Re-Elect Mike Dell

A Plan for Callander

Callander is a great place to live. And we face a challenge.

3,900 residents are carrying the cost of a municipality with aging infrastructure and rising expenses.

We can't keep responding by asking the same taxpayers to pay more.

I believe the long-term answer is to make Callander stronger — by growing carefully, improving the community people already love, and planning ahead for the infrastructure we know we’ll need.

That means attracting more residents and businesses, creating opportunities for new homes, protecting the character people love about Callander, and making smart decisions before major costs are on our doorstep.

My focus over the next four years will be built around three priorities:

  1. Make Callander a place people choose

  2. Grow carefully

  3. Make smart infrastructure decisions

Make Callander a place people choose

Keep improving our downtown, waterfront, parks and public spaces.

Projects like the Heritage Walk and the natural shoreline at Centennial Park are part of a bigger idea: make Callander an attractive, interesting and welcoming small town.

A more attractive community draws new residents, visitors and investment. That supports local businesses and helps grow our tax base.

But quality of life is about more than how the community looks.

Speeding remains a concern, and I want to keep working on ways to slow traffic through our neighbourhoods and along Main Street. The larger goal is to make our streets safer and more comfortable for people walking and cycling.

And because so much of Callander’s identity is tied to the lake, we need to continue monitoring the health of our water and be ready to act when there are signs of a problem.

Over the next four years

  • Continue moving our downtown and waterfront plans forward

  • Keep working on speeding and safer streets for walking and cycling

  • Continue monitoring the health of our lake and water

Grow carefully

Callander needs to grow, but the goal is not growth at any cost.

We need more residents, homes and businesses sharing the cost of the community if we want to keep Callander affordable over the long term.

That growth also needs to fit Callander.

In our serviced areas, that means creating opportunities for new homes and making the most of the infrastructure we already have.

In rural Callander, it means looking for appropriate opportunities for residential growth while protecting the rural character people value.

And growth isn’t only about housing. We need more opportunities for local businesses, a stronger downtown, support for home-based businesses and more reasons for visitors to spend time and money in Callander.

Grow the tax base, not just the tax rate.

Over the next four years

  • Create more opportunities for housing in areas where growth makes sense

  • Look for appropriate opportunities for rural residential growth

  • Encourage more local business, downtown investment and tourism

Make smart infrastructure decisions

Callander has some major infrastructure decisions ahead.

The operations building and fire hall both need a clear, realistic plan so we can move them forward with a full understanding of the cost and the long-term impact on taxpayers.

We also need to plan carefully for future wastewater capacity.

Council has now approved a step-by-step approach: first understand how much unnecessary water is entering the sewer system, identify what I&I work remains, look realistically at expected growth, and calculate the wastewater that growth would create.

Then we can determine whether the existing lagoon has enough capacity or whether a larger expansion plan is actually needed.

That is a smarter way to make a major infrastructure decision. Get the information first, then spend the money.

Over the next four years

  • Get the operations building onto a clear and realistic path forward

  • Develop a long-term plan for the fire hall

  • Complete the wastewater capacity work needed to determine whether lagoon expansion or a Wastewater Master Plan is actually required.

We've already started

This approach builds on work I’ve been doing over the last four years.

  • Created Take it Slow for Callander, our annual speed-awareness campaign

  • Pushed for the Share the Road lane on Main Street South

  • Introduced plain-language top sheets for zoning bylaw changes

  • Pushed to turn the Beautification Committee into the Placemaking Advisory Committee

  • Helped launch the Callander Heritage Walk, with Phase 2 coming this summer

  • Pushed for improvements to the Main Street and Lansdowne Street corner

  • Proposed the natural shoreline at Centennial Park after the previous shoreline washed out

  • Consistently brought Council decisions back to our Strategic Plan and Downtown Waterfront Revitalization Strategy

See more of what I’ve worked on

Why I’m running again

We’ve made progress, but the work isn’t finished.

There is more to do downtown and along the waterfront. We need to create room for careful growth. We need to keep making our streets safer. And we need to prepare now for major infrastructure decisions that will shape Callander for the next 10 and 20 years.

I’d like the opportunity to continue that work.