Presentation to Committee of the Whole re the Budget
by Tina DiClemente
February 17, 2004

You have often heard it said:

"The end justifies the means" but in my mind, the following Latin proverb rings more true: "The end depends upon the beginning."

Thus the essential question to ask during this budget process is NOT: "What to cut from the budget?"

The question is: "Why did we get into this mess in the first place?" (Afterall the end depends upon the beginning).

Here are a few examples of how Council's vision of economic promise has ended in grief and financial turmoil for us:

• Last year the budget was passed in March with the full knowledge that a deficit would emerge later in the year. But all of this was swept under the rug because it was an election year.
  
  
• The audit report released last August showed that our leaders have been fiscally irresponsible with public funds.
  
  
• The firing of 2 city managers in the past 2.5 years.
  
  
• A decaying infrastructure that led to unprecedented water main breaks last year. The Spectator recently reported 119 breaks have occurred this winter alone.
  
  
• A deteriorating public transit system that becomes more expensive to use for those who can least afford it.
  
  
• In the past year nearly 40 senior staff members have left City Hall to work elsewhere . Why are we losing such experienced and seasoned people?
  
  
• It is a known fact that new residential growth is costing the city money and yet the vision is to continue this growth. (worth repeating!)
  
  
• City leaders have tried to convince us that the Red Hill Expressway will bring prosperity. The promise is that thousands of jobs will be created as the expressway will lead to new industrial development. But as Paul Wilson recently wrote in The Spectator "don't bet the farm on that." It is now known that many landowners are asking the city to re-zone this land for residential development. So the taxpayers are being asked to borrow money and go further into debt to build an expressway on the hope that the jobs will come, but meanwhile there is a good possibility we will just get more residential growth which in the end causes us to lose even more money.
  

What is going on here?

All these bad news items reflect incompetence within our leadership.

Why are we in such a mess? Because over and over again we are told in order to have a prosperous future, we must attract new business. I am tired of this slogan, because I am tired of seeing this city go down the drain, while a few people are getting rich.

Stop trying to attract "new" business by deteriorating what we have. (worth repeating.)

This way of doing things would be like a family deciding to sell the Van Gogh to increase their chance of winning at the slot machines. Most would call this style of investing INSANE! Yet it happens right here in Hamilton. But the people of Hamilton are slowly putting 2 and 2 together.

The recent decimation of Red Hill Valley is the stark visual evidence of where this city is heading. That planned expressway is the biggest financial deal we have ever undertaken in our history. This budget crisis clearly shows its unaffordability, and yet it remains an untouchable. The scars in that Valley will never heal, because sooner or later the people of Hamilton will wake up to see how the sacrifices made will only line the pockets of the richest in our community. That is not leadership that works. It is leadership that will only further divide us as a community.

In my hand I am holding a great work of literature. It is Dante's Divine Comedy.

It remains a masterpiece because its themes deal with the very essence of what it means to be human. At the beginning of this epic tale, Dante meets the wise and old Roman poet Virgil who will be his guide as they journey through inferno. As they are about to descend into hell, Dante notes the message at the entrance:

"Abandon all hope, ye who enter."