Not much about cycling from the municipal contenders

Are websites passe? I wondered as I went looking online for what the positions on bicycling were for the region's contenders for the jobs of mayors and regional chair.

So far, hardly anyone has anything posted on the WWW. 

Cambridge Mayor Doug Craig has a fairly extensive site, but not a thing posted in the issues section yet except a request for voters to contact him on the issues. 

Among his rivals, Andrew Johnson has a Facebook page that looks a bit out of date (nothing on cycling) and Linda A. Whetham has a detailed website, including her history as a Cambridge councillor. But the tone of site – needing to address spending, better sewers, roads, water supply – sounds like the code for “don’t waste money on frills, such as cycling infrastructure.”

In Kitchener, none of Mayor Carl Zehr nor his challengers Frank Kulcsar or Don Pinnell are online.

In Waterloo, Mayor Brenda Halloran has a web page that is essentially a collection of platitudes about a vital community.

Her challengers include former councillor Jan D'Ailly, whose "issues" portion of his website misses cycling; former University of Waterloo prof Franklin Ramsoomair has a nice site: too bad it focuses on EI, tax credits, health care and other issues that municipal politicians have little or no control over (nothing on cycling); and businessman Dale Ross, whose site reads like the typical lean-to-right cut these horrible taxes screed (cyclists beware).

Lastly comes the regional chair race, where neither the incumbent Ken Seiling, nor his late-coming rival, Robert Milligan, have websites.

This will undoubtedly change change, but since these candidates have known about this municipal election for the last four years, you think they might have something prepared to hit the streets with on this first week.

Comments

[Franklin Ramsoomair]

Bill,
I'd be very happy to talk to you about the benefits of cycling. I cycle myself and would have no aversion to including it on my platform. Please contact me when you have a minute.

Kind regards,
Franklin

[Jason]

Considering the province is telling the region to expect a 50% increase in population in the next 20 years, anyone that sounds their ideas will make the city look like Mississauga, should be avoided like the plague. We need "frills" and a reasonable tax-base so that this remains a pleasant place to live and travel (by bike).