Jim King, candidate for Osoyoos Town Council. (Richard McGuire photo)
With the 2014 municipal election set for this Saturday, the Osoyoos Times wanted to give all of the candidates running to become mayor and town councillor the opportunity to make one final impression with eligible voters.
We have decided to ask each of the candidates four questions.
1. What would be your top priority during your first year in office if you are elected mayor/councillor following the November 15 municipal election?
Osoyoos Lake is our major asset as a tourism driven community and local residents need to have confidence in their quality of water. We need to know as a community what we can do to improve the quality of the water in Osoyoos Lake. My major priority is to work with council and the citizens of Osoyoos, to assure we have water quality in our lake and good drinking water for the residents.
2. How can you make a positive difference to the Town of Osoyoos and the residents who live here?
I have a fresh perspective as to what we could do to improve the desirability of businesses to relocate to Osoyoos. If you can’t offer concessions to future businesses or prospective members of the community why should they consider coming here or living here? Listening to the concerns of the local residents and finding solutions through community consultation to their problems, in a timely manner. I would also work to see that council is more transparent by having council meetings later in the day so the residents that would like to attend can attend.
3. What in your background qualifies you to be a good mayor/councillor?
I have extensive business experience from owning my own business for over 25 years and have been writing business plans for several new businesses looking to start up. My experience as President of the Surrey Board of Trade has given me the opportunity to meet contacts in many business fields as well as different members of both the federal and provincial governments. This affords me the opportunity to make inquiries as to whether or not they would be interested in locating a satellite office here. These contacts have proven valuable in my experience with writing grant applications for community groups and businesses, including funding for beautification projects here in Osoyoos. I have been fortunate enough to sit on several boards over the past years so proper protocol for conducting a meeting and governance is foremost in my mind. Being currently involved in the local community through the Rotary Club of Osoyoos, South Okanagan Chamber of Commerce and Community Futures Okanagan Similkameen keeps me abreast of the developments going on in the South Okanagan.
4. What is the most important issue, in your opinion, facing our community and what will you commit to doing about it?
The most important issues I believe are the creation of year-round employment and assisting young families. I will contact Corrections BC, Ministry of Transportatio and the Canadian Border Services Agency to see if there is a possibility of having shared government offices here in Osoyoos. This would bring in professionals to run these operations and they would need to hire local office staff. We shouldn’t forget they would be bringing their families with them. We also have a lot of trucking companies going through Osoyoos who could use warehousing and logistics because of our proximity to the border.
