Winnipeg | 2026 Civic election & City affairs

[thebasketballgeek]

If Klein splits the vote on the right with Motkaluk then nobody stands a shot at Murray.

I wouldn’t be surprised if half the candidates withdraw come September because 14 is simply too much. I’m sure people like Loney and Rick Shone realize they have a much easier path of resistance turning to council instead. Would love to see Loney take over St James and Shone take Tuxedo as that would make the Assiniboia Community Committee almost pure YIMBY with Janice Lukes retaining Waverley West.

[esquire]

It's generally a horse race when there is no incumbent in the running. That's when everyone who has been mulling it over decides to jump in and go for it.

[wags_in_the_peg]

i think it's a 3 horse race Gillingham vs Klein vs Murray.

[thurmas]

Originally Posted by wags_in_the_peg

i think it's a 3 horse race Gillingham vs Klein vs Murray.

I think all 3 are an improvement over Bowman i have never seen such abdication of leadership like i have with Bowman in his 2nd term. I was so optimistic when I voted for him in 2014 and it just became so disappointing.

[rrskylar]

Robert-Falcon Ouellette proving how oblivious he is once again with a promise to freeze the police budget as crime spirals out of control in the city!

The cancel the police is already so yesterday with progressive left leaning mayors all doing a 180 on that stupidity!

Come on peanut butter Falcon, get up to date with reality!

[zalf]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

peanut butter Falcon

wut?

[trueviking]

Funny Poster shenanigans.

[WestEndWander]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Robert-Falcon Ouellette proving how oblivious he is once again with a promise to freeze the police budget as crime spirals out of control in the city!

The cancel the police is already so yesterday with progressive left leaning mayors all doing a 180 on that stupidity!

Come on peanut butter Falcon, get up to date with reality!

Yea because a continually spiraling police budget with constantly increasing O.T costs has sure shown itself able to handle things accordingly.

Great insight as usual from you!

[thebasketballgeek]

Was just in DT and out of sheer coincidence saw Glen Murray is based at Portage/Garry. Had no clue their campaign would start today lol. Asked him some questions related to urbanism/transit. Here are a few things he told me.

1. He isn’t against single-family zoning. However, he doesn’t believe a whole street should be purely single-family, and in fact if try and adjust zoning to allow for middle housing/small apartments specifically stating Dorchester and Grosvenor are the ideal residential streets.

2. He is against setback requirements and believes buildings should go to their lot line provided there is adequate tree coverage on the street. Lot coverage is just an abstract concept after all.

3. Finally, his first phase for transit is full electrification and frequent headways where the BRT plan calls for it. However, in what he calls his “phase 2” he wants an East-West and North-South LRT corridor. It’s called phase 2 but calls for a study would be done immediately and is only called phase 2 because it would take about 4-8 years for construction to actually start after all the studies, bureaucracy, NIMBYism etc is dealt with.

The North-South line would be Main/St Mary’s. The kicker is that the east-west would be Portage/Provencher. The style of the LRT however would not run on the middle of the street and instead run on one side of the street. Think Queens Quay in Toronto with the sidewalk, 2-way bike lane, and then the streetcar running all eastbound while westbound is left for the cars.


Idk about the rest of y’all but suffice to say this is good enough for me, and further reaffirms the belief that no one else stands a chance this year.

[trueviking]

That guy having his bike stolen is the best thing that ever happened to him. Free publicity. It was even the Huffington Post UK. It’s too bad for him there’s two middle aged bald guys with similar names because half the people will think it’s the other guy. I honestly can’t remember which was which.

[biguc]

Originally Posted by thebasketballgeek

Was just in DT and out of sheer coincidence saw Glen Murray is based at Portage/Garry. Had no clue their campaign would start today lol. Asked him some questions related to urbanism/transit. Here are a few things he told me.

1. He isn’t against single-family zoning. However, he doesn’t believe a whole street should be purely single-family, and in fact if try and adjust zoning to allow for middle housing/small apartments specifically stating Dorchester and Grosvenor are the ideal residential streets.

