Welcome!
December 2009
This has been a very busy fall in the Legislature. As your MLA, I take my responsibility to represent all of my constituents very seriously. I have addressed concerns through Question Period, Tablings and Private Members Statements while the Legislature was in Session. My staff continues to assist constituents in the local office, and I met with as many individuals and organizations as possible on Fridays and the weekends. I have also attended as many community functions and meetings as possible.
It has been my privilege to serve as your MLA again this past year. In an effort to continue to communicate effectively with you, the Calgary-Varsity Constituency is continually updating our website at www.HarryChaseMLA.com and my facebook page. You are always welcome to call, email or stop by the office to make specific inquiries or just to say hello. I thank you for allowing me to represent you in 2009, and look forward to a new year as your MLA.
Wishing you and yours all the best in 2010,
Harry Chase
November 2009
Like many, many Albertans, my colleagues and I are greatly concerned with decisions and actions being made by this government, particularly when they threaten the very existence of programs and services that Albertans have clearly said they value.
The Stelmach government, like its Klein predecessor, treats spending on programs that involve the well-being of people as an expense instead of an investment.
My colleague, Kevin Taft, Official Opposition Health Critic, has produced a special edition of his MLA newsletter, and it paints a disturbing picture of how Tory mismanagement and neglect of the health care system is putting Albertans at risk.
Taft is the Alberta Liberal MLA for Edmonton-Riverview.
His special edition of the Edmonton-Riverview newsletter features:
• A timeline of Tory health care decisions, covering missteps from the early 90s to 2009
• Quotes from doctors and patients illustrating the challenges health care professionals and Albertans face every day thanks to decades of Tory neglect
• Concerns with children being treated in a tent at the Stollery Children’s Hospital, and the new Mazankowski Heart Centre standing empty for over a year
• A clear picture of confusion over health care staffing, showing how Tory administrations eliminated thousands of jobs, then identified large staffing shortages, only to freeze hiring this year
The theme of the newsletter " how quick fixes rarely lead to long-term solutions " is especially timely in the wake of health care spending cuts announced by Dr. Stephen Duckett, CEO of Alberta Health Services.
“I haven’t heard anyone saying we have too many nurses, but the Stelmach administration seems to be doing everything it can to push health care professionals out the door. And yet the administration claims that they will improve health care services. How is that possible when they’re cutting jobs and surgeries?”
HEALTH CARE Special Edition
Or to have a copy mailed to you, please contact the Calgary Varsity Consituency office.
As Official Opposition critic for Children and Youth Services, I launched the “SAFE KIDS SAVE DOLLARS” campaign on September 30th at the Annual General Meeting of the Alberta Association for Children and Families.
I encouraged delegates to aggressively lobby the Stelmach administration to avoid funding cuts to vital services for at-risk Alberta youth. I am gravely concerned by the cumulative effects of growing numbers of homeless young Albertans combined with Stelmach administration cutbacks to vital social services, including the forced closure of Bosco Homes facilities and funding cuts to the Boys and Girls Clubs, which have affected that organization’s crisis response team.
The Stelmach administration’s short-sighted approach is placing already vulnerable children at greater risk. Failing to intervene positively while at-risk kids are young inevitably leads to greater costs to society down the road; on the other hand, helping kids now helps them lead better lives and saves taxpayer money in the long run. In other words, safe kids save dollars.
It is possible to be simultaneously ethically and fiscally responsible. Investing in Alberta’s children is both the right thing to do and the fiscally smart thing to do. I encourage you to contact my constituency office, or click here:
http://alc.whitematter.ca/index.php/alc/content/safe_kids_save_dollars_chase_launches_campaign_to_protect_alberta_youth_fro/
for copies of the petition.
As always I welcome your input through letters, emails, phone calls and faxes at the constituency office.
#108, 4616 Valiant Drive NW Calgary AB T3A 0X9 (403) 216.5436 calgary.varsity@assembly.ab.ca
October 2009
Welcome to the Calgary-Varsity webpage, the online home of Harry Chase! Please feel free to look around, and check back often.
I hope that everyone has now settled into their fall routines, with children and youth back in school and taking part in healthy extra-curricular activities. The area that we know as the Calgary Varsity constituency encompasses the communities of Varsity, University Heights, Dalhousie, Brentwood, Charleswood, Banff Trail, Capital Hill and SE Silver Springs. We are fortunate to have the Alberta Children’s Hospital and the University of Calgary in our constituency. The fall term always brings a sense of purpose, vision and energy with returning students and faculty. Our Community Associations are important partners in supporting physical and social wellbeing in our neighborhoods. Businesses, schools, places of worship, organizations such as the VRRI and countless volunteers also contribute to strong communities and strong societies, which are a vital part of every democracy.
