Toronto will provide $6 million to Arts and Culture. The money will come from billboard revenue
not taxes.
Toronto has a population of 2 .479 million It means slightly more than two dollars per capita for Arts and Culture.None of it from taxes.
In Aurora , we have committed $570,000 dollars on Arts and Culture, We have a population of about fifty-five thousand population. That's in excess of ten dollars per capita. All of it from taxes.
Last time I checked, Toronto's taxes were substantially less than Aurora's .
I thought taxpayers might be interested in that comparator.
The other thing about the new agreement for the Church Street School . It's supposed to provide museum space. But he majority of Council including the Mayor and Councillor Pirri have voted with
Gallo ,Gaertner and Ballard not to act on the recommendation on the collection until the Master Culture Plan is complete.
The study is not near beginning. We expect the Art aficionados to do what they can to exclude the museum from its rightful home. We can only conclude the Mayor and Councillor Pirri have the same
objective.
It's weird having to watch for clues to discover the reason for a decision to reveal itself.
Another e-mail has been received urging Concil to continue to protect the peace and tranquility
of the streets at he core of the community.
We are hearing a lot about it being a special neighbourhood. Not like the modern cookie-cutter
subdivisions. One writer is sure people come from the city to enjoy the beauty of their neighbourhood.
Inconvenience to residents outside the neighborhood is dismissed as a factor.
If the diverters (obstructions) are removed ,some of the families will have to look for a safer neighborhood to live.
I can recommend my neighborhood. We don't have much traffic. Kids play on the street. People walk and ride bicycles when the weather is fine.
The difference is the lack of amenities within walking distance. Except for school. everything is a drive. Nothing is convenient.
It's the price most expect to pay.
We don't expect to pay millions for construction and maintenance of streets in a "special" neighborhood as well as blockades and barricades to force us not to use the streets.
We find ourselves told ,without embarrassment,we have no right to use of the streets we paid for.
We , the lesser ones, are good only for paying the tab, can't be allowed to disturb the peace and tranquillity of the special neighborhood, dontcha know?
Toronto is going to spend a hundred and fifty million dollars
on roads and infrastructure this year.
I haven't heard mention of obstructions for special neighborhoods to prohibit invasion from
outside.
More reverse snobbery - that chip on your shoulder must be a boulder of Ailsa Craig granite.
ReplyDeleteHere's another comparison for you.............
ReplyDeleteHow many square miles comprise Toronto? How many for Aurora?
According to someone's favourite research site. Toronto is 240 sq miles for a density of 10,750/sq mi.
Aurora is 19 sq miles for a density of 2,768/sq mi
So, how much billboard revenue per square mile in Toronto? $25,000 per square mile.
Using the same factor, we could get $475,000 doing the same thing. That's close to the $570,000 nut.
I don't know how much a billboard generates, but let's throw up a bunch and see what happens. Maybe increase the density a bit. We could put some in the north-east quadrant advertising it's unique culture.
The way Aurora and all the communities of York Region are heading with urbanization and intensification, and every other "ation" is that more and more people, houses, high rises etc. will be gobbling up the farm land the woods and the meadows. And inbetween every other building new dense condos will sprout up.
ReplyDeleteThere will be more traffic that we'll know what to do with. Just wait until you see the flow around the 2 lanes of Wellington at the GO Station and what Yonge & Wellington will look like. People will be avoiding these areas because of the congestion.
Just yesterday I noticed the clearing of land on the westside of Bayview north of Vandorf Side Road. It made me think that besides Sheppard's Bush, Case Woodlot and the Aurora Arboretum there will be no green space left. Good thing for Aurora that Frank Stronach is donating his Eco-park because it will be saved for public use. But it is ironic that he'll be saving a small part of what a major section of Aurora used to be. No offense to Mr. Stronach but kids will then have to go to the eco-park to see what nature used to be like all around Aurora but has be cleared, paved and re-purposed. Aurora kids will be like other city kids not knowing where their food comes from or what a farm looks like other than what they see in pictures on the internet.
Take a look at Google satelite map and you'll see - beside the aforementioned and golf courses, Aurora is going to be housing from north to south and east to west. The town's limits are only Bathurst to the 404 and Bloomington to just north of St. John's Sideroad. We'll have to get out of town and out of the Region to find any nature. Aurora's problems are not unique and are shared with many other communities in York are just beginning with its urban intensification. I don't know what the answer is, but there's going to be a lot of people in a small footprint. But perhaps people don't care about such things.
Make an argument, @3:30
ReplyDeleteThe Museum has become a bouncing ball. Used by various councillors as they wish when they wish. It is going to be very difficult, however, to explain to residents that the Aurora Room will not be ready for the birthday celebration. It was just a small amount of space given what was originally conceived. Not to have followed through is just plain petty.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteInto every life a little gravel must fall.
Ignore it and it will become part of a trail.
Since when does ' reverse snobbery ' have anything to do with wasteful spending? You sound like a constipated sociology minor. Get your own bloody blog- the clock is running out on you.
ReplyDeleteMore pigeon-holing and exaggerating Reverse snobbery working quite well during the French Revolution. In Aurora we are talking about council members- not their heads. Ease off on the rhetoric.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteThe spoiled child known as Ballard offers sabres at dawn as a means of settling a matter.
Someone should take him up on this and remove his head from the rest.
The rest would make a far better councillor.
Nice smackdown by Mayor Dawe on Cllr Buck re: the heritage park. She needs to get called out more often.
ReplyDelete8:43 AM
ReplyDeleteIt is funny how differently people view the same material. We thought he was being quite defensive about his early involvement in the ' scheme ' and then that he should not have been commenting when he was in the chair. Councillor Abel could have taken the gavel for a bit to keep it clean.