The budget process may have just gotten started at City Hall, but Mayor Lee Brain has already put a communication officer on his municipal government wishlist.
“What we heard is that this council needs help communicating with the community and engaging the community and streamlining our communications and using social media and writing press releases and those sorts of things,” he said at the Dec. 15 meeting after putting forward a motion to have staff prepare a report on the costs and details of the position.
“We have this information we want to share with the community about why our infrastructure is failing, how much it is going to cost, where that money is coming from and what that legacy is. With everything that is going on, I think it is important for us now that we have someone who can communicate that to the community.”
Other councillors said they supported the idea, but urged caution given the budgetary constraints and the uncertainty of future development.
“I don’t think we should start counting our chickens before they hatch. We can’t predict how much more revenue we are going to get because we put fees up ... we put fees up on the buses and it went backwards. I like the idea of having a wishlist, but counting on user fees before we have them is a good idea,” said Coun. Barry Cunningham.