OK found some time
Michael Jackson - tragic but inevitable, ironic that his estate will make piles of money and a cottage industry will spring up fighting over it
The PC's have elected Tim Hudack - another urban rube for the snotty liberals to try to patronise.
The talk shows in Toronto will have found their Messiah by tonight - reports that John Tory may run for Mayor has orgasmic quivers all over it for these guys.
A new Doctor in Town - it will be interesting to see just how fast her book fills up as she signs up the "orphans". With the Port Hope Health Centre 50% under subscribed it looks as though there might not be as many "orphans" as the experts predicted.
Dare to dream - another airy-fairy exercise of the "chattering classes" will take place, but only if we can get a grant for it! Council has decided to let the citizens play at being community builders by asking for those interested in playing in the sandbox to help design something on someone elses's land. A "design charrette" will held led by a hand-picked consultant who will be paid $10,000 to hold a session where people come in and tell someone else just what they (the chattering classes) think should be built on the old Tannery Lands. Interesting, plan away but this land is the most polluted environmental toxic waste dump in the town. The site which has had the contents of the chrome tanks, used in stripping hides and fish, routinely dumped on the ground for many years, before the practise was outlawed in Ontario. Just what mix of chemicals lies underneath is unknown but plan away - just another waste of public money.
The PC's have elected Tim Hudack - another urban rube for the snotty liberals to try to patronise.
The talk shows in Toronto will have found their Messiah by tonight - reports that John Tory may run for Mayor has orgasmic quivers all over it for these guys.
A new Doctor in Town - it will be interesting to see just how fast her book fills up as she signs up the "orphans". With the Port Hope Health Centre 50% under subscribed it looks as though there might not be as many "orphans" as the experts predicted.
Dare to dream - another airy-fairy exercise of the "chattering classes" will take place, but only if we can get a grant for it! Council has decided to let the citizens play at being community builders by asking for those interested in playing in the sandbox to help design something on someone elses's land. A "design charrette" will held led by a hand-picked consultant who will be paid $10,000 to hold a session where people come in and tell someone else just what they (the chattering classes) think should be built on the old Tannery Lands. Interesting, plan away but this land is the most polluted environmental toxic waste dump in the town. The site which has had the contents of the chrome tanks, used in stripping hides and fish, routinely dumped on the ground for many years, before the practise was outlawed in Ontario. Just what mix of chemicals lies underneath is unknown but plan away - just another waste of public money.
6 comments:
Ben, Ben, Ben-
How else do you sell this as prime low-rent housing territory than by getting "the public" to "suggest" it and then push for it. If the cheeses were to do either on their "own" initiative, they'd be crucified! Can't wait to see what materializes before our very own eyes.
So Ben, are you now not in favour of public participation in public affairs? You talk about another airy-fairy exercise of the "chattering classes" that might take place to discuss possible uses of the Tannery lands.
Since the “chattering classes” is not a term often heard in Cobourg I looked it up on Wikipedia and found:
The chattering classes is a generally derogatory term often used by pundits and political commentators to refer to a politically active, socially concerned and highly educated section of the "metropolitan middle class," especially those with political, media, and academic connections. It is sometimes used to refer to a liberal elite, but its first use by British right wing polemicist Frank Johnson in 1980 appeared to include a wider range of pundits. Indeed, the term is used by people all across the political spectrum to refer to the journalists and political operatives who see themselves as the arbiters of conventional wisdom. As such, the notion of 'chattering classes' can be seen as an antonym to the older idea of an unrepresented Silent Majority (made famous by the U.S Republican President Richard Nixon).
In the United States, the term has come to be used by both the right and left-wings to describe political opponents, with Stephen Perrault of the Merriam-Webster dictionary suggesting that the term has "connotations of idleness, of useless talk, that the noun 'chatter' does. [...] These people don't amount to much — they like to hear themselves talk."
Additionally I checked the Oxford Dictionary and found “the chattering classes: derogatory educated people, esp. those in academic, artistic, or media circles.”
