This city council, as the ones before them, just don't get it!!

We want our frikken roads fixed, and we want better air to breath! We want good hospitals, and we want good education for our children.

But most of all, we want our ELECTED city council, to be very, very careful, on how they spend our money!

I see by this article, they still want to spend 6 million dollars plus on 4th Ave., and they are still "entertaining" the thought of a 52 million dollar on a performing arts center!!

I don't care if they get funding from the Feds, the Province, or where ever else they want to beg, IT IS OUR MONEY, what don't they understand about this.

The roundabout goes around again, and again, and again!! And so it goes. When are the people in this country going to stand up, and say we have HAD ENOUGH!

My daughter said it right, "this city is a sh!t hole"! There is no hope, with the mentality we have running the show, past and present, and a mix of both!!

FIX THE DAMN ROADS already!! Shari Green, step out of council now! Well at least while council is making a bad decision on 4th Ave.

Some of these agenda items are bizzare.

(1) If they provide free transit during bad air days, who do they think will take the bus???? People buy cars so that they can drive. I suggest that if the City thinks that this is a serious proposal that the Mayor, Councils, and City staff, be the first to leave their vehicles at home, and ride the bus, followed by all other Goverment employees, in the City. If they are not prepared to do this, then why would they expect anyone else to do it.

(2) Its time to throw the Community Energy System out the window. This is a foolish idea, and has been since it was incepted. Another dumb idea left over from the previous Mayor and Council. These buildings already have Electricity, and Gas and we dont need some major project to tear up the streets, buildings, etc; plus add to the pollution, just so we can burn a few beetle killed trees.

(3) They will try to get some money from the Feds for the PAC and then we will have to match it, and of course after it is built we will have to pay every year for the short fall in revenues. This idea should be chucked also.

Why another subdivision?? There are so many now that have not been completely sold out. Who is going to buy them? Does the city know something the rest of us are not privi to?

Goods points Shellshadow. I doubt if the present subdivisions will be filled in the next 10 to 20 years. I have no idea why they keep building more.

If we were to add up all the spaces available in all the sudivisions in Prince George, along with all the spaces in the seniors residences, etc one would think that there was going to be a huge increase in population, however all indications are that they populaton will continue to decrease.

Is this for real? The woodburning Community Energy System (polluting the downtown bowl airshed!) idea is still one of the dummest ideas ever to be spawned at City Hall!

Forget it already! You can put all the lipstick you want on a pig, but at the end of the day it is still a PIG!

Just outlaw any old style wood burning stoves in the bowl area! Inspect all houses and their stoves! The City pays for removal of the old stoves, purchase of the new ones and the complete installation cost of same.

Get it over with, quit dithering!

How come we can contemplate a tens of millions of dollars PAC, a millions of dollars revamp of 4th Avenue etc, etc and we can't aggressively once and for all solve the wood burning issue?

It's unbelievable!

Can we please have the REAL change that we voted for?

it should illeagal for any city and school bus driver or taxi drivers to talk on their cell phones while operating their vehicles.

I for one fully support the offering of free transit during an air quality advisory, and a new policy that will restrict the use of cell phones, blackberrys, pagers or two way radios by City staff when they are operating equipment. As for the two projects from the Build Canada fund the Performing Arts Centre, and the Community energy System, get my vote!

If you all feel so passionately about these things go to the council meeting and have your voice heard there instead of hiding behind your keyboards!

Can we have another election? To coin a phrase from a movie I recently saw:

Our city council are like diapers - they should be changed regularly and for the same reason!

If city council are endorsing the community energy proposal as a means of dealing with beetle kill, should'nt we tell them that the beetle killed trees have a finite afterlife? I mean these pine trees rot from the inside out, and the rotted wood is not usable for anything but nutrients for the forest floor. I have noticed more and more that bettle killed trees break in half, or about twenty feet down from the tip after standing dead for a couple of years (be careful on the PGG&CC golf course this summer!)
metalman.

The community energy system should just go down as a bad idea proposed by people no longer on council. If it was such a great idea private industry would be chomping at the bit to get involved. Do we see the new Sandman Hotel putting in a wood burning system. Not likely. How about Wal-mart, Home Depot, Canadian Tire. This shopping center has a heating demand far exceeding city hall, civic center, art gallery and the aquatic center yet there was no mention of burning biomass for heating. Why, because natural gas is a very clean efficient fuel and the capital costs for gas heating equipment are less than 1/2 of biomass burning equipment.

