Skip to content

Canyon Ski Area purchase bad for taxpayers

Why do I get the idea this is just another white elephant waiting to happen?

Re. the proposed purchase of Canyon Ski Area by the City of Red Deer and Red Deer County:

Why do I get the idea this is just another white elephant waiting to happen?

The reason given for the purchase was unless the municipalities bought it, it might go into housing! The county controls the zoning, so why would it have to go into housing?

The owners of Canyon owned it for a long time and I assume ran it at a profit, so what is the problem?

Consider it this way.

If I want to sell my farm for $4.2 million and I get no takers, what do I do? Do I ask the county to buy it at that price and if they refuse, then I sell it for housing?

This is not how it works. If I want to sell, I lower my price until it makes sense for someone to buy it!

It seems to me whenever government tries to buy a private business and run it, they do a terrible job and the taxpayer is on the hook for the losses.

The county doesn’t have a good record on a lot of things, like the Pine Lake landfill, the mess at the former air force base in Springbrook, the embezzlement scandals of a few years ago, and the list goes on and on!

Maybe city council and county council should listen to the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, which stated on June 12, 2008 that Red Deer overspent $11.4 million for a 5-year period and Red Deer County overspent $17 million for the same period!

The taxpayers of Red Deer County and Red Deer will pay for this irresponsible purchase.

In case councillors and aldermen don’t know it, our hog and cattle industries are going broke, our senior citizens are facing huge increases in their health-care costs, and our oilfield workers are facing very hard times.

We can’t afford to pay for a playground.

Douglas Malsbury

Red Deer County