Windsor Post

THE ONLY OPTION ON OUR BORDER

2006-10-26T12:17:00.000-07:00

Windsor provides a service to the rest of Canada. We provide Canada's busiest route for transportation of goods for "ALL" Canadians. ENOUGH SAID.

We as citizens will not tolerate a highway in our backyard. As a Ward 1 Councillor I will do everything within my power to prevent that from happening.

Nobody should have to sacrifice their home, be forced to breathe in fumes or lose sleep over excessive noise from Trucks on route to other Canadian Destinations.

"We as Windsorites will gladly accommodate trucks through our city by means of a Tunnel. The people we elect will get this done, or they wont be re-elected."

Their job is to serve the citizens of our great City and Country. I welcome your vote.

AMALGAMATION

2006-10-25T07:43:00.000-07:00

Windsor must seek amalgamation with other surrounding Municipalities.

On a regional basis, residents of LaSalle, Tecumseh, Lakeshore and other municipalities all use Windsor roads. Windsor City tax payers pay hundreds of thousands of hard earned dollars in road and sewer infrastructure every year to repair streets jointly used by people who live in these surrounding communities.

These people shop in Windsor, work in Windsor, attend events in Windsor, and as a result place tremendous strain on our roads and city finances.

This must be fixed, but the only way we can initiate cooperative discussions with our neighbours is by demonstrating an ability manage of city finances and decision making that focuses on moving Windsor ahead.

*The recent $48 Million Arena deal that competes with Tecumseh must be stopped.
*We must have a consistent plan to reduce property taxes.
*We must focus on a regional transportation initiative.
*We must reform city planning and zoning to protect residential communities.
*We must bring affordable housing back to the city core.

With a new council making right decisions as a region, we can all prosper.

Existing Council Proves They Lack Heart to Serve Community

2006-10-24T06:21:00.000-07:00

Windsor City Council has failed to serve its citizens. Time and time again, when city council has had an opportunity to stand up for the citizens of Windsor, they hide.

Superior Park was the pride of a neighborhood, and of course it was sold for the French Public School Board. The school boards, who continue to restructure and close many other facilities in the city, could not find a way use existing land to construct a new school.

Instead they spoil another natural environmental area. A much treasured area, considering the neighborhoods proximity to Huron Church Road truck traffic and pollution. Wildlife again will be forced out, citizens will find a decrease in value of their properties, poor infrastructure of area streets will deteriorate further.

Windsor needs a big change in council. We need people with a future to make decision for the future.

Airing on Cogeco TV - Channel 11

2006-10-20T11:47:00.000-07:00

Good Day and thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak.

My name is Greg Baggio and I am a City Council candidate in Windsor - Ward 1.

I was born in this community and have a Master’s of Business Administration and Honours, Bachelor of Commerce Degree from the University of Windsor. I work in the Financial Services Industry and happily live in South Windsor with my wife Rita.

As a citizen I look I at our city today and see our current leaders taking us down the wrong path.

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is no mistake that Windsor has an 8.6% unemployment rate, high taxes, and not to mention, constant mismanagement of those same hard earned funds. Here is why.

Time after time, when faced with an opportunity to move our city forward, this council has chosen to do nothing.

Time after time, when faced with an opportunity to improve our economic base, this council has chosen to do nothing.

Time after time, this council sees nothing, hears nothing, does nothing.

Our city, my city, deserves better, and I intend to be a part of a new council, a proactive council, that will spare no effort to move Windsor ahead.

And we either move ahead on that path, move confidently into the future with a solid plan and an active administration, or we will fall behind, perhaps never to recover our position again.

Here is my position on the border issue, and it is the position I will take to the residents of Ward 1. I issue a clear call to them and to all the citizens of our great city to pull together behind this cause.

The only acceptable means of moving trucks through our city is a tunnel –. And if we use DRTP rail lines it will can convert our rails to trails and parks. Pollution will decrease and so will traffic. Our neighborhoods will become safer for all our families.
And for those who say A tunnel can’t be done, here is a newsflash.

The people of Windsor have paid enough!

It’s been our roads that have been torn up by thousands of trucks, roads we built with our tax dollars.

It’s been our air polluted by the exhaust fumes of thousands of trucks as they breeze right through our city on route to someplace else.

It’s been our residents who have had to put up with the noise and congestion caused by those thousands of trucks.

We’ve paid our share. We’ve done our share. And now it’s time for our City to step up and claim its share!

