Ward 2 candidate wants to tackle downtown safety

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This article was published 08/09/2022 (1261 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A city council candidate in Brandon’s most-contested ward is hoping to make downtown a more welcoming place if he is elected.

Challenging incumbent Coun. Kris Desjarlais and Phillip Emmerson in Ward 2, the new name for Rosser Ward, is Dale Bates, a 30-year veteran of the security industry.

“It’s a new challenge,” the 65-year-old Bates said of his decision to run. “I want to work for people and with people.”

He said he’s running because he wants to exercise his right to participate in democracy and put forward his own ideas, not necessarily because he takes issue with the current councillor’s performance.

Bates said his main goals as a councillor would be to curb injectable drug use at the downtown bus terminal on Eighth Street near Rosser Avenue and to deal with people at Princess Park who make it unwelcoming to residents.

“People are setting up homeless encampments,” he said.

“You and I can’t even go to Princess Park because people will tell you to ‘get the f–k out of our park’ and they’re sitting there, drinking all the time.”

He said that on Aug. 9, before a Music in the Park concert, he saw four women get into a fight that ended up with someone being stabbed with a screwdriver. A few days later, he said another person was jumped and stabbed at the park.

Neither of these incidents appear to have been reported in the Brandon Police Service’s daily media releases that week, though the Sun was unable to reach the service’s public relations officer to confirm.

Though security officials patrol that part of downtown, Bates said people causing trouble there should be given one chance and then forbidden from returning to the park.

To help with issues that involve people experiencing homelessness, he said he believes the city should be doing more to promote additional affordable housing. This, he said, would also reduce the burden on organizations that provide temporary housing like shelters.

He’d also like to see a playground installed at Princess Park like the one at Stanley Park.

Bates said he’s hopeful the downtown wellness and safety task force established last year will be able to deal with problems concerning both locations, ad he would be interested in contributing to the group’s work.

A persisting issue in the ward for the last few years has been the fate of the Park Community Centre. With the structure having deteriorated over time, there have been proposals over the years to tear it down and replace it with a green space; demolish it and build a new one or; renovate the building.

Earlier this year, city staff submitted a report to council stating that it would not be cost-effective for Brandon to renovate the building and suggested that it be torn down and replaced.

The best course of action for the facility, Bates said, is to fundraise for renovations to help offset the total cost incurred by the city.

Over the past year, the city has looked into the possibility of renovating the Library/Arts Building on Rosser Avenue to make it a more welcoming space.

According to Bates, a better idea would be to have the library and art gallery move into the historic building at 1043 Rosser Ave., which is the home of the Brandon Chamber of Commerce and the Rural Manitoba Economic Development Corporation.

On the subject of the proposed wastewater infrastructure upgrades in southwest Brandon and the drainage improvements in the southeast, Bates said both projects are worth pursuing and will benefit the entire community.

At press time, Bates was just five signatures away from meeting the requirements for submitting his nomination papers, he said.

Election day is Oct. 26

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