A new candidate has stepped forward in hopes of being elected to the mayor’s seat.
Dennis Trepanier, a resident of the City for 30 years who previously worked at Nova Chemicals for 24 years as an information analyst and records manager and is now a consultant and project manager for oil and gas firms, entered the mayoral race on Monday.
“I think the City needs change and I think it needs real change. Honestly, I think all of council needs to be flushed and I think there needs to be new people at all levels,” he said. “I’m really excited to see all of the candidates for council – this is great – but I want more change at the mayor. I’m giving the people another alternative.”
Trepanier served as a councillor in Blackfalds from 1992-1995 and also served as deputy mayor for the Town one of those years.
“I’ve always loved politics and I have always looked for an opportunity to get back in,” he said. “As a consultant now my time is more flexible.”
Trepanier added if elected he would bring a fresh perspective to the mayor’s chair and to council.
“My perspective really is to represent the people and to listen to the people. It all really boils down to that. What are people saying? And what do they want us to do?”
He added his platform is based on three pillars of what he has heard from the community.
“This is what the people are telling me and this is what I represent. The first pillar is safety and security in the City. When I talk to people everybody is concerned with these things – robberies and drugs and break-ins. This is a real concern and people have spoken about that,” said Trepanier. “Second is fiscal responsibility. Why are we spending this money and why are we doing these things and who has the controls? As a project manager every project I do has financial controls. This is what I want to bring is a project approach to everything we do.
“Number three is quality of services. I think all of our services have to have a level of quality to it. We need to be really fast at our snow removal and we need to be really careful about our water quality.
“We have the RCMP, one of the finest policing services in the world, but why are we still having this problem (of crime rates)? I’ll tell you why, if you look at problems it’s always management; it’s not the line worker. We need to look at directions and attainable goals.”
If elected, Trepanier said he would bring a number of assets to the table.
“It’s just the ability to hear what the people are saying and to be a voice for them,” he said. “I’ve been in business, I’ve run million dollar projects and I know how to run a project from start to finish, from planning to execution, to controlling and monitoring and also closing. The perspective I want to bring is different – I want to look at the next four years as a four-year project. I’m not a professional politician.
“But I think I can bring a project perspective to this – set attainable goals for council to reach in four years and we can look back and say we did that. We addressed crime, we addressed safety, we addressed fiscal concerns the City has and we made sure we provided quality services.”
efawcett@reddeerexpress.com
