blueandgoldguy

If this game is as bad as people are saying (for tix) then this'll be the last game Winnipeg gets for a long time.

When the Jets were here, the city was a black hole for much of the 80s and 90s.  In the early 2000s, the city and province began growing again primarily due to the provincial nominee program.  Jets did not create some sort of economic boom when they came back though some like to spin that narrative.

AKA passing the maintenance costs on to the government.

You have to factor in the opportunity cost of providing all the taxpayer funds for a project like this.  Why subsidize a stadium/arena complex for the benefit of crappy, minimum wage part-time jobs when you could just as easily subsidize some other corporate interest that would provide full-time decent paying jobs...or deal with pressing infrastructure needs with that money instead.  Those construction jobs are nothing more than temporary and are always the go-to response from proprietors of such projects and the the die-hard sports fans who parrot this nonsense.
 
A sports team is but a small part of a city's identity.  If it is all you have, that is pretty sad.  When the Jets left, live went on as usual and the city did not suffer some personal identity crisis nor did it dry up.  Stadium and arena funding in smaller cities are pretty much a necessity to allow for financial viability but within reason.  No one wants to see a city that is encumbered by such a financial obligation as to cut essential municipal services as has been done in Cincinatti and Glendale.
 
Good ol' Ken King.  Trying to pull the wool over the eyes of Calgarians and the city council.  I loved how king and those renders emphasized that this is a EVENT CENTRE and a FIELDHOUSE as if this project is being primarily built for the public first and foremost. haha.  In reality the arena will be a professional sports facility for the Flames, the Hitman (yeah, they are amateur but you still pay to see them), and the Roughnecks.  Then you add another 100-120 events per year, factor in off days for maintenance, concert set-up and takedown, creating and melting ice and there might be 50 or so days available for public use..of course almost all those would be available at a steep rental price.  There might be a few days that the Flames organization makes the building available to the public for no charge like a fan appreciation day but those will be few and far between.  Making money is the primary reason for the arena while public use will be given little thought.
 
I also love how King piggybacks the idea of a domed stadium onto the plans of fieldhouse.  Since the City had discussed funding a $200 million indoor facility it basically reduces by 50% the estimated amount it would cost for a 30,000 seat domed stadium.  The problem for the city though, besides the outrageous costs, is that a shared facility with pro sports teams greatly reduces the amount of time the public has access to the facility.  Between the Stamps games and practices, pro soccer team games and practice and a few concerts, the facility will probably lose 80-100 days of public use whereas a spending that $200 million on a standalone facility for the public guarantees them 365 days a year of open public access.
 
Fortunately, Calgarians and the city council will see right through King's attempts as selling this as a primary public event centre.  They will also be expecting a substantially larger contribution from private interests than the proposed funding model suggests.
Pretty much.  It will be a loan from the government.  These CRFs are far from a guarantee too.  So basically, the Flames are asking the government to subsidize half this project...and probably pay for the entire clean-up of the site.  Won't happen.
 
This is probably the first of a series of proposals we will be seeing in the coming years.  I think it will be 8-10 years before anything is actually built.  Fasten your seatbelts - it's going to be a long and bumpy ride.

The emotional argument is about the only long-term one.  There's no economic benefit on a region to having pro sports.  Most of the jobs are comparable to working retail, and very few are full-time.  Like Noeller says, there is the short-term benefit of building it.
 
I fully agree with using public money in many cases, I just hate when they try to make it seem financially sensible.  In reality it is tossing money into a financial black hole.  Fair enough and like you said a lot of public money goes into projects that will never return that money to the public purse, just be honest.  Otherwise you end up in the mess we've been stepping in for half a decade now.

Odd, isn't it? Somehow sports franchises (corporations, really) are some sort of sacred cows and deserving of massive public funds as opposed to individuals who are reviled for being temporarily (for the most part) down on their luck.
As an example, in Detroit, the city agreed to give over $200 million plus iinfrastructure improvements of an undetermined value to the very profitable Red Wings owner (who is worth some 5.8 billion) to build a $660 million new arena. And the city did this a week after declaring bankruptcy. Sort of a reverse Robin Hood thingie.

Who's our boundary WR?  Non-factor against the Argos.  One injury and we're playing projects.  Westerman has 6 of 8 sacks by our entire defensive line.  Where's our import rush ends?  I'd give Walters about a C+.  We continue to have the same depth issues over and over.

I don't know if they really supported their team as I remember they had some decent teams in the 80's & late 90's but were only getting 14,000 to their home games for years. They have a new stadium now so things are better. Yeah, Austin can be a **** at times but he's head & shoulder along with his assistants better than O'Shea & his coaches. He  holds his players accountable by reaming them out when he feels he has to instead of coddling & protecting ours like O'Shea does. Instead of a smirk there's anger. 

