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I recently took a three-day course entitled “Economics for Journalists.”
The most important lesson was that government spending is about choices, about making wise choices for the long run, not just for the next election.
There’s no practical reason to debate Canada’s role in lowering carbon emissions to save the planet. That argument has been won.
Today, the debate is now about what government policies will best encourage the lowest-cost route to a low-carbon future. A low-emissions future that’s cleaner, greener, safer, faster and at least the same price, if not cheaper, than what we have today.
Ontario has become a case study on how not to create a low-carbon future.
Its first climate change action plan, from 2009 to 2016, has been an economic disaster. Electricity prices in Ontario are among the world’s highest with little to show for it. The Ontario auditor general says phase one of Ontario’s climate change action plan cost $37 billion more than ex ...
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Mythos Greek Taverna
5524 Calgary Trail
780-758-6161
mythosgreektaverna.ca
Tues. to Thurs. 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., 4 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Fri. 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Sat. 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Sun. 4 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.
Closed Mondays
Food: 3 of 5 Suns
Ambience: 4 of 5 Suns
Service: 3 of 5 Suns
Dinner for two: Excluding drinks and tip; basic $50, loaded $90
One of our dining companions succinctly summed up the evening at Mythos Greek Taverna. “The company and the conversation was spicy and scintillating. The food was not."
Mythos is the former Yianni’s Backyard. The Calgary Trail street address suggests a concrete canyon, but the cute little Greek taverna’s location, at the end of a commercial strip, intersects with a tree-lined residential avenue. The tavern is sheltered from noisy traffic and bathed in natural light. Its vine-covered, sheltered patio is perfect for warm weather.
The new owner had big boots to fill. Former owner ...
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We have given deep thanks to both God (if you believe) and Alberta’s emergency responders for an orderly evacuation of Fort McMurray in which, incredibly, no lives have been lost other than a tragic highway crash claiming two teens.
The spirit and goodwill of all Albertans and Canadians has been celebrated as we pull together as a loving community to assist the 80,000 evacuees from the fire.
And now, the reality of what it will all cost sets in.
Will the Great Fort McMurray Fire of 2016 be a drain or a boost to Alberta’s currently sagging economic well-being?
More important – what of Fort McMurray’s future, period?
In the short-term, University of Alberta business professor and business school dean Joe Doucet suggests the Great Fire will be a damper on the provincial economy, probably for most of 2016.
- Click here for more wildfire coverage
But once the rebuilding/renovation of 1,600 burned Fort McMurray buildings gears up in 2017, the activity could absorb much o ...
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Japonais Bistro
11806 Jasper Ave.
780-760-1616
japonaisbistro.ca
Mon. to Fri. 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Sat. noon to 11 p.m.
Sun. noon to 9 p.m.
Food: 4 of 5 Suns
Ambience: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Service: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Dinner for two: Excluding drinks and tip; basic $30, loaded $70
In 2013, I dined at Japonais Bistro at lunchtime on a Saturday. The Japanese cuisine and sake bar had yet to wake up and was not at its best.
But positive word-of-mouth on this sushi house has never let up. It’s considered one of the best Japanese dining establishments in the downtown, if not all Metropolitan Edmonton.
Clearly it was time for a return visit, this time on a bustling Friday evening with a party of six.
I’m glad I did. The restaurant performed as per its reputation. Despite an initial service lull, the uniformly excellent fusion dishes cascaded from the kitchen and sushi stations. With Earls Tin Palace to one side and the original Famoso Pizza on the other, the mode ...
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We have given deep thanks to both God (if you believe) and Alberta’s emergency responders for an orderly evacuation of Fort McMurray in which, incredibly, no lives have been lost other than a tragic highway crash claiming two teens.
The spirit and goodwill of all Albertans and Canadians has been celebrated as we pull together as a loving community to assist the 80,000 evacuees from the fire.
And now, the reality of what it will all cost sets in.
Will the Great Fort McMurray Fire of 2016 be a drain or a boost to Alberta’s currently sagging economic well-being?
More important – what of Fort McMurray’s future, period?
In the short-term, University of Alberta business professor and business school dean Joe Doucet suggests the Great Fire will be a damper on the provincial economy, probably for most of 2016.
- Click here for more wildfire coverage
But once the rebuilding/renovation of 1,600 burned Fort McMurray buildings gears up in 2017, the activity could absorb much o ...
