NDP candidate for Hastings, Lennox and Addington, Jessica Zielke, says she believes rural municipalities like ours are being ‘short-changed’.
Last week Zielke came to the area to meet with constituents.
In a conversation with MooseFM, Zielke pointed out how consecutive provincial governments have downloaded responsibilities onto municipalities.
She says the fallout of this is being felt in areas like housing, healthcare, and infrastructure, and she acknowledged the frustration rural municipalities feel.
“Last summer, our leader Marit Styles, had a meeting with several of the mayors in Hastings County because no one was listening. (The mayors) were trying to get the attention and access to the leaders of the parties.”
Zielke grew up in Tweed and now lives just north of Belleville. She says reliable funding for marginalized municipalities is a key election issue.
“It’s important to me because I can see that the municipalities are just struggling…. And for consecutive governments, so many services have been downloaded without the accompanying funding to go with them, and they don’t have the tax base to support the needs of the community.
“So, residents see their municipal taxes going up and they feel angry with their municipal council… and really the municipalities are the ones being short-changed by the provincial government.”
Zielke says the downloading of responsibilities has affected everything from housing to healthcare.
“Rural homelessness is on the rise, thousands of folks in Hastings, Lennox and Addington don’t have access to a family doctor, and rural municipalities are left scrambling to implement solutions with no support.”
“I have a long history in Hastings Lennox and Addington” says Zielke, “I am a part of it and it is a part of me….as an MPP, I will never forget that my primary responsibility is to advocate for my constituents…we now have an opportunity to hold this government to account and to elect representatives who put people at the heart of every political decision.”
Zielke will be at all candidates meeting Thursday (Feb. 20) evening at North Hastings High School along with Liberal candidate Lynn Rigby, Green Party candidate Michael Holbrook and New Blue candidate Glenn Tyrell.
