2012 grade: F
2011 grade: C-
2010 grade: D
2009 grade: C
2008 grade: D
2007 grade: D+
David Hendsbee voted against taking Hydrostone out of the BID, but for selling St. Pat’s Alexandra. He voted for the stadium and for sending the Skye Halifax development to a public hearing.
But where Hendsbee really distinguished himself was with his over-the-top obnoxiousness when it came to the Occupy movement. At meeting after meeting, he ridiculed the group and churlishly told Occupiers how they should be conducting their protest. There’s no evidence that Hendsbee ever went to visit the encampment and attempt to engage protesters in positive dialogue—rather, he simply made pronouncements sitting in the comfort of the council chambers, with the TV trained on him.
Hendsbee had no problem attacking the powerless Occupiers at every turn, but when he had the chance to show some real courage, he ran from it—he voted against censuring Peter Kelly.
Council as a whole owns the hypocrisy of siccing the cops on some kids trying to make a political point while letting the mayor get away scot-free with his multiple sins, but that hypocrisy is epitomized as one odious, spineless coward in the person of Hendsbee.
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Welcome to the 2012 City Council Report Card
This article appears in May 10-16, 2012.
To top it all off, the “charges” from the police raid, that cost the city so much in overtime pay for the Remembrance Day debacle against the protestors, have ALL been dropped.
Hendsbee is a Tory, or claims to be. So he naturally, and correctly, thought the Occupy crowd should have gone down to province house and gave Dexter an earful. That was never on because the unions were bankrolling the disaffected people who needed housing, and addiction services. No way Rick Clarke and Kyle Buot wanted them anywhere near their NDP friends.
Other than that he loves spending our money on every crazy ‘Put Halifax on the map’ idea and now wants every council member to have a constituency office and staff. He sounds like a Democrat from Chicago; a natural ward heeler. He should be turfed, but he has made sure to spread our taxes around the district. He makes LBJ look like an amateur.