Do a mass mailing of questionnaires concerning downtown to a majority of PG residents. Please include a prepaid reply envelope. In the questionnaire just ask people ONE question. In 25 words or less, why don't YOU want to come downtown? When the city gets the replies, put each specific reason in a pile. Then cure the biggest pile of complaint letters first. This attempt would preclude special interest groups.That is, if you want to omit special interest groups. Seems to me that hasn't worked before. IMO. Anyone but merchants and lefty enablers who want to keep the "people of the streets" as a job secure career. Too simple? What say you?

Best idea I've heard yet.

Only one problem. Just like turkeys dont vote for Xmas, bureaucrates don't vote for simplicity.

"we need to do more in the way of Public- private partnerships if the down town is to succeed.”

Downtown is a "public private" partnership already. The public owns the streets, many of the properties are owned by private people and operated by private people.

The private people put in the money for the capital investment and they put in the money for the operations of their business, and they put in the money for their portion of the public part.

So far we have one "partner" putting in all the money for both private and public parts.

Now we come to the public part of the bargain. The private part pays for the public part, its maintenance, and its operation. The company that does the maintenance and operation is called the government - municipal, regional, provincial, federal.

We are the clients, they are the service providers.

I thus fail to see that if our service providers cannot provide to our satisfaction, that we must kick in ourselves. What we really need to do is fire them and hire someone who can deliver on the promises they make when we elect them to run that part of our private enterprise.

Heard it all before. All the fancy catch phrases are there. Will not work until the rif raff are moved away.

I like the idea of the public being consulted and not by the phoney meetings that the last Council had where the conclusion was already foregone but a real public input such as Harbinger suggests.

Dan Rogers needs the support of the public and the best way to do that is get out amongst the public. We have excellent communication channels now with the Internet and for those without computers there is always the mail.

Let's give it a try.

So is the doorman going to escort you to one of the restaurants down the street? Or do they now have a captive audience and you will have to eat in their restaurants?

At the Coast there are no such problems. You can walk to the White Spot or Jordy's or Cimo or North 54 or even just enjoy a coffee and donut at Timy's without the same type of street scene.

Alright,

Everyone complains about the downtown. Yes it needs work. Everyone talks about the bad things. The problem is it never gets cleaned up because there is no vision. Is the vision just to get homeless of the streets? Is the vision to redo the front of every business with good looking "unbc" style store fronts. The problem is, no one knows what they want. First thing is to do is build even a simple model of what you want it to look like. Yes a model that people can stand around and see what the future of prince george will look like. Cant clean up downtown if no one even knows what they want. Go to the most vibrant downtown in bc or canada and see waht they do. Easy peasy. Only let new business open up downtown. The city has to give tax breaks to business downtown (possibly this is already done, dont know). its a start....

"The Mayor of Prince George, Dan Rogers says every time that someone has a complaint about down town, he would like to see them come up with five solutions or ideas on how to fix the problem."

Doesn't the man have a mind of his own? What is he doing running a town if he doesn't want to be bothered with a problem unless someone solves it for him and he gets to cherry pick the answer he likes best?

I'll tell you the solution to fixing the problem in one answer Dan.

Have police patrol downtown and issue tickets to junkies, panhandlers, prostitutes, etc.... EVERY DAY. Throw the repeat offenders in jail.

The downtown is a symptom of unemployment, uncontrolled drug/sex trades, mental illness and so forth. The current strategy of ignoring the problem isn't very effective. Putting law breakers in jail is effective, and better yet, when the jails are full, it will force the provincial and federal levels of government to deal with the root causes.

It's actually your job to look after the law abiding citizens of your town Dan, and when you let scum shoot up on the sidewalks at 7pm at night without fear of going to jail, you're giving them the downtown, not us. Do your damn job, Dan! That's the solution!

Take the streets back!
and CLOSE down all the freebie service agencies. ie free coffee at many locations, free lunches at many locations, free clothes at many locations, free needles etc etc etc...there is no significant problem downtown...they all live in the VLA etc. You see them migrating to the freebie places every morning! They are also FREE to do whatever they want, wherever they want and whenever they want. We solid citizens of this community have to PUT up with the anti-social behaviour of these only a few hundred individuals on OUR streets that we pay taxes for. Yet, we maintain our dignity and live by the expected mores of our society. The tipping point has passed.
Chug is right on the money. Its very simple, deal with these people in an effective and compassionate manner. Teach them to cook and clean at the soup kitchens, teach them about HARD WORK and teach them to pull their own socks up. I am tired of "woe is me the victim". Many immigrants, through hard work, have made it in our society and they could not even speak English at first or lacked any skills whatsoever other than sheer determiniation to improve their lot in a new country. I am embarrassed to bring anyone downtown from outside our community and feel particularly for those that book into the Ramada unknowingly. City Hall, look out your front windows and take a GOOD look! There is ANARCHY on some of our downtown streets. Butterworth-Carr is on the right track starting with foot and bike patrols that actually pound the pavement. Keep them moving and apply a little constant pressure. Don't we have vagrancy bylaw? Or do we need to phone Bylaws at City Hall to open up a file and then they may act on it "when we have time". Deal with this bad energy first and then maybe good things will happen?!?
This is a rant, but it is "free" for all Fridays.

gold-rush - you are right.

