I always have trouble with these announcements "significant economic activity". Very short term activity, the only ones really working are usually minimum wage earners in the hotels and restaurants and their owners making large profits. The actual host city seldom if ever makes any money off of this.

I bet if all staff time, travel, and expenses are actually tracked including the time that has been spent so far and all the way till the event is complete, combined with the money the city will no doubt have to put up, usage of the facilities that this is far from actually generating any money, just economic activity, there is a difference. Just like the Olympics, this group wants to close schools, so they can use the facilities, at the school boards expense as well. I think that should be reflected as a cost to the city and billed by the school district.

If they would just call it as it is. We want to put on a event that cost you money, but because so much of it is changing hands you will think it is good for the economy. Kind of like the Olympics :)

AND THE SPENDING CONTINUES!!!!! Art Centre (52 million), trails project (11 million), Park outside City Hall (900,000), now this. Will it ever stop??? Obviously the new council is oblivious to the economic situation????? WTF!!!!

These anouncements are becoming more and more sickening!!

A Canada Games would be the best thing that ever happened to PG.

The ignorance of this fact is sickening.

Realitycheck, if you feel this way then why dont you pay the bill and give the rest of us tax payers a break??? In the end you can have the profits! LOLOLOL

Posted by: realitycheck on December 18 2008 8:06 AM
A Canada Games would be the best thing that ever happened to PG.

The ignorance of this fact is sickening.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Usually those with vested interests are the ones that love these type of things coming to town.
It is those of us that pay the bills that make all profits for these people.

Now that is what is truly sickening

I agree with you realitycheck - and just to be clear - my vested interest is in the growth and development of our city and to be known as more than simply the gang, drug and prostitute haven that it currently is. Promoting our city and brining people here cannot be a bad thing - just my opinion.

Agreed with Thunder and reality. The benefits to this city and the region would far outweigh the costs. No, I don't have a vested interest.

To the naysayers, believe it or not, there are opportunities that are worth exploring, and this is one of them.

FUNNY how every other city that has hosted such things have ended up in the RED. If you think that bringing people here for a week event is going to change the reality that is rampid in every town, city and village in Canada and is going to go away you are sadly eluding yourselves. Visitors will attend the event yes but it will not make them think differently about the REALITY that we have here. The gangs, drugs and crime will continue long after we tax payers finish paying.

The only good thing about this in terms of economics,is that it is for the 2015 games.
Maybe by then we will have a economy back.

What makes you think that, andy? The trees sure arent going to grow back that fast.

Silly me....what WAS I thinking!
:-(

To Shell,

rampid = "rampant"; eluding = "deluding".

Stay in school kids.

The thing about bringing people to the city, in theory the one of the reason's for the Winter Games, is you need to have attractions that they are going to want to travel back to the city to partake in. In other words, before doing so much work in getting people here, lets work on getting real attractions for why someone from the other side of the country would want to come here. There are lots of nice places in the world to visit and we have to make ourselves standout as an attractive place. Just dragging people here and then hoping they will find a reason to return has not worked so good for us so far.

You're right lunarguy - this is why we should be open to new ideas and spend some money on our city bringing in new attactions and creating jobs and giving people something to see and do! But - all I hear about are people complaining about money being spent on performing arts, trail systems, parks, etc. All I hear is "clean up the potholes first". Well, great idea, but seriously, someone from out of town is not going to notice that the city is crap, but at least there are no potholes! The conditions of our roads, with or without potholes, is not going to bring people back here. We have to invest in order to benefit, or we can just keep our heads up our asses and continue on as we are - how's that working for us so far?

Lets be perfectly clear about these 2015 games.
It is going to do nothing to change what people think of PG during or after the games are over. These games are not going to leave us with all kinds of fancy facilities afterwards. We will not see any decreases in our taxes because of them.
Our streets will not be repaired because of them. The hookers, drugs and crime will never go away as it will never go away in any other town in BC or Canada.

I could go on for ever why they will do us no good in the long run. All it will do is put money in the pockets of business and the rich.
To think anything else is living in a dream world.

lost, if everyone has the same defeatist attitude as yourself, then yes, I can see nothing ever changing.

As a matter of fact, maybe we should just put our hands in our pockets and do nothing because it's a waste of time, right?

I don't think anyone it touting these games as 'the' overall fix for PG's problems, but it's potentially a positive thing for the community.

first I think we would have to know what would have to be spent to put on a show like that and what facilites do we have that could be modified to use for such an event. If the money going into such a project can be kept down it can be a very worthwhile event.

"A Canada Games would be the best thing that ever happened to PG. The ignorance of this fact is sickening"

That about sums it up!

