There's one. Oh, there's another, and another and holy cow they're everywhere! Those little soccer balls hanging from rear view mirrors invaded our town last weekend and they brought with them a swarm of football (sorry, soccer) players.
Sure you can say seventy soccer teams are playing in town, but you simply can't appreciate what that looks like until you actually see it. Much like you simply can't appreciate what 800 mountain bike riders looks like until you witness the beginning of the Test of Metal. Both of them the biggest sporting event revenue boosts in town. Of course this year's smashing soccer success was all the more sweeter coinciding with the year's first 'take off your top and soak up the sun' weekend.
Now that is a market Squamish must expand on as it infuses literally millions of dollars into local pockets. We should be thinking of ways to absolutely pack Squamish's big event calendar. I imagine this would be a good idea to work through the Adventure Centre. Ahh but no, for now we'll only be focusing on how all the money was spent, because the Adventure Centre was wait for it over budget! Shock, gasp, horror! Of course it was, everything is. Every huge project that is ever built comes in over budget. The RCMP building, the Adventure Centre, the Olympics, coming in over budget is what big projects do. I don't like it, and if funny business happened we should definitely know about it, but come on, when is it time to look ahead?
To his credit, Councillor Mike Jenson is only keeping his loudest campaign promise and that was to count every penny that went to the Adventure Centre. Mike is very good at that and Squamish is lucky to have him behind the calculator. I only hope that after this one, he will use his powers to focus on what could be done instead of what has been done.
And please, can we never, ever again mention the RCMP building? That building is nothing short of an architectural abortion and you just know someone was laughing all the way to the bank. It's over, it's ugly and it's ours. It would be petty and unproductive to re-hash what many consider an obvious mistake.
Yet here we are awaiting the audit on the half-finished Adventure Centre. When the detailed numbers are released, is anything going to change? Everyone knows it was built fast with outside money help and it came in way over budget. Those who are already mad at the Adventure Centre and those responsible, will stay mad (possibly even elevate to angry). Likewise, those who have seen their tax dollars spent on worse things and think it's a nice building with potential, will also continue to do so.
After all that, we'll be right where we are now, all agreeing it's a landmark building but no closer to using it to its full potential.
