＂15 Minute Cities＂, the Role of Municipal Government, & Bureaucratic Waste
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
151.7213
Summary
In this episode, we discuss the proposed 15 minute cities in Canada and why they are a bad idea. We also talk about municipal government, waste, and the lack of accountability in municipal government. We also discuss the problem with municipal government and how it is run, and why it needs to change.
Transcript
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it's become their talking points yeah so michael jance he's a city council counselor
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travel safe today in the snowfall edmonton try to take transit and reduce congestion
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your cars mean less traffic a 15-minute city would help prevent you from needing to leave
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your district your district like can you believe this shit this two years ago all three of us would
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have been like booed off of a stage somewhere because laughed off yeah laughed off 15-minute
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cities yeah with your new world order right and i'm not one like i understand convenience i understand
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all that but that's not what this is this is the first step to restricting you to your district like
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dude this guy he's gone a little too far down the hunger games theology it raises a question well
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i think people a lot of people forget what does a municipality like what what is their key role
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what are they supposed to do and does that involve electric buses and saving the climate
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why is there all this extra ideology attached when you aren't even fulfilling your base level
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services exactly calgary's water is completely it's been a mess for many years it's not new it's not a
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surprise it finally got to a point where it couldn't be ignored but they were ignoring it while putting all
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this other money into fluff that doesn't really matter you know like fluff i mean there's so much waste
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we say like rick bell likes to write about it right waste at city hall and i mean i don't always agree
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with rick bell but when it comes to the city of calgary i i wholeheartedly agree and and that's a
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problem in a lot of municipalities that's a problem in my own municipality too there and there's no incentive
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to do better because taxation is real and you don't pay your taxes if you don't pay your property
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taxes after year two year three they can you you they can take take you to court and and uh i mean
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take away your property and i mean there's got to be a consequence like you got to pay your taxes but
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it's become criminal in in nature as to how governments have been able to to tax people
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and at what levels while failing to deliver the basic level of service right and and it depends
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on what part of the city you're in what what there's a lot of factors but there is significant waste
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in municipal government like tremendous amounts of waste whether it's uh through the rfp program for
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projects where they they don't necessarily pick the cheapest um i mean i mean even the method how they go
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about awarding these projects the community sets a budget as to this is what we're looking to spend
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because the engineers have already submitted a a cost analysis for said project you're gonna
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like i mean most contractors no matter how many they're all going to be within that range and that
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range allows for a 13 for the engineers it allows it allows for a lot of things so there's no real
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um cost benefit or savings for the community because we're we're telling contractors where
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they need to be and what what this project the engineers are saying this is what the project
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should cost and now we're just going to find somebody who's gonna you know who who if they're
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in that ballpark they they get awarded the project okay this is something that should cost a hundred
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thousand but the engineers made a four hundred thousand it's going to cost three hundred seventy
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five thousand dollars and that'll be the cheapest guy the next one's going to be four hundred seventy
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five thousand dollars and there's times where the four hundred seventy five thousand dollar company
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gets the job for reasons that are never disclosed to the public but you know what they get paid for
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by the by the taxpayer by the public purse so there's no and that money keeps on rolling in and they
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can debenture it and they can it's just no business would operate this way i mean no business