2. He is against setback requirements and believes buildings should go to their lot line provided there is adequate tree coverage on the street. Lot coverage is just an abstract concept after all.

3. Finally, his first phase for transit is full electrification and frequent headways where the BRT plan calls for it. However, in what he calls his “phase 2” he wants an East-West and North-South LRT corridor. It’s called phase 2 but calls for a study would be done immediately and is only called phase 2 because it would take about 4-8 years for construction to actually start after all the studies, bureaucracy, NIMBYism etc is dealt with.

The North-South line would be Main/St Mary’s. The kicker is that the east-west would be Portage/Provencher. The style of the LRT however would not run on the middle of the street and instead run on one side of the street. Think Queens Quay in Toronto with the sidewalk, 2-way bike lane, and then the streetcar running all eastbound while westbound is left for the cars.


Idk about the rest of y’all but suffice to say this is good enough for me, and further reaffirms the belief that no one else stands a chance this year.

I like it.

[pspeid]

Originally Posted by thebasketballgeek

1. He isn’t against single-family zoning. However, he doesn’t believe a whole street should be purely single-family, and in fact if try and adjust zoning to allow for middle housing/small apartments specifically stating Dorchester and Grosvenor are the ideal residential streets.

2. He is against setback requirements and believes buildings should go to their lot line provided there is adequate tree coverage on the street. Lot coverage is just an abstract concept after all.

3. Finally, his first phase for transit is full electrification and frequent headways where the BRT plan calls for it. However, in what he calls his “phase 2” he wants an East-West and North-South LRT corridor. It’s called phase 2 but calls for a study would be done immediately and is only called phase 2 because it would take about 4-8 years for construction to actually start after all the studies, bureaucracy, NIMBYism etc is dealt with.

The North-South line would be Main/St Mary’s. The kicker is that the east-west would be Portage/Provencher. The style of the LRT however would not run on the middle of the street and instead run on one side of the street. Think Queens Quay in Toronto with the sidewalk, 2-way bike lane, and then the streetcar running all eastbound while westbound is left for the cars.


Idk about the rest of y’all but suffice to say this is good enough for me, and further reaffirms the belief that no one else stands a chance this year.

This is exciting...a Mayoral candidate who actually has a vision for the city over and above "fill the potholes/no new taxes"! I'd love to hear his plans for P & M, but I'm happy to leave it unspoken for now to avoid another insipid "carmageddon" tantrum by certain segments of the population.

[trueviking]

sssssshhhhhhhh dont say the p word until after the election....

[pspeid]

Originally Posted by trueviking

sssssshhhhhhhh dont say the p word until after the election....

Yes....I see......I was talking about "Perogies & Mackerel", of course......
P & M......nothing to see here.....

[thurmas]

https://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/winnipeg-councillors-lament-loss-of-amazon-deal-1.6054168

A Winnipeg city councillor is calling out The City of Winnipeg on what he calls "a missed opportunity" to have a major Amazon distribution centre built in Transcona, potentially bringing thousands of jobs to the area.

Charleswood-Tuxedo-Westwood councillor Kevin Klein said in a news release that he recently learned about a group representing Amazon that had approached the city about building a new facility in the industrial area of Transcona.

"As part of their proposal, Amazon requested that an underpass be built at Dugald Road and Ravenhurst Street. The City of Winnipeg saw no benefit and declined," said the release, "A second proposal was then made by the group, this time with Amazon offering to cover the cost of the underpass and potentially with the city issuing a TIF (tax increment financing) over several years to cover some of the cost. Again, the city saw no value in the opportunity and declined."


Transcona councillor Shawn Nason says he found out about Amazon's interest six months ago, "The land owner in this case back in February let me know that there were some conversations with Amazon, they were seeking a TIF for building an underpass in the range of 65 to 80 million dollars."


But Nason says that by the time he was made aware of the proposal, Amazon had already moved on.