We must all remember that the movers and the skakers may be in Toronto or Montreal, but what they move and what they shake goes right through this city, like it or not! A tunnel is not only what our citizens deserve, its also what every Canadian will bennefit from.

To the Citizens of Ward 1,

I will be your voice to save Superior Park from being sold.
That is our park and not only should we keep it, we need to create more natural parkland for our families.

I will be your voice in council to stop Cabana Road from being converted into a 5-Lane road.
It is our neighbourhood for our families and our children, and we care too much for their safety.

I will also stand up in council to stop the mismanagement of our tax dollars. Better services for our seniors and attracting jobs to Windsor is more important than wasting our tax dollars on a second regional arena without seeking private funding.

Ladies and Gentleman My Name is Greg Baggio.

I will stand strong in council for our community.

With your help, Windsor will move into this new century with all flags flying high, ready to meet every challenge, and not being afraid to succeed. We are the economic future of Canada!

We are Canada’s gateway because Canada starts at Windsor!

Please visit my website,

www.gregbaggio.com

Windsor - The Distribution Capital of Canada

2006-10-11T13:04:00.000-07:00

It is time people realized what Windsor is really all about. It is about Distribution. Like it or not, the fact that automotive presence has existed here for the last 100 years is because of our convenient location to ship product to major centers like Toronto, Detroit, Chicago, Indianapolis, Cleveland, and so on. It's a fact-companies manufacture goods to sell to their final consumer. The easiest place for the "Big 3" and other manufacturers to ship their products to mass populations in the east and west has been Windsor.

Can it therefore be said that good distribution environments create jobs????

The simple answer is "YES".

We had 2 great border crossings for years that have deteriorated since 1961 from the increase of traffic off the 401. Windsor needs to define itself as the "place to distribute" once again. Our best asset is our location, and if we make it easy for companies to ship goods through our city, they will invest here yet again. If they invest Windsor our job market will blossom.

It's a simple understanding of business. Something our existing council knows nothing about and explains an 8.6% unemployment rate.

Also, Toyota and Honda are investing in Ontario. But, why not Windsor? It's because we have no border solution. The choice to invest in cities like Woodstock is clear. Sarnia and Fort Erie are both 1.5 hours away and have viable US-bound traffic movement.

We need to tunnel our traffic beneath our city so that there will be facilitated traffic movement like Sarnia and Fort Erie.

Its time for someone who knows business to enter City Council.

Greg Baggio
MBA, B. Comm. (Hon.)
Council Candidate Ward 1

Zalev

2006-10-05T20:03:00.000-07:00

It's time we revisit a very important issue in our city, especially since it concerns the residents of Ward 1. The air we breathe and the impact of the less than beautiful Zalev Brother's in the heart of our city. One must give the company credit for turning profits at the expense of our health and our city's beauty. Surely the land is useless due to its contamination, but $50 Million toward moving them out of our core is more valuable than approving an arena that will compete for business with another proposal.

I plan to make this a priority in Council in December and feel its an important issue our existing council has ignored.

CAMPAIGN KICK OFF SPEECH

2006-10-05T18:13:00.000-07:00

The following is the word for word speech heard on todays Campaign Kickoff.

My name is Greg Baggio, and I am running for City Councillor in Ward 1.

I am running for council because I cannot stand by and watch this city slip further and further behind other Canadian cities because our present administration refuses to make decisions.

Time after time, when faced with an opportunity to move our city forward, this council has chosen to do nothing.

Time after time, when faced with an opportunity to improve our economic base, this council has chosen to do nothing.

Time after time, this council sees nothing, hears nothing, does nothing.

Our city, my city, deserves better, and I intend to be a part of a new council, a proactive council, that will spare no effort to move Windsor ahead.

Make no mistake. Windsor is not at a crossroads. We are on a path.

And we either move ahead on that path, move confidently into the future with a solid plan and an active administration, or we will fall behind, perhaps never to recover our position again.

It is time we reclaimed our position among Canadian cities as the gateway to the Canadian economy. The movers and shakers might be in Toronto or Montreal, but what they move and what they shake goes right through this city, like it or not.

Some of our fellow citizens sometimes feel that other cities get special treatment and that we get nothing. If that’s true, it’s because we have a council that is prepared always to take a back seat, never to step up and claim our status as a major component of the economic engine that drives our entire country.

In recent days, we’ve seen Ford announce the closure of the engine plant with not a peep from our council. Ford, who has made billions of dollars in profit in the more than 100 years they’ve had operations here in our city suddenly can’t find a way to keep our plant going.

