Q3: Caledon's Economic Development Strategy appears to be similar to our            neighbour's.  It is also a stated objective to have more people live and work in             Caledon. With the current stock of high priced housing, how does your Economic Development Strategy plan to attract firms with high paying jobs and fit with Caledon's image and reputation?

Regional Council Candidates:

Richard Paterak

"I think we need to try harder to attract higher level employment. That is, research and development campuses, IT businesses, and other office type establishments—insurance companies etc."

Jim Pattison

No reply.

Area Council Candidates:

Doug Beffort

"We say that our image and reputation centres on being ‘green’. If that’s so, we need to highlight that image. I believe we need to attract many more green industries. We should be the ‘silicon valley’ of the green industry in Canada and the world. We could even offer the opportunity to have research facilities located in an area of Caledon known worldwide for creating new ideas in health, education and the environment to improve the problems we face in each of those areas. I see an industry devoted to combining the many fundraisers we have for hospital research and diseases and put the research under one roof for each issue and combine the money and the technologies and the expertise and announce to the world that a solution has been found in Caledon. Such industries would attract very high paid and intelligent individuals to our area. We need to encourage IT companies, Insurance Companies, other non-industrial companies to use our land to develop ideas and thoughts and products to help the world. We are located so close to a large market, we have direct access to the world via an international airport and we are a perfect spot for the development of a ‘green’ label industrial workforce."

"I would like to consider the opportunities that exist for further education of the workforce of the future. It is now stated that 70% of the jobs being created today require a tremendous retraining and education to provide the best candidates. We can use our location and our ideas to host educational seminars, retreats, think tanks and opportunities, again, to let people worldwide know that we are open for this type of business."

Tim Forester

"My wife and I have the luxury of living and working in Caledon. Not spending time commuting allows us to spend more time with family and helping the community. In today’s modern world many companies do not need to be in the urban environment. These companies tend to be technology based and pay higher than average wages. We could look at developing rural or semi-rural business parks that would attract this type of business. We should review successes of other municipalities and then develop a made in Caledon Solution."

John Martin

"Caledon economic strategy is upside down. Instead of attracting firms with only high paying jobs the town should look within itself. The town is looking for tax dollars to offset residential taxes. Within Caledon there are hundreds of viable businesses operating under the radar. If these businesses were to be encouraged to come out of the shadows with assurances the would not be taxed to death   these businesses could thrive grow and employ more local people. Also by spreading the business tax load legitimate small businesses (the ones which do pay commercial taxes now) may get some reprieve from the burden imposed on them by the town. There is a hitch in this plan though ,it could be quite complicated with variance to allow some businesses to operate where they are. Also land costs will probably prevent businesses from moving out of their basement into a designated area."