Zach Cholera (channeling Nate with the dumb nickname} looks like the next Tom Clements out there right now. Too bad that the Bombers couldn't nail him down.  Willy is good, but Zach is just that much better.
 
I just can't stand that Austin prick.  Even up by 30 points he is screaming at the refs and having a coronary on the sidelines.  Just a massive ******-bag.  

Comparing 2007 to now:
 
Receivers: Milt, Edwards and Armstrong all over 1,000 yards that year. Franklin played the dependable NI role. Compared to what? An inconsistent Denmark, Nick Moore, who is productive but injury prone and Darvin Adams who was playing well but is hurt. Our receivers were better in 07.
 
Running back: Charlie Roberts had over 1300 yards rushing, over 350 receiving and 16 tds. That is light years ahead of Marshall/Cotton/Scott.
 
OL: Dan Goodspeed, Alex Gauthier (NI tackle), Picard, Sheridan, Val. St Germaine, Aaron Fiaconi, Kyle Koch versus now? Please.
 
2007 had more talent.

Sarcasm?  I'll chalk it up to that.  FrostyWinnipeg falsely assumes that a housecleaning will automatically mean no playoffs the following season.  I rather easily dismissed his claim with my Hamilton example who by the way are smoking the Lions as we speak and will lead the East Division within a few short hours.  Try and follow along more carefully next time.  Maybe you missed your afternoon nap and aren't quite with it today?

Rave all you want about the punter/kicker and crucify the ST coach but that punt return for a TD was his fault and no one else's. Get to boom those punts as far as you can but to put a booming punt like that in the middle of the field is a cardinal sin. Firstly you have out kicked any type of coverage by 15 yds ( especially) given the new rules on releasing at the LOS. Secondly, by placing the ball in the middle of the field you have now required the cover team to blanket the entire width of the field. A punt should be between the numbers and the sidelines. At the very least between the hash marks and the sidelines. That then provides the sidelines as a boundary for containing a return thereby not giving a returner the entire width it find a seam. Credit where credi is due, blame equally where due. Players have to execute - you don't think he has been coached on where to locate a punt?

Guys that don't have jobs when both pro leagues are in full swing are coaches that are not worth it, no it's better to stay as is and then clean house at the end of the year. Again

Worked in Hamilton.  Cleaned house in 2012 with a 6-12 team including a first year coach and brought in Austin plus several others and the team went 10-8 and made it to the Grey Cup.  Went to the Grey Cup last year too.
 
Honestly, some people have these preconceived ideas of how they think things will work out without providing any evidence to back up these preconceptions.
 
I'm not saying the Bombers are due for a housecleaning just yet.  Let's see how the season plays out first.  No excuses for the team to not win at least one of their next three.  I think they have a shot at winning two of the next three personally.

I like marve, but frankly I don't think he played very well. Always moving from the pocket is still clearly a run first QB, when he did stay in the pocket he took a long time to make a decision I found,unless of course it was a designed quick hitter. He also under through a couple balls (his int) comes to mind. He'll get better but if willy plays tonight, we win hands down.
I liked the commitment to the run game but at the end of I was just wishing they would take a shot down field already. It seemed like they didn't want to throw anything past 20 yards

So many times after the qb was sacked you saw Picard just standing around because he didn't block anyone. I'm sick of that guy... and then to think of the money we're paying him to not block anyone.... 

MB has never excelled above mediocrity... so even earlier in this season when we did well most of the long term people on the boards still doubt the guys ability.    

MB's offense looked good in 2 games, but we've now played 7. That's not good enough IMO.

The Bombers had 273 yards of NET OFFENSE.  Again, it was against a defense that had a 31 point lead at the half.  Only natural to take the foot off the gas and yet the Bombers's offense still managed to stall out and punt 12 times.  Pathetic.  Moving the ball means sweet f-all unless you convert some of those drives into points, whether with field goals or TDs.
 
What I see is a team up to this point in the season is a team that is at the bottom-half of the league in most offensive categories...AGAIN.  It's only going to get worse with Willy out.  Hope the defense is up  to the challenge next week.

The Bombers had 273 yards of NET OFFENSE.  Again, it was against a defense that had a 31 point lead at the half.  Only natural to take the foot off the gas and yet the Bombers's offense still managed to stall out and punt 12 times.  Pathetic.  Moving the ball means sweet f-all unless you convert some of those drives into points, whether with field goals or TDs.
 
