Friends,

Here's an update on what's happening with Lansdowne Park.

Public Meeting on Site Contamination at Lansdowne

On Thursday, October 27, the City of Ottawa and the Glebe Community Association are holding a public meeting on environmental issues related to the Lansdowne Partnership Plan. At the meeting, the City will present its remedial action plan for dealing with the contaminated soil on the site.

This will be the first public discussion of environmental issues at Lansdowne.

Although the City completed the first phase of environmental assessments in early 2010, it failed to release the report publicly until all opportunities for public comment were over and the Lansdowne Partnership Plan was approved. Apparently, the failure to make the report public was due to an administrative error and had nothing to do with the report's findings of serious soil contamination that could be tremendously costly to clean up. An independent peer review estimated that the clean-up costs would be close to $20 million. This major cost was not included in the project budget.

But costs are not the main concern here. There are serious environmental and health and safety issues at stake. The City is not planning to remove the contaminated soil; just move it closer to the Rideau Canal and bury it in the landscaping for the stadium. Nor is the City aiming to meet the highest standards for site remediation; it has made an arrangement with the province to comply with the 2004 standards and not the current ones.

This meeting should be informative as the Glebe Community Association has arranged for an independent environmental expert to be one of the speakers, along with officials from the City and the Province, and the consulting firm that did the work for the City. There will be a question and answer session too.

The meeting takes place at the Glebe Community Centre, 175 Third Avenue (at Lyon) from 7:30 to 9:30 pm.

Thursday, October 27, 2011
Presentations from 7:30 to 8:00 pm
Q & A from 8 to 9:30 pm

Find out more about the issues at http://www.letsgetitright.ca/issues/environment

The World is Watching: LEAD Conference hosts Case Study on Lansdowne Park

Over 200 leaders from around the world will gather from October 16 to 22 in Ottawa for the 2011 LEAD International Session. LEAD is the world’s largest non-profit focused on achieving sustainability through leadership. The Ottawa gathering will focus on a key issue facing humanity – how can economic aspirations be met in ways that are socially equitable and environmentally sustainable? This global gathering features speakers such as Stephen Lewis and Sir Terence Matthews.

LEAD has selected Lansdowne Park for a case study and Friends of Lansdowne has been invited to speak to the group This reminds us that our grassroots fight for the public good is important and that people the world over are dealing with the same types of pressures and patterns of development.

Etcetera...

We have no news on the legal appeal, so thought we would pass on a few choice news items from recent weeks.

1. Ottawa Business Journal, October 7, 2011 http://www.obj.ca/Local/Sports and entertainment/2011-10-07/article-2769522/The-man-behind-Ottawas-events-engine/1

In an article on Cyril Leeder of the Senators, Jeff Hunt, a principal of OSEG, is quoted as saying: "Nobody in our group has any experience in operating major sports facilities, so it's great to have people like Cyril (from whom) to get feedback."

Good thing the City sole-sourced the stadium operations to OSEG.

2. Canadian Business Magazine http://list.canadianbusiness.com/rankings/rich100/2011/Default.aspx?sp2=2&sc1=0&d1=

An article on the top 100 rich in Canada lists the Greenberg family (which includes Roger Greenberg, another of the OSEG principals) in position 57 among the top 100 richest in Canada with a net worth of $1.1 billion, up 10.7% in the last year.

No wonder Mr. Greenberg wants to recoup court costs from Friends of Lansdowne.

3. Ottawa Sun, October 1, 2011 http://www.ottawasun.com/2011/10/11/cfl-fans-could-face-3-transit-charge

According to the Ottawa Sun, the City may add a $3 surcharge to event tickets at Lansdowne Park to cover extra transit and parking costs (estimated at an extra $46,000 for each event of 18,000 people).

Too bad the City doesn't plan to locate its major stadium anywhere near its new $2 billion dollar light rail transit system.

As always, we need your donations. Go to www.letsgetitright.ca to find out how to donate.

Let's Get it Right!