Mary-Ann Graham - Council Candidate

[Jo]

This thread is for Mary-Ann Graham, council candidate.

[Gramps55]

website http://www.maryanngraham.info

[stefzaz]

I really like her last statement “Let’s reflect on the past, live in the present and prepare for the future”.
Her campaign write -up sounds great compared to others, she sounds very 'down to earth'. I think she would be good on council.

[Timi]

I don't live in Rutland, but if I did, I would vote for Mary-Ann Graham for sure. She's very involved in that part of the city...

[mechanic_virus]

She's not just active in Rutland, Mary-Ann is involved in other areas as well.

[Timi]

I guess that did not come out right. I meant, that if I lived in Rutland...I would put Ms. Graham No.1 on my list, because she is so active there...but I understand she cares about the whole city.

[mechanic_virus]

Please list 5 of your top priorities, and how you would deal with each issue if it were completely up to you.

[Mary-Ann]

Thank you for yor support. I have the experience, leadership ability and passion to be an effective well balanced concillor. I don't know everything but I want to. I am not a single issue candidate and want to address all the needs of the residents of the beautiful city of Kelowna. Environment, sustainability and communication are factors that need to be addressed in every decision made by the city.

My five top priorities in no particular order are affordable rental housing, homelessness, transportation (transit), development and crime (public safety).

The focus of the city needs to change from affordable home purchase to the availablity of decent affordable rental accommodations. We have a less than 1% rental vacancy rate and this has made the rents skyrocket. We need to increase the inventory so that the rents will go down.

Place a moratorioum on stratification of rental buidings
Allow secondary suites in all parts of the city. Still need to go through a public process to
ensure health, safety, parking and buffering are addressed. One should not be able to tell
which homes have secondary suites
Minimize age restriction developments as this descriminates against young people, families
students and people just starting out.
Partnerships with agencies to supply cooperative type housing.
Set up a housing Authority.

Homelessnes will be addressed partly by the affordable rental housing initiatives listed above. A triage approach needs to be used to assist on an individual basis. Find the ones that are disabled (mentally or physically, the drug addicts, working poor and the temporarily down and out and give them the ability to get off the streets and become contributing members of society. This would take facilitation from the city working with other agencies to deal with this issue on a one to one basis. We need proper programs and training centers to allow true assistance. With the future looking uncertain, we could have more people without homes and this unacceptable. I believe in quality of life for all.

Highway 97 is a large part of our transportation issue. We need to find creative ideas to alleviate the congestion. Alternative transportation such as improved transit and on and off road paths for cycling, walking, strollers, wheelchairs and what have you are needed to connect the town centers and the amenites to each other.

Increase speed limit to 60 kph from Gordon to the bridge
More advance left turn light on and off the highway
Investigate right turn only solution
Create off road bike lanes
Lobby senior governments for a second crossing to get the through traffic and trucks out of
city down town
Increase investment into transit so it is reliable and convenient. Make it 18/7 with earlier
and later bus runs. We are not a 9-5, Monday to Friday city anymore and haven't been for
a long time. Encourage people to use the bus will increase ridership which increase revenue
which draws down the amount of the original investment.

Our town is growing quickly and we are behind the eightball. However, we have been doing things too quickly and missing the important underlying issues that need to be addressed within the infrastructure of the city. We are still allowing urban sprawl and are encroaching on the agricualture lands, wetlands and hillsides. These need to be protected for the future.

Stop urban sprawl by densification of the town centers.
Create a diversity of land base to give options to the residents and businesses.
Path connections between town centers
Ensure all infrastructure is addressed with development. Sidewalks, parks, transit and
other amenities need to be done in conjunction with major developmnents and not left
for years under serviced.
Tightened up the policies so that developers must talk to the neighbourhoods and
associations before going to council. This would alleviate the grief that abounds at this
time. COuncil meetings and pblic hearings would run smoother if the applicants have all
their ducks in a row and the biggest duck is the immediate community.

The crime rate is high. Some of the aforementioned issues if addressed will help alleviate the crime issue. We should not feel unsafe on our own streets or parks. I would like to see us take them back. We are short about 41 police officers at this time and I would like that number decreased. The city is continuing to grow and we need to get on top of our shortages quickly. I do not believe that our city is much more crime riddled than other cities but if we percieve we are than that is more important than reality.

I do not have all the answers. Council, city staff, residents, businesses, service organizations and developers are partners in ensuring that Kelowna becomes the best city it can be. We will do this together. Sorry this has been so long (you should have seen my first copy). I hope it has stirred up some conversation. Please feel free to contact me directly at [email protected] or 250-870-4215, if you have more questions as I truly want to serve the citizens of Kelowna well. I can only do that if I know what you are thinking.

Sincerely

Mary-Ann Graham
Candidate for Kelowna COuncillor

[mechanic_virus]

Thanks a lot, Mary-Ann.

[justice4U]

Whoa!

Wish I had read Mary-Ann's most recent posting before I voted yesterday. If I had, she definitely would not have received my vote.

Support for secondary suites in all parts of the city???!!! Not a chance. My candidate will have a lot more respect for single family home owners in single family neighbourhoods.

Fortunately, the voters of Kelowna yesterday saw what I had missed.