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Small Property Tax Rate Increase Anticipated For Red Deer In 2017

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5 minute read

By Sheldon Spackman

Red Deer City Council is preparing to deliberate next year’s proposed Operating Budget starting January 10th.

After the approval of the 2017 Capital Budget and Ten Year Capital Plan on November 23rd, Council will now turn it’s attention to the $357 million Operating Budget which aims to focus on sustainability for both people and services by keeping tax increases to a minimum while maintaining core services.

Currently, the proposed Operating Budget calls for a 2.51 percent property tax rate increase in 2017, the number City Council will try to wittle down once deliberations take place next month. The two and a half percent property tax rate increase being proposed represents a $3.2 million increase to the Operating Budget, which includes a 1 percent increase for Capital amenities and growth. City officials say this would translate to a roughly $50 increase per year in the municipal portion of a property tax bill on a Red Deer home assessed at $325,000.

In regards to the 2.51 percent starting point for Council next month, Red Deer Mayor Tara Veer says “This is the lowest recommended operational budget in about 15 years of City history, Council’s recognition of the current state of our economy.” Veer adds however that despite the lower than normal property tax rate increase being proposed, “there may very well be movement anticipated in that recommended percentage as well.” Veer also points out that in Council’s guidelines regarding the Operating Budget, the currently proposed property tax rate increase of two and a half percent is close to inflation and maintains a Capital Savings Program to relieve the City from having to Debt finance.

City Manager Craig Curtis says “This is the most challenging Budget I’ve worked on since returning to the City. There are huge challenges financially because we’re seeing much less growth, which translates into less Revenue and as we see less Revenue, we’ve also seen a decline in the use of our Transit System and our Recreation, Parks and Culture facilities, so the Revenues from those have also affected this Budget.” As a result, Curtis says one of the key initiatives in the 2017 Operating Budget is to look after the social well-being of our community, so they are recommending that user fees for City facilities remains the same next year, the first time the City has recommended that in many years.

However, Mayor Tara Veer and City Manager Curtis also point out that they are both disappointed that the Province’s new three-year pilot program for a low-income transit pass subsidy for residents in Calgary and Edmonton is currently not extended to other municipalities, making it unfair to Albertans in mid-sized cities such as Red Deer. Curtis says “This is a total inequity. The fact that they have a pilot project stemming from their Big City Charters, that invests millions of dollars in their Transit subsidies, is not fair to those who operate Transit Systems in the middle sized cities.” Mayor Veer adds to those sentiments by saying the mid-sized cities represent close to 900,000 Alberta residents, which means they are being treated inequitably from those in the two larger centres by being less able to participate in their communities or access things like employment and educational opportunities, as well as other community and government resources.

Manager Curtis says their latest survey results indicate roughly 15 percent of Red Deer’s population currently lives below the poverty line, with residents having identified Crime, Transportation and General Municipal Government Services as their top priorities for this Budget. He says it’s important to note that this recommended Budget makes investments in Crime Prevention, Safety and Homelessness, a recognition of some of the Social challenges Red Deer is facing.

Operating Budget debates begin on January 10th and are also slated for January 11th – 13th and on January 16th, 17th and 18th if needed. Red Deerians can learn more about the proposed Operating Budget online and submit feedback until December 22nd. Check out this link for more details:

http://reddeer.ca/city-government/budget-and-annual-financial-reports/

(Thumbnail provided by the City of Red Deer)

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Environment

New must-see documentary exposes climate alarm as an “invented scare”

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From the Climate Intelligence Foundation (CLINTEL).  

Founded in 2019 by emeritus professor of geophysics Guus Berkhout and science journalist  Marcel Crok, CLINTEL‘s main objective is to generate knowledge and insight into the extent, nature, causes and consequences of climate change and the climate policy related to it.

From CLINTEL on YouTube

This film exposes the climate alarm as an invented scare without any basis in science. It shows that mainstream studies and official data do not support the claim that we are witnessing an increase in extreme weather events – hurricanes, droughts, heatwaves, wildfires and all the rest. It emphatically counters the claim that current temperatures and levels of atmospheric CO2 are unusually and worryingly high. 

The film includes interviews with a number of very prominent scientists, including Professor Steven Koonin (author of ‘Unsettled’, a former provost and vice-president of Caltech), Professor Richard (Dick) Lindzen (formerly professor of meteorology at Harvard and MIT), Professor Will Happer (professor of physics at Princeton), Dr John Clauser (winner of the Nobel prize in Physics in 2022), Professor Nir Shaviv (Racah Institute of Physics), professor Ross McKitrick (University of Guelph), Willie Soon and several others.

The film was written and directed by the British filmmaker Martin Durkin and is the sequel of his excellent 2007 documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle. Tom Nelson, a podcaster who has been deeply examining climate debate issues for the better part of two decades, was the producer of the film.

Follow @ClimateTheMovie and @ClintelOrg for updates.

Climate Intelligence Foundation (CLINTEL) is an independent foundation that reports objectively on climate change and climate policy and aims to be a voice of reason in the often overheated climate debate. CLINTEL was founded in 2019 by emeritus professor of geophysics Guus Berkhout  and science journalist  Marcel Crok . CLINTEL’s main objective is to generate knowledge and insight into the extent, nature, causes and consequences of climate change and the climate policy related to it. CLINTEL also wants to participate in debates on climate science and policy, as well as in decision-making processes in this regard.

