I believe Calgarians are the solution.  I believe the intellectual capital of Calgary – the youngest averaged age city, best educated, and most connected – is insurmountable.  And with that intelligence, Calgary will propel itself towards the potential I know exists.

 I have heard over and over again that Calgarians “just want their city back”.  To return to the fiercely proud city we were a few years ago, and to build a future is one we will be proud to leave our children.

What is Crowd Sourcing?

 According to Wikipedia: Crowdsourcing is defined like this.

This video explains crowdsourcing in very basic terms.  Initially developed for business, people around the world are realizing the tremendous strength it has in giving citizens a voice in their government.  I want to introduce a new democracy where Calgarians WILL have a true voice at city hall – through this same process. 

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 Once again a very basic but powerful explanation of Social Media and Crowdsourcing creating a situation where “anyone” can have a voice and contribute in a collaborative way…

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There are many examples of business, organizations and governments who are successfully implementing crowdsourcing to focus on priorities and build more efficient and effective services and products.  I want to introduce this to City Hall.  I want Calgarians to have a voice in the priorities of your municipal government, because right now we have 25 priorities.  And that is PRECISELY why we ended up with a $25M pedestrian bridge.  Because Calgarians did NOT have a voice so we gave up important things like recreational facilities, the airport tunnel, and funds towards a new library.  

We can’t do everything.  But I believe we should do at least the core services of building a safe, clean and friendly city right.

Some interesting examples to visit:

http://challenge.gov/

http://www.whitehouse.gov/open/

How can Calgarians use Crowdsourcing?

The system will be open for EVERYONE to use – those without home computers can access one freely at stations that will be set up.  This gives a voice to all Calgarians who want to participate – everyone has ideas and all need to be considered.

To start, I will ask Calgarians for their ideas on cutting $60M.  I hear from people all the time about how the City is wasting money.  Now we will have a formal means of capturing those ideas and suggestions.

Then we will move to challenges like removing the red tape and administrative hurdles.  On to parking rates and availability – again many people have offered solutions, but I want to formally capture all those ideas.  Then to traffic flow and congestion.  Many Calgarians have come from other cities and have learned better ways to do things than we do here.  But until now, we don’t hear about them in a manner that we can actually consider your ideas at City Hall.

It is endless what projects we can source ideas on from Calgarians.  Some topics will be of interest to everyone.  Other topics will be more focused to the groups most affected – like the thousands of people who plan festivals and public events in Calgary.  Being at virtually every festival this summer I heard hundreds of complaints on how City Hall seems to be intent on throwing up hurdles rather than contributing to the success of events that make this city great.

 
Calgary – I invite you to vote yourself on the City Hall team October 18.

Vote Joe Connelly Mayor and register to participate in the many crowdsourcing projects that will allow you to “Take Back Your City”.

If you have any questions please feel free to email us at: team@joeformayor.ca