Our HRM Alliance is hosting an All-Candidates Mayoral debate on Wednesday September 19 at the Lord Nelson Hotel in anticipation of the October 20 Municipal election.

It’s true that Halifax-the-City has a lot of untapped potential. It has unfortunately been the victim of corruption, political scandal and secrecy, and policies that continue to favour auto-oriented suburban development and generally developer-first policies.

Is voting in the hopeless state-of-our-contemporary-Canadian-democracy futile? Well, maybe… but you can’t deny the immediate nature of a Municipal election — the visceral voting process that has you as part of the conversation of Officially shaping-your-city. Provincial, Federal, these are abstract regional concepts… municipal politicians are the people that most closely effect issues that directly shape your life — things like public transportation! and liquor licenses! and development! and, other stuff directly experienced day to day!

Be even more part of the conversation, and participate in the Our HRM Alliance Mayoral Debate  — as the poster points out, questions will be taken from the audience, and, if you can’t make it, go ahead and tweet a question (#HRMAllianceDebate), or post one on Facebook and cross-your-fingers that it will be asked.

Our HRM Alliance is a fantastic organization comprised of over 40 urban, suburban and rural organization from across HRM, united in fighting for a more liveable, sustainable city.

Their efforts are valiant, and hope-inspiring: taking the enormous and somewhat ridiculous political entity known as the Halifax Regional Municipality, and transforming it instead into an opportunity for high quality, efficient, connected and sustainable regional governance with such issues as their incredibly succinct and no-doubt effective Greenbelt plan.

Plus, your Urban Geographer designed the poster for the event !

Inspired by one of the Our HRM Alliance’s Seven Solutions, and one especially pertinent to the location of the debate, Invest in Downtown and Growth Centres, the poster’s accompanying graphic and tag line “HOW DO YOU WANT YOUR CITY TO GROW” was designed to evoke reflection on the direction the city is heading, or could be heading. The green arrow is open to interpretation: after the election, and the new configuration of mayor and council, what will be this city’s official priorities? Social and ecological sustainability… or same-old same-old, i.e. money ?

UPDATE — Downtown Halifax didn’t like the original image… thought folks would confuse things and think the debate was exclusively about building height… sigh..I guess. Here’s the new design, complete with new illustration! A fractured HRM, unified by a strong core? Sure!

 

One more edit later, the final poster: