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“Beattie, who makes frequent deliveries to the Dewitt Park area for his garden centre business, said he noticed the grass was roughly knee-high in mid-May. Overall, he would like to ensure Ward 10 receives the same level of investment in park upgrades, compared to other parts of Hamilton.

“I’d certainly like to see our Ward 10 get our fair share,” said Beattie. “It feels like we’re a little behind other parks.”

Beattie said park upgrades must be comprehensive and planned for.

“Just be honest and let everyone know what’s happening,” he noted.”

“Beattie, 46, said his campaign will be issues-based and focus on community concerns about housing developments that are out of place with surrounding neighbourhoods and often lack supporting infrastructure like sidewalks, suitable roads and transit.

His examples include the city’s rezoning of a Baseline Road municipal property for a nine-storey apartment building, the Winona Point survey near the Costco plaza, the proposed skyscrapers near the lake shore, the planned redevelopment of LIUNA Gardens in Winona, and the recently approved 11-storey condo building near Cenotaph Park.

“It’s on people’s minds and respectfully to our incumbent councillor, she is known as a pro-development councillor, and I’d like to position myself as a pro-community councillor.””

““If they’re getting off the highway, what will be compelling to them to follow the detours and to land back out on Hwy. 8, where all of these businesses are?” Beattie asked Sept. 17.

The city provided a sample of the signage, which states access is open to all local businesses, including Winona Gardens, Puddicombe Farms and Leaning Post Wines.

Beattie said local customers should be able to find their way around the detour with little difficulty, but he’s planning to use the power of social media to let out-of-town customers know Winona Gardens and other nearby businesses remain open and accessible.

“We’re still open, and there will be a disruption for three months,” said Beattie. “But we want to make sure that … customers in our local trading area that would be venturing out to get their pumpkins and their cornstalks, their fruit and their wine and everything else, that they still know we’re actually very easily accessible.””

Scott Thompson spoke with Jeff Beattie, to find out more about how generations of the family have cared for Winona Gardens, as well as how they adapted to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“"I wasn't 100 per cent convinced the community's voice was being captured like it needs to be," says trustee Jeff Beattie. "You only get one chance to name a school, so you better do it right and make it something everyone can buy into," Beattie says.”

“Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie said he appreciates the naming process tries to strike a balance between what the community supports and broader considerations, but he saw no "groundswell" in favour of Koostachin, unlike with Custis and Tesla.

He said one of his motivations for becoming trustee was his community's uproar in 2011 when the board considered a name other than Winona for the replacement elementary school built there.

"I can't help but go back to my days as a community member and wonder about what the community acceptance of the name that's being (put) forward would be outside the bubble of this room," Beattie said.”

“Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie, who supported the changes, said the restriction on moving more than half of a school's students thwarted an advisory panel's ability to find a better plan.

"There wasn't really a winning option anywhere," Beattie said. "It was an exhaustive process and there were a lot of different permutations and combinations that were examined, and we kept on coming up with options that were less desirable."

Beattie said sending new Nash students to Tapleytown is a short-term solution because the school, which already has four portables, is projected to be nearly double its building capacity of 291 students by 2022.

He suggested the board can at least temporarily send overflow students to one of the three lower Stoney Creek schools scheduled to close once Collegiate Avenue is expanded and Eastdale and Memorial are rebuilt.”

Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie said he didn't support the subcommittee's recommendation to proceed with the addition because he hadn't had a chance to "thoroughly engage" the affected school communities.

He said a 6 p.m. information session at Collegiate on Dec. 21 will provide that opportunity, but many question if the addition is financially feasible given the school's state of repair.

"It was an issue that I raised and the community continues to raise, whether or not this is the correct direction to move in," Beattie said.

“Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie objected to the reordering, which bumped Mount Albion's addition down a spot for the second time since June, when trustees overruled a staff recommendation and moved Sherwood ahead of it. He said he fully supports the Macdonald hub plan but trusts staff's ranking because it's based on need and the strength of business cases.

"I'm having the worst case of deja vu right now," Beattie said.”

“Todd White and Jeff Beattie have been re-elected to lead the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board. White, a ward 5 trustee, will remain as chair of the board and Beattie, a ward 9 and 10 trustee, will stay on as vice-chair following a Dec. 5 annual meeting. Public board leaders are elected on one-year mandates.”

“"I think the strength of the plan speaks for itself," Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie said, welcoming an end to "the French immersion drought" in wards 9 and 10. "If we were planning new schools in a growth area, we would be looking for central locations, large parks with green space, highly walkable schools," he said.”

“Stoney Creek trustee Jeff Beattie said the latest numbers help show the public why the board is closing schools.

"We do take a lot of heat for consolidating schools, but when you look at the fact that we've essentially lost three medium-sized elementary schools in one year, that's a significant decrease," he said.

"It tells the story of why we have to make some of the tough decisions that we've had to make and continue to make, because the system is shrinking and that's the reality."”

“Jeff Beattie, Ward 9 and 10 trustee, said the process for Stoney Creek is already 25 years in the making for its aging schools. He says he admires the work the original trustees had made 50 years ago in planning schools that "withstood the test of time."

"We have the opportunity to do the same," said Beattie. "We can plan what our education will look like for the next 50 to 60 years."”

“Beattie said the six Stoney Creek schools haven't seen upgrades for decades and constituents have been promised reviews since the Wentworth County days.

"The newest investment in any of those schools was about 1972," he said.

"They've been waiting and waiting and waiting for this."”