There is not any surplus hog fuel in the PG area. Logging debris is being hogged out by Norman Lake to satisfy the needs of the power boilers at the pulp mills. Hog fuel prices have increased substantially. The capital and installation costs ensure there will never be a payback for the citizens of PG. The city claims there are grants available. These grants are still taxpayer dollars coming out of our pockets.

Throw in the fact there will be a negative impact on the quality of the airshed in PG it would be a most welcome and wise decision by city council to let this project die.

Backit - you are hiding behind a user name yourself!

Come clean or keep your cheap shots to yourself!

Tell us who you are and I will talk to you personally at the next city council meeting!

I am with you Backit. How can a community ever move forward if everyone wants to keep it moving backwards???
Prince George needs a performing Arts Centre and then maybe we can actually be a part of the century we are living in.

I didn't realize there were so many people in PG that should have been running for Mayor or council...Oh that's right they just want to continue to hide behind their keyboards and complain every day. Wow, how depressing to think you day consists of complaining and bitching at every chance you get...Grow up and get a life.

How did you input your criticism which is a complaint about people who use a keyboard to complain every day?

With a keyboard, of course.

And how do you know that they complain every day?

By reading it every day.

If it depresses you so much why don't you make a change to your own life?

Quit reading it and do something else.

A Catholic priest, a Protestant minister, and a rabbi are discussing what they would like people to say after they die and their bodies are on display in open caskets.

Priest: I would like someone to say "He was a righteous man, an honest man, and very generous."

Minister: I would like someone to say "He was very kind and fair, and he was very good to his parishioners."

Rabbi: I would want someone to say "Look, he's moving."

I have to admit I have been reading the same peoples complaints for a couple of uyears now and just decided last week to login ina nd comment. I ahve made many changes to my life. First and formost I moved away from PG, a city I will always call home and love....I moved to a city where people understand why money gets spend and don't complain about the day to day crap like you guys do. SO if you don't like what is happening in PG...pack your bags and move. Maybe if some of you moved and paid real taxes and seen what the real cost of housing was then you would stop your silly ass complaining. Your cost of living is alot less than most of the province...

Posted by: Shellshadow on March 2 2009 8:17 AM
Why another subdivision?? There are so many now that have not been completely sold out. Who is going to buy them? Does the city know something the rest of us are not privi to?"

It's not city money, it's private investment money, so why would you tell them to invest someplace else?

I think we have too many restaurants in PG, but they just keep building more, does the city know something we are not privy to?

I understand the property in question is City property and they will benefit by getting $1.5 million in its sale to the developers.

Not unusually then, the City is in conflict in a way. There are some sensitive slope lands involved that the engineering firm is trying to push to maximize the residential area.

It is time this City takes a completely different view of this type of land. It is land with a view. Rather than giving 10 or 15 single family properties that view, start looking at developing some of the nicer 3 and 4 storey condo developments where 40 or 50 dwelling units have that view, are located on a quiet street rather than a large urban collector and can be set back further from the hill to preserve some of the land and reduce the impact on the slope.

Time to grow up beyond sprawlsville. Attend the Smart Growth meetings on Wednesday and Thursday of this week at the Ramada and listen to the people who are trying to teach this city a few tricks the administration has had no interest in addressing.

This is more of the same ticky tacky boxes. Absolutely no imagination. Absolutely total disregard for the nature of the site. Absolutely total disregard of what infill development should mean these days.

Backit. I suspect that when the next bad air advisory comes, you will be the first to get on the bus.

Buildings were heated by hot water back in the late 1800's and early 1900's, so dont suggest that we are living in the dark ages. Its the City that wants to go backwards. Electricity, Natural Gas, Wind Energy, etc are the way of the future. Any wood burning to create energy should be down outside the City limits, and should connect to the Hydro grid. The same as the one in Williams Lake. There is no need for hot water heating. If it was really a good idea, you could get your surplus steam from the Pulp Mills and heat these buildings without any problem, and it would be a hell of a lot cheaper than building a so called Community Energy System. Wake up and smell the flowers.

People who support the PAC always neglect to appreciate those facilities we already have such as Theatre Northwest, Pr George Playhouse, Vanier Hall, Civic Centre, and the CN Centre to name a few. Why do we need more. Who is coming to town to use these facilities. The Philharmonic Orchestra? The New York Symphony? Get a life.

See all of you at Council in about an hour. I will be voicing my opinion, will you?

