{"id":27632,"date":"2020-10-01T23:24:43","date_gmt":"2020-10-02T03:24:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=27632"},"modified":"2020-10-01T23:24:47","modified_gmt":"2020-10-02T03:24:47","slug":"gilliland-focuses-on-environment-budget-in-fall-council-sitting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/gilliland-focuses-on-environment-budget-in-fall-council-sitting\/","title":{"rendered":"Gilliland focuses on environment, budget in fall Council sitting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

From promoting stronger measures to protect Aurora\u2019s urban forests to bringing forward the re-establishment of the Town\u2019s Environmental Advisory Committee, green initiatives have been a passion for Councillor Rachel Gilliland in her first two years on Council. As Council settles into the fall, they will continue to be a focus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It has been an eventful year for Council as they grappled with the stark realities of the COVID-19 pandemic, but in that time Councillor Gilliland has continued her push for a more environmentally friendly community, all the while helping the local cultural sector try and find their feet amid equally stark uncertainty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think it is no secret I am really protective of the environment and brought forward [a motion to declare a] Climate Emergency, which was really good to identify within Aurora and initiatives across the country,\u201d says Councillor Gilliland. \u201cIn February, I was really concerned about the tree canopy and as a result of that discussion around the table came the motion around the Urban Forest Study. I was really happy to see staff had gone back and reviewed that \u2013 then COVID happened and a lot of things stalled.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They weren\u2019t stalled for long, however. As the community settled in to a \u201cnew normal\u201d so too did local lawmakers. A number of task forces were established to address the COVID-related needs of various sectors, including the arts and culture realm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Gilliland serves on the Arts & Culture Roundtable, which brought together a diverse cross-section of cultural stakeholders to not only identify needs but solutions as well. Among their initiatives was a professionally-produced music video to highlight the community\u2019s cultural partners and organizations to remind everyone they\u2019re still here and ready to thrive once again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201c[With] the support and collaboration we\u2019re able to achieve between all different cultural partners and the cultural sectors, whether they are for profit or not, having that information and support out there was key because there was so much uncertainty out there,\u201d says Councillor Gilliland. \u201cKnowing you had a pool of people who were all going through similar things, we were able to identify the kinds of supports we all needed for one another and could share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur video was very uplifting for the community. We saw people start off feeling nervous with high anxiety come out of this with some sort of plan and optimism and you\u2019re seeing people start to recover. I think that is really the greatest achievement.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back at the Council table, there is no shortage of achievements to collectively look back on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to the environmental measures, Councillor Gilliland says she looks back with pride on several other key issues, including the decision to install a four-way stop on John West Way at Town Hall and Amberhill Way, as well as her stance on economic recovery following the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Gilliland, along with Councillors Wendy Gaertner and John Gallo, were the three dissenting voices against moving forward with the construction of Library Square when the matter came before Council for a final vote at the end of August.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From her perspective, it wasn\u2019t a matter of nixing the plan completely rather than delaying a decision until this month when Town Treasurer Rachel Wainwright-Van Kessel is due to present local lawmakers a new economic forecast incorporating the realities that come from fighting a pandemic, including potential loss of revenue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am going to respect the decision of Council moving forward,\u201d she says. \u201cI do think Library Square is a great project. It is a fabulous facility for the community. Obviously one of the big reasons for my vote of \u2018not right now\u2019 is because I wanted to have that budget and financial update and use those 120 days [to get that information before the tender bid expired]. I will be watching the budget, if there are changes that need to be made, and how that is going to impact the overall budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to see this project balloon to an astronomical level we couldn\u2019t predict, so if we do find some changes that need to be made, we make smart decisions to scale back financially where it is needed in order to stay within the budget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt is the fall budget report for the operating of the Town, our shortfalls, how our tax levy is going to be impacted, if at all. I also wanted a report back from staff about the shortfalls of operations for Library Square. We never did see that report that reflected that shortfall. The only operating budget we were presented was something that reflected a normal way of operating in 2019. I would liked to have seen that, but it doesn\u2019t mean I can\u2019t ask for that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another Council decision she says she respects is moving Aurora from its current at-large system of government in favour of the implementation of wards by the 2022 Municipal Election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think there are great positives to it, but at the same time, you want to feel when you do finalize these decisions you have done it in a way where it feels the residents were engaged and included in the decision-making on such a really big change in the community,\u201d she says, reiterating her concerns that the survey circulated to residents did not poll voters on whether or not they wanted wards in the first place, just ward configurations. \u201cI am going to respect the decision of Council and move forward with what we decided.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Future decisions of Council, she says, need to be viewed through a budgetary lens and this is something she is going to focus on in the months ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am focused on keeping an eye on the budget for everything,\u201d says Councillor Gilliland. \u201cThat is where my uncertainty is. We have other projects potentially on the go and obviously I am going to be concerned on how we can afford to do those. For example, the Aquatics Feasibility Study has come back to us\u2026. And will explain some options, needs and whatnot, but it is really exploring where we\u2019re going to find that money to do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think for the next six months, as things happen and the uncertainty with COVID and that impact, it is really going to be about trying to identify our priorities and where we\u2019re going to spend our money.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong>
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From promoting stronger measures to protect Aurora\u2019s urban forests to bringing forward the re-establishment of the Town\u2019s Environmental Advisory Committee, green initiatives have been a passion for Councillor Rachel Gilliland in her first two years on Council. As Council settles into the fall, they will continue to be a focus. It has been an eventful […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":27614,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/10\/2020-10-01-02.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-7bG","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-13 18:39:16","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27632\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}