"It's unfortunate, by the time it came to by attention it sounded like it was pretty much a done deal, and there wasn’t life left to it from the landowner's perspective."

Nason says he raised the issue as a missed opportunity at the February 24th council meeting, although he did not mention Amazon by name. "We have a big city, and when opportunities like this come around … we as city officials should be aware of it … we should be included in some dialogue. It doesn’t seem to have occurred in this case."

The City said in an email to CTV News Winnipeg that conversations held with potential stakeholders are confidential, and therefore cannot be shared with council, "The City will at times participate in multi-stakeholder discussions, including Economic Development Winnipeg, with the aim of attracting large, multi-national businesses to Winnipeg. As part of those discussions, multiple considerations would be discussed, and all efforts would be made to reach an agreement that benefits Winnipeg taxpayers, contributes to the economic growth of the city, and meets the needs of the proponents."

Nason says he's still not aware of who Amazon was having these discussions with. He wishes they had come to him first.

"It boggles my mind how the city of Winnipeg works when it comes to these large economic opportunities. I would prefer if Amazon as a retailer is looking to establish, if they come to the councillor, and the councillor can work with the public service, and we can all be on the same page," he said.

[Winnipegger]

Originally Posted by thurmas

https://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/winnipeg-councillors-lament-loss-of-amazon-deal-1.6054168

A Winnipeg city councillor is calling out The City of Winnipeg on what he calls "a missed opportunity" to have a major Amazon distribution centre built in Transcona, potentially bringing thousands of jobs to the area.

Charleswood-Tuxedo-Westwood councillor Kevin Klein said in a news release that he recently learned about a group representing Amazon that had approached the city about building a new facility in the industrial area of Transcona.

"As part of their proposal, Amazon requested that an underpass be built at Dugald Road and Ravenhurst Street. The City of Winnipeg saw no benefit and declined," said the release, "A second proposal was then made by the group, this time with Amazon offering to cover the cost of the underpass and potentially with the city issuing a TIF (tax increment financing) over several years to cover some of the cost. Again, the city saw no value in the opportunity and declined."


Transcona councillor Shawn Nason says he found out about Amazon's interest six months ago, "The land owner in this case back in February let me know that there were some conversations with Amazon, they were seeking a TIF for building an underpass in the range of 65 to 80 million dollars."


But Nason says that by the time he was made aware of the proposal, Amazon had already moved on.

"It's unfortunate, by the time it came to by attention it sounded like it was pretty much a done deal, and there wasn’t life left to it from the landowner's perspective."

Nason says he raised the issue as a missed opportunity at the February 24th council meeting, although he did not mention Amazon by name. "We have a big city, and when opportunities like this come around … we as city officials should be aware of it … we should be included in some dialogue. It doesn’t seem to have occurred in this case."

The City said in an email to CTV News Winnipeg that conversations held with potential stakeholders are confidential, and therefore cannot be shared with council, "The City will at times participate in multi-stakeholder discussions, including Economic Development Winnipeg, with the aim of attracting large, multi-national businesses to Winnipeg. As part of those discussions, multiple considerations would be discussed, and all efforts would be made to reach an agreement that benefits Winnipeg taxpayers, contributes to the economic growth of the city, and meets the needs of the proponents."

Nason says he's still not aware of who Amazon was having these discussions with. He wishes they had come to him first.

"It boggles my mind how the city of Winnipeg works when it comes to these large economic opportunities. I would prefer if Amazon as a retailer is looking to establish, if they come to the councillor, and the councillor can work with the public service, and we can all be on the same page," he said.

So let me get this straight: Amazon had two opportunities.

Either A) locate within the City of Winnipeg on the condition that they build an underpass at the cost of $65 to $80 million to taxpayers, or B) locate in R.M. of Rosser with no such requirement. Am I understanding that correctly?

In both situations, one would assume the amount of "jobs created" and "economic impact" on the local labour market would be the same. So the difference between option A and B is that option B costs Winnipeg taxpayers a bunch of money whereas option A costs no taxpayers any money. Sounds like option B lets us have our cake and eat it too, with the only downside is the local councilor for Transcona missed out on a big ribbon cutting event an extra $500k/year in incremental property tax revenue. Big whoop.

