By Chris Lewis/September 23, 2021
Former Bay Bulls councillor Jason Sullivan, whose seat was vacated a previous term ago for missing three council meetings in a row, is throwing his name back in the ring.
Sullivan is one of 10 names on the ballot for council, and a familiar one to those who have followed council over the last decade or so. His time on council was characterized by accusations and counter accusations of conflict of interest involving fellow councillors. He was also part of a council group who evicted councillor Joan Luby from her position over what she described as a trumped-up accusation of conflict of interest. Their move was later overturned by the court and Luby was reinstated with the Town having to pick up the legal bill.
Sullivan admitted his past experiences on council had not been the best leading up to his removal from his seat. At the time, he had missed three council meetings in a row: one, he said, was due to him attending his son’s sports game, but the other two were associated with the sudden loss of his father.
“If you miss three in a row, council has the opportunity to eject you,” Sullivan said. “I had put in for a bereavement leave to deal with some stuff, but they denied that and booted me off. Because it was so close to the upcoming general election (at the time) I wasn’t replaced and the seat was vacant.”
Although he said it was not in his nature to give up, he decided to hold off on putting his name in for the 2017 election in order to deal with personal things.
Now, Sullivan is hoping for another chance with a potentially new slate of council members this fall.
Sullivan said one of his biggest gripes with the current council is its taxation policies, which he attributed to the Town’s stagnant growth over the last few years.
He highlighted in particular the Town’s craft tax, stating that it would be one of the first things he would work to axe entirely. That, and some of the development regulations.
“If you want to change the colour of your siding, you’ve got to go down and get a permit for that,” Sullivan said. “I don’t agree with that. If you’re upgrading your property, that’s making the town more beautiful as it is. So, I don’t think you should be burdened by an extra little fee. That’s nonsense, if you ask me. I want to try and get rid of a lot of that.”
Sullivan would also like to develop a Southern Shore trailway. If elected, he said, he would like to approach neighbouring municipalities and see a trailway established that would stretch from the Goulds to Trepassey, which he believes would be a solid economic benefactor for the entire region.
“Most of the other regions in the province now have a good trailway,” he said. “They just got $650,000 to put a foot path around Long Pond in Bay Bulls, which is outside of town and kind of out of the way. So, there’s obviously money available for those sorts of things. I mean, I could put a trail from Bay Bulls to Trepassey for $650,000. They must be paving that one in gold.”
Sullivan said, due to the currently small size of the council, there was not enough people to volunteer for a public works position. So, for the first time, the Town hired a public works director.
“They’re paying him between $50,000 and $100,000 a year, and I’d like to eliminate that job to roll that money back into the community for different things like a tax break for people living on old age security,” he said. “I’ve got a number of ideas. It seems like, over the last few years, they’re (the current council) just trying to drain more money out of people for no good reason.”
He said, when he was on council, there was plenty of money and he would like to see those funds go into more things that directly benefit residents.