With this in mind, I am sorry to have to report that, due to poor management, what Albertans have built since the deep and often cruel cuts in the mid 1990’s appears to again be at risk. After years of blood, sweat and many tears, Albertans believed that we could finally look forward to the rewards of having tightened our personal belts for so long and working so hard to try to rebuild our core services including education, health care, safety nets and assistance for the disabled and seniors. Only when Premier Klein resigned did he admit that his government never had a plan for after the cuts!
After 15 consecutive years of multi-billion dollar surpluses, in less than 12 months we have gone to a multi-billion dollar deficit. Obviously there still is no plan. Health care professionals face a hiring freeze and forced gag order, school boards are having reserves resulting from prudent planning and spending clawed back and face budgets cut, rental supplement programs are broke, putting thousands on waiting lists, and seniors are being asked to bear the brunt of many cuts. Home foreclosures have more than doubled in just two years, we have a 102% increase in bankruptcies and the highest unemployment rates in 13 years.
A cursory look into the mismanagement of our tax dollars by this government reveals the following:
1) $10,000,000 Branding the Province
2) $25,000,000 ‘Greenwashing’ Environmental Reputation Internationally
3) $2,100,000 International Travel
4) $35,000,000 Horse Racing
5) $40,000,000 Senior Management Bonuses
6) $42,000,000 Health Board Severance Packages & Pensions
7) $70,000,000 Information Technology
8) $38,000,000 Cost to Form New Health Superboard
9) $222,000,000 Addition to the Peter Lougheed Hospital that is unstaffed, resulting in no new beds
10) $200,000,000 Mazinkowski Heart Institute that still does not have functioning Operating Rooms (Grand Opening was May 1, 2008 though no patients were moved there until this summer)
11) $2,500,000,000 Obligations under P3 contracts
Grand Total: $3,181,100,000!
A “Value for Dollar Audit” must be implemented for all new spending immediately, and for all current programs as quickly as possible. With infrastructure spending there must be provision for sustainable operational funding.
Please contact me with your ideas or concerns. The legislature resumes later this month and I will bring your voice to the assembly.
This has been a very busy fall in the Legislature. As your MLA, I take my responsibility to represent all of my constituents very seriously. I have addressed concerns through Question Period, Tablings and Private Members Statements while the Legislature was in Session. My staff continues to assist constituents in the local office, and I met with as many individuals and organizations as possible on Fridays and the weekends. I have also attended as many community functions and meetings as possible.
It has been my privilege to serve as your MLA again this past year. In an effort to continue to communicate effectively with you, the Calgary-Varsity Constituency is continually updating our website at www.HarryChaseMLA.com and my facebook page. You are always welcome to call, email or stop by the office to make specific inquiries or just to say hello. I thank you for allowing me to represent you in 2009, and look forward to a new year as your MLA.
Wishing you and yours all the best in 2010,
Harry Chase
November 2009
Like many, many Albertans, my colleagues and I are greatly concerned with decisions and actions being made by this government, particularly when they threaten the very existence of programs and services that Albertans have clearly said they value.
The Stelmach government, like its Klein predecessor, treats spending on programs that involve the well-being of people as an expense instead of an investment.
My colleague, Kevin Taft, Official Opposition Health Critic, has produced a special edition of his MLA newsletter, and it paints a disturbing picture of how Tory mismanagement and neglect of the health care system is putting Albertans at risk.
Taft is the Alberta Liberal MLA for Edmonton-Riverview.
His special edition of the Edmonton-Riverview newsletter features:
• A timeline of Tory health care decisions, covering missteps from the early 90s to 2009
• Quotes from doctors and patients illustrating the challenges health care professionals and Albertans face every day thanks to decades of Tory neglect
• Concerns with children being treated in a tent at the Stollery Children’s Hospital, and the new Mazankowski Heart Centre standing empty for over a year
• A clear picture of confusion over health care staffing, showing how Tory administrations eliminated thousands of jobs, then identified large staffing shortages, only to freeze hiring this year
The theme of the newsletter " how quick fixes rarely lead to long-term solutions " is especially timely in the wake of health care spending cuts announced by Dr. Stephen Duckett, CEO of Alberta Health Services.
“I haven’t heard anyone saying we have too many nurses, but the Stelmach administration seems to be doing everything it can to push health care professionals out the door. And yet the administration claims that they will improve health care services. How is that possible when they’re cutting jobs and surgeries?”
HEALTH CARE Special Edition
Or to have a copy mailed to you, please contact the Calgary Varsity Consituency office.
As Official Opposition critic for Children and Youth Services, I launched the “SAFE KIDS SAVE DOLLARS” campaign on September 30th at the Annual General Meeting of the Alberta Association for Children and Families.