No wonder these yahoos on council weren't consulted. Sounds like a bad deal for taxpayers with better options. It's not taxpayer's fault the city lacks proper infrastructure to begin with such that developers either require massive one-off projects to accommodate them else they move outside of the city where there is less congestion. Maybe if these councilor's got off their butts over the last couple years and actually built stuff, we wouldn't have this conversation; there would have been ample room to accommodate new development. But instead they hum and haw, while pinching every penny, and then wonder why businesses that require extensive infrastructure skip Winnipeg altogether or demand massive cash infusions to make the project work.

[pspeid]

Originally Posted by Winnipegger

So let me get this straight: Amazon had two opportunities.

Either A) locate within the City of Winnipeg on the condition that they build an underpass at the cost of $65 to $80 million to taxpayers, or B) locate in R.M. of Rosser with no such requirement. Am I understanding that correctly?

In both situations, one would assume the amount of "jobs created" and "economic impact" on the local labour market would be the same. So the difference between option A and B is that option B costs Winnipeg taxpayers a bunch of money whereas option A costs no taxpayers any money. Sounds like option B lets us have our cake and eat it too, with the only downside is the local councilor for Transcona missed out on a big ribbon cutting event an extra $500k/year in incremental property tax revenue. Big whoop.

No wonder these yahoos on council weren't consulted. Sounds like a bad deal for taxpayers with better options. It's not taxpayer's fault the city lacks proper infrastructure to begin with such that developers either require massive one-off projects to accommodate them else they move outside of the city where there is less congestion. Maybe if these councilor's got off their butts over the last couple years and actually built stuff, we wouldn't have this conversation; there would have been ample room to accommodate new development. But instead they hum and haw, while pinching every penny, and then wonder why businesses that require extensive infrastructure skip Winnipeg altogether or demand massive cash infusions to make the project work.

I don't know, the entire piece seemed designed to foment outrage while providing few details. Personally I found the tone of the article to be somewhat misleading.

First of all, the information is basically what this Mayoral candidate heard. Was it ever verified?

Secondly, the article made it sound like Amazon gave a pass on Winnipeg altogether when it didn't fund a new underpass. Later we read it just moved it "all the way" to Rosser, still within the Perimeter. The place will probably still be staffed primarily by people from Winnipeg, so there will be some indirect economic benefit to the city anyway.

Thirdly, I don't believe the cost of the overpass wasn't really mentioned in the article, was it? How many years would it have taken the city to build that underpass, and would they have ever made it back in taxes from Amazon?

Finally, isn't this what CentrePort was built for in the first place? It seems odd that Amazon would use CentrePort as "plan B" when their supposed "Plan A" in Transcona would have needed the extra infrastructure, isn't it?

Too many unknowns in this article for me to stress about it too much at this point.

Edit: CBC news article mentions the Amazon facility being built at CentrePort, CTV news doesn't mention this. CTV news mentions the proposed price of the underpass, CBC doesn't.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Winnipegger

Either A) locate within the City of Winnipeg on the condition that they build an underpass at the cost of $65 to $80 million to taxpayers, or B) locate in R.M. of Rosser with no such requirement. Am I understanding that correctly?

In both situations, one would assume the amount of "jobs created" and "economic impact" on the local labour market would be the same. So the difference between option A and B is that option B costs Winnipeg taxpayers a bunch of money whereas option A costs no taxpayers any money. Sounds like option B lets us have our cake and eat it too, with the only downside is the local councilor for Transcona missed out on a big ribbon cutting event an extra $500k/year in incremental property tax revenue. Big whoop.

Or looking at it differently, the City lost the opportunity to get a contribution towards the costs of an underpass that would have been a significant improvement to the road network of that area.

Winnipeg isn't really having its cake and eating it too, because with Amazon locating in Rosser there will be a) no direct revenues from Amazon and b) no associated infrastructure improvements.

