Showing posts with label hamilton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hamilton. Show all posts
Monday, August 9, 2010
A Recommended Site
While I will soon move on to other things on this blog, an excellent source of information for those of you following the Hamilton stadium debate is Raise The Hammer, a web magazine devoted to various issues pertaining to Hamilton.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
What Is Really Going on Here?
In reviewing earlier statements pertaining to the Federal Conservative Government's decree that they would not fund the West Harbour Stadium site, it is obvious that we are being lied to, by both the federal and provincial governments.
Allow me to reproduce part of a report carried in the August 07th edition of The Hamilton Spectator:
In a statement released yesterday afternoon, MPPs Sophia Aggelonitis and Ted McMeekin confirmed the province is pulling its funding from the west harbour. Aggelonitis -- who says she got a phone call late Thursday from the premier's office alerting her of the funding change -- said the move was prompted by a federal government decision to choose the east Mountain.
"We have said all along that we respect the decision-making process and we want to make sure that Hamilton gets a Pan Am stadium," Aggelonitis said. "What has now changed, unfortunately, is that the federal government has told the city it will not fund west harbour."
"We didn't make the decision, but at the end of the day, the province does not have the money to fund a whole stadium. We cannot go it alone," Aggelonitis said.
Local MP David Sweet and federal Minister of Sport Gary Lunn didn't reply to calls for comment.
Ted McMeekin said the federal government passed its decision on to the province through Pan Am CEO Ian Troop.
"Apparently the federal minister called Ian Troop and made it clear that they weren't going to come to the table with money for the west harbour," he said.
Troop issued the following statement via e-mail:
"Toronto 2015 will be able to offer some perspective when we know the city's direction. Until then, we don't have anything to add to the discussion."
According to the above excerpt, the message from the federal government was passed on by Ian troop, CEO of HostCo, to the Provincial Liberal Government. Now, especially given the denial of the Harper Government through Federal Minister of Sport Gary Lunn that such a statement was ever made to Troop, isn't there at least one logical question clear thinking demands?
That question: “Is there any credible way, short of concluding massive incompetence on the part of the Liberal McGuinty Government, that there weren't measures in place and employed to confirm the truth of what they were being told by a private citizen, even if he is is the CEO of the 2015 Pan Am Organizing Committee? In other words, are they trying to tell us that they made no inquiries of the feds about this, but based simply on the Troop notification, they drafted a united front with the feds?
One more thing that is also immediately interesting is that, given the chance when the veto story first broke, both area Conservative David Sweet, and Federal Minister Lunn, declined to comment. Would that have not have been the perfect opportunity to comment, to set the record straight?
Yet only silence. Until, of course, the official story was concocted.
Allow me to reproduce part of a report carried in the August 07th edition of The Hamilton Spectator:
In a statement released yesterday afternoon, MPPs Sophia Aggelonitis and Ted McMeekin confirmed the province is pulling its funding from the west harbour. Aggelonitis -- who says she got a phone call late Thursday from the premier's office alerting her of the funding change -- said the move was prompted by a federal government decision to choose the east Mountain.
"We have said all along that we respect the decision-making process and we want to make sure that Hamilton gets a Pan Am stadium," Aggelonitis said. "What has now changed, unfortunately, is that the federal government has told the city it will not fund west harbour."
"We didn't make the decision, but at the end of the day, the province does not have the money to fund a whole stadium. We cannot go it alone," Aggelonitis said.
Local MP David Sweet and federal Minister of Sport Gary Lunn didn't reply to calls for comment.
Ted McMeekin said the federal government passed its decision on to the province through Pan Am CEO Ian Troop.
"Apparently the federal minister called Ian Troop and made it clear that they weren't going to come to the table with money for the west harbour," he said.
Troop issued the following statement via e-mail:
"Toronto 2015 will be able to offer some perspective when we know the city's direction. Until then, we don't have anything to add to the discussion."
According to the above excerpt, the message from the federal government was passed on by Ian troop, CEO of HostCo, to the Provincial Liberal Government. Now, especially given the denial of the Harper Government through Federal Minister of Sport Gary Lunn that such a statement was ever made to Troop, isn't there at least one logical question clear thinking demands?
That question: “Is there any credible way, short of concluding massive incompetence on the part of the Liberal McGuinty Government, that there weren't measures in place and employed to confirm the truth of what they were being told by a private citizen, even if he is is the CEO of the 2015 Pan Am Organizing Committee? In other words, are they trying to tell us that they made no inquiries of the feds about this, but based simply on the Troop notification, they drafted a united front with the feds?
One more thing that is also immediately interesting is that, given the chance when the veto story first broke, both area Conservative David Sweet, and Federal Minister Lunn, declined to comment. Would that have not have been the perfect opportunity to comment, to set the record straight?
Yet only silence. Until, of course, the official story was concocted.
A Portrait of Passionate Local Democracy
Having grown up just east of the core, there will always be a special place in my heart for downtown Hamilton and the vivid memories I have of a time that it teemed with people at night, attracted to the wide array of stores ranging from Kresges and Woolworths to Birks Jewelllers and Eatons. I suspect it is the realization of how important a vital downtown is to the health of a community that propels so many people to vocal and passionate support for the inner city, something I suspect might be difficult for those raised in the anesthetic environs of suburbia to really understand.
