A veil of secrecy around a Plan to introduce transparency. Rampant mismanagement. Council apathy. Bureaucratic betrayal. Administrative abuse of a vision from 18,000 Calgarians.
A slap in the face of future Calgary. A dead plant as a gift to the citizens.
Momentum is not building for imagineCALGARY and just by stating such on a website does not make it true. The imagineCalgary Plan has been seriously mismanaged by the administration and bureaucracy of City Hall.
The groups listed below are according to imagineCalgary "...actively implementing the imagineCALGARY Targets and Goals within
their organizations."
The website erroneously states: "Members of the imagineCALGARY Partnership and citizens, corporations, community agencies and the civic government of Calgary are now using the Plan and working together to shape the city’s future."
Again, organizations are not working together, the Plan is not being taken seriously by council or admin and the future is not being shaped by imagineCalgary... its a neglected, withering vision.
So what does this all mean?
Simply, that civic engagement is really a cruel and costly comedy of errors. The result is a lengthy, dust collecting tome which the City of Calgary has no intention of truly implementing and has somehow evolved into a form of appeasement with the local sustainability culture. Citizen and organizational silence is bought via the opportunity to passively participate in this increasingly comical venture at the very unfunny cost of the future of Calgary.
What council and administration is clearly saying to citizens is this...
1. We really want your input,
2. We want you to believe we value your input,
3. We'll go to great lengths to promote and drape ourselves in this input,
4. There's not a hope in hell we'll ever take citizen input seriously.'
5. We'll continue telling citizens the exact opposite, shamelessly.
The list below has not changed significantly in 3 years.
Also, many of the groups below are small, social justice/environmental orgs that already adhere to sustainability protocols, with imagineCalgary failing miserably to make a dent outside the perimeter of the choir.
ImagineCalgary is idle, stagnanting and withering... How ironic is that?
The website erroneously states: "Members of the imagineCALGARY Partnership and citizens, corporations, community agencies and the civic government of Calgary are now using the Plan and working together to shape the city’s future."
Again, organizations are not working together, the Plan is not being taken seriously by council or admin and the future is not being shaped by imagineCalgary... its a neglected, withering vision.
So what does this all mean?
Simply, that civic engagement is really a cruel and costly comedy of errors. The result is a lengthy, dust collecting tome which the City of Calgary has no intention of truly implementing and has somehow evolved into a form of appeasement with the local sustainability culture. Citizen and organizational silence is bought via the opportunity to passively participate in this increasingly comical venture at the very unfunny cost of the future of Calgary.
What council and administration is clearly saying to citizens is this...
1. We really want your input,
2. We want you to believe we value your input,
3. We'll go to great lengths to promote and drape ourselves in this input,
4. There's not a hope in hell we'll ever take citizen input seriously.'
5. We'll continue telling citizens the exact opposite, shamelessly.
The list below has not changed significantly in 3 years.
Also, many of the groups below are small, social justice/environmental orgs that already adhere to sustainability protocols, with imagineCalgary failing miserably to make a dent outside the perimeter of the choir.
ImagineCalgary is idle, stagnanting and withering... How ironic is that?
Current Partners
Alberta Ecotrust Foundation
Bridgetown Works
Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR)
City of Calgary
Cultural District Renaissance Society of Alberta
Enmax
Families Matter
Flextronics Calgary Centre
Light up the World
LINKages Society of Alberta
Old Y Centre
Peratos Consulting
REAP Business Association
Sierra Club of Canada
The Unique Blend
Theatre Calgary
Torode Commercial Ltd.
Tour de Nuit
