I have to laugh at the idea of Nenshi and The Flames being on equal footing here.
Nenshi represents the interests of the citizens of Calgary. It's not his job to come up with alternate solutions to hamfisted proposals, and yet the city of Calgary has funded studies, proposed alternate locations and conducted public opinion polling on the project.
They've green lit exploration of an olympic bid that would almost certainly tie into arena funding, have been meeting with the Flames weekly apparently, and all of this in an election year where the discussion of public money for private interest is a political hand grenade.
Nenshi and council have probably done more, and spent more, than they should have on the various arena proposals.
Is the idea that Nenshi should be 'nicer' to the Flames, who are indirectly threatening to leave the city? Is that how negotiations usually go in business? Not in my experience.
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