^ something to do with this...?
http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/loc...-4738909c.html
Provincial park status for Upper Fort Garry?
Gordon Sinclair Jr.
How does this sound? Upper Fort Garry Provincial Park.
Last Saturday I was musing about Premier Gary Doer giving himself a birthday present -- and all of us a birthplace gift.
Now it looks as if it could be on the way to happening.
Doer turns 60 on Monday -- the same day the Friends of Upper Fort Garry must have $10 million in pledges if they are to secure the fort's remaining footprint and an adjacent parcel of land that, otherwise, gets sold to a high-rise apartment developer.
But Tuesday afternoon, as the premier, Mayor Sam Katz and federal minister Vic Toews met collectively with the Friends for the first time, Doer tossed a surprise solution on the table.
At least it was a surprise to Friends spokesman Jerry Gray.
Here's how he remembers it.
They were gathered at Toews' Winnipeg office on the eighth floor of the Cargill Building.
Over cookies and coffee, if that matters.
Gray, the American-born Dean Emeritus of the Asper School of Business, was in the midst of explaining the Friends' fundraising position -- they're still $3.7 million short -- when the premier interjected.
"And he said, 'Well, there's another way to do it,' " Gray recalled. " 'And that's to make it a provincial park.' "
Right in the heart of Winnipeg.
Gray said under the premier's proposed park, the province would take over administration of the site where Manitoba was conceived by M ©tis leader Louis Riel in 1869 and granted its birth certificate by Ottawa in 1870.
Gray stressed that the provincial park plan isn't a done deal.
The Friends also have to do another deal and secure the purchase of the Grain Exchange Curling Club, which encroaches on the fort's footprint.
Although that's not anticipated to be a problem.
The problem is there's not much time left to do the whole deal that was dictated to the Friends last December by the city. But that's why the premier's "creative solution", as Gray called it, is so vital.
"It opens up other areas of funding," Gray said.
Meaning the money that's needed to make the deadline.
"We feel with the money that will be coming with this we'll meet our $10 million commitment. That's the key to moving this ahead."
Meeting the March 31 deadline would secure the parcel of land immediately adjacent to the footprint. That's the property on the southwest corner which Crystal Developers wants for a 20-storey-plus apartment tower and the Friends insist they need for an interpretive centre.
"The primary thing is to get the property," Gray said.
Interestingly that's exactly what I told the premier when we spoke over the phone last week.
Secure the site.
The Friends would be willing to scale back the $9 million interpretive centre, I suggested.
But they can't do that -- they won't do that -- without having the parcel Crystal Developers wants for a towering apartment building that would overshadow the historic property.
What's also still unknown is precisely what Doer has in mind in the way of a provincial park.
He is on the record with me as wanting what he called a "green corridor" from Bonneycastle Park on the river to Broadway.
What isn't known is whether a provincial park would include an indoor interpretive centre and where the government would locate it.
The Friends, said Gray, won't compromise their basic vision -- or use money gathered in trust from the public who gave with that vision in mind.
Anyway, Gray and the Friends may have been pleasantly surprised by the premier's solution.
But I doubt that he came up with it the day before.
By the time we spoke, the premier probably knew he had the provincial park deal up his sleeve. I only say that because I received a phone call late last week.
The politically plugged-in person on the other end had a question that, even then, sounded like a statement.
"Have you heard anything about the fort site becoming a provincial park?"
"No." I answered.
But now I have. And somehow I gotta believe that Gary Doer can and will make it happen.
Happy Birthday, Mr. Premier.
gordon.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca
Parks in the city
There are only two provincial parks within Winnipeg, St. Norbert Provincial Heritage Park and the Trappist Monastery Provincial Heritage Park.
Several provincial parks are just outside the city -- Beaudry, Duff Roblin, River Road, and Birds Hill.
Memorial Park immediately north of the Legislature is provincial land, which the city maintains.
The Forks is a federal park.
Prev
Then the whole block will get closed off and will have to be excavated to 10 metres removing the remaining foundation of the fort and killing the appartment complex on the adjacent parcel of land. Now that would funny.
Linear Mode
