Comments on: Welcome to tellJoe!!

By: joe

joe — Thu, 06 May 2010 01:03:40 +0000

Roger, I couldn’t agree more and am working to address the shortfall (huge shortfall!).

Joe

By: Roger Renton

Roger Renton — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 03:56:53 +0000

I think its time city council considered more than one skatepark in Calgary is needed to service the needs of the youth in this city. Whether it’s a new concrete outdoor park or an indoor to skate in the winter, Calgary needs more skateparks. Our current options aren’t really cutting it. With the removal of Westside, Millennium Park is the only concrete skatepark in Calgary. Millennium Park is dated and has many features that aren’t even skateable (that’s being kind). Calgary is grossly behind other Western Canadian cities when it comes to concrete skateparks. Edmonton has 6, Winnipeg has 5, and Vancouver has dozens.There are thousands of skaters in Calgary (one recent estimate is 10,000). To have to commute downtown and pay for parking at a city park on a weekend is ludicris. It’s time city council realized that the youth and adults are due for more parks in this city.

By: joe

joe — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 00:54:36 +0000

Rob, thanks for your input…I will be reviewing your position with my office and will consider your points regarding Enmax and dividend structure.
-Joe-

By: Will

Will — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 16:27:56 +0000

Urban sprawl is costly both for public infrastructure and allocates resources away from creative and intellectual capital that can be exported. Calgary should try and be more like Chicago, Boston or Portland. The current economic recession has highlighted that cities have built in a compact form have been more resilient to the recession. Calgary needs to retain the highest quality of life in the country so it can continue to attract new and creative people from a variety of walks of life. I believe this means allowing the city to grow in new ways including the revitalization of East Village and SunAlta, and a focus on transport orientated design. I believe if the city evaluates the economic costs and benefits of each city design (compact vs. sprawl) that it would find that the compact form has more economic benefits associated with it. I believe this is substantiated by the relative economic outperformance of cities with compact designs in the US versus sprawlcities. I also believe that compact forms allow for more closeknit cities to be developed with better accessibility to services.

I want Calgary to be a leader in helping design the best city to live in the world.

By: Rob Savard

Rob Savard — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:21:30 +0000

Joe, I think the Enmax dividend is way too small.

It seems Enmax has been given a significant franchise to reinvest profits, take business risk and grow, in theory great if managed effectively.

However, if Enmax is to reinvest tax payer dollars and expose the city to commercial risk, then In my view the Enmax dividend should increase dramatically.

Also, the Enmax position on tranmission is a bit misleading.

Anyway, an increase in dividends would add revenue to the city and slow the rate of increase of the tax base

By the way, my background is in the renewable energy sector and I was involved in the deregulation of energy markets in circa 2000 so I understand utilities and rate making ———- creditability 101

Cheers,

Rob Savard