Brilliant work, Neil. It is astounding this extraordinary give-away of public land and money to developers. A superb follow-up piece would be all the things that the citizens of Ottawa could get for all the money given to OSEG - How many daycare centers? How many genuine parks? How many community public health clinics?
The second thing that boggles my mind when I re-visit Ottawa is the shambling condition of the roads in the areas whose councilors do not support the mayor. Potholes and canyon-sized cracks like downtown Havana... while out in the suburbs, where the councilors toe the line, the roads are in pristine shape.
While fully supportive of this campaign, I do suggest a clarification. By "1% property tax increase" I believe you mean one percentage point? (Anyone who interprets your message literally may think that a 1% increase is very little!)
(I learned some years ago that 1 %-point increase means, on the average tax bill, an increase of $7/month or $84/year and yields $20 million.)
Lived in Ottawa long enough to see the slow rise of this corruption played out by developers.
If Minto’s Beechwood Avenue development in New Edinburgh is Minto’s idea of a community project then Landsdowne will surely be a let down. After making all kinds of promises to retire the village in order to get approvals they built their condos and did little else. The “village restoration” was no longer a priority. Their commercial space at street level remained empty for years because their rents were too expensive to bring back the businesses and services, and they refused to subdivide the units to provide smaller areas for small scale entrepreneurs. They waited until they secured leases with sure renters like the LCBO. Shameful but this gets played out over and over again because Council never makes them accountable.
Landsdowne is a terrible deal for this city, a city that is in need of more meaningful projects with high, positive community impact.
We have to convince Council to scrap this project.
When $$ drive the deal. Rather than sustainability. Unfortunately GEN X are good at making money. By charging more & giving less. Which has its benefits. Until you realize they lack the talent. That come when you are dealing with a 2 decade old Gold Rush. Their generation started by going after the disposable cash of the boom to bust of the Hi Tech. Which Harper admitted was a problem. Now the only thing of value is the over priced condo. Who paid to have a prime seat to the games. Only due to being in Ottawa, the odd of making $$ with the 2 decade old Gold Rush driven GDP. Require innovation ,community collaboration that has little to do with $$ but sustainability. That does require 21st century vision.
Brilliant work, Neil. It is astounding this extraordinary give-away of public land and money to developers. A superb follow-up piece would be all the things that the citizens of Ottawa could get for all the money given to OSEG - How many daycare centers? How many genuine parks? How many community public health clinics?
The second thing that boggles my mind when I re-visit Ottawa is the shambling condition of the roads in the areas whose councilors do not support the mayor. Potholes and canyon-sized cracks like downtown Havana... while out in the suburbs, where the councilors toe the line, the roads are in pristine shape.
While fully supportive of this campaign, I do suggest a clarification. By "1% property tax increase" I believe you mean one percentage point? (Anyone who interprets your message literally may think that a 1% increase is very little!)
(I learned some years ago that 1 %-point increase means, on the average tax bill, an increase of $7/month or $84/year and yields $20 million.)
Lived in Ottawa long enough to see the slow rise of this corruption played out by developers.
If Minto’s Beechwood Avenue development in New Edinburgh is Minto’s idea of a community project then Landsdowne will surely be a let down. After making all kinds of promises to retire the village in order to get approvals they built their condos and did little else. The “village restoration” was no longer a priority. Their commercial space at street level remained empty for years because their rents were too expensive to bring back the businesses and services, and they refused to subdivide the units to provide smaller areas for small scale entrepreneurs. They waited until they secured leases with sure renters like the LCBO. Shameful but this gets played out over and over again because Council never makes them accountable.
Landsdowne is a terrible deal for this city, a city that is in need of more meaningful projects with high, positive community impact.
We have to convince Council to scrap this project.
When $$ drive the deal. Rather than sustainability. Unfortunately GEN X are good at making money. By charging more & giving less. Which has its benefits. Until you realize they lack the talent. That come when you are dealing with a 2 decade old Gold Rush. Their generation started by going after the disposable cash of the boom to bust of the Hi Tech. Which Harper admitted was a problem. Now the only thing of value is the over priced condo. Who paid to have a prime seat to the games. Only due to being in Ottawa, the odd of making $$ with the 2 decade old Gold Rush driven GDP. Require innovation ,community collaboration that has little to do with $$ but sustainability. That does require 21st century vision.