Some days I just want to punch this city in the face.
CJOB and the Freep are reporting that, miraculously, just three days before the March 31 fundraising deadline for the Friends of Upper Fort Garry, the group has suddenly been given a TWO-YEAR EXTENSION. Even more amazing, the extension was actually agreed to by Crystal Developers.
This deal stinks, and badly.
In recent weeks, Crystal had repeatedly said it expected the City to honour its parking lot purchase deal if the Friends didn’t meet their fundraising target. Crystal had come just short of threatening a lawsuit over the issue. So how were they suddenly convinced to agree to a two-year extension??
I don’t want to tempt the lawyers myself, but — hypothetically speaking — I wonder if any of the Friends ever toyed with the thought that it might be cheaper to buy an extension and wait for more government funding rather than paying for the park themselves?
According to the Freep, “Crystal Developers owner Ruben Spletzer said he was offered no financial incentives to walk away from a $1.2 million deal to purchase a parcel of surplus city land at the corner of Fort Street and Assiniboine Avenue.”
In completely unrelated news, my bullshit detector just exploded into 1.2 million pieces.
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Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: City of Winnipeg, friends of upper fort garry, the friends and the mayor and ruben spletzer all suck, upper fort garry
I agree. When it’s finally constructed in 7 years we can go and do some citizen journalism on the site and get some Vox Pop.
I think that what you really want to do is Kick This City/Bully
http://radio3.cbc.ca/play/band/Kara-Keith/Kick-This-City/
Who gets to wear the white hat? I don’t think that it’s Gary, Sam or Ruben. The “friends’ sure do know their way around. Must be nice.
Yesterday was a great moment for the city of Winnipeg. A piece of our history was spared from greedy developers and the future at any cost types.
Sorry you can’t celebrate.
If not money, what would be Crystal’s incentive to walk away from the deal. Maybe Reuben realized that he could trace his roots all the way back to this historic landmark. Yes, Clan Spletzer, one of the founding families of Manitoba.
@A Friend – Ah yes, the historic parking lot where…oh yeah, nothing actually happened there. Sort of like what’s going to happen inside the new interpretive centre.
To “Friend of the Fort”
A piece of our history has been spared from nobody. Anybody who believes otherwise has simply been deluded by a false notion that somebody was going to bulldoze, or otherwise deface the fort.
The reality is that nobody in this city would even entertain the thought of bulldozing such a landmark.
No other city would allow such a key piece of Canadian history to be defaced with a condo development.. We dodged a bullet thanks to the work of the Friends, a FEW elected officials and some great work in the media to raise awarness from Vic Grant, Gordon Sinclair et al.
In 2 years when the site is a wonderful park, with a world class education centre it will be great to see all the people like you that praise the plan, just like the foot bridge to St. Boniface, which negative nancies hated, until it was built.
I have a few questions for Mr/Ms Friend.
Can you address why the unmistakable cross-membership between the Friends and Manitoba Club, which benefits directly from the cancellation of the apartment block out their back window, was never mentioned by the Friends or by any reporters in the major media outlets?
Also why did Sinclair never mention in the columns where he listed major contributors, that the big donors themselves were actually on the Friends board ?
Why should the taxpayer shell out $10M to preserve the view for the rich and connected of the Manitoba Club?
I really question why Crystal Developers droped their develpoment plan?
I fail to see why a much needed addition to downtown living space (something Winnipeg should encourage becasue people living downtown is better than things like the MTS Centre or Hydro tower) could not exist at the corner of Main and Assiniboine, with a public park and outdoor interpretive centre taking up the rest of the space.
I wonder what it’s really going to cost the City/Province to move the Petro Canada station. I’d be willing to bet that the great unwashed will never know the true cost of that land flip. Maybe I ought to buy shares in PC. Hmmm