Raise the Hammer

From the website:

The success of the Games will be enhanced by a _well-informed, engaged_ community that both _feels_ included and _is_ included in the planning, preparation and execution of the Games.

(emphasis original)

If the West Harbour continues to lead that poll by a margin of 7 to 1, then a decision to opt for the East Mountain will ensure that the games fail, according to the city's own criteria above.

Make that 83%-12%... It should be made clear that a decision like this has the ability to be political suicide for each and every member of council.

This is one of the most mind-boggling things I've ever seen in Hamilton. Everyone from regular joe citizens to architects/designers to young professionals to the real estate board, Ontario construction association, big time downtown businesses, local BIA's and community groups, the Future Fund board, small businesses downtown, well known developers and everyone in between are throwing their support behind West Harbour. And up until a few weeks ago, council was decidedly in favour of WH. Some provincial meddling and backroom deals later and here we have a council willing to put their jobs on the line in order to cave to the provincial pressure and do the wrong thing for Hamilton. Usually it only takes a 60 signature petition to get these guys to fall all over themselves, yet here they seem willing to ignore virtually every sector in the entire city. People have compared this to Red Hill. In my mind it's not even close. Red Hill actually did have quite a split of supporters with heavyweights on both sides. This is as lopsided an issue as you'll ever find, and many councillors will pay a hefty price this fall if they in fact cave to the province.

The flying monkeys haven't arrived yet, but let's savour this moment.

The goeastmountain site is catching up. I'm sure there is as much support for the east mountain site. Just look at how many people shop at limeridge and power centres vs. downtown. They probably want the same for the stadium. That doesn't change anything, we're running a city here and we need to do what works for cities.

Dude. "web poll" = "non scientific poll". Do you really think most RTH readers don't already know that?

Ryan, you strike me as a bright fellow, someone who knows the difference between scientific and unscientific polling, thus, I am angered and dissapointed that RTH doesn't point out the fact that this is not a scientific poll.

FFS. The one time the post does not begin with a disclaimer that web polls are not scientific, someone goes apeshit. Calm down.

Comment edited by jonathan dalton on 2010-07-27 13:08:04

I think that this voluntary poll is entirely accurate.

Capitalist, here's an answer for you!!! (I'll say it since no one else will)

Just because an organization owns land somewhere doesn't mean that there's a church there - take a look at the property, it's vacant land! Also note that as a "church" meaning charitable organization, Jason is NOT personally responsible for any decisions made by the "church"! Furthermore that same "church" owns three properties downtown near the Gage Park area of which only one is to be a "church". Further-furthermore if you want to get right down to the usage data itself, from their website, LHCA has 3 services each week which means that any venue they build will be used approximately 156 times each year compared to the Tiger Cats 10. Further-further-furthermore the "Jason's church" isn't asking for any public money in their efforts to build whatever they want to build on their land!!

Give up the partisan bullshit and get a life!! MOVE ON!!!

Bo Beep - there are many reasons for listing land at a higher price and none of them are hypocritical (I think you need to look up that definition). It could be that they didn't really want to sell it, could be that they bought the land as an investment, could be that because of market conditions they should be looking for more than they paid for it... There's nothing hypocritical about investing in anything whether it's land or mutual funds!

FWIW NONE of those questions have ANYTHING to do with this article and therefore they weren't addressed by anyone. Mea culpa for feeding the trolls...

Comment edited by frank on 2010-07-28 09:23:46

Don't waste your time Frank. I just wasted 60 seconds of my life looking up this so-called land for sale on the EM and there appears to be an 18 acre piece listed at 4.7 million, another 15+ acre site listed at 8.5 mil, a 2 acre site listed at 1.5mil and a 6 acre site with building (doesn't look like a church though) for 3.7 mil.

I'm going to assume that this church owns the 15+ acres listed at 8.5 million based on the trolling above. Even so, who cares?? Let's say someone buys that land for 8.5 mil, what does that tell you? It tells me that the other land owners have undervalued their land. Land prices in Hamilton are skyrocketing lately.
Someone with a screen name 'capitalist' should understand this, or maybe he only likes it when Walmart pulls off a great deal, but nobody else..... like I said, 60 seconds, plus another 60 to post this that I'll never get back.

Where's the zookeeper??

lol, I had fun doing it so it wasn't a waste of my time. FWIW, I believe the church owns the 18 acre piece... I haven't seen zookeeper in a while.

Councillor Terry Whitehead has a poll up on his site, www.terrywhitehead.ca, which, according to the Spec, he is going to use to gauge public opinion and base his decision on said public opinion...

Get voting, people!

Looks like the East Mountain side realized this poll existed. Last night it was 81% WH, 19% EM, now its 60% WH to 40% EM.

The interesting thing is that despite this apparent 20% shift, there isn't a corresponding jump in pro EM related comments. I wonder if someone is trying to game the results?

Councillor Terry Whitehead has a poll up on his site, www.terrywhitehead.ca, which, according to the Spec, he is going to use to gauge public opinion and base his decision on said public opinion...

Does he seriously expect anyone to believe that he still doesn't know what the vast public opinion is?? My question is this - are there ANY groups left in the city who haven't thrown their support behind WH??

"I wonder if someone is trying to game the results?"

I can only vote once so I'm not sure how someone would do that... I'm sure there are more than a thousand ppl who are paying attention to the matter...

I can only vote once so I'm not sure how someone would do that

I've been trying various methods to see what the problem is and it looks like a simple clearing of your browser's cookies is all that's necessary. Something anyone can do (or be shown how to do.)

The more amusing fact is that Clr. Whitehead's stadium poll does not contain this vulnerability, it seems to be logging IPs to prevent multiple votes. Still not foolproof but something that the city's web people should have done.