Mike Montague

The fabric of the North American economy is under a stain, potentially as great as any witnessed in the past century. It isn’t going to heal of its own accord this time around. Many of the economic models, methods and corporate behaviors that have guided the capitalist world in the past are becoming antiquated and will not sustain us much longer. The deregulation of our biggest industries opened the doors to unbridled top level greed and made houses of cards out of many of our tried and true blue chip corporations.

We are more dependent now than at any time in history on Chinese imports for everything from the electronics in our cars and appliances to the `fresh`garlic in your grocery store. A large percentage of the administration for larger U.S. and Canadian corporations is handled by operators who run a greater risk of being hit by donkey carts than taxi cabs on their way to and from work. What we do produce capitalizes on the abundance of pennies-per-day foreign sweat shop labor in impoverished regions of the world as acceptable practice with which to reach profit margins. The global stature held by the United States and Canada is slipping and nothing is being done that is assuring us that our stature wont be lost entirely before the children born today become old enough to vote.

Bail outs are not solutions, they are life support systems for failing corporate entities that in true Darwinian fashion have lived their cycles, shown themselves unable to survive change in their present forms and now do little more than impede the evolution of newer healthier ventures with the DNA to thrive in an evolving economic climate were self reliance is crucial. The self reliance our Countries once held has gradually eroded over a half century taking our industrial base, goods and services from being the best on the planet after WWII to where we now strive to be as good as we can manage while cutting corners to meet share holder’s insatiable need for instant gratification.

Our leaders must obsess less over the evil thoughts rifling the minds of middle eastern radicals which we only inflame with our dependence and interventions and go to war with at least equal determination against our addiction to oil which lies at the root of all of our present political and economic challenges. The capacity to break our fatal addiction to fossil fuel comes down to determination and actions that will secure North Americas place as the worlds economic leader for the next 100 years. Without an unprecedented “shock and awe” effort led by government to design and build the energy systems of the future, the downward spiral will continue.

The government should stop throwing all of the hundreds of billions of dollars at trying to save mismanaged corporate dinosaurs and instead embark on a major infrastructure program to rebuild all major interconnecting roads and highways up to a future standard that incorporates high speed – high efficiency mass transit systems. The second part of this project would see the design and creation of the personal and commercial vehicles that will effectively replace today's gas powered cars and trucks.

The United States got to the moon inside of ten years by committing to do so and did it using computers with a small fraction of the ability of your child's play station. The biggest obsticle standing between where we are today and total efficient independence from fossil fuel is commitment.

The cost of such an undertaking would be incredible, outrageous some will say but likely no more so than the cost of bailing out financial institutions too blinded by greed to dare look even a few months into the future and an automobile industry whose predominant long term focus for the past 20 years has been to effectively market bigger less efficient vehicles to the public and give little resource to product innovation and evolution that matches up our long term transportation needs with practical solutions.

Who if anyone even thought it possible for government to come up with a $700 billion plan for anything a few short months ago?

We now know that this is possible leaving us absolutely no excuse to not apply the same fiscal determination towards rebuilding our country's infrastructures and set the new world standard for transportation and ecologically advanced industry.

The jobs created in building this world class infrastructure for the future would be in the multiple millions. Entire industries would be created that never existed before. Industries that would survive far into the future much like the companies still thriving that were born out of the space race of the 60’s. This is not as simple as stated but then we are not a simple people. If there is a culture on this planet with the capacity to sustain us and take us forward, we are it. What are we waiting for?

No single company or group of fortune 500 companies will ever do this on their own. This is why we appoint leaders in a democratic society. This is the type of dynamic outside the box initiative we expect and should be demanding our leaders be able to envision and execute. This is what the leadership our future must bring to the table more than at any time in our history, not for the next quarter, not for the next term but for the next generation.

I have been telling everyone the best thing that could happen to the real estate market in Canada right now would be for our cable companies to stop carrying CNN. We need a break from the panic mode doom and gloom financial health forecasts of economic prophets lined up around the block at CNN headquarters like it was the tryouts for American Nostradamus. My suggestion, watch a good movie. Back to you Wolfe.

A snap shot of our economy here on this side of the 49th shows inflation has dropped from August to September and continues to ease while some are predicting we are actually heading into a period of deflation. The central bank predicts inflation will hover around 1% for 2009. Gas prices which are at the core of inflation, have dropped from a their summer high of $1.37 just a few weeks ago and have dipped below the dollar per litre mark, about where they were just over a year ago. The Canadian dollar has dropped from a high of $1.18 US just a few weeks ago to around $0.80 US which should stimulate our export volumes and tempt more American tourists and shoppers to go north once again.

Interest rates keep falling and are still at historical lows right now however lenders have begun tightened the purse strings on higher risk borrowers this year. If your credit is good and the property appraises at or within your purchase price then you should not have problems securing a mortgage.

We are still in a general period of stifled growth economically and likely will remain in that shadow for a while yet due to global economic tension. This climate has caused many to hesitate on buying real estate and allowed listing inventory to accumulate this year to previously unseen levels. This presents opportunity for smart investors and savvy home buyers. Right now there are record numbers of properties listed for sale in and around Barrie.