Where there is no vision the people perish.
(Proverbs 29:18)

chug states "Have police patrol downtown and issue tickets to junkies, panhandlers, prostitutes, etc.... EVERY DAY. Throw the repeat offenders in jail.
"

ok, all these people will get right on it and pay there tickets i assume. Great idea. Load up the jails. Thats great too, isnt it something like $50,000 a year to keep someone in prison. Think there are better solutions.

What is your ideal vision of downtown, not the negatives...tell me what is your ideal downtown. If more people come to the dowtown, one will not even notice the 2-5 percent of the unfortunate....

"ok, all these people will get right on it and pay there tickets i assume. Great idea. Load up the jails. Thats great too, isnt it something like $50,000 a year to keep someone in prison. Think there are better solutions."

If they don't pay their tickets, they should eventually go to jail, the same as you or I would. If they won't go to jail, then we all should pee in the streets. get high and beg for money, since it's become acceptable.

If junkies can afford to get wasted all the time and they can't afford to pay a ticket, then it shows you they will do nothing to stop their behaviour and they should be dealt with according.

If the jails are not already full, it's not really costing $50,000 a year to house them. It actually makes better use of space to have full jails since you're not paying to heat and operate a facility which is underutilized. Besides, even if it did cost $50K to house a prisoner, it's not like the money is disappearing into an abyss, it's going toward employment.

I don't know why people always think there are better solutions than enforcing laws which already exist. You can't softly nudge, educate or otherwise induldge people into doing the right thing. The only option people don't want to try is the obvious and natural one.

As for my ideal vision of downtown, I don't need an ideal vision, there already is something downtown. No planning is required for it to grow, action is needed to clean it up. When drunks and bums move into a public park and urinate on the playground equipment, leave syringes where kids play, etc... you don't come up with a vision for the park before ejecting the bums. The people who were intended to use the park don't use it because the bums won't let them. The people who would use the downtown don't, for the same reason.

Get rid of the criminals!

All most of you want to do is bitch about the downtown, let's hear your solutions to rectify the problem - but nobody seems to have an intelligent one. Those who are trying to make a difference are ridiculed by a select few idiots.

Thanks to qwaszxter who seems to have a little more on the ball than most of the people who use this site to bitch about ANYTHING............

Chug:
Rogers cant run a City on his own anymore than the President of the United States can run a country. Get a heart! We are all involved and yes, you too, sitting in your ivory tower passing judgment.

I'm not passing judgment saying criminals should be prosecuted, I'm being just. The judgment has already been passed by Canadian law.

Everyone who thinks junkies, drug addicts, sex workers, etc... ought to be snuggled and supported by tax dollars are passing their own judgment on everyone else, as if it's society's fault individuals make choices they know are not only self destructive, but illegal.

greta, I just gave the one and only solution to the problem. It is the best possible solution, and it has not been tried and probably will not be tried.

Imagine the nerve of treating people who break the law with ... the law. That's only for working class people to worry about. Scumbags who shoot dope on street corners have enough problems without the law coming down on them, right?

Either everyone lives by rule of law, or no one does. Downtown is a toilet because rule of law is not followed.

ya chug, im agreeing with you more and more....

Chug is right
Went downtown today at 3 pm. Third, George, to Sixth. What a sight!
Sure would not want to bring my kids downtown esp at this end of it...saw people drinking and drunk in the open, urinating in broad daylight right in the open, shooting up, got yelled at, got sworn at, got solicited and even had to get off sidewalks to continue on our way at several locations because they were blocking the sidewalks. In fact, they were congregated at each street corner. We did not talk back, exude attitude or anything. What a pleasant day downtown it was!

Time to spring clean! Several huge street sweepers and water cannons may be the only solution at this point. Then off to jail and HARD WORK each day!

I am tired of the socialbabble, oh they are homeless, came from poverty, broken homes etc etc BS. Try renting to them and then try to get them out of the unit when they wreck everything and use it for drug sales and injection sites...enough IS enough! This is our town also. Deal with the social issues forcefully and with resolve and consistency. Manhattan did it and it is now one of the safest places in the US, day and night. The rule of law MUST prevail.

