This is how you do it .... Penticton!

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southy
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This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by southy »

The little town that can is doing it again. I cannot for the life of me understand why Penticton lacks vision when it comes to planning their downtown core. Nelson has been successful for years and they are at it again doing a redesign on something that worked well for them for years. http://www.nelsonstar.com/news/378993951.html

This little town works so well together in so many ways - from their Chamber to tourism to downtown association to council.
Yet again - here we sit in Penticton playing little boy and girl politics just so some very large and fragile egos get stroked.
Shameful.
southy
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by southy »

Gee - and here's another idea that perhaps the Downtown Association and other groups might consider ... http://www.nelsonstar.com/community/379204671.html
Static
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by Static »

^^^ the downtown is already ugly enough!
southy
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by southy »

And correct you are Static. Just don't understand why downtown has so much difficulty becoming alittle creative. Although I suppose creativeness is a preceptual thing ... I mean there is the market and there is the water slide down Vancouver hill .. And I mean the downtown Association is now putting their hands out for fireworks donations. There is downtown revite .. Yet Static as you say ... Downtown penticton is just plain un creatively ugly!
Static
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by Static »

The thing is, downtown has so much potential. It could be a very nice and a huge draw for the community. And, the waterslide could very easily be situated down Vancouver Hill.
southy
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by southy »

southy wrote:Gee - and here's another idea that perhaps the Downtown Association and other groups might consider ... http://www.nelsonstar.com/community/379204671.html


Guess they considered it! http://www.pentictonherald.ca/news/arti ... 74521.html
twobits
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

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Static wrote:The thing is, downtown has so much potential. It could be a very nice and a huge draw for the community. And, the waterslide could very easily be situated down Vancouver Hill.


It will never reach that potential until it reaches a point where land values entice redevelopment investment. The City pouring millions into sidewalks and bollards does nothing but kick the can down the road. It is nothing more than taxpayers paying to maintain property value for downtown slumlords by curb appeal. And burdening each parcel with a levy for a portion of the improvements makes new investment even more expensive.
Granville St Mall in Vancouver is a good analogy. City pumped millions into street and sidewalk and reduced traffic to two lane public transit only. Worked for a few years but in the end it became a chithole. Stores boarded up and property values dropped to the point where some of the once highest priced real estate in Vancouver could be bought and redeveloped. And it did. Look at it now. It is bustling to the point that the sidewalks need pedestrian lights and it wasn't the City making the investment, it was the new property owners. Bottom line is that the City cannot fix our downtown's problem, the owners of the properties have to.
Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

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twobits
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

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southy wrote:

Guess they considered it! http://www.pentictonherald.ca/news/arti ... 74521.html


I like public sculpture too. But something doesn't jive to me in this article. 37k in the "arts budget", 5 sculptures, and 15k each. In grade three I learned this math is screwy. Anyone what to ponder where that hole gets filled from? Hey, but what the heck, it's only tax money. Just raise taxes. Between new building inspectors at 90k, an ADHD former Fire Chief suing, Firemen paid 75k a year for two day shifts, two sleepovers and four days off, or the list of litigation the City is in court over now, affordable housing will not be defined by the price of the housing but rather the tax burden on the housing.
This current City administration is making Jake Kimberly look like the scrooge. And while many of you here didn't care for Ashton or vote for John Vaz, they are looking pretty effin brilliant as managers of the public purse right now.
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Rosemary1
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by Rosemary1 »

The old saying of putting lipstick on a pig? There is an ugly underbelly in Penticton with growing vandalism, break and entries, assaults and rowdiness esp. in downtown area. Public washrooms are constantly destroyed. Little is safe that is not locked down and protected. Almost daily reports of storefronts broken into. Rowdy drunks and addicts roaming streets and beaches after dark looking for trouble. Too many run down buildings needing a facelift from owners. . All of that speaks to some underlying social issues that new sidewalk brickwork, bolars, sculptures, artwork and parkettes will not fix or hide.

