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Orillia and area residents will elect a Progressive Conservative MPP on Feb. 27 as they have faithfully done in provincial elections for almost a century.
It’s a tradition in what is one of the safest seats in the province for the Tories.
I am not asking dedicated voters to consider alternatives. But I would like to remind Orillia residents how much they owe to the NDP.
It was Bob Rae’s heavily ridiculed government that decentralized provincial ministries and brought the OPP General Headquarters to our city in the 1990s.
The same government opened the door to the First Nation casino built in Rama.
Both these projects, bringing more than 4,000 jobs, cushioned the blow caused by the closure of the Huronia Regional Centre (HRC) and the loss of a $30-million payroll.
During the NDP mandate, four large-scale affordable housing projects were approved and funded by the government — Heritage Towers, Elizabeth Overend, Rosemary Apartments and Mariposa Place.
The latter is an 88-unit facility, built on a portion of the Rynard Farm subdivision. Planning guidelines introduced by the NDP required developers to devote 25 per cent of large projects to affordable housing. The Villages of Leacock Point, approved under the same planning regime, never fulfilled their requirement to do the same.
This affordable housing initiative was eliminated by the Progressive Conservatives as soon as they ousted the NDP.
It was also the NDP who banned waste incineration at a time when Orillia was targeted by a U.S. company as a site to burn Toronto’s garbage.
What have the other political parties done for our community? The Liberals tried to prevent the establishment of Lakehead’s satellite campus in Orillia and pulled the HRC property off the table after a Lakehead delegation toured the sprawling facility and expressed interest in restoring empty buildings to create a waterfront campus.
I can’t recall anything the conservatives have contributed to the city remotely comparable to the very real benefits derived from the NDP.
I do not expect conservative supporters to veer from their long-established pattern.
I only ask as you cast your vote to give a mental nod to the political party that in their brief reign did so much to improve the economic and social well-being of the Sunshine City.
This in spite of the fact they have never held a seat in this riding.
And quite likely never will.
Colin McKim
Orillia
