Downtown Renewal

I received a phone call. There is interest in assembling three properties on Yonge Street to develop something new.

The houses are in the designated Heritage Neighbourhood on Yonge Street opposite Aurora Heights Drive ..

They are modest frame- clad rental homes of no significant design, run-down and shabby.

A young mother was murdered in one by a violent ex-boyfriend, while her children were in the house. Reason enough, I think for that house to be wiped from the face of the earth.

For forty years, successive Councils have talked and spent money on consultants to advise on the need for re-vitalisation of the downtown core.

When I was Mayor, we bought planters for the sidewalks and filled them with flowers.

A Business Improvement Area was formed . That's an association of business owners and the municipality with the objective of ... you guessed it.... improving the business area.

A grant was available. The town put up the bulk of the money with an agreement that benefitting property owners would share with the town proportionately, as an annual tax.

We created the parking lot behind the west side of Yonge. We acquired a property leading up to Yonge Street.

After the railway came to Aurora, a team of draught horses pulling Fleury Plough flat bed carts galloped hard to get up that hill and swung around at full speed on Yonge Street, taking ploughs to the station to be shipped all over North America.

We put in steps there and designed an aesthetically pleasing parking lot. With lights and little gardens here and there. We bought the old Fleury office building and created a little park on the corner of Wellington and Temperance Street.

Heritage style lamp standards and benches were installed here and there on Yonge Street.

I think it cost $250Ks after the grant. As soon as it was completed, the BIA voted to disband. Never paid a penny of their share. Stuck the town with the whole bill.

Merchants tend to be a fractious bunch. I put it down to the insecurity and pressure of running a small business.

Council and staff had a good working relationship. We were doing good stuff and we were doing it together. Without consultants. Norm Weller and I had a great partnership. Every day was a great exciting day.

That's how I know how much can be accomplished. Because I've done it. Not by myself alone.
But I've done it.





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