And…he’s off!
CBRM Mayor Cecil Clarke has fired his starter’s pistol and burst from the gates like a lone horse on a winter racetrack, taking a commanding lead in the 2016 mayoral election by beginning his run in 2015.
He informed the public of his decision to re-offer by blanketing the city in campaign flyers (I almost threw mine out unread — I glanced at the photo of the silver-haired Mayor and his elderly supporters flashing thumbs-up signs and assumed it was a brochure for sit-down tubs or no-exam medical insurance.)
In truth, it’s a list of our mayor’s “accomplishments” over the past three years, weighted heavily toward “things that haven’t happened yet.”
Among the things that have happened, the mayor includes “200 meetings” which is “more than double the meeting rate of the previous administration.” I don’t remember Clarke running on a “more meetings” platform, but if he did, he’s certainly delivered. As a bonus, some of those meetings were even held in public (although, as you will no doubt recall, at least 31 of them — between January 2014 and November 2015 — were held in secret).
What’s missing from the Mayor’s pamphlet is the same thing that’s always missing from his discourse — any mention of the high rate of child poverty in the municipality he has been leading for three years. One in three children in the CBRM — 32.6% — lives in poverty. The Mayor knows this — he attended a youth summit on child poverty in New Waterford in April of this year and shared his own story of growing up poor and yet, I cannot find him on record anywhere proposing solutions. The issue doesn’t seem to resonate with him the way, say, public prayer does.
The election is not until October 2016, so Clarke has just over 10 months to explain what he will do to improve the lot of children in this municipality.
I’ll be listening.
This article first appeared on goCapeBreton.com