It appears that both Wikipedia and Oxford believe term is derogatory. Apart from that it would appear to include people who host or participate in web blogs, or sit on local advisory committees.
I know the town is eager to minimize the contributions of citizens by calling them members of “special interest groups” , but I am surprised that you are also hostile to them.
It seems to me that it is a good idea for the Town to discuss the use, and presumably the potential zoning, of piece of land before a developer comes to tell them what to do. My problem with the “design charrette” is not participation by chattering classes, but is the payment of $10,000 to consultant when it could equally well be done for free by holding a public meeting.
Are you being as provocative as I was Greg? I am in great favour of public participation and how you construed that I wasn't, with a comment about those who do is a stretch but let me will explain.
I am pleased that you took the time to wiki "the chattering classes" and it is good to find that the term is derogatory, but unfortunately it is a term in vogue for the right hand side of the punditry so the progressives get slagged by those who chatter just as much.
I used the term because when one looks at the audience at the events that Council let us participate in, usually those that they would not deign to attend, and as Manfred says they can then blame for the construct, they (the audience) - as you say Greg are the same people who wish to take in the mix.
The problem I have is not enough of a mix get to participate, not the organisors fault, and the results tend to be a mirror of the organisors ideas. I believe that the Diversey lands had a similar exercise but the terms of reference just made the exercise an echo of Brocaniers and Delanty's dreams. The Community Centre had one and did anything different come from that? Just a building wrapped around what the majority wanted - two hockey rinks.
If the Council wanted a real consultation process they would extend questionnaires to organisations, like ACO, Low income groups, sports groups and others who might want to something happen there, let those groups discuss them as a group not a member of a round table, and then someone should distill the various opinions. But it is still Mr Beasley's land and here we go again (not too many weeks after the beach takeover suggestion) that something meaningful for the community can be done on someone else's land. The question here is how much of the cleanup costs, demolition and security costs are going to be recovered from these lands, the taxpayers are probably owed in excess of 1.3 million already. We failed to do anything like this with Kraft, and we could have made a bundle, why do we spend so much time on these polluted lands stuck in the middle of a residential wasteland?
To quote the man on 649 "because we can!"
Ben
Clearly I agree with your sentiments and analysis.
Greg
Port Hope Community Health Centre. The jury is out on how many health care "orphans" in the catchment area of the Port Hope CHC remain to be reached.
At the recent AGM, a bylaw to extend the service area from 25 to 50 km. was defeated, lacking the 2/3 majority required. The opposition to the area extension included some who 10 years ago initiated the CHC process in the town. They are convinced that Centre's outreach efforts have not effectively targetted under-serviced segments of its current service area, including low-income residents, rural residents facing transportation barriers, and others who are, for one reason or another, difficult to serve or health care averse.
Several things come to mind here.
Originally you wrote "led by a hand-picked consultant who will be paid $10,000 to hold a session". Then later you wrote "the results tend to be a mirror of the organisors ideas" There is an extremely important connection there. By paying someone to 'lead' the session, they get to set the preconditions and therefore the direction of the charette, which is what they must do to get to where they want to end up (see my earlier post).
Secondly, while "it is still Mr Beasley's land" legally, that is sure to change considering your statement "The question here is how much of the cleanup costs, demolition and security costs are going to be recovered from these lands, the taxpayers are probably owed in excess of 1.3 million already". If the town were to get stuck with a report from the charette that strongly favoured 'public ownership' of this land with some public amenities on it, there would be no recovery of the money owed to the town already plus the cost of full remediation. That's just not affordable, I dare to say. The only way to get back that money is to sell the land and the only way to sell the land is to make it usable (issue-free). So the stage is set to begin that series of steps and the only way to entice someone to even look at it is to make it developable for residential use (see my earlier post). Too bad it's so close to the tracks, eh! Just look at the plans for developing the land closest to the south side of the tracks on Brook Rd north. Surprise! (not really) Just sad.
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