Great points gus, I agree completely!

"People who support the PAC always neglect to appreciate those facilities we already have"

Your assumption which is only true of those who typically do not use any of the facilties you speak of.

You assume that just because one goes skiing, that one does not play hockey. Or if one goes skiing and plays hockey, that they do not play soccer, of softball or tennis. All of them are sports.

All the facilities you mention are facilities to view the performing arts and some are be multi user, especially the Civic Centre which ranges from PA to Sports to Conferences. Jack of all trades, master of none as they say of people. The same goes for facilites. Sort of something like a gym with different lines drawn on a floor for badminton, tennis, volleyball, basketball and God knows what else. You can play tennis in such a facility, but it just does not equal a real tennis court for many reasons.

Many people who go to TNW also attend PGSO performances at Vanier Hall. Many of them also go to the Playhouse.

People who perform at Vanier Hall have known the short comings of that facility for some time. When I first came here and the Royal Winnipeg Ballet performed here I remember tales of people crashing into walls. The stage might loo big to you, but it is far too small fro many uses.

People who travel have heard classical music as well as contemporary music, Broadway musicals etc. in proper facilities. They understadn that facilities cannot be all things to all purposes.

In addition, facilties age. Vanier is more than 40 years old and was built substandard in the first place (the high school I went to from those days, for instance, had a fly tower and balcony with seating much closer to the stage for instance and was remote from the gymnasium and its smell of dirty socks.)

I hear the SD wants the facility back and is not interested in satisfying its customer needs to any great extent. Take it as it is seems to be their view.

Civic Centre is not a performing arts space of the calibre that will bring any performance of note to town. I remember going to a performance by José Feliciano in the old Civic Centre that was condemned shortly afterwards. He spoke about it and it was an embarrassment to me sitting in the audience listening to him speaking about the facility and the stink in the air of the City. I want to have more pride in this City when guests come here or when locals perform and I hope others will as well.

The CN Centre is another facility altogether. We are looking at mass audiences with performances that are acoustically enhanced to the point where some of us of advancing years are starting to wonder why loud is better. But so be it. It is most certainly not a performing arts centre. It is an arena built for mass audience events.

I am assuming what we essentially need is a replacement for the high school auditorium that has served the community well for decades but has outlived its usefulness. It is high time people understood what it is that is needed. It is a substandard building and has been almost from the start. It is like that multipurpose gymnasium, great for some things, good for a few others, passable for others. it was that way right from the start of its construction but, of course, people intially loved it and supported it because it was new and brought the community up a notch or two.

Things change Palopu. You might not, but things around you do. We now have flat panel TVs with high definition, surround sound and anything below 42” or even larger is simply not acceptable to many.

And yes!!!! let's fix the potholes and get better snow clearing.

Or we can all go back to our caves and watch the world collapse around us as we stopp trying to improve our lot in life and kill the economy so dependent on that very goal and enter into a new dark age.

You want to talk about a happy medium between the two? I'm game for anything but rolling up and dying. This negative attitude of everyone everytime one turns on the TV is really the pitts.

Beautiful post gus, well stated!

Idiots, most all of you!!

wavoes!!! And you should not stop talking on your cell phone while driving?? You, are the biggest fool of all! You point the finger, but never at yourself.

Want to meet some place, so I can take your cell phone, and stuff it where the sun don't shine??? You are an idiot!!

Gus. As Shakespeare said. He doth protest to much.

Just because you say its so, doesnt make it so. Most people in this town are happy with the facilities that we have, and we have paid huge dollars in taxpayers money to get what we have.

The people who want to sit on their backsides and listen to Jose in a Multi Million dollar facility are entitled to do so, but not neccesarily on tax payers money. Maybe you should spend some of your own money and go to Vancouver, Toronto, Winnipeg, or Montreal, and listen to these dudes. It would be a hell of a lot cheaper than the rest of us building you an $30 Million facility that will sit empty for most of the year.

The old Civic Centre was condemed so that they could build a new Civic Centre that was to attract conventions from all over the world. Problem is it has attracted nothing and remains unused for most of the year. Another multi million dollar fiasco. The same as the stupid Sports Centre at UNBC which is highly under used, and which will cost us huge dollars to keep the doors open. Most people in Prince George dont even know the bloody building even exists.

I suggest that you buy your music at the local outlets, get your surround sound, and sit at home and enjoy yourself. That way you will save us both a lot of money.