When municipalities like Barrie look at their budgets it is always critical for our elected officials and the bureaucrats to assess and analyze value for the dollar spent.
Some “get it” and some don’t. Just tightening you belt won’t solve economic problems, in fact, sometimes spending less can mean a decrease in economic growth.
Simply put, it’s the fundamental difference between “spending” and “investing”.
Spending usually means paying for a something that isn't essential and doesn’t have a tangible benefit to economic growth or provide a critical pubic service; it’s the “nice to have” stuff.
Investing on the other hand presupposes that there will be a tangible return for the dollars spent.
Unfortunately the difference between the two ideas gets blurred all too often, especially when we speak about investing in cultural institutions such as museums or art galleries. There is a vibrant debate about the value of that sort of investment in Barrie but there is one “investment” that brings undeniable benefit. Higher education.
A study done by “Liberty Street Economics” found a direct correlation between the percentage of population with at least a Bachelor of Arts degree and the amount of innovation, economic activity and growth in that community. It also found that in general ALL workers in these highly educated areas tend to be more productive and earn higher wages regardless of their education.
For at least a decade the city of Barrie and numerous other institutions like Georgian College, Laurentian University and Lakehead University have lobbied hard for Barrie to have a university presence in some form.
During my time in Queen’s Park the case was strongly made to the government by local authorities, businesses and citizens for a university degree granting institution to be established in Barrie. It looked good for the city, but as time went by sides began to divide and different ideas began in emerge what that establishment might look like.
Would it mean degree granting status for Georgian? Expanded degree partnerships with other universities? A standalone university? A satellite campus of another university?
As the community divided the provincial government moved closer to making a decision about which community would benefit from new campuses or expanded programming. As the largest city in Canada without a university, Barrie seemed like a shoe-in. But as Barrie has been prone to do in the past we stole defeat from the jaws of victory and were denied any version of a new campus or expanded degree granting authority. Largely because of our lack of a cohesive vision for growth of higher education in Barrie.
This wasn't anybody's fault per se, and perhaps we were even the victim of a touch of over enthusiasm but the fact remains that without a comprehensive and stable university programming present Barrie will be playing catch up.
The good news is we have a world class college and so far we seem to be keeping up fine . . . but can it last?