Our fellow citizens didn’t design the cars that Ford can’t sell.

Our fellow citizens didn’t place the executives in Ford’s head office that made terrible business decisions, one after the other.

All our citizens are guilty of is building their engines, and we do it better than most. So now, to make up for Ford’s mistakes, our fellow citizens face unemployment, hardship, and debt.

And our council is nowhere to be seen.

For years now, there have been proposals before our Council on an arena project. Meeting after meeting goes by, and no decision gets made.

Business people spend their hard-earned dollars putting projects together, and our council completely ignores them.

Our citizens implore them to act, and our council ignores them also.

Now, we are told that one of those plans, the IceTrack proposal of the Toldo/Rosati group, has tired of waiting for Windsor to act and has made an agreement with Tecumseh – they will relocate Windsor Raceway, they’ll build a new casino, and yes, they’ll build that new arena. And yes, they’ll take something like 3,600 jobs to Tecumseh with them! Now WE are forced to pay a desperate $48Million out of our pocket for our own Arena.

nd easily the biggest issue of the last twenty years or more is the border crossing issue. We’ve had one council after another avoid this issue by demanding study after study, and still we’ve gotten nowhere.

And this council has made an art form out of ignoring the wishes of our citizens. Here’s a news flash for our council:

The people of Windsor in general, and particularly the residents of Ward 1 will not accept any proposal that includes surface routes as a means of getting to the border.

We don’t need another study to know that.

We don’t need another report to tell us that.

What we need is a council that will follow our residents’ demands and lead the way to getting this situation resolved.

Here is my position on this issue, and it is the position I will take to the residents of Ward 1. I issue a clear call to them and to all the citizens of our great city to pull together behind this cause.

The only acceptable means of moving those trucks through our city is a tunnel – from Highway 401 right to the apron of the Ambassador Bridge or beneath the Detroit River. We know we need to keep that bridge open, we need to expand it, and we know the bridge corporation is working on that now, but to get trucks to any crossing point, a tunnel is the only option. A tunnel can be built anywhere. And if we use DRTP rail lines it will can convert our rails to trails and parks. Our neighborhoods will become safer for all our families.

Some will say that’s not possible. But those who say that do not give the residents of Ward 1 and the other wards in this city enough credit – the fact is, if that’s what we want done, it will get done. We need only for our leaders to do their jobs and bring this about. Leaders are elected to serve their citizens.

Some will say it’s too expensive. But money is not an issue here – the tunnel will pay for itself many times over. And it will provide perhaps five years of employment for Windsor’s residents. But there’s another key point that I want all of Ward 1 to know, and all of our city’s residents to know. As costly as that tunnel may be, I believe the citizens of Windsor should pay NOT ONE DIME of their tax dollars to build it.

Days ago, the Federal Government announced a surplus of some $13 billions, with every likelihood that it will be closer to $17 billions when all of the accounting is done. They say they want to use that money – our tax dollars, don’t forget – to pay down our national debt, which sits today at something like 450 billion dollars.

That’s good. As a business man, I’m in favour of debt reduction. But I believe it’s time for the Federal government to step up to the plate and earmark some of that surplus, at least $5 billion dollars of it, to build our tunnel. The money is there, we know it is, and Canada needs this facility more than ever. This is an investment for our government that will pay huge dividends in the future, unlike some other projects the government has gotten involved in.

When Toronto wanted a new stadium, our tax dollars built the Skydome – half a billion dollars worth almost twenty years ago!

When the Skydome was going broke, our tax dollars picked up their debt – millions of dollars worth of debt – and turned the stadium over to private interests.

When Toronto got a few inches of snow, they called out the army, and our tax dollars paid for that.

And let’s not forget that a huge chunk of that $13 billion surplus came right out of Windsor in the first place – GST paid on goods that crossed into Canada, fuel taxes paid by all the trucks that carried those goods, and so on.

And it’s time that people realized that Windsor has paid enough!

It’s been our roads that have been torn up by thousands of trucks, roads we built with our tax dollars.

It’s been our air polluted by the exhaust fumes of thousands of trucks as they breeze right through our city on the way to someplace else.

It’s been our residents who have had to put up with the noise and congestion caused by those thousands of trucks.

We’ve paid our share. We’ve done our share. It’s time for our City to step up and claim its share!

All of this can be done. All that’s needed is strong leadership, a vision for the future, and a plan to make that vision a reality. And above all, we need a council that has the backbone to make decisions based on the needs of our citizens.