That passion and love was much in evidence at yesterday's rally for the West Harbour Stadium site held in Hess Village. What follows is a small photo essay that I hope helps to convey a small element of that fervour.
Friday, August 6, 2010
My Letter to McGuinty
While the following may seem quite harsh and unforgiving, it accurately reflects my sentiments regarding the betrayal of Hamilton by the Ontario Liberal Government. This will be of interest only to those who are concerned about the current controversy revolving around the selection of a stadium site for the Hamilton portion of the Pan Am Games:
Dear Mr. McGuinty:
Once more you have provided me with another reason I was right in deciding to withhold my support from the provincial Liberal Party at the next election. Despite claiming for the past few weeks that the location for the Hamilton Pan Am stadium entirely an independent local decision, you have overridden local decision-making and decreed that it must be located on the East Mountain. In addition to that decree, which will wind up costing local taxpayers $80 million more than if it were sited in the West Harbour, according to a staff report delivered to city councillors, I believe you are once more being dishonest with the public as to the reason for your betrayal of your earlier statements of impartiality.
According to your spokesperson Sophia Aggelonitis, the reason for this reversal is that the Federal Government decided it would withhold funding for the West Harbour site, and the Provincial Government cannot go it alone. The only flaw with this fable is that the announcement made it sound as if both the Federal and Provincial Governments were in accord on this issue. Since you stand to lose much owing to taxpayer outrage over this dictate, why would you have gone along with it? Would there not have been more political capital, especially if you hope to have more than one elected Liberal in the area after the next election, had you said that the Province stands behind the independence of Hamilton's decision, and would guarantee the already committed amount of money, provided that a new stadium was actually built for the Pan Am Games?
As well, when questioned by CHCH news host Nick Dixon about the influence that private interests might have played in influencing the decision, her answer was, as they say in television courtroom drama, unresponsive, as she went on to answer a question that wasn't asked, a favorite trick, I have observed of the contemporary evasive politician.
It is clear to me, and probably to many clear-thinking Canadians, that private interests (a.k.a., Bob Young) reached out to other private interests (a.k.a David Braley, the former owner of the Tiger-Cats, former Pan Am board member, current owner of two other C.F.L. teams, and a newly-appointed Conservative Senator) whose business interests are best served by a football league that includes the Tiger-Cats.
Just as you and your Party evaded responsibility for the cruel lie you perpetrated on Ontarians when colluding with the police to deprive peaceful protesters of their Charter Rights, this latest misrepresentation leads me to conclude that your contempt for the people's right not to be lied to merits the withholding of my vote in the next election, and provides me with the motivation to try to persuade as many as I can, through the various media available to me, to do likewise.
Lorne Warwick
Dundas, Ontario
Dear Mr. McGuinty:
Once more you have provided me with another reason I was right in deciding to withhold my support from the provincial Liberal Party at the next election. Despite claiming for the past few weeks that the location for the Hamilton Pan Am stadium entirely an independent local decision, you have overridden local decision-making and decreed that it must be located on the East Mountain. In addition to that decree, which will wind up costing local taxpayers $80 million more than if it were sited in the West Harbour, according to a staff report delivered to city councillors, I believe you are once more being dishonest with the public as to the reason for your betrayal of your earlier statements of impartiality.
According to your spokesperson Sophia Aggelonitis, the reason for this reversal is that the Federal Government decided it would withhold funding for the West Harbour site, and the Provincial Government cannot go it alone. The only flaw with this fable is that the announcement made it sound as if both the Federal and Provincial Governments were in accord on this issue. Since you stand to lose much owing to taxpayer outrage over this dictate, why would you have gone along with it? Would there not have been more political capital, especially if you hope to have more than one elected Liberal in the area after the next election, had you said that the Province stands behind the independence of Hamilton's decision, and would guarantee the already committed amount of money, provided that a new stadium was actually built for the Pan Am Games?
As well, when questioned by CHCH news host Nick Dixon about the influence that private interests might have played in influencing the decision, her answer was, as they say in television courtroom drama, unresponsive, as she went on to answer a question that wasn't asked, a favorite trick, I have observed of the contemporary evasive politician.
It is clear to me, and probably to many clear-thinking Canadians, that private interests (a.k.a., Bob Young) reached out to other private interests (a.k.a David Braley, the former owner of the Tiger-Cats, former Pan Am board member, current owner of two other C.F.L. teams, and a newly-appointed Conservative Senator) whose business interests are best served by a football league that includes the Tiger-Cats.
Just as you and your Party evaded responsibility for the cruel lie you perpetrated on Ontarians when colluding with the police to deprive peaceful protesters of their Charter Rights, this latest misrepresentation leads me to conclude that your contempt for the people's right not to be lied to merits the withholding of my vote in the next election, and provides me with the motivation to try to persuade as many as I can, through the various media available to me, to do likewise.
Lorne Warwick
Dundas, Ontario
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