Although Coun. Bob Russell has only served on this council for part of the term, he sees several significant accomplishments in that time.
Russell returned to council chambers on June 24, 2015 after a byelection to replace Coun. Gilles Prefontaine. Russell served as councillor for three terms in the 1990s.
While Prefontaine declined to comment on what he saw as his accomplishments during the time he served on council, Russell noted one of the main reasons he ran was his displeasure at the city’s hiring of Prefontaine while he was a sitting councillor.
Russell said he had initially wanted to have a full review of the hiring process, and notes his efforts on this front as one of his biggest accomplishments.
“I was told rather bluntly after I was elected that there wasn’t support for this,” he said, noting he only had support for such a move from two other councillors.
Russell noted council’s decision to terminate former city manager Patrick Draper’s contract was an accomplishment.
The other major reason Russell said he ran for office, and something he sees as a big accomplishment, is getting the sanity sewer trunk-line known as Project 9 moving forward to facilitate additional non-residential development in the city.
“Until I really got shaking the branches, nobody was saying ‘Let’s get on with it,’ and to this day the project hasn’t really started yet,” Russell said.
As other personal accomplishments, he cited his support for creating an internal auditor position, his work on establishing a policing committee, working on various land-use bylaw amendments. Russell opposed “that stupid traffic circle” downtown, which ended up being built as part of the St. Anne Street realignment.
Finally, he said a major accomplishment was getting council to agree to stop working on an 80-year infrastructure plan with Sturgeon County until the two municipalities can come to an agreement on a long-term boundary adjustment strategy.
“We’ve done nothing yet. Not one decision has been made with respect to boundary adjustments,” Russell said. “I think when we get to that, we’re going to find that nobody’s rolling over and playing dead. They have their own axes to grind, and so do we.”
In terms of things this council as a whole has accomplished since he came on board, Russell pointed to the decision to terminate Draper as the one worth mentioning.
The biggest challenges facing this council, Russell said, directly relates to some of his criticisms of the former city manager. The high tax increases, he said, relate to the out-of-proportion hiring of city staff.
Russell suggested hiring in the city should come “to a grinding halt.”
“People are really reaching their limits now on what they’re prepared to pay,” he said. “They’re either going to be leaving us or really getting the tar and feathers during the next election.”
Russell noted that he has put forward a motion for debate during this year’s budget deliberations that would reduce administration’s request for 26 new staff members to just seven.
The other major challenge facing the city that will also have long-term financial implications, is sorting out boundary adjustment with Sturgeon County, he said.
For the remaining year of this council term, Russell identified two major items he sees as being more significant than the rest.
The first is to set “a reasonable tax level,” which council will do in early 2017 after all the budget numbers are finalized.
The second is to make sure Project 9 moves forward, and gets finished as soon as possible. Russell said he has heard from several developers that without that project completed, many significant non-residential developments in the city are stalled, and the sooner those projects move forward the better it will be for residential taxpayers.
“I’m going to be a nervous cat until they tell me they’ve hooked it up to that lift station,” he said. “So many things rely on it.”