There’s an old saying that used to be popular a few years ago, but today, it’s more appropriate than ever.

That saying is, “Lead, Follow, or get out of the way!”

I say to the residents of Ward 1, with your help, I will lead.

With your help, I will see to it that your needs are met.

And with your help, Windsor will move on into this new century with all flags flying, ready to meet every challenge, and not being afraid to succeed. We are the economic future of Canada! We are Canada’s gateway!

And I say to the followers on our City Council, “It’s time. It’s way past time. Get out of the way!”

Thank you all. Please join me. Let’s get our city moving!

Tecumseh Scores Hat Trick

2006-09-29T13:37:00.000-07:00

A council that cannot make a decision has just chased away our pride. Just like the urban sprawl of Windsorites moving to LaSalle, Tecumseh and Lakeshore due to high taxes and less traffic, this council’s inability to make a decision has cost Windsor new entertainment development, an arena and potentially 3,600 new jobs.

However, congratulations to the Town of Tecumseh. Your ability to act promptly and professionally and request proposals by being proactive has just landed you a jackpot. Sure we will all reap the benefits on a regional basis, and the location could not be better, it’s unfortunate our council could not see fit to make a sound decision for our city.

Greg Baggio,
Council Candidate Ward 1
Windsor, ON

WHY WE NEED NEW LIFE

2006-09-28T07:47:00.000-07:00

The bottom line for resdients of Windsor is Quality of Life. Quality of Life issues arise in every topic City Council is dealing with, and this is what good elected representatives will remind each other in making community decisions.

Improving quality of Life for residents is about reducing environmental pollution, creating safer parks and schools, and building proper infrastructure that preserves our neighborhoods. A deteriorating quality of life for residents can occur when citizens are forced to work harder to pay higher duties, such as, the property taxes paid by Windsor-Ward 1 citizens. Quality of Life can also severly detriorate if a "superhighway" is constructed along side neighborhood communities along the Huron Church corridor.

Could you imagine the improvement in our community if Council spent the $50 Million set aside for land acquisition and construction of a new arena, to actually convince Zalev Bros. to move out of the center part of our City. We have a proposal for private enterprise to build an arena in the west end, why not releive our tax payers in the process of settling two Quality of Life issues?

A Proactive Council - It Is Possible

2006-09-27T07:37:00.000-07:00

Hats off to the great effort of Valiant to “seal the deal” on the $93 Million Dollar Investment in our community. It was also fabulous to see two leaders in Sandra Pupatello and Dwight Duncan be present to assist with the job creation project and potentially, the job saving project with Ford Motor Company.

The only thing that shadows Valiant’s commitment to the city is that fact that Ford’s loyalty to Windsor is diminishing fast with the 650 personnel cuts. Though I wish Dwight Duncan and Mayor Francis luck with trying to save them, our city needs to be more proactive in job creation instead of always resorting to reactive measures.

Being proactive means putting to rest, once and for all our border woes, it means letting the world know we are open for business. It also means having a good urban development plan, it means that we spend our hard earned tax dollars wisely, and not wasted on study after study. The hard working people of our community deserve this leadership more than any other community in Canada right now because we are an important link in a global economy. Let’s take advantage and prosper from it.

Shhh! Border Meetings . . . RSVP Only

2006-09-24T20:55:00.000-07:00

It has come to the attention of selected residents that meetings are being held by the Ministry of Transportation, Ontario about a Super Highway being built connecting to a new bridge. One must receive an invite and RSVP in order to attend. Too bad the media was not aware of this in order to exploit the best interests of the residents of Ward 1.

These meetings are also held in focus groups, and for what purpose??? Could it mean that people's individual concerns can be kept from being exposed to others???

2006-09-23T15:01:00.000-07:00

Windsor's location an asset to promote

LetterPublished: Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Job losses can be prevented, but it also means we need to seek new opportunities for our region. Windsor's electives must improve at aggressively marketing our community to the world.
Our best asset is our location -- first and foremost -- and communicating this is exactly what council has failed to accomplish in the past three years. A new council must see the south and east areas around the airport as crucial in the movement of goods.
Just like the State of New Jersey's role as a distribution hub to the Eastern seaboard of the United States, we need to take the same advantage of major cities near us, such as Toronto, Cleveland, Chicago, Indianapolis and Detroit. There is no excuse for having an 8.6 per cent unemployment rate. Windsor is a first-class city. Opportunities exist to do better.

GREG BAGGIO
Ward 1 Council Candidate
Windsor