Have your say

Still hope for city

Jenny Gerbasi's April 24 letter, Many unanswered questions on water-park proposal, had me jumping up and down with pride.

She is what we need as an example of a thinking councillor. She has raised the proper questions and has the intestinal fortitude to stand by them.

There is still hope for our city if more councillors would sit down with the city planning committee and discuss the future of our city and ultimately meet the needs of the citizens and taxpayers.

DIANNE GLASS

Winnipeg

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I think the water park and hotel beside the human rights museum is a terrific idea. But why stop there? Maybe the slide could be incorporated into the museum itself. Besides, there's nothing like a walk through a Holocaust exhibit to get people in the mood for a little wet and wild fun in the sun.

Has anyone suggested a comedy club across the street, or maybe a casino? There just doesn't seem like there's enough to do at The Forks yet. Fortunately, we still have a few acres of un-designated land left.

DOUG BROESKA

Winnipeg

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Does anyone remember our mayor's promise during the last election for a splash-pad water-play area easily accessible to the families and children of the core? It became an infinitely delayable budget item immediately after his re-election.

This forgotten promise sits in stark contrast to the energy and drive behind the commercial water-park complex proposed for The Forks. Once again, the smaller human story is hidden behind the bright initial glow of financial gain.

More, in the form of commercialization, is not always better, and certainly not for those marginalized from privilege and disrespected by the powerful.

NANCY LITCHFIELD HUTCHISON

Winnipeg

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As the expression goes, the devil is in the details, and essentially the city is being asked to buy a pig in a poke.

Exactly how many admissions would the $700,000 worth of credits yield the first year the park is open? And with inflation, looking 25 years ahead to 2037, how many admissions will $700,000 yield then? Let's have more details before final decisions are being made.

DAVE JENKINSON

Winnipeg

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Yes, Winnipeg could use a water park but giving it a proper location and size is what's important. Many other areas could be considered, such as the Red River Ex site in Headingley, the Blue Bomber stadium site or where the new IKEA store will be.

Now that's a destination. The overdevelopment of The Forks is becoming somewhat vulgar.

HANNON BELL

Winnipeg

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It seems to me while the seriousness and quietude of the human rights museum message will be pondered inside its walls, it would be a relief to get outdoors and encounter the complete opposite of that reflected sadness and see where life is being experienced with joy and laughter by children and adults, Manitobans and visitors alike, from all over the world, at such an accessible location.

DOLLY DENNIS

Rosser

Exceptional excerpt

Re: It'll make your hair curl (April 21). Having gotten away from reading many books the past few years (or more), I normally bypass book reviews or even excerpts. But Richard Stursberg's passage from his memoir The Tower of Babble: Sins, Secrets and Successes Inside the CBC was an exception.

Maybe it was because the CBC was mentioned or because its logo -- that Canadian symbol that many have grown, rightly or wrongly, to despise over time -- was flashed. Or maybe it was because the topic was curling, a subject I equally hold in as much disdain.

Regardless, Stursberg's piece was hilarious. It must be my having that secret desire, like many others, to see bad things happen to the CBC and feel vindicated when it does, that sparked a grin or two. I now believe I might just be forced to buy his book.

AL YAKIMCHUK

Winnipeg

Electrifying idea

In his April 19 letter, Selinger walks into a bar... , Scott Hillhouse suggests we vote for Sam Katz for premier of Manitoba.

What a great idea. In a couple of years we will have Shindico building our hydro dams.

BILL PARKES

Winnipeg

Church on the corner

I wholeheartedly agree with Sidney Green's April column, Selkirk Avenue can have a future. The city has allowed the birthplace of much of Winnipeg's unique character and soul to go to rot. It's a great shame.

One small correction: The Ukrainian church on McGregor and Stella is the Metropolitan Ukrainian Catholic Cathedral of Sts. Vladimir and Olga. There was a St. Nicholas parish across the street (where Sel Villa, a senior's complex, now sits.) It moved in 1966 to its new location, Arlington and Bannerman.

What Green may also be remembering is the old location of the Ukrainian Catholic St. Nicholas School, which was very close to that location.

IVAN BANIAS

Winnipeg

Clouded perceptions

Re: Mark Stobbe always denied killing his wife (April 20). David Roberts' personal revelations about acquitted murder suspect Mark Stobbe were interesting thoughts to ponder.

But I believe Roberts' warm friendship with Stobbe may have ultimately clouded his perceptions and prejudices of the court case to the extent that he risks becoming, rightly or wrongly, a guarantor of Stobbe's innocence.

The media crow about matters of juries and the weight of evidence with usually high praise for our established system of justice. But for Beverley Rowbotham and her family, who will champion their justice?

DON WARKENTIN

Winnipeg

History abandoned

Well, the Free Press has finally abandoned its history of a proud and true newspaper. The April 24 fake cover page, an ad for an automobile, is a sad event to witness.

Your paper has often trumpeted the beginnings of the Free Press and its fine history of great editors, writers and photographers. I wonder how many of the former would be proud of a newspaper that allows an advertisement to cover the front page?

For a few years now, you have been putting ads in paid stickers on the front page, which are annoying and demeaning to the stories next to them. Now, in a final act of pandering to advertisers, you have allowed a car company to co-opt your banner page. The founders of your paper would surely roll over in their graves.

LORNE TYSON

Winnipeg

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition April 25, 2012 A11