Hello everyone:

What a glorious day for the Melissa's race, and not too bad yesterday for Walk-a-Mile.  Maybe we'll get a bit of nice fall weather, which would be great for ...

CAMPAIGNING

Door-knocking

I'm starting today, in the Springs Crescent/Glen Crescent/Glen Avenue area.  I look forward to chatting with people at the doors -- it's always interesting and often encouraging.

Special thanks to the fifteen volunteers who have agreed to help me by taking on a bunch of neighbourhoods around town.  I hope you will give them a friendly "hello" at your door.

Newspaper ads

Special thanks also to the people (over 45 of them so far!) who have contributed to newspaper ads for my campaign.  We're all set now, with ads in each paper for every week of the campaign, plus a larger set of ads in the final week to provide some more detail on platform.  It means so much to me that these people are willing to put their names on my ads!

Seniors' event

The seniors held the first campaign event on Friday - they invited all candidates to come to their monthly birthday party and to make short speeches outlining their platforms.  We also had a chance to circulate among tables and listen to people talk about the issues that matter to them.  Here's what I heard from the seniors:

• they hope to see a system of transportation to get people to and from medical approintments in Canmore and Calgary
• they would like to see the Roam transit incorporate a route to the Banff Centre, and they'd like shelters at the bus stops
• they are concerned about the new provision for the seniors society to pay $5,000 per year for their use of building space
• they'd love some help getting the seniors society membership numbers back up -- they've dropped from 160 to 119 over recent years.  They asked me to remind people that everyone 55 and up is eligible for membership
• they'd like to be able to contact the seniors' bus easily when they have a change of plans

Mark your calendar

The all-candidates' forum will be in the evening of October 14 at the Banff Park Lodge.  David Bayne will be the moderator.  You can look forward to a lively and informative discussion, so if you're having trouble deciding how to vote, mark your calendar for this event.

Your input (and my accountability)

You can see my council platform on my website at http://www.lataylor.com/node/144   I hope you'll take a look and let me know what you like and don't like, and anything you think is missing.

Scroll down farther on that same page, and you'll see my election information from 2007.  It's there so that you can hold me to account.  Take a look at what I said I would support, and decide whether you think I lived up to my commitments.  That should help you decide whether to vote for me (or not) on October 18th.

I'll be emailing once a week during the campaign, to provide updates and share anecdotes from the campaign trail. 

COUNCIL ON MONDAY

You can see council's agenda package for Monday at this link:

http://www.banff.ca/Assets/PDFs/Town+Hall+PDF/Council+Agendas+PDF/2010+Agendas+PDF/council-agenda-100927.pdf

Highlights include:

• a verbal progress report from KidSport on their work to help kids overccome financial barriers that may keep them from playing organized sports
• information on an application that council may make to the "Green Trip" fund to help buy a hybrid bus for the planned Banff-Canmore route.  Canmore would apply for the other bus.  You can see this report on page 22 of the package.
• A post-event report on the successful Doors Open Banff event, held in early August.  You can see this report starting on page 25 of the package.  It's great to see the steady increase in numbers of Doors Open visitors over the past four years.

LAST COUNCIL MEETING FOR THIS COUNCIL

This Monday will be the last meeting of the current council.  At the September 13th meeting, which I missed due to a vacation on the rainy west coast, council voted 5-1 to cancel the October 11th meeting. 

I hope you will all take the opportunity over the next few weeks to say special thanks to retiring council members Chris Macdonald and John Gibson, and to retiring mayor John Stutz.  These people have worked very hard for our community.