- Lack of local content affects credibility:
1) It seems as though the consultants remained intentionally ignorant to important local events. Positive events (such as WIDC) will not only change the look, flavour and feel of downtown; it will change the economic framework of the downtown. The report is strangely silent how these significant events will play-out. This is a disservice.
2) Best-guessing critical issues like land costs, construction costs, market data, land availability, public safety and private sector motivation (or lack thereof) cannot lead to trustworthy analysis. If we pay for expertise, we should get expertise.
3) By choosing to remain aloof from the local construction and development community the consultants lost a critically important opportunity to educate themselves.
- So why do it...?:
4) The consultants advised that their own 'recommendation' (10-year 100 per cent abatement) will fail. If that's the case, then why are they 'recommending' it?
- Take my land...please:
5) To insinuate, even tangentially, that Downtown Prince George could not be given away is not only offensive, it is plain wrong. Not only does the land have value, Prince Georgians want to takes steps to increase the value of the land.
- As a matter of fact, yes we are desperate!
6) Let's be very clear here. Yes! We are desperate. For the past 30-years, Prince George has had the worst downtown in Canada. Desperate times call for extraordinary measures. If people were lined up to buy our land, this exercise would not be underway.
- Where's the beef?
7)The report is long on verbiage, but short on deliverables. Without an effective task list, assignment of responsibilities and an implementation strategy, this is merely "Report No. 20" in the long list of municipal dust collectors. As the mayor said: "We will be judged by what we do".
- Reality check
8)Developers are standing at the ready. They are awaiting the city's incentive package. To argue otherwise is absurd.