I encouraged delegates to aggressively lobby the Stelmach administration to avoid funding cuts to vital services for at-risk Alberta youth. I am gravely concerned by the cumulative effects of growing numbers of homeless young Albertans combined with Stelmach administration cutbacks to vital social services, including the forced closure of Bosco Homes facilities and funding cuts to the Boys and Girls Clubs, which have affected that organization’s crisis response team.
The Stelmach administration’s short-sighted approach is placing already vulnerable children at greater risk. Failing to intervene positively while at-risk kids are young inevitably leads to greater costs to society down the road; on the other hand, helping kids now helps them lead better lives and saves taxpayer money in the long run. In other words, safe kids save dollars.
It is possible to be simultaneously ethically and fiscally responsible. Investing in Alberta’s children is both the right thing to do and the fiscally smart thing to do. I encourage you to contact my constituency office, or click here:
http://alc.whitematter.ca/index.php/alc/content/safe_kids_save_dollars_chase_launches_campaign_to_protect_alberta_youth_fro/
for copies of the petition.
As always I welcome your input through letters, emails, phone calls and faxes at the constituency office.
#108, 4616 Valiant Drive NW Calgary AB T3A 0X9 (403) 216.5436 calgary.varsity@assembly.ab.ca
October 2009
Welcome to the Calgary-Varsity webpage, the online home of Harry Chase! Please feel free to look around, and check back often.
I hope that everyone has now settled into their fall routines, with children and youth back in school and taking part in healthy extra-curricular activities. The area that we know as the Calgary Varsity constituency encompasses the communities of Varsity, University Heights, Dalhousie, Brentwood, Charleswood, Banff Trail, Capital Hill and SE Silver Springs. We are fortunate to have the Alberta Children’s Hospital and the University of Calgary in our constituency. The fall term always brings a sense of purpose, vision and energy with returning students and faculty. Our Community Associations are important partners in supporting physical and social wellbeing in our neighborhoods. Businesses, schools, places of worship, organizations such as the VRRI and countless volunteers also contribute to strong communities and strong societies, which are a vital part of every democracy.
With this in mind, I am sorry to have to report that, due to poor management, what Albertans have built since the deep and often cruel cuts in the mid 1990’s appears to again be at risk. After years of blood, sweat and many tears, Albertans believed that we could finally look forward to the rewards of having tightened our personal belts for so long and working so hard to try to rebuild our core services including education, health care, safety nets and assistance for the disabled and seniors. Only when Premier Klein resigned did he admit that his government never had a plan for after the cuts!
After 15 consecutive years of multi-billion dollar surpluses, in less than 12 months we have gone to a multi-billion dollar deficit. Obviously there still is no plan. Health care professionals face a hiring freeze and forced gag order, school boards are having reserves resulting from prudent planning and spending clawed back and face budgets cut, rental supplement programs are broke, putting thousands on waiting lists, and seniors are being asked to bear the brunt of many cuts. Home foreclosures have more than doubled in just two years, we have a 102% increase in bankruptcies and the highest unemployment rates in 13 years.
A cursory look into the mismanagement of our tax dollars by this government reveals the following:
1) $10,000,000 Branding the Province
2) $25,000,000 ‘Greenwashing’ Environmental Reputation Internationally
3) $2,100,000 International Travel
4) $35,000,000 Horse Racing
5) $40,000,000 Senior Management Bonuses
6) $42,000,000 Health Board Severance Packages & Pensions
7) $70,000,000 Information Technology
8) $38,000,000 Cost to Form New Health Superboard
9) $222,000,000 Addition to the Peter Lougheed Hospital that is unstaffed, resulting in no new beds
10) $200,000,000 Mazinkowski Heart Institute that still does not have functioning Operating Rooms (Grand Opening was May 1, 2008 though no patients were moved there until this summer)
11) $2,500,000,000 Obligations under P3 contracts
Grand Total: $3,181,100,000!
A “Value for Dollar Audit” must be implemented for all new spending immediately, and for all current programs as quickly as possible. With infrastructure spending there must be provision for sustainable operational funding.
Please contact me with your ideas or concerns. The legislature resumes later this month and I will bring your voice to the assembly.
 Heartbreaking” stories drive Albertans to Official Opposition website Friday, December 11, 2009 | Heartbreaking” stories drive Albertans to Official Opposition website
www.liepertmustgo.ca gets more response than Ask Premier Ed Edmonton " http://www.liepertmustgo.ca has received nearly 500 submissions from Albertans deeply concerned by what Ron Liepert has done to the health care system.
“Some of the stories we’re receiving are heartbreaking,” Taft says. “People are suffering immense personal tragedies and they’re looking for a place to share them, and to move the Premier to take action. So far they seem to feel that our website is a better alternative than Ask Premier Ed.” Taft says that the stories he’s reviewed have moved him profoundly, making him feel deep compassion for affected patients . . .
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