Read the rest of entry »
It’s a deep belief, thoroughly unprovable, that Edmonton’s roads are in worse shape than other Canadian cities.
We love to complain about our potholes, about arterial roads so bandaged up with pothole filler that there’s no original asphalt left, about back-alleys that are nothing but potholes.
Okay, okay, okay. Anecdotally, our roads are in rough shape.
Help is on its way. Frustrated by “under-performing” pavement, years ago the city’s Integrated Infrastructure Services beefed up its quality-assurance testing lab, doing its own research on asphalt mixes and best paving practices.
Slowly but surely, lab supervisor/Construction Services Engineer Hugh Donovan promises, Edmonton’s roads will smooth out, be far more pothole and rut resistant.
New roads will last 12 to 14 years before needing re-paving, rather than being rut-and-pothole infested just five or six years after being built or re-paved.
Mother Nature isn’t our best ally. Most of Edmonton ...
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For years, this column has highlighted innovative made-in-Alberta technologies, new ways of doing things that are, as Edmonton Economic Development’s Brad Ferguson so adroitly says, cleaner, greener, safer, faster and cheaper than what was out there before.
In the space of three or four weeks, two big pieces of the provincial innovation puzzle have snapped into place.
Last week, Hicks on Biz praised the Alberta government for its strong and intelligent commitment to technology commercialization. (In New Democrat circles, the online column went viral. A Sun columnist had actually said something good about their government!)
This push is somewhat born of desperation. A golden spoon — $10 billion a year in oil/gas government revenues — has been yanked out of our mouths. If the New Dems want their Utopian nanny state to work, new revenue has to be found.
No matter, there’s finally serious political will to make economic diversification happen.
On Monday, our hipster mayor Do ...
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Nando’s Peri-Peri
4210 Gateway Blvd
780-642-7474
Sun. to Thurs. 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.
Fril and Sat. 11 a.m. to 12 midnight
Food: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Ambience: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Service: 3.5 of 5 Suns
Lunch for two: Excluding drinks and tip, basic, $20, loaded $30
Global, multi-cultural, melting pot — call it what you will. In the casual/fast food business, international dining has moved to a new level in Edmonton with the arrival of a Nando’s Peri-Peri chicken franchise in February.
Nando’s is founded and headquartered in South Africa. Just like McDonald’s or Swiss Chalet, it has some 1,000 franchised restaurants world-wide (three now in Alberta) with identical décor, systems and food.
Nando’s menu is all about flame-grilled chicken marinated in peri-peri sauce, peri-peri being a Portuguese spice made from a tiny, hot red pepper originating in the Portuguese African colony, now country, of Mozambique.
The Nando’s folks are trail-blazers & ...
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At last, a faint light at the end of a very dark tunnel.
I am slowly convinced the Notley government is saying the right things, making the right decisions to speed up the process of “diversifying” Alberta’s provincial economy.
There’s nothing like the sight of the guillotine to sharpen a person’s mind. Previous provincial governments paid lip-service to economic diversification. But as long as $10 billion a year in non-renewable energy revenues (i.e. oil and gas royalties, land sales) was gushing into the government’s coffers, nobody felt any particular urgency.
Royalties this year will be less than $1 billion. Even if oil prices return to $50 to $60 US a barrel, the royalty gusher will never be the same.
Here’s the reason for a little, just a little, optimism.
In a series of announcements of loans, tax credits, investments and vouchers, the Notley government has committed to the start-up, growth and expansion of new, high-tech and innovative companies ...
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Opening of rebuilt Varscona Theatre and review of Teatro La Quindicina’s For the Love of Cynthia
For The Love of Cynthia
By Stewart Lemoine
Starring Ron Pederson and Jeff Haslam
Varscona Theatre, 10329-83 Avenue
June 2 – 18, 2016
Tickets
Review by Graham Hicks, HicksBiz.com
How could the “new” Varscona Theatre have opened with any show other than a Stewart Lemoine original?
The astounding Lemoine and his equally astounding Teatro La Quindicina are one of the three main production houses (with Die Nasty and Shadow Theatre, plus about eight smaller companies) who shared the previous Varscona Theatre for years, and then took on the Herculean project of raising $7.5 million to re-build the previously decrepit Old Strathcona landmark.
Lemoine and Teatro are astounding on multiple levels. Lemoine has a natural gift to pour out well-written plays, some 60 to date, all as unique and endearing to a loyal audience as the man himself.
Likewise Teatro La Quindicina has been ...
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