Maybe city and businesses owners need to first think about security cameras as deterrents before investing more in beautification projects!.....
twobits
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

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Rosemary1 wrote:The old saying of putting lipstick on a pig? There is an ugly underbelly in Penticton with growing vandalism, break and entries, assaults and rowdiness esp. in downtown area. Public washrooms are constantly destroyed. Little is safe that is not locked down and protected. Almost daily reports of storefronts broken into. Rowdy drunks and addicts roaming streets and beaches after dark looking for trouble. Too many run down buildings needing a facelift from owners. . All of that speaks to some underlying social issues that new sidewalk brickwork, bolars, sculptures, artwork and parkettes will not fix or hide.

Maybe city and businesses owners need to first think about security cameras as deterrents before investing more in beautification projects!.....


I liked your post and agree with the gist of it. I also agree that the downtown association of merchants should be more proactive in their own security as a group rather than expecting the RCMP to be able to devote the resources required to provide the level of street view observation required. Imo, the downtown merchants would be better served with a portion of their association fee's to hire their own visible security cruising the streets and alleys dawn to dusk rather than new bricks, bollards and guaranteeing the revenue of a friggen waterslide on Vancouver ave. The other three "malls" have this security patrolling their interests and parking areas, and the merchants in those commercial facilities pay for it in their fee's (leases). This is a rather interesting example of downtown merchant's (property owner's) mindset. They behave as individuals rather than a commercial district to promote collectively and the Downtown merchants association is nothing but a joke and fluff when a majority of the downtown owners are not willing to step up and invest. What they have now is an illusion of making an effort with minimal contribution, unqualified people like Barb "let's just talk about the fun stuff" Haynes , and taxpayers putting....yes.....the proverbial lipstick on the pig every two decades in some hope that this time the effort will work. There is also another proverbial notion that those that do no learn from history are doomed.
Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

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Bunnyhop
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by Bunnyhop »

twobits wrote:I liked your post and agree with the gist of it. I also agree that the downtown association of merchants should be more proactive in their own security as a group rather than expecting the RCMP to be able to devote the resources required to provide the level of street view observation required. Imo, the downtown merchants would be better served with a portion of their association fee's to hire their own visible security cruising the streets and alleys dawn to dusk rather than new bricks, bollards and guaranteeing the revenue of a friggen waterslide on Vancouver ave. The other three "malls" have this security patrolling their interests and parking areas, and the merchants in those commercial facilities pay for it in their fee's (leases). This is a rather interesting example of downtown merchant's (property owner's) mindset. They behave as individuals rather than a commercial district to promote collectively and the Downtown merchants association is nothing but a joke and fluff when a majority of the downtown owners are not willing to step up and invest. What they have now is an illusion of making an effort with minimal contribution, unqualified people like Barb "let's just talk about the fun stuff" Haynes , and taxpayers putting....yes.....the proverbial lipstick on the pig every two decades in some hope that this time the effort will work. There is also another proverbial notion that those that do no learn from history are doomed.


What does Barb Haynes have to do with downtown merchants? I thought she left years ago??
twobits
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

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Bunnyhop wrote:

What does Barb Haynes have to do with downtown merchants? I thought she left years ago??


She got booted from that job a cpl of years ago. She is now the prez of the PHA and we know how smoothly that organization is running as well. The point however was that that caliber of talent makes a mockery of the Downtown Merchants organization as an effective body and exposes it as the fluff that it really is.
Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

The problem with the gene pool is that there is no lifeguard.
southy
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Re: This is how you do it .... Penticton!

Post by southy »

Twobits couldn't agree more with your comments about the downtown merchants and DPA. However, I do not believe Barb Haynes has anything to do with or has been a staff member of the Downtown Penticton Association - she IS involved with the Penticton Hospitality Association - two different animals (well kind of) I've included a link for the Downtown Penticton Association staff: NOTE - Kerry Milton is no longer Executive Director as she has moved on to a bigger and better opportunity in Victoria, (we've seen this movie before too). I got this from some downtown merchants who are not fans of the DPA - The Executive Director in all of her time there never even set foot in some of these businesses - now that's positive leadership. Think our friends at city hall are the influencers of the DPA - not the membership. Here is link: http://downtownpenticton.org/contact/ By the way how much do these people get paid for what they do and does anyone know what they do??
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