Many of those sellers have been listed longer than they hoped to be and are looking to negotiate. A growning number of the homes I am showing to buyers are vacant which usually means the seller is carrying two mortgages, double property taxes and utility bills and needs to sell fast. Some sellers out there have found homes they want to buy and made offers conditional on their own sale. The clock on their conditional offer is counting down. This happens more frequently in a slow turnover market. Some are finding they are in deeper than they can or want to handle financially with increased energy costs and wish to downsize or cash out of the market altogether for a while. The problem for those in that situation today is it can take a few more months than they are prepared for to close a sale and this puts pressure on them to take the offer presented to them now over chancing the odds of a better offer down the road.

My advice would be turn off the TV and start watching the real estate papers for some of the deals that are out there.

With a proposed Hotel and convention center providing the perfect catalyst, Barrie could begin to evolve its downtown into a thriving lakeside entertainment and shopping district and become a magnate for unique and stylish boutiques, galleries, craft and antique shops, great markets, cafes and fashionable restaurants where for lease signs, tattoo parlours and pawn shops currently dot its landscape.

There is opportunity for revenue growth that will encourage new cutting edge architecture in hand with the revamping of Barrie’s historic downtown architecture to its past splendor. Dunlop and its neighbouring streets can evolve into vibrant and exciting pedestrian friendly streets that will lure residents and visitors to our core.

Yes Barrie has an official plan for its future that intends for much of what I described to take place. Kind of a “build it and they will come “philosophy behind it all which leaves much to chance.

The proposed downtown Hotel and convention centre is an “about time” great idea that will attract attention and new revenue to downtown and keep millions of dollars in convention spending from going down the highway to the GTA because we don’t have venues at present with the capacity to hold events bigger than a few hundred people. But this is just one part of what could and should be taking place to provide the foundation for a revitalized down town.

Literally Millions of tourist dollars travel across Lake Simcoe between the Trent and Severn Rivers each year. The upper echelon of North American Society move across our lake in a steady stream from May to October on yachts that are pretty much six and even seven figure floating 5-star hotel suites. Very few of them or any Boaters/cottagers on Lake Simcoe will make the side trip to Barrie because they know the chances of finding temporary or overnight (transient) docking are slim to none and the only semblance of a dining experience apparent when scanning downtown from the lake is Hooters or Burger King.

Barrie take note: The Big Bay Point Resort project is going to introduce hundreds of new boating enthusiasts to Lake Simcoe just a fifteen to twenty minute boat ride from downtown Barrie. Along with thousands of existing waterfront property owners, most will take the occasional afternoon or evening cruise past Barrie’s down town, few will think to or have the option to tie up and spend a few hours enjoying Barrie’s down town shopping and dining.

A couple years ago I tried to shake up our last City Council on the idea of expanding Barrie’s downtown marina, especially the public docking facilities into a world class marina facility capable of attracting nautical clientèle from all of Lake Simcoe and the Trent Severn to come and experience Barrie. I got no reply from anyone on Council to my emailed suggestion. A short time later I had the chance to speak with then mayor Rob Hamilton about the idea. He told me Barrie’s marina facilities are adequate. I suggested to him we should make that our official slogan, “Barrie, striving to be adequate”, I got a blank stare in response and he kindly excused himself from our conversation.

The road to adequacy is littered with safe minimalist planning and half baked ideas. If adequate is all Barrie will ever be then we don’t deserve the privilege of being located on one of the best and busiest waterfronts in Ontario. Hopefully the advent of a downtown hotel and convention centre will stimulate the adrenaline of City Council and our Mayor and allow them to see this is the perfect time and opportunity to venture beyond adequacy.

Part of the approval for a Hotel and convention facility that will enjoy and benefit from having the most prime and convenient commercial proximity to our lakefront and marina has to be that they make a direct and ongoing financial investment in our public marina facilities allowing Barrie to build a world class Marina with a generous supply of transient boat slips that will help to make Barrie stand out the way it should.

The hope when we send our children to school is that along with academic knowledge they will pick up some vital lessons to prepare them for adult life. The lessons learned this past week by the students of St. Catherine of Siena School in Barrie could be that political correctness supersedes expression of community or team passion and pride and that you can justify any action, how ever far reaching, so long as you attempt to affiliate peoples worst fears with it, (just ask George W. Bush about that)

Thirteen year old Adam Zussino who showed up for class last week with his hair dyed blue as his expression of support for his Barrie Colts PeeWee A Hockey team in their playoff efforts learned quickly that attempting to stand apart from the masses, regardless of how noble your intentions, is often a road paved with resistance from those who are unable to understand or appreciate your enthusiasm.

A 13 year old boy joining a gang and turning to a life of crime as a result of dying his hair blue for his local hockey team seems like a very big stretch of logic, but that was exactly the fear association that justified the orders to him by his school not to return until his hair look like the rest of the students once again. I am reminded of a quote by Nietzsche: "And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music".

Ironically, once the warmer weather returns, support will likely be granted by many of our schools to hold fund raisers in which swarms of students take over busy intersections to promote student car washes. I have more concern for those unsupervised students being hit by cars than of Adam Zussino leaving school and quitting organized hockey to join with the homeys in the hood.

The school board and this principal have yet to retract their position, however, given the media attention on TV, by Don Cherry and in many Ontario news papers, the lesson they may demonstrate to our impressionable students in the coming week might be; it is ok to reverse your position on something if you think there is even a slight chance to save face with the people of your community.

See stories in Toronto Sun >>Don Cherry's reaction Saturday's story