There were cheers and boos from the audience, and a few heated exchanges at the first Timmins mayoral debate.
Hundreds of people packed into the auditorium at O’Gorman High School for the event hosted by the Timmins Chamber of Commerce.
While all five of the candidates — Steve Black, Raymond Burey, Daniel Fortier, Lauchlan MacInnes, and George Pirie — took part, the tension was between the perceived top runners in the race, incumbent Black and former mining executive Pirie.
Stars and Thunder and the proposed multi-use recreation centre were two of the most contentious topics.
Recently, it was revealed that the 2018 edition of Stars and Thunder, an eight-day music festival and international fireworks competition, lost $1.6 million. In its first year, the deficit was about $600,000.
“I’m happy we’re having this conversation about Stars and Thunder because it wouldn’t be able to be had if the council this term hadn’t had the courage to try something new. And I agree the event cannot continue to lose the money it did last year, I’ve said that many times,” said Black.
Based on the revenues, he supports a four-day festival, which he said could also be helped by the implementation of the municipal accommodation tax.
At the final council meeting in September, council gave staff the green light to put together the hotel tax program. The proposal talked about is for a mandatory four per cent charge on hotel, motel, cottage and other short-term accommodations within the city. How the program will work, including where the municipality’s share of the money is directed, will be determined by the new council.
Later in the debate, Black noted how Stars and Thunder attracted 15,000 people in the first year and 10,000 this year, and the impact on tourism.
“I think it’s important to our community that we don’t consider investing in the residents in our community a distraction and quality of life a distraction,” Black said.
Through the applause for Black’s answer, Pirie responded.
“So in the third year of this festival, you’re going to finally propose a business plan. That’s three years too late,” he said.
Earlier in the meeting, Pirie said he has been very clear on his position about the festival.
“If you ask me if I can support an event that lost $2.2 million in two years, I would say no. If you ask me to support an event that transferred the financial risk to the taxpayers, I would say no. If you ask me if I could support a model with a business plan that made money for the city and was a run by a not-for-profit corporation, run by volunteers, and it made money for the city and returned money to the city for any projects you wanted to invest in in the city, I would say yes,” Pirie said.
MacInnes said he imagines the people who went had a lot of fun. With a $5-million budget, he noted it cost a sizeable amount of money, though.
“We’re Timmins, yes we should have nice things, but we need to tone it down a little bit and keep things reasonable. We can use a lot of that money to, I think, fund a series of events to spruce up the arts and cultures here in the city instead of using all of it in one big show that only lasts for one week,” he said.
As a senior, Burey, who didn’t attend the festival, said he finds Stars and Thunder hard to swallow.
“When you start spending money on these kind of events, it affects me directly, it affects a lot of seniors directly and we’re not getting anything out of it,” he said.
“Now there are other concerts in Timmins and they make money. I think Stars and Thunder should be self-supporting, raise funds through the internet or how the kids do it now so it’s not on us. If you want a concert, sell tickets online, raise the funds and have the greatest concert ever.”
While Fortier thinks it’s a good thing for the city, he said council shouldn’t be involved.
“I think it should have been only a three day to a four day and the first year if it was a failure, I would have brought everything back to the table and reconsidered,” he said.
Plans for an aquatics centre in the city have also been a much-debated issue within the community, and the mayoral candidates also had their chance to chime in on it.
In August, the engineering designs for the $48-million facility were approved for the multi-use recreation facility.
The building includes an eight-lane competition pool, leisure pool and a family-friendly play zone. There is also a dryland section with multi-use and squash courts, and an indoor walking track.
The main lobby would be central and connect the existing Archie Dillon Sportsplex arena to the new facility.
“The construction of the aquatic centre as developed by council is something that the council has already said is a non-issue. They’ve said it’s a non-issue ‘cause they’ve realized that the funding is unlikely to be there, it won’t be there from the provincial government. I can’t support the design as proposed because there’s no way in my background you can have a design that costs $2 million that didn’t include the operating cost,” said Pirie.
He said the city can’t afford it, noting there are non-discretionary spends like sewage, roads and other infrastructure.
“This is one of the fundamental differences, I believe, between George and myself in this campaign and it’s not just a pool, it’s a multi-use rec centre,” said Black.
The two disagree about whether there is money available from the upper levels of government.
Pirie said the city didn’t get the funds when they were there, and that signs from Queen’s Park indicate that money will be tight.
Black, however, said that funding is available from the federal and provincial governments “in the infrastructure plan that they just signed a bilateral agreement for a few months ago.”
The previous funding formula being talked about was a 40-30-30 split between federal, provincial and municipal governments.
If the municipality were to pay for about one third, Black said the municipal portion would be about $16 million.
It should be noted, however, that if the funding is only available for the construction cost of the facility, which is $36 million, the municipality would also be on the hook for the $11.9 million in soft costs.
“I will lobby as hard as I can for the funding because our community deserves it. Our community shouldn’t have to drive to Cochrane to go to a facility, our community should be able to go to a facility here at home in the City of Timmins. We’re the biggest city in this region and we shouldn’t consider discretionary spending as a bad thing,” said Black.
“We have to consider operational spending as the essential thing,” responded Pirie during the crowd’s reaction to Black.
MacInnes said that the multi-use facility would be a boon to the community, but he isn’t sure the city can afford it.
“Part of being the mayor is unfortunately you have to say no to good ideas every once in a while,” he said.
Having worked in construction for 40 years, Burey said the existing pool is in great shape.
“I really hate to tear down a perfectly good building to put up another perfectly good building,” said Burey.
While Fortier agrees with giving people something to do, he said it shouldn’t cost that much.
“This is my business, this is what I do for a living. I do pools and hot tubs and it’s way overpriced,” he said.
The Timmins Chamber of Commerce has also organized two ward candidates debates.
Oct. 10 at Northern College will feature candidates in Ward 2 (South Porcupine), Ward 3 (Schumacher), and Ward 4 (Porcupine). It runs from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
Oct. 11 is your chance to hear from candidates in Ward 1 and 5 from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at College Boreal.
Discover more about the municipal election candidates and more here.
