Quote:
Originally Posted by Hackey
What infrastructure are we suppose to gain potentially?
- a new 5000 person hockey rink?
- renovation to the oval?
- renovation to McMahon?
- a field house?
That doesn't exactly get me excited.
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- a new 5000 person hockey rink?
High chance that this turns into a full NHL arena with little to no extra money from tax payers.... I can't see a scenario where CSSC says no to taking the money for the 5,000 person hockey rink and doesn't build the new arena that they want.
- renovation to the oval?
Don't know enough about what the future plans would be so I won't touch on it.
- renovation to McMahon?
Is going to be done one way or another at some point in the near future. With the games, we see provincial, federal and IOC money contribute. Without the games, local tax payers fund the renovation.
- a field house?
This is being built regardless of the games. Again, let the federal, provincial and IOC accounts help build it and save us from having to build it.
Whether one is a no or a yes vote, we cannot compare what has happened with unemployment rates, budgets, etc to any other games. When you host the games in a low unemployment environment, chances are people are not looking for work. Calgary has a boatload of people looking for work that would welcome a new job. Unfortunately, it seems people I talk to who are looking for work are more concerned about the slight tax increase vs the job they could have for several years (temporary).
We also can't compare games that go way over budget building 90% new + adding in state of the art weather stations, alternative energy programs, etc which are really not a part of the games. We have 80%+ of the structures in place. Am I blind the to fact we could go over budget? not at all but I am also not buying that we could go over budget to the level of what some people want to think it could be.
Isn't the SW portion of the ring road coming in hundreds of millions under budget due to the current economic times? Tokyo has a 2.4 unemployment rate while Calgary has a 8% unemployment rate. If the games can temporarily reduce the unemployment rate until we get pipelines built, does the reduced unemployment not significantly help our city from multiple different angles including financial?