October 12, 2013 Yesterday, the keg was tapped to open our community’s 45th Oktoberfest festival. My wife, Kate, and I were pleased to join thousands of our neighbours at this morning’s annual pancake breakfast. It’s a great time to come together over Wellesley apple cider, Piller’s sausage, and pancakes all served up by friendly and […]
Another Transit Expansion
September 2, 2013 The Region of Waterloo’s Light Rail Transit project continues to attract a lot of attention, but did you know that Regional Council’s approved tax plan also includes a significant expansion and overhaul of regular surface transit across the Region? I served as Waterloo City Council’s liaison to the Region’s transit improvements committee […]
September Move-in
August 31, 2013 Tomorrow, we will begin welcoming the tens of thousands of students who will be arriving in Waterloo – many of them arriving for the first time. I look forward to welcoming as many of my new and returning constituents as I can. In order to prepare for that influx, we have created […]
Fire Safe Living
August 14, 2013 As we get ready to receive another large influx of students into our neighbourhoods, I’m pleased to pass along a public service announcement from our fire rescue team. These tips are valuable for any household, as we have seen incidents over the last few years caused by just one of these tips […]
Storm Clean-up and Other Updates
July 31, 2013 I will be cross-posting my electronic newsletters as blog entries moving forward. If you aren’t already receiving them, I’d be happy to have you as a subscriber. Below is my second newsletter, emailed out on July 22. — In this edition: 1. Storm Clean-up 2. Community Financial report 3. Northdale Plan Approved […]
Jane's Walk Recap
May 5, 2013 Yesterday, Northdale resident Christine Carmody and I led more than two dozen people on a Jane’s Walk through the neighbourhood that last year got a new vision and plan approved by Council. I posted in more detail about the history behind the neighbourhood and the walk last week. Several guests joined Christine […]
Walking into the Future
April 29, 2013 In 1961, Jane Jacobs published ‘The Death and Life of Great American Cities‘ and in so doing sparked an international conversation about how cities do and should work. When we talk today about urbanism, where cities are most vibrant when they are designed for people to cross paths and interact with each […]
BlackBerry 10
January 30, 2013 Congratulations to RIM BlackBerry on the launch of their new and revolutionary mobile computing platform. So much hard work has gone into today, and our friends at BlackBerry should be proud of the result. I was pleased to attend the community event in our public square earlier this evening, and glad to […]
Electronic Voting
January 20, 2013 Earlier this week, the City Clerk received Council’s support to explore what electronic and telephone voting would look like in the 2014 municipal election. Council heard from Communitech and the Barn Raiser’s Council that as an intelligent community electronic voting was an obvious choice: it would entice the younger generation to vote, […]
Midterm Reflections
December 6, 2012 Last year, I wrote about my thoughts one year into this Council term. In reviewing the commitments I made in my election platform, I am pleased to say that I have made great progress with my colleagues on Council in most of them. In addition to those successes we have achieved together, […]