Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Dick Whittington ,Dick Whittington...Where have yo...":
Evelyn:
There are two matters that I wish to address.
The Joint Operations Centre according to the information I located on the town website at a cost of $19,800,000 is to be financed by debt gradually reducing by monies from development charges and the sale of the 9 Scanlon Court property. Will the proceeds of sale of any other town properties by available to reduce this debt?
When companies agree to merge or when one buys out another, the first thing that is publicized is the degree of saving that the new larger entity will be able to accomplish, reducing duplication of staff and physical facilities, etc. In other words the combined company wii be more profitable because its overheads will be reduced.
I have not managed to see anywhere a similar statement on the overheads saved as a result of the Joint Operations Centre. I appreciate that staffs are not interchangeable but the larger, purpose-built structure must surely create savings. Has such a study been done and how does one access it?
The second matter must unfortunately once again address Mr. Bill Albino. He was described by another blogger as totally dedicated to the restoration, if not the resurrection, of Hillary House. His presence now on the Aurora Historical Society Board and as an officer of AHS provides him with a platform to meddle into areas where he is neither welcome nor is it appropriate for him to do so. Fifty members hardly represent the community
A recent blogger said that the asking prices for the two properties that would be required are apparently public knowledge. I have not seen any numbers and if they are public how do I find out what they are?
Hopefully the Hillary Heritage Park will fade from sight sooner rather than later and with it the COA's pretentious memorandum relating to a strategy to conduct purchase negotiations.
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Public works and parks are two departments within the organization.
Only facilities are to be joined. The departments currently work together to ensure all necessary areas of services are covered.
More space is required. The project has gone forward . A new site was purchased.
A budget of $14 million was projected.
A status report was due in October. It never appeared.
Word was the price had zoomed $10 million higher.
November was the new date . It failed to emerge.
Finally it came forward with an increased budget of $19 million plus land
Clearly the Mayor and several Councillors had been part of an effort to reduce the cost.
When the status report was finally presented , their support was organized .
I was never persuaded the facility needed to be re-located.
I was convinced the Hydro building and five acre secure yard should have been retained by the town and become permanent location for the parks department.
Space vacated by Parks on Scanlon Court would have provided adequately for expansion of Public Works.
The new joint facility site , on a dangerous curve on heavily travelled Industrial Parkway, in a ravine was never suitable for a mainly truck operation .
$3 million additional cost to remediate the site ,simply confirmed my conviction several wrong decision had been made.
The Hydro property owned by the Town , perfect for our purpose, needed for our use but leased to the National Defense Department, sits quietly idle throughout the week.
The Armories ,previous home of DND ,on the corner of the Town Park is also vacant and abandoned.
I believe the town should put the interest of taxpayers first and take back the Hydro property
I believe the Department of National Defense Program, being accommodated in a property we need for our own purposes , may very well be on the Federal chopping block.
I believe Council should seriously entertain the option of recovering our property at this time.
There has never been a financial advantage.
What's at stake is $15 million of needless debt to homeowners and business in our town.
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Scuttlebutt has it , the town's two mechanics have jointly submitted resignations.
I cannot ask without being accused of micro-managing.
So I thought I would share.
Thursday, 20 February 2014
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16 comments:
So much for that earlier remark about there being no well-reasoned arguments or discussions on the blog.
Well-done, whoever.
"...to meddle into areas where he is neither welcome nor is it appropriate for him to do so."
Which areas, pray tell? Also, unwelcome and inappropriate according to whom, exactly?
You exalt and diminish his "platform" in the same 'reasoned argument' - you can't have it both ways.
We are bleeding jobs not just from the Town Hall but from the Town itself. The Mayor did not mention Rona or any of the other operations that have left. Like no one is supposed to notice ?
I would really like to see an independent appraisal of those properties. It is long over-due and I believe the numbers we hear are not only inflated but unrealistic. There is nothing for Aurora to be had here.
Meanwhile the Stronach Legacy will proceed with due diligence and never be in the hands of any Council.
This is really different. Last term staff were getting escorted out the door. Now it would appear that they are going of their own accord.
Thank you, Councillor. You must feel like you spent your day inside a pin-ball machine.
19:31
You're forgetting about his inability to keep Blockbuster open in Aurora - How could any Mayor of any city/town in the provice be blamed for the closing of a national company that's bleeding money across Canada?
21:53 As a former employee of Blockbuster's Head Office, I could tell you what really happened there but this is not the venue. Suffice to say that a profitable, viable company was brought down by it's vendors because the US parent sent them adrift so that they could save their own a$$.
21:53
I think the point might be that we are spending a whole whack of money to attract customers to the town centre without the slightest reassurance that it will reverse the trend. When Cllr Abel asked how he would know the plan was working, he was told that he " would see it on the streets ".
Say what ? See what ?
Someone mentioned yesterday that we might need to file FOI requests in order to find out what the town was doing. I'm fairly sure that they have to go through the Town Clerk.
Do we even have a Town Clerk ?
How about the Mayor and his deputy suit up for the mechanics jobs. The way I figure it they could get a hands on feel for a truck/equipment garage. They might even better understand why town people think the proposal to build a new one is way too expensive. Further, anything they damage over at the garage can be repaired at reasonable cost compared to the monetary damages they are inflicting in their current jobs.
16:53's comment must be what passes for "sense" around here.
I'm afraid Council are going to vote for the Joint-Ops Project because they have backed themselves into a corner.
There is a chance that the cost of that will deter them from the Heritage fandango.
But 17:11, you both have votes of equal value. So your opinion carries no weight.
18:29
All the efforts of volunteers, AHS members over the years and the regular flow of money for Town Hall have been been enough to keep Hillary House from always tilting downward. I cannot believe you think the same individuals could handle more properties. And Councillors did signal strongly that they thought it was time to stop throwing good money after bad. They just lacked the gumption to end it in their last term.
If that's true, 19:47, why do you feel compelled to try to disparage said opinion?
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