Gown strategic plan.

The Town Gown Strategic Plan was presented to Council on February 1, and on February 15, just prior to the council meeting, there was a very interesting session in Memorial Hall, with Don Drummond, the visiting scholar at the Queen’s School of Policy Studies, as the guest speaker.

Glover's motion addressed four issues.

All of this is a direct and recognized result of the motion I brought to council in November 2007. Then the concern was the almost total lack of meaningful communication between the university and the city. The 2007 motion, drafted in my living room with the then Vice Principal Academic and the city’s Chief Administrative Officer, directed the CAO to form working groups of city staff to address four issues, including Aberdeen Street, student behaviour, and housing standards. Queen’s was invited to nominate representatives and to bring their issues to the table as well.

“Town gown” report a “milestone”.

The report brought to council in February represented a milestone. The original issues had been dealt with in a reasonable manner and the working groups had demonstrated their usefulness and were being transformed. The subject areas going forward are quality of life, community planning, student engagement and economic development. The Kingston Economic Development Corporation has already been asked to become involved.

Voice of community restored.

Sadly, the voice of the community was conspicuous by its absence in the first iteration of the report brought to council. By the time of Mr Drummond’s address in Memorial Hall, this oversight had been noted, and in addition to neighbourhood associations being invited to attend, there was also a public press release announcing the event.

Kingston's “brain drain”.

Demographic studies suggest that about 2025-2030 Kingston’s population could begin to decline. This is the product of several things. First, to maintain a zero population growth, the birth rate must be 2.1. At the national level, Canada’s birth rate is 1.55. Without immigration, Canada’s population will begin to shrink. The second factor is the baby boomer generation is aging. (For example. I have already retired once - from the Navy.) The second “certainty of life” will follow sooner rather than later.

A population that is both shrinking and aging presents real challenges to employers - how do they recruit the staff necessary to maintain their current level of business and operations, let alone grow? Queen’s ought to represent to Kingston an ideal source that is presently all but ignored. Approximately 95 percent of the student body comes to Queen’s from elsewhere, and nearly as many leave on graduation. This represents Kingston’s very own “brain drain.”

The inclusion of KEDCO will assist in showing graduates that there may well be interesting employment opportunities here in Kingston, and local employers that they may be able to find skilled and qualified employees here in Kingston. There is also a possible indirect spin-off that may help “town gown” relations considerably.

Several years ago at the height of the Aberdeen Street tensions one graduate wrote a letter to the paper saying that we had no grounds for complaint because students could always trash Kingston because it was not their home. The writer of course did not live locally. I think that undergraduate attitude towards Kingston will change with time as the city is seen as a place of good opportunities immediately on graduation. That said, the need for community representation on an expanded “town gown” working group certainly remains in the short term. I understand that this need is now fully appreciated and will be addressed.

At the “town gown” meeting on February 15, Queen’s University Provost and Vice Principal Academic Bob Silverman noted the need to help families in the “student housing area” and to encourage families to move back in. Obviously I was delighted with this comment. It is, in my view, directly related to the need to develop the Williamsville area, and that development guidelines study is progressing.