Council candidates: Bonnie Henderson

Introduce yourself to readers. Who are you?

I’m Bonnie Henderson and have served on council since 2006 and have worked making our community a better place to live, work and play. I currently sit on the social services and community services committee, AAC (accessibility committee), parks board and CIB (Community in Bloom). I also am on the AAC site plan review so review site plans to make sure they are accessible we make lots of changes.

What are the core issues you are focused on this election?

My core issues are making our city more accessible and affordable to live here. I believe its important people can get around our city, can afford to live here, ensuring we reduce our greenhouse gases, have more child care spaces and get the grand trunk project moving along as it is now with the Y and the library starting their part.

Next year’s budget, like last year’s, will be presented and guided by the mayor. As a councillor, what will you do to keep the tax levy low?

I will work towards making our city go forward without increasing our taxes more then the C.P.I. (Consumer Price Index). We need to ensure we keep the services we offer and at the same time try to run them at low increase to the tax levy.

Housing and homelessness in Stratford continues to be a challenge. What, in your opinion, is the strategy the city should be taking in building more homes and/or improving affordability?

I believe we need to get the provincial government to put rent controls back on. This changed in 2018 and we are certainly seeing the results of rent increasing in our city as people move out. We need to continue working with landlords so more affordable units are added to the stock in Stratford. Continue to work with the government to get grants to help us build more affordable units for residents to live in.

The Grand Trunk renewal project is underway, yet still far from any concrete changes to the grounds or superstructure. Are you in favour of the current council’s direction? If not, what strategy would you be in favour of?

I think the idea of starting this next stage of working with the Y and the library who provide monetary towards their builds and at the same time getting more partners. The senior centre is an important part of this development once we get the partners who can contribute to this build. We need to get more partners that can bring monetary plans to the build so in the future non-profits, etc. can also benefit from this new community hub idea.