Privatization a no-no, city candidates say

Bob Bainbridge has his own theory of why some public sector jobs city jobs went the way of privatization, and his union brothers and sisters didn’t appear too thrilled to hear it.

Bainbridge is one of 25 candidates running for North Bay city council, and he and the four mayoral candidates made their pitches Wednesday evening to about 100 CUPE Local 122 members at the Royal Canadian Legion Branch 23.

One of the questions each candidate was asked to answer included a list of public services, which have been contracted out.
‘Do you agree that the time has come for our council to take back these services in house?”

Bainbridge said he’d been a snowplough operator for the city many years ago. His take on contracting out?

“Some of my friends brought this on themselves, some abused the situation,” Bainbridge said to some grumbling.

Avoid contracting out
Lynne Bennett spoke first and talked about her strong ties to organized labour, even wearing a red CUPE t-shirt.

She said as a city councillor she has been “at the table” when privatization of city services as come up.

“I opposed any further moves, and I think we have to avoid contracting out,” Bennett said.

“Financial problems won’t be solved by contracting out,” Bennett said.

Way to make money
Vic Fedeli said he didn’t know if the city would be able to afford buying garbage trucks to bring trash collection back in the public sector.

“I don’t have the answers, but I would want to talk to you about it,” Fedeli said to the audience.

Jeff Marceau, the third mayoral candidate, believes keeping city jobs instead of contracting out means money in North Bay rather than being paid out to an outside contractor.

“If there’s a way to make money, why not do these services ourselves?” Marceau asked.

Show business plan
Tim Wright said there was room for public-private partnerships in dealing with city services.

Coun. Peter Chirico said there had been no privatization at the city in the last three years.

“When the issue did come up there was a collaborative effort and it was solved with the help of the union.”

And on the subject of bringing back services already privatized Chirico said to the union,

“Show us a business plan if it can be done better that way, and we’ll look at it.”

Public-private partnerships
First time council candidate Tim Goldthorp said increased economic development in North Bay would lead to more public sector city jobs.

“If, through prosperity, we can provide more city services, it will mean we’ll need more employees,” Goldthorp said.

“I’m completely against privatization and I’d fight against it.”

Another newcomer, Sean Madigan, said he was “committed to the public service,” while candidate Tom Mason said he was opposed to the privatization of all city services because “there’s a short term financial gain but long term financial loss.”

Don Size said privatization was not the way to go.
“It’s done for profit and not for service.”