Comment 40717

By adrian (registered) | Posted May 17, 2010 at 03:27:32

I never saw "best place to raise a child" as being limited to poverty issues. I think it's meant to be an ambitious vision statement intended as a basis to transform the city.

The problem is that it is simply not taken seriously, as Ryan has pointed out.

"Best" is a big word. The goal is not "to be a good place to raise a child", "to be a decent place to raise a child", or even, "to be a safe place to raise a child." "Best" says that it is not enough just to do everything right for children as a city: we actually have to do everything better than everyone else. Better than Vancouver, better than Montreal, better than Paris.

By that measure this statement is worse than a failure. It's a farce.

"To be the best place to raise a child" ought to be a prism through which all municipal decisions are viewed and evaluated.

On every planning document, there ought to be a section where the planner defends their recommendations in the context of this goal.

The simple fact of having to do this exercise for every plan would likely have a huge impact on planning in this city (imagine being asked to write this section right after recommending retaining a truck route in a residential neighbourhood - the rationalization required would simply be too difficult!)

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