Economy, building strong neighbourhoods among goals for new Barrie city council

On Saturday, the newly sworn-in Barrie city council met at Barrie City Hall to discuss their strategic priorities for the new term.

According to a news release issued by the city, council identified five goals which will guide the municipality’s strategic direction over the next four years.

The five goals for the 2018-2022 council term will be:

• Growing the economy;
• Fostering a safe and healthy city;
• Building strong neighbourhoods;
• Offering innovative and citizen-driven services;
• Improving the ability to get around Barrie.

According to the release, council discussed several key issues they heard while campaigning. These issues included affordable housing, the opioid crisis, community safety, road safety, innovation and customer service.

Now, staff will work on developing action plans for each strategic direction and will report back to General Committee early in the new year.

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The city says the action plans will include “key performance indicators” to monitor the success of the plan over the next four years.

“As a team of eleven we now have the honour of shaping our city for the next four years,” Barrie mayor, Jeff Lehman, said in the release. “There was a lot of energy in the room as this Council started setting our priorities. We know there’s a lot of work to do, and there is clearly a sense of optimism as we set the direction for our community.

“It starts with having a straightforward vision, which I believe we achieved today.”