During the election campaign one of the things I promised to do was to make the renewal of the Calgary, Churchill, Edmonton, Manitoba, Winnipeg, Vancouver, Whitney Street area of Ward 2 a priority.

I was sworn in as your Councillor on December 4^th. Getting started on this was my first priority and on December 5^th I sat down with our City Engineer, Manager of Roads, and Director of Water and Wastewater. As you know, it is not just the roads that are in bad shape, sewer and drainage upgrades are needed as well, Whitney and Calgary Streets shouldn’t flood every time it rains. It was at this meeting that I learned that some of the drainage in the area dates back to the 1920’s and the City of London’s infrastructure renewal for this neighbourhood was not in the plans to be completed until 2029- 2030!!!

I made it clear that wasn’t good enough. Not only had residents been led to belief for years that improvements were “just a couple of years away”, but the city was constructing a $20 million community centre in East Lion’s Park with no plan to upgrade the roads around it for another decade!

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