If this is as Nason and Klein say, then it's disappointing and a missed opportunity.

[cllew]

Who in the civic administration gets to decide this without bringing it to the city council level for a decision?

I also noticed that there was no mention of CN in any of the news articles. Any change in the crossing would involve them as there would have to be a shoefly during construction of the underpass

[Winnipegger]

Originally Posted by esquire

Or looking at it differently, the City lost the opportunity to get a contribution towards the costs of an underpass that would have been a significant improvement to the road network of that area.

Winnipeg isn't really having its cake and eating it too, because with Amazon locating in Rosser there will be a) no direct revenues from Amazon and b) no associated infrastructure improvements.

If this is as Nason and Klein say, then it's disappointing and a missed opportunity.

Gonna have to disagree with you on that one. A big business shouldn't be able to just waltz right in to our city and demand massive infrastructure improvements that jump the queue, which aren't even on our already-prioritized and council-vetted infrastructure plan, all for an extra couple hundred grand in property taxes.

Let's do the math: Best case scenario, Amazon builds a warehouse worth what, $50 million? That adds roughly half a million dollars in property taxes to City coffers annually [(((50,000,000*0.65)/1000)*13.468)=$437,710]. BUT this is in exchange for a massive infrastructure upgrade that isn't even on the City's radar. Fine, we'll let Amazon jump the queue because think of all those delicious, low-paying barely above minimum wage order picker and warehouse jobs that will be created. Okay, so Waverley underpass was $145 million in total. Let's assume this underpass is less complex and construction inflation isn't an issue, and pretend this new underpass is $100 million. If the City splits it three ways, then it's responsible for about $33 million. If the entire thing is debt financed over 30 years using typical rates accessible to the municipality, then annual debt payments for 30 years will be roughly $2.4 million for the underpass.

To me, "bringing in Amazon" for an extra $500k/year in property tax in exchange for $2.4 million /year in debt payments seems like a bad deal for taxpayers, to the tune of a $1.9 million loss (a.k.a. corporate subsidy) every year. Why subject taxpayers to this kind of pain when plans are already in place and council approved to get working on servicing CentrePort? Sure, we might not get Amazon today since it's going to Rosser, but we're much better off building the infrastructure to service the much more attractive CentrePort area than diverting funds to build out the relatively low-value areas in Transcona. The only way this makes sense is if local residents and businesses agree that the infrastructure upgrade to the area is worth as much as or more than $1.9 million/year to them. And that's a pretty hard figure to determine.

In a real city with per-capita revenues and expenditures closer to the average for a large Canadian city, I'd argue that both should be done. We should be extending services to as many industrial areas as we can to accommodate growth and remain competitive. But for years council has chosen to limit the growth of municipal revenue and therefore infrastructure investments, and projects like these show them they are paying the price.

Of course each area councilor wants as much development in their area as possible, but when it comes time to pay up, their tune changes. If councilor's actually wanted to make Winnipeg an attractive area for investment, they would have raised taxes long ago and taken a stronger stance on area charges so that we'd actually have the money to build infrastructure and accommodate new investment. But they never did that, so we're left with businesses either demanding massive subsidies or threating to move on to some other city/municipality instead.

Now whether or not the administration should have done the math and then taken the result to council for public debate is another story. Transparency is important, but the net financial impact to the city and citizens also needs to be presented to the public instead of either just "this investment is good" or "this investment is bad". If elected officials want to approve corporate subsidies/demands that have a net negative impact on citizens, that's their choice and citizens can voice their approval and disapproval accordingly. But keeping this information from them may not be the best idea, but it's not worse than sharing only half the information so councilor's can make half-baked decisions without the backing data. I'd wager councilors like Klein or Nason would be eager to approve net-negative investments so as long as it makes them appear "business friendly" and gets them a ribbon cutting ceremony, but would be quick to quiet down when asked the true impact such projects have on the municipal budget and therefore taxpayers.