Here’s the latest from city hall, from those of you not already in the loop from the twitterings, blogs, news flashes and what all emanating from the media horde there. More later on some of the interesting Q and A at the council meeting, but I’m at work on other projects right now. STATEMENT FROM […]

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That’s the latest fun news from city hall, as per this report that just got put up on the city’s website. The cost of the 250 housing units has soared from the original estimate of $65 million to $110 million. Now the city is facing the question of what to do — put in millions […]

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Former journalist, now councillor, Geoff Meggs has put his blog back in motion recently. For those of you who just can’t read enough about city hijinks and deep policy thoughts, the link is here. It was impressive that in a recent post, he took the time to publish a lengthy comment from someone critical of […]

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It was one year to the Olympics yesterday, but for the city and the Olympic village developers, the deadline is much closer: Oct. 31 to be exact, except for a couple of buildings that are going to be delivered Nov. 30. The city is still working on finalizing its financing, and it’s also taking extreme […]

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The Globe’s Gary Mason has a story today about the city getting close to coming to a deal with Fortress, the lender on the Olympic village project, to take over the financing. It’s not a completely done deal yet, of course, since Fortress’s syndicate partners have to agree to this too and the city still […]

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Looking at the way Olympics cities all watch each other and share news, I sometimes feel like Vancouver has joined an exclusive little support group. Kind of like a Moms of Troubled Teens or Cancer Survivor group, but on a slightly larger scale. I was reminded of that yet again as this story from Chicago […]

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Both citycaucus.com and the Tyee have posted the former mayor’s thoughts on the Olympic village, which you can read here and here. And apparently he’ll also be in the Vancouver Sun tomorrow. Quite the media blitz. Sam makes some strong arguments — I have my doubts about whether anyone’s opinion on this issue is now […]

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Our favourite time of the year — budget estimates — is here again, with the traditional three acts: 1. The discovery that the projected tax increase to maintain the existing budget is not as high as everyone said the previous fall. 2. The wrangling over what gets cut or added, during lengthy public meetings 3. […]

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I feel bad that I’m not on an advisory committee to the mayor. Everyone else in town seems to be. First, there was the homelessness action team, a high-powered group that meets Sunday afternoons to figure out how to get 1,500 people out of shelters and off the streets ASAP. Then, there was the developers’ […]

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I see my former Sun buddy Jeff Lee was the first to get this story in print about Jim Green being hired by Millennium Developments to help out with the Olympic village and possibly other projects of theirs. Of course, the sub-text is that this must be about Jim, who helped started the Vision Vancouver […]

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