Yesterday, I tried to walk from my home in Brander Gardens at 56 Avenue down to 53 Avenue but had to turn back; although sections of the sidewalk were clear, many parts were covered with small seas of ice, rendering the sidewalk unwalkable.
Throughout this month’s occurrences of freezing rain, wet spring-like snow that turned to frozen slush, and fluctuations of temperatures that resulted in cycles of thawing and freezing, this sidewalk has remained unmaintained.
The responsibility for maintaining this sidewalk lies with the city. This is the same city that is planning to eventually cut bus service from my neighbourhood, thereby requiring me to walk to 53 Avenue to catch a bus. Right.
The city is expecting me, a senior with low-bone density, to risk my safety and physical well-being in order to get to a bus stop that is not in my neighbourhood. Maybe in your dreams, City of Edmonton, but this won’t happen in real life.
D.E. Johnston, Edmonton
PCs didn’t heed fiscal warning
Re. “Alarming report sees Alberta heading into fiscal brick wall,” Keith Gerein, Nov. 22
Trevor Tombe’s report on the fiscal health of Alberta is not a surprise. The column references a 2011 report but there is an even earlier 2007 report authored by Jack Mintz titled Preserving Prosperity: Challenging Alberta to Save.
Mintz told the PCs that if they didn’t change their fiscal policies, raise royalties and start saving, by 2011 this province would be in deficit. The PCs ignored Mintz and, as predicted, in 2011 Alberta began running ever-increasing deficits.
Premier Notley and the NDP did not create the deficit as the UPC would like us to think, but rather they inherited this untenable fiscal situation right when Alberta went into a major recession.
Jason Kenny likes to portray himself as a fiscal saviour but it should be remembered that it was the hard-right former PCs, who populate his party, that backed the fiscal policies that got us where we are today. Electing these ideologues would be inviting even more pain and loss of public services than we suffered under Klein.
Allan Hayman, Edmonton
Hitchcock fulfills a dream
I am so pleased to see an Edmonton native like Ken Hitchcock coaching our Edmonton Oilers.
I have known and coached against Ken when he successfully coached in Sherwood Park. We had many post-game chats at United Cycle where Ken worked. He would relate to me his desire to one day coach in the NHL. This desire is highlighted by the fact Ken was never an NHL player but chased his dream by coaching Kamloops in the Western Hockey League which then propelled him into pro hockey.
He has told many people how Clare Drake was such a big influence in shaping his coaching career. I can even go back further, remembering Ken as young golfer. I was president of the Edmonton Golf Association and Ken, as a junior golfer, would enter the junior tournaments we had. He was a gifted golfer who could score par golf at the Riverside course.
Congratulations to Ken for fulfilling a dream in coaching the Edmonton Oilers.
Darryl Havrelock, Edmonton
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