Update March 5, 2013 ....
By a vote of 8-7 the Notice of Motion passed.
Thank you to my colleagues; Peter Demong, Gian-Carlo Carra, Richard Pootmans, Ray Jones, Mayor Nenshi, Diane Colley-Urquhart and Andre Chabot for your visionary thinking and willingness to open a discussion on alternative funding for Transit projects including the SETWAY.
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With the continued rapid growth of the SE quadrant and with
the development of 3 major employment hubs creating 40,000 office job sites,
retail, commercial, small business and the new South Health , the need for the
SETWAY is now.
All current Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) and
GreenTrip funding are fully allocated on other projects for the foreseeable
future coupled with the Province projecting a deficit budget has resulted in thinking
outside the box approach to furthering the momentum of the SETWAY.
Do we reallocate funds from other projects or do we search
for Alternatives? Alternative s such as
the Community Revitalization Levy, P3 Partnerships or BOOT (Build Own Operate
Transfer) have potential and need to be explored. Regardless of the Notice of Motions success or
failure at Council, I am committed to the development of the SETWAY in spite of
its challenges.
