Councillor candidate Ron Fode looks to stop tax increases in Medicine Hat

“That’s the mentality of people, we have to spend that money, or we’re not going to get it next year.”

He said his focus is on spending for needs, not wants.

“We have to cut back for a few years. We will put more money into our pockets so that we can go to a restaurant. We can go see a movie. We can build stuff around us if we have a few more bucks in our pocket,” Fode said.

“It seems that we’re spending our money on places that we really don’t need to.”

Fode also stressed the importance of keeping the cities utilities publicly owned.

“These third parties want to come in and run our electrical, our gas, and all that; they know how to make money,” Fode saide.

“To me, we don’t have the right people at the top end making us that money,” he added.

“Whether we have not trained them good enough, or these other people want to come in to run our businesses, we’ve got to get the right people at the top end of the business to make sure that we can be profitable and we can make money for our city.”

Fode, 64, has lived in Medicine Hat his entire life and worked in various roles, including as a union member, business owner, and manager. He spent 17 years at Goodyear, managing up to 100 employees, and also ran a landscaping business.

Two companies he worked for in the area, Dominion Glass and Ogilvy Flour Mill, had shut down.

“Trying to bring in new businesses to Medicine Hat, that’s three to four years away,” Fode said.

“If we have $1 to spend in Medicine Hat, we should be saving that $1 to keep the businesses that we have in Medicine Hat,” Fode said.

“We’ve already got a tax base coming from those workers, and throwing all this money out there to get a new business. We’ve got to keep the businesses that we have.”

“I think of my whole lifespan, Dominion Glass 340 people gone, Ogilvy’s 70 people, and these are good-paying jobs. I-XL Industries has 145 people gone.”

Fode said Medicine Hat’s location on the Trans Canada Highway, Highway 3, and near the United States border should make it an economic hub.

“Everything should be in Medicine Hat because it can split out everywhere, but it just doesn’t seem to be that way,” Fode said.

“Whether it’s the red tapes that we’re giving out, once you get into the council, you’ll be able to go deeper into what’s really going on.”

Working as a field manager allows Fode to travel throughout southern Alberta, where he has noticed growing workforces in other communities..

“Especially the Bow Island, Grassy Lake, Taber areas, they’re booming,” Fode said.

“What they’re doing, I’m not really all that sure, but there’s a lot of new buildings going up.”

Traffic flow issues in the city is also something he wants to address.

“Everybody complains about our traffic rate in Medicine Hat,” Fode said.

“We’ve done a couple of very good things, like at the bottom of Scholten Hill, we made that right turn only by Saamis Memorial, that has flowed traffic so well now. We need to do that up at Strachan Road at Toyota,” he added.

“I think once we can start moving traffic a little bit better, our city will be much happier, the road rage will come down.”

Board-level governance isn’t foreign to Fode, either, having spent time as a president or committee member with several groups.

Fode encourages people to have a positive outlook by using his go-to phrase, “Keep smiling.”

“People say it’s a life changer, a day changer for them when I say that to them,” Fode said.

by Jesse Gill

Councillor candidate Ron Fode looks to stop tax increases in Medicine Hat

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