Mayoralty candidates discuss plenty of issues at debate

With less than two weeks to go before the municipal election, the city’s mayoral hopefuls met with voters on Thursday in a last-ditch attempt to win their favour.

Mayor Lynn Peterson and challengers Keith Hobbs, Jeff Irwin, Frank Pullia and Colin Burridge broached a litany of topics posed by the public at an open forum put on at the Da Vinci Centre by the Young Professionals Network.

Though candidates often strayed off topic, or took their time winding their way back to the question at hand, they provided answers on everything from beautifying the city and protecting and promoting small business to crime, the future of mining and a capital project wish list.

Peterson touted the city’s recently launched crime prevention committee and tackling the source of crime, addiction and other social factors, saying the city must tackle those problems to find a long-term solution.

“We have a lot of good agencies in our community that are doing good work,” she said. “But we need a co-ordinating body.”

Hobbs, a 34-year veteran of the police department, said a solution was needed 20 years ago, and while the crime committee will help halt future crime, he plans to institute things like Neighbourhood Watch and citizen patrols to take a dent out of it today.

“We need to stabilize this community now,” Hobbs said.

Burridge, casually dressed in a T-shirt, suggested keeping a closer eye on kids will cut into illegal activities.

“We need the curfew back,” he said, also calling for the return of Block Parents, expanded foot patrols and faster response times.

Irwin had perhaps the most radical solution of the entire campaign.

“Maybe we have to go to the criminals and ask them why they’re committing the crimes,” he said, also suggesting police put undercover officers in cabs to get the dirt on crack houses and prostitution.

When it comes to mining and forestry, Pullia said the city is missing too many opportunities and needs a voice to speak up for itself and encourage development and local jobs, noting Sudbury has done extraordinarily well in this field.

The multi-billion dollar Ring of Fire project has the potential to revitalize the city’s economy, Pullia said.

“We can make Thunder Bay one of the mining service centres across Northwestern Ontario,” he said. But he and Hobbs differed in at least one area.

Pullia admitted defeat on the subject of a chromite refinery in the region, which he said a mining company official told him simply won’t happen in Ontario because of high energy costs.

Hobbs said he won’t give up that easily.

“I’m not going to take no for an answer. I’m going to lobby hard,” he said. “I think it’s still a possibility to do that. I just don’t want to have a defeatist attitude. I want to fight hard to have a Ring of Fire smelter here.”

Burridge however, said it would not fit the city’s clean, green and beautiful plan.

“We don’t want a smelter here. I’ve been out to Fort McMurray. No we don’t want a smelter here, even if it brings a few jobs. We want to keep Thunder Bay the way it is.”

Meanwhile Irwin said the province is dangling the Ring of Fire as carrot on a stick, noting in all likelihood it will be southern Ontario that benefits unless northern mayors can collectively convince the province to come up with a sustainable, affordable energy policy.

Peterson said she thinks the city’s already on its way, having hired a mining project manager through the Community Economic Devlopment Commission.

When asked about future capital projects, Irwin, Burridge, Pullia and Peterson all listed a proposed $60-million multiplex as being No. 1 on their wishlist.

Peterson said it could be partially paid for using the Renew Thunder Bay fund, which has collected about $27.3 million, a portion of which has been filled through a special TBayTel dividend.

“It’s about taking dollars and leveraging and investing it in strategic infrastructure in Thunder Bay that will make a difference,” she said.

Irwin, not opposed to the plan, said the city has to get its financial house in order first, before embarking on any more major projects.

“Our demographics and planning are out of synch,” he said.

Pullia said it’s time to maximize federal and provincial funding while it’s still available, while Burridge said he’d like to see a multiplex built, but only as an add-on to a convention centre.

“I think we have to go into something we don’t have,” Burridge said. “We don’t have a convention centre here in this community, and we’re in the centre of Canada.”

Hobbs did not answer the question, instead using his time to rail against the sale of public land to private developers at Marina Park and question the reasoning behind the condominiums set to be built there as part of the project.

At one point Hobbs also suggested building a new wing on the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre as one way to end gridlock at the hospital, answering a question on how to bring more doctors to the city.

The debate was a mostly friendly affair, though candidates did take veiled shots at each other during opening statements.

Irwin, largely invisible for the first five weeks of the campaign, took on Hobbs’s sea of red that has blanketed front lawns from one end of the city to the other.

“Does having the most signs make you the most qualified to be mayor? Or should you come here and get the facts and make an informed decision?” asked Irwin, an anti-wind turbine candidate who entered the race to take on Horizon Wind’s planned turbine farm on the Nor’Wester Mountain range.

Hobbs countered, agreeing that the most signs do not make the best candidate, the best ideas do.

It’s something that’s been missing for years, Hobbs said.

“On Oct. 25 we have the chance to chart a new course for the city. It must be economically strong and environmentally sustainable.”

Peterson was more than happy to stand by her record, and touted her experience, which includes time as a school-board trustee and two terms as mayor.

“I have a passion for this community, where my family and I have spent our lives. And we’re getting it right,” she said.

The sixth candidate, Brian Kwasny, was not present for the debate.