BOYLE — Since moving to Boyle 11 years ago, there has hardly been a cause, organization or community group that Shelby Kiteley hasn't been involved with in one way or another, all while splitting her time between working, parenting and being a village councillor.
And she puts the same vigour and effort into all three of those very important jobs.
“The first term I wanted to run because I see a lot of potential in Boyle,” she said in an interview Aug. 7. “I believe there's a lot of opportunity here yet to be tapped into. I volunteer and I am part of a lot of different groups, so I hear different ideas and I saw council as an opportunity to bring all of that forward.”
Goals in municipal politics take time to accomplish, but Kiteley is all for putting in the hours needed to be an effective councillor.
“I think we've made good strides to accomplishing what we have; it's always a work in progress and there's always room to improve. The work is never done, and the needs of the community are always changing.”
With all the changes over the past four years, it will take experience to ensure Boyle flourishes, she said.
“Of course, there's going to be funding cuts, there's going to be budgetary cuts, but Boyle's so resilient. We're used to working on a small budget to begin with,” said Kiteley. “I think we're going to be sustainable, but I do think we've got a lot of hard work ahead of us. Between the new policing funding, decrease in grants, aging infrastructure and an overall increase of cost in our day-to-day operations, we've got to be realistic about the impact all of this is going to have, but I'm quite optimistic it is something we can overcome.”
That’s not to say some things haven’t been crossed off the list during her first term though, she noted.
“One of the things I wanted to accomplish was downtown beautification and we're taking the right steps to get that done. I wanted to make sure there was open communication and people felt comfortable reaching out to the council and having transparency between council and the community and I feel like we've really done a good job opening up that door,” Kiteley said.
“Another thing that was important to me was to spotlight Boyle as a year-round community – we have such a population influx in the summer, which is fantastic, but we have so much to offer in the winter as well that's so often overlooked.”
Kiteley is looking at long-range planning to ensure essential services are, at minimum, maintained.
“Definitely keeping up on our infrastructure projects, making sure our roads, water systems and everything are going to hold up and improve via strategic planning,” she said. “I want to make sure resources we have in our community stay here, such as a hospital, seniors housing and school."
Going forward Kiteley would also like to have affordable and accessible amenities for young families coming into the community and expand the retail base.
“We need to attract new business to the community so we can grow and evolve with the times,” she said. “My family has been fortunate enough to join the business community by opening our store; I also sit on the Chamber of Commerce board and because of that I'm able to see the needs of businesses and can bring feedback to council to find a means to support them.
“We are very fortunate we have a passionate community behind us, and I think that's going to help council be successful.”
