We, the taxpayers in the city of Prince George, can Forgive, and forgive, and forgive-and bail out and bail out and bail out!!! We have MONEY and we do not need pay backs. Oh to have a banker like this city. We do NOT need that $252,061.00 , so the Art Gallery Society can start again tonight with a clean slate. The debt is forgiven---swoosh-just like that!!!!! Would have cost them 38 cents to raise a dollar-and they don't have any money-so-- yeah--SO wouldn't that look bad if that Art Gallery had to close for lack of funds. Businesses can take the dive, but this crew at City Hall are prepared to save face no matter the cost to the taxpayer. Oh my, we knew it had to happen some day!! Was this city ready for that Art Gallery??? Not in my opinion. All is well-their banker still has money.Of course many pledges did not arrive. The population of this city dropped to about 72,000, so people needed their money to move out??? Possibility?
I was delighted when Scott talked back. Surprised His Honor, Zurowsky, (Sethen changed his title as Kinsley, his worship, was absent). Rogers kept giving reference to "future" councils, and here I had a hunch he was going to go for the Mayor's seat this year. They were all a bit more subdued. Must be getting s message from somewhere.Maybe Opinion250??
No removal of tourists talk, no downtown solving, no hot water street heat,no studies.
I did notice one point of interest. I actually think George does run this city, as a writer implied in a previous letter.I actually heard it many times before. He supposedly has all the answers-or is expected to. Some a bit tongue tied tonight. Gosh, I wonder if some of that self confidence is slipping???? Almost like "shock therapy."

I'm a little curious as to were all the art lovers went,where are all the dogooders who had their pictures in the paper shaking hands and raising money?(apparently not enough)The 2 that I think of most was the ex city councillor and the young up and coming lawyer.Where are these people now?At least the muilti plex has the ability to pay for itself.
ROCK

Our City is busy shoveling money into the economy and the down town area. We are supporting our Mayor for his far off travels so why not give some to the arts of our City.

Well, if the Arts are "so" important why is the art gallery not self supporting?? The interest is obviously NOT there, OR there is obviously nothing interesting there?? I wonder if the city will forgive me my taxes this year?? Oh, how come Kinsley wasn't there? Is he abroad again?

Hey lefty,
Lets get with the program,the old saying goes "if you want to play,you have to pay"
ROCK

It seems that Councillors are starting to take positions for the fall elections. Some are waffling others are straight shooters.

I do not care which side a Councillor takes, whether it is the hard line that every service a city the size of Prince George provides has to be paid for by the user, versus the softer line that some services will simply never come about unless the larger population pays a portion and sometimes even a substantial portion. However, I dislike those who waffle. They will not get my vote for sure. I would rather pick straight shooters on both sides of an issue and hope that they will stick to their guns so that we have proper debate at Council by folks who can make decisions and stick to them.

I can remember the debate over building a warehouse for books by our wonderfully frugal Harold Moffat. Having just moved from Canada’s largest metropolis, which has since doubled in size, I was wondering what backwaters of the world I had come to.

What those of us familiar with PG must surely be aware of by now is that it is always difficult for a small community to finance the first of something when it comes to public institutions: the first substantial City Hall, first substantial library, the first substantial arena, the first substantial museum, the first substantial gallery. Although I was nto around for the City Hall, I think none of those listed came without controversy. In fact, we have still not managed to build the first substantial performing arts theatre even though Nanaimo, Kelowna, Kamloops, Prince Rupert, Vernon, and most of the other cities of similar size to Prince George across the country have.

Even in these days of a shrinking city population, this town has a higher than average income than the province and every single one of the BC communities listed above based on the last census information. I am also reasonably certain that this town has the lowest living cost of any of those communities primarily because of the low cost of single family residences. Why people are jumping for joy that the house prices are going up is beyond me. Is everyone about to jump ship and move to the greener grass on the other side of the hill? Is that why they want their house prices to go up so that they can get closer to an even trade for housing in those greener pastures?

I have often scratched my head, and still do, trying to figure out where people in this town spend their money, because it sure does not appear to be here! Restaurants go broke, nightclubs with live entertainment that used to be here 30 years ago have gone from the face of the earth; we have become pub crawlers having to listen to people who think they know how to sing or relegated to watching wrestling, golf, hockey, or whatever the pub owners feel their patrons are keen on watching as they east fattening foods and downing fattening brew because it is the cheapest socializing deal in town.

In my old age I am tempted to reach the conclusion that this town is inhabited by a bunch of skinflints who really don’t give a tinker’s dam about facilities in this community unless it has a hockey puck, a soccer ball or softball attached.

In my mind, a community needs a well rounded population. That means some will enjoy the symphony and others the latest country and western star to hit the CN Centre; some will enjoy going to the latest exhibition at the gallery, others the hockey enforcers; some will like fine dining at Winston’s, others wings night at the local pub; some will play tennis at the tennis club or other courts around town, others will go watch a softball game; some will go for a walk with their dog along the river, others will visit the Railway Museum.
No matter how large or small the group, it costs money to support those activities and if we go to a user pay system for all of them, many of those facilities simply will not be there. Result? There goes a segment of our community in which each of us have a purpose to play to make it a healthy and viable community.

That’s my rant for the day! :-)