I was just browsing restorative justice and while that concept couldn't be used as a solution to downtown perhaps the consultative portion of it could.
In community work (of which I know very little)) wouldn't it be more productive to have a meeting between the downtown core street people and City Council to come up with a solution? Also, there would be people at UNBC doing sociology research who could become part of a team. We need solutions, let's explore possibilities even if they sound far fetched to some.

I don't think downtown will get better as long as all the shelters/needle exchanges, etc, are located there. The area appeals to a certain type of people and those are the type of people you find there, 24 hrs a day, because thats where the services they want to access are.

Personally, I think its sad that PG doesn't have a nice downtown area to walk around and enjoy like in other cities. However, I'm also glad that the "rifraff" are mostly contained in a certain area. I sure wouldn't want them moving the needle exchange or shelter anywhere around my neighborhood! At least this way, we know where to avoid.

"In 25 words or less, why don't YOU want to come downtown?"

Well....in addition to all the above mentioned, I was downtown with my kids one weekend morning around 10 AM and we had to walk around a guy who was passed out drunk with his pants down, after having crapped on the sidewalk.

Then, I got a parking ticket.

Now, it appears I will be in for a seat belt ticket too if I'm not careful.

I have a much better shopping experience elsewhere.

In addition, businesses around the area of Main and Hastings in Vancouver had to close down because they couldn't get customers to come into the stores. Downtown PG is headed for the same route.

I see a lot of people called on others for solutions, as though no one has suggested any. There are several suggested here by people who were willing to at least try thinking some up. Of course, a lot of people dont like the answers so they pretend they were not offered.
The problem with the downtown is that it is a dump. Many of the buildings are in disrepair or are just too damn old and outdated. The downtown community is heavily skewed towards the drugged, drunk or disorderly. A lot of folks are scared to go down there. A lot more have very little reason to do so.
The last point is the most important. If people dont need to go downtown, why should they be encouraged to? Why is it so necessary to spend public money restoring the downtown core when it hasnt been made clear why we should do so?
There has been a lot of complaining about the concentration of services downtown. I say either get rid of them (like the needle exchange, say) or leave them there. I dont think a lot of residential areas are crying out for addict support services and the like.
There is alos a lot of talk about 'moving those people out of there'. These people are not going to be moved. We can constrain their behaviour but we cat ship them out. Where, exactly do you think they will go? These people are the citizens of downtown. You dont have to like it but so long as they dont break any laws (serious enough to get them arrested) then they have the right to be there.
I am often downtown at night and thus far the worst i have had to put up with is pan handlers. Thats not to say there isnt a serious problem down there. I just think that the social engineering and 'new facade' approaches are not the way i would go. Enforce the law. Stop copping out with excuses like full jails and cluttered courts. Spend the money on all stages of law enforcement and punishment, reform sentences as necessary. Stop pretending that spruced up store fronts and sidewalks is going to draw people back downtown. And above all, stop pretending that the problem is so complex that no one has any answers. Just because you aren't willing to carry them out it doesnt mean they are not there.
One final word: All of you who favour the so called harm reduction strategies behind needle exchanges, safe injection sites etc. need to take a walk around Vancouver near chinatown (East Hastings and such). I used to walk around there when the worst you would find were peep show houses. Words (at least my command of them) cannot describe the place now.

"wouldn't it be more productive to have a meeting between the downtown core street people and City Council to come up with a solution?"

All the King's horses and all the King's men, and all the social service agencies on the planet couldn't get Humpty Dumpty to wash his own stinky ass, let alone show up for a meeting or contribute anything productive.

I suppose if you held the meeting at the corner of 5th and George and provided copious amounts of free booze, you might get a good turnout.

Seems all Humpty Dumpty wants to do is get smashed all the time, and the entire downtown area is set up to easily accommodate and facilitate any substance abuse problem you may have and that makes it a convenient place to be to carry out such a lifestyle.

That's where you want to start fixing.

Lamb wrote, "In community work (of which I know very little)) wouldn't it be more productive to have a meeting between the downtown core street people and City Council to come up with a solution?"

Do you think there is a council of bums willing to meet with city council to carry out this dream of yours? There is no king bum to tell the other bums to stop breaking the law or provide a single consistent (or rational) reason why they break the law. It's actually a waste of time trying to understand the how or why at this point, and the longer we leave the problem, the greater it will become. The downtown problem grows, and it becomes easier for people to be a part of when people ignore the legality of the issue and focus on the treating every willing participant as a victim.

The johns, pimps, dealers, etc... are not going to meet with city council about the downtown problem, obviously.

My solution of enforcing our laws will work. If you could get any RCMP officer to speak frank and off the record on this, they would agree 100%.

You have to think of where you want all these people to go, and what you want to do with them before you start formulating any plan.

It's not what where I or you want these people to go, it's what they want to do with their lives. If they want to continue being bums then they have to accept the consequences. If they don't, there is plenty of help already out there.