Along with excessive pay rates for employees one of the biggest wastes of taxpayers’ money in the CVRD are the tens of millions of dollars squandered over the past decade by their Economic Development department and nothing to show for it. The CVRD always tries to solve its problems and issues by new spending and more taxes and there’s lots of evidence that is not a solution that ever works.
More than a year ago, after another expensive consultant’s report, the CVRD board was reminded again how wasteful the EDF has been with its million dollar EDF budget each year. Yet the CVRD continues to throw our tax money at a function that has proven worthless in improving the local economy. Our CVRD taxes would be much lower if this and other wasteful spending stopped.
Now we have the befuddled CVRD board members spending more time and resources trying to decide if EDF should have a $150,000 a year manager or a cheaper coordinator. Yet the CVRD board has never stated exactly what the EDF should accomplish, or identify why it should exist at all.
Like most spending in the CVRD there are never any measures of success established other than shovelling our tax dollars out the door. That’s why they now spend more than $80 million a year and employ well over 200 employees.
I vote for killing this million dollar a year CVRD waste of tax money. The most important economic development functions in the Cowichan Valley are lower taxes and less bureaucracy.
W.E. (Bill) Dumont
Cobble Hill