What I see is a team up to this point in the season is a team that is at the bottom-half of the league in most offensive categories...AGAIN.  It's only going to get worse with Willy out.  Hope the defense is up  to the challenge next week.

The Bombers had 273 yards of NET OFFENSE.  Again, it was against a defense that had a 31 point lead at the half.  Only natural to take the foot off the gas and yet the Bombers's offense still managed to stall out and punt 12 times.  Pathetic.  Moving the ball means sweet f-all unless you convert some of those drives into points, whether with field goals or TDs.
 
What I see is a team up to this point in the season is a team that is at the bottom-half of the league in most offensive categories...AGAIN.  It's only going to get worse with Willy out.  Hope the defense is up  to the challenge next week.

I was very surprised at how well May did at the debate. I thought she was very articulate and had her facts down pretty tight. Trudeau also did better than I expected. He was a little too argumentative with Harper, but otherwise I thought he did well. His closing remarks were a little much, but certainly not as bad as TUP tries to make it sound.
 
Mulcair had the best line of the debate with his shot at Harper about having to ask "which one?" when talking about recessions under his watch. Getting Harper to admit he basically tells Conservative senators what to do was also a point in his favour. His fake smile for most of the debate was pretty weird though. He also sounded a little too rehearsed at times. Trudeau got him pretty good regarding his pandering to separatists.
 
Harper got smacked around a little at times, but certainly nothing that could be considered election changing. I thought he looked a little more animated than he has in previous elections. He engaged with the other leaders more, rather than like last time where he never took his eyes of the camera.

The issue isn't that people are against having to provide ID in order to vote (whomever believes that is taking an incredibly simplistic view of things) .. it's that you are potentially disenfranchising 500k+ voters who could prove their ID but not their current address.  Typically, people falling into this group are students or people who have recently moved .. but also impacts the elderly living in long term care facilities and First Nations who live on reserves.  One method of verifying your address was the use of Voter ID Cards (those mail outs you get from Elections Canada at election time). In the last election, about 400k voters used the Voter ID Card as a method of corroborating their address - the Fair Elections Act eliminates its use.  The other issue is that it allows parties to game the system in ridings where there may be a tight race.  Party officials can challenge IDs, holding up / causing lines to back up and people simply leave without casting their vote.  
 
So why was this done?  Potential voter fraud.
 
There's no evidence of voter fraud and, as noted by the Supreme Court of Canada in 2012, the issue of voting irregularities wasn't one of fraud but of inconsistent training of and mistakes committed by elections officials.  They found that the people who voted were eligible and voted in good faith.  In fact, an EC compliance audit (completed before the SCC ruling) came to the same conclusion and recommended (among other things) that paperwork be simplified for elections officials dealing with people with ID issues, better training and more widespread use of the Voter ID Card.  Instead, the Fair Elections Act simply makes it harder for people a segment of the population to vote and does nothing to address the root cause of the problem.  
 
C-23 was a terrible bill and actually does more harm to our elections process than it does good. But this is what you get when you limit debate on legislation and rush things through the House.

As a youngster, I remember going with my dad to a game in October 1985 against the Lions.  Sold out stadium with 32,000 in the stands.  Bombers one a close game by a TD.  
 
At that time Swervin Feryn Fernandez was the best receiver in the CFL, and would have probably been the best receiver in CFL history had  he spent his entire career in Canada.  You could always count on at least one deep ball completion to Fernandez each game and this one was no different as Dewalt hooked up with him in the third or fourth quarter.
 
I seem to remember a play late in the game where the Bombers were pinned deep in their zone on third down, and Cameron, uncharacteristically, hit a poor punt to give the Lions good field position inside the Bomber 50.  On that drive, and possibly another, I think the Bombers defense held strong limiting the Lions a field goal or no points ultimately winning the game.
 
Great game, great atmosphere and some great memories.

As a youngster, I remember going with my dad to a game in October 1985 against the Lions.  Sold out stadium with 32,000 in the stands.  Bombers one a close game by a TD.  
 
At that time Swervin Feryn Fernandez was the best receiver in the CFL, and would have probably been the best receiver in CFL history had  he spent his entire career in Canada.  You could always count on at least one deep ball completion to Fernandez each game and this one was no different as Dewalt hooked up with him in the third or fourth quarter.
 
I seem to remember a play late in the game where the Bombers were pinned deep in their zone on third down, and Cameron, uncharacteristically, hit a poor punt to give the Lions good field position inside the Bomber 50.  On that drive, and possibly another, I think the Bombers defense held strong limiting the Lions a field goal or no points ultimately winning the game.
 
Great game, great atmosphere and some great memories.