Mayor's Awards, Dead Bodies and Curry Killed

Want to see a dead body?

So I was minding my own business last week, stopping by Ed Video Media Arts Centre to run an errand when I ran into the Guelph Mercury’s Scott Tracey in the lobby of 40 Baker Street. He was trying to snap a picture of some city workers doing road work on Baker, filling a sinkhole at the side of the road. Or so it seemed. Because what began as a simple picture of road work turned into one of those stories.

The worker we talked to was quite frank about what brought him there. The sinkhole in question could have been from a body. Not a fresh body, mind you, but one that was buried there before the existence of Baker Street at the turn of the 20th century. There was no confirmation at press time, that the woe of the Baker Street sinkhole is, in fact, the body of some poor soul left behind when the occupants of the former cemetery behind Knox on Quebec St were moved to Woodlawn, but we’re left to wonder. More news as it develops.

Deadline for Mayor’s Award Noms Soon

Know somebody that deserves an award of such prominence it’s named in honour of the highest political office in our land? Well, your opportunity to shower them in adulation is soon closing. The deadline to nominate someone for the 2010 Mayor’s Awards is Friday April 23. The criterion for nomination is simple: making a difference in our city. This can mean any number of positive actions, including volunteering, fundraising, coaching, or showing leadership in our community. Know someone that fits that bill? Send an e-mail with a letter describing your nominee’s contributions, along with contact information for yourself and your nominee, to mayor@guelph.ca. Winners will be announced at the Guelph Awards of Excellence gala on June 24.

Road construction kills Curry

If you’re a fan of the downtown institution Curry in a Hurry, then tomorrow is your last chance to partake its delicious curry goodness. The restaurant will be closing on Friday April 16 because, you guessed it sports fans, revenue is down after last summer’s construction along Norfolk. Between road repairs being conducted by the city and Bell Canada fibre optic upgrades that necessitated further road construction, Curry in a Hurry spent about eight months last year being difficult to access for customers. “I had people call and then wouldn’t pick up their order because they couldn’t find their way into the restaurant,” said owner Sarah Dewbury. “Unfortunately, we often have to dig when we do work of this nature,” Bell Canada spokesperson Julie Smithers said in a Mercury article. “We always look to minimize any impact on local businesses.” Mission: failed. Dewbury says that there’s a possibility that she may continue to be a distributor of fine curry dishes as a delivery-based business, but she’s still unsure. RIP: Curry in a Hurry, 1997-2010

Money for DT Businesses to improve externals

Ten downtown business owners are going to get a $10,000 bonus from the city to improve their external appearance of their buildings downtown, so long as they kick in a matching $10,000 for the enterprise. The decision was approved by council last week, and included another $25,000 for up to five feasibility studies to estimate how much it might cost to restore other buildings in the core to their former glory. The plan is similar to one enacted in Kitchener in an effort to revitalize that city’s downtown area. However, not all were impressed with the plan. "I think the downtown has more problems than a lack of awnings," said Coun. Christine Billings. She was one of three councillors to vote against the plan. Results of the projects are expected to be delivered to council by year’s end.

The Origin of a Protest

It may have been cold and blustery outside last Monday night, but the resolve was on fire at Fresh Start on Baker Street as the first official meeting of the Land Is More Important Than Sprawl, or LIMITS began. Over 50 people filled the small space on the first floor of the Baker Street Centre in order to discuss direction in terms of mounting an appeal to the construction of a 675-acre industrial and business park development. The long in the works Hanlon Creek Business Park has been on the books for years, but it looks to moving forward to a groundbreaking sometime this year.

The problem? That nearly a quarter of that land is home to an old growth forest, where some trees are as old as 500 years, with many more well above the age of 200. As presented in the meeting, the land, which is west of the Hanlon with Laird Road running through the centre of it, is also home to 90 species of birds, 20 species of reptiles and several mammal species including deer, coyote and fox. The focus on local wildlife had a purpose, or as one member of LIMITS observed, “It’s about respect and realizing that there are things that belong here besides us.”

Much of the main presentation was about the environmental impact on the specific area where the HCBP hopes to set up shop and the Guelph area generally. The Downey Well sits on this tract of land, a source of water that supplies Guelph with 20 per cent of what it drinks. The Hanlon Creek itself feeds into the Speed River acting as a “recharge zone,” as well as being one of the four, major tributaries to the Grand River, which serves Cambridge and the Six Nations Reserve.

The way LIMITS sees it, there are some fairly large stakes for not just Guelph, but the surrounding community, should construction of the HCBP move forward. The point of last Monday’s meeting was two fold: to gage interest in making this activist start-up a more formal entity and kicking around some ideas about how to launch the “official” protest, so to speak. And time is of the essence, members of the group feel, they believe that the melting of the snow may herald the beginning of the end for this patch of greenspace.

Several options were discussed including make appeals to Environmental Commissioner of Ontario Gord Miller and bringing the issue back to the City Council. LIMITS is also interested in exploring brownfield options, considering so much land in the inner city is already built on and simply waiting for business to make use of it. First and foremost, they want to avoid a situation where the wetlands and forests on the proposed HCBP site are drained and clear cut.

They’re concerned about a recent trend in construction called Speculative Development, where an area is cleared by the landowners as they try and sell the space and find tenants and finding tenants maybe an issue given current economic conditions. According to Statistics Canada, the number of new building permits issued nationwide declined by 12 per cent in November, the most recent month numbers have been released for. In Ontario, non-residential building permits were down by 30 per cent over the same period in 2007.

As for LIMITS’ next stage plans, they hope to keep up their momentum from Monday night with more meetings in the next couple of weeks. They’re also seeking out alliances with other environmental and pro-responsible development groups in order to make an impact on the public consciousness and get their message out before any shovels dig into the earth on the HCBP property. For full details on the city’s plans for the Hanlon Creek Business Park, you can check it out on the city’s website for this link: http://guelph.ca/uploads/business/documents/Flyer07.pdf. And to learn more about LIMITS, you visit their Facebook group or fire off an e-mail to guelphlimits@gmail.com