To this end:

  • The foundation tries to communicate clearly and transparently to the general public what facts are available about climate change and climate policy and also where facts turn into assumptions and predictions.
  • The foundation conducts and encourages a public debate on this matter and carries out investigative journalism work in this area.
  • The foundation aims to function as an international meeting place for scientists with different views on climate change and climate policy.
  • Will the foundation also conduct or finance scientific research in the field of climate change and climate policy?
  • The foundation participates in decision-making procedures regarding the climate, climate communication and climate policy, in particular legislative and regulatory processes, but possibly also legal procedures regarding climate policy of governments, companies or other parties.

CLINTEL wants to take on the role of ‘climate watchdog’, both in the field of climate science and climate policy.

CLINTEL was made possible in part by a start-up donation from real estate entrepreneur Niek Sandmann. The foundation is very grateful to him for this. Several people have already indicated that they would also like to contribute financially to the foundation. This can also be done anonymously if desired. You can support us by becoming a Friend of CLINTEL or making a one-time donation .

The foundation strives for as few overhead costs as possible, so that almost all resources can be spent on investigative journalism, scientific research and public information. CLINTEL will work on an extensive national network of “friends” and “ambassadors”. To this end, meetings ( CLINTEL Chambers ) will be organized throughout the country . CLINTEL also has a youth organization, Young CLINTEL .

CLINTEL is located in Amsterdam and can be reached via [email protected].

Channel details

www.youtube.com/@clintel628

 

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Health

Radio-Canada journalist defends report exposing ‘gender clinics’ for ‘transitioning’ children

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

Radio-Canada journalist Pasquale Turbide revealed that concerns from parents were what originally sparked her investigative report on the gender ‘transitioning’ of children in Quebec.

Radio-Canada journalist is defending her investigative report that exposed a “gender” clinic in Quebec for prescribing potentially sterilizing hormones to an actress posing as a young teen in less than ten minutes. 

In a March 3 interview on Tout le Monde en Parle, Radio-Canada journalist Pasquale Turbide  revealed that concerns from parents were what originally sparked her investigative report on the gender “transitioning” of children, and that she stands by her work despite backlash.   

“Parents began writing to us last summer, when there was a bit of a controversy about names, pronouns, all-gender bathrooms, etc,” said Turbide in French.  

“But the letters we were getting were not about those issues, they were talking about medical transitions,” she explained.   

According to Turbide, the parents who contacted Radio-Canada revealed that their children, who believed they were “transgender,” were being offered sterilizing “puberty blockers” in the name of care.

“We started to look into it, and we easily found fifteen to twenty people who were all telling us more or less the same story,” said Turbide. “They were often very open-minded parents, open to homosexuality, open to all sorts of things but were panicking at the speed of the transgender healthcare system.”  

The documentary, published by Radio-Canada, the French arm of the state-funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), delved into the dangers of giving children “puberty blockers” as well as the regrets of detransitioners, the term for people who have undergone irreversible surgeries in an attempt to “change” their gender but now regret it.   

The report also followed an actress posing as a 14-year-old patient at a private “gender clinic” in Quebec where she was prescribed testosterone and advised on life-altering mutilating surgeries during a consultation that lasted a meagre nine minutes.  

During her interview, Turbide exposed the dangers of taking puberty blockers, especially considering many of the side effects are still unknown.   

“Girls take testosterone, boys take estrogen and that’s semi-irreversible,” Turbide added. “Some things don’t come back even if they stop. One’s voice will stay changed most of the time. The face of their shape is another thing that’s affected. You can become infertile if you are a girl. It’s not yet clear how far it can go.”  

Turbide further pointed out that some Scandinavian countries are seeking to ban the irreversible treatments for children.  

The documentary went viral online the same week leaked internal communications show doctors who offer so-called “gender-affirming care” know that transgender hormones cause serious diseases, including cancer. 

Journalist Michael Shellenberger released the internal documents from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), which “is considered the leading global authority” on so-called “gender medicine,” despite being an LGBT activist group. 

The “WPATH FILES” include emails and messages from an internal discussion forum by doctors, as well as statements from a video call of WPATH members. The files reveal that the doctors working for WPATH know that so-called “gender-affirming care” can cause severe mental and physical disease and that it is impossible for minors to give “informed consent” to it.  

As LifeSiteNews has previously noted, research does not support the assertions from transgender activists that surgical or pharmaceutical intervention to “affirm” confusion is “necessary medical care” or that it is helpful in preventing the suicides of gender-confused individuals.   

In fact, in addition to asserting a false reality that one’s sex can be changed, transgender surgeries and drugs have been linked to permanent physical and psychological damage, including  cardiovascular diseases, loss of bone density, cancer, strokes and blood clots,  infertility,  and  suicidality.    

There is also  overwhelming evidence that those who undergo “gender transitioning” are more likely to commit suicide than those who are not given irreversible surgery. A Swedish study found that those who underwent “gender reassignment” surgery ended up with a 19.2 times greater risk of suicide.   

Indeed, there is proof that the most loving and helpful approach to people who think they are a different sex is not to validate them in their confusion but to show them the truth.   

A new study on the side effects of transgender “sex change” surgeries discovered that 81 percent of those who had undergone “sex change” surgeries in the past five years reported experiencing pain simply from normal movement in the weeks and months that followed — and that many other side effects manifest as well.    

Additionally, LifeSiteNews compiled a list of medical professions and experts who warn against transgender surgeries, warning of irreversible changes and lifelong side effects.    

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