MRPG writes...
"I don't think anyone it touting these games as 'the' overall fix for PG's problems, but it's potentially a positive thing for the community."
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Like downnotout said above... All this is, is a SHOW.
A show that will cost the taxpayer tons of money they don't have and then once the SHOW is over what then? What benefits do we get that will prove this SHOW was a worthwhile SHOW.

Again nothing more than profits for business and the rich.

Posted by: MrPG on December 18 2008 2:11 PM
lost, if everyone has the same defeatist attitude as yourself, then yes, I can see nothing ever changing.
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A defeatest attitude not, a realistic financial attitude yes sir.

If everyone had bottomless pockets like yourself life would be grand wouldn't it?
I take it with your attitude you live your life running on credit cards.

Taxpayers don't have the money to pay for all these wonderful get rich ideas, sorry.

Posted by: NMG on December 18 2008 6:17 PM
"A Canada Games would be the best thing that ever happened to PG. The ignorance of this fact is sickening"
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I could list dozens of things that have happened in PG that are better things than any winter games will ever be for PG.

The Prince George Ski Hill on Connaught Hill in 1931 had a 90 foot tower and a 200 foot hill face. Running across the flat to 9th and Brunswick. The Prince George Ski Hill was the second lighted ski hill in North America. The Lake Placid Hill was the first to have lights in 1927.

The Prince George Ski Hill was constructed to Olympic Standards and at one point was used for try outs for the Canadian Olympic Team.

Wells BC hosted the Western Ski and Snowshoe Championships in 1936, and the Provincial Ski Championships in 1942.

This all took place before the pulp mills etc;. Prince George has a long history of being a frontier logging town, however none of their endeavours ever attracted world attention to the extent that it made any significant change to the City.

Having the 2015 Winter Games here is just a business ploy and will have no long term effects on the City.

We have thousands of people who come to Prince George every week-end from Mackenzie, Quesnel, Vanderhoof, Houston, Ft St James, etc;, these people spend millions of dollars in this town. When we host things like the Winter Games and use up the facilities that are normally available to these shoppers they stay home for that week-end, and as a consequence what we gain from the games we lose from out of town shoppers, so at best we break even.


There are a lot of people on these ;posts who have absolutly no idea of the history of this town, yet they talk as if they are in the forefront of a great adventure.

People have been logging, trapping, hunting, fishing, farming,railroading, road building, schooling, etc; for over 100 years. During the war there were over 10,000 soldiers stationed in Prince George and surrounding areas. The Millar addition was where the Army houses were built for officers and their familys. Some of these houses are still their to-day.

The City it self was very small, but it was surrounded by South Fort George, and Central Fort George and together had a huge population, somewhere around 50,000 in the mid forties. Then a big decline.

With the exception of the Pulp Mills, and to some extent the University nothing much of any significance has happened since 1945.

"We have thousands of people who come to Prince George every week-end from Mackenzie, Quesnel, Vanderhoof, Houston, Ft St James, etc;, these people spend millions of dollars in this town. When we host things like the Winter Games and use up the facilities that are normally available to these shoppers they stay home for that week-end, and as a consequence what we gain from the games we lose from out of town shoppers, so at best we break even."

Great point Palopu...guess the same thing could be said about the Olympics.

I just figured out why I've been having common feelings of Deja Vu when I read Opinion 250 lately.

It takes me back to when I was a child at Christmas being stuck in the living room, surrounded by all of the older people, listening in amazement to all of their stories and thoughts, in awe as to how smart they sounded. Then the older I got, I started to realize that I had already heard those same stories before and I realized that nothing new was ever being discussed. As I grew even older, I started to listen more and figured out than 90% of the talk was just that. There were lots of people saying lots of things, but there was no real relevance, insight or thought to most of it. Eventually I just got to the point where I either tuned them out or I put my headphones on and listened to music until it was time to go home. Sometimes, mind you, it was entertaining to listen to some of the banter.

A defeatest attitude not, a realistic financial attitude yes sir.

If everyone had bottomless pockets like yourself life would be grand wouldn't it?
I take it with your attitude you live your life running on credit cards.

Taxpayers don't have the money to pay for all these wonderful get rich ideas, sorry.
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There are so many incorrect statements and assumptions in your post that I am at a loss where to start. Nice work, I guess.

Once everybody sees what a moneypit the 2010 games will be, they will change their mind. Our money would be much better spent on something with more long range potential than a one week shindig.

However, power brokers make these decisions and power brokers have vested interests. They just like to talk us into eating the sh!t before they start force-feeding it to us anyway.