Martin Taylor has worked in local government for over 30 years across Northern Alberta.
Now, he’s looking to bring that experience to School District 57 as a trustee.
Taylor moved back to Prince George a few years ago to be closer to family.
“I thought it’s time to give back to the community,” Taylor said.
“Public education is extremely important in our society, and I’ve been noticing some issues off and on with the school board, I thought, maybe I can help with my background being an Administrative Officer for many years working in public service.”
“I’m concerned with people leaving halfway through their term, some issues with the board, high turnover with Superintendents, those are just not good governance,” Taylor explained.
“It happens on boards and councils, but we need to try to avoid that.”
He said another thing that concerned him is the district being under a special advisor from the province.
“When that happens there are some serious issues going on, so the community needs to put forward some good people on the board, get that corrected, because that’s always a grey cloud, and that’s hard to recruit and retain people when you have those issues,” Taylor explained.
“We need to be a whole lot better, and hopefully the next batch of school board trustees can try to turn that around a bit. There’s all kinds of challenges with changes in rules with the Ministry of Education, there’s always budget issues, there’s always community issues, but we need to have a sound board there. It’s not going to be perfect, but try to turn it around for the best, and of course the best is all about serving the kids.”
The School District Elections, along with the Municipal Election, will take place on Saturday, October 15th.