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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
Frank Clair upgrades get court's go-ahead
Step toward CFL's return to Ottawa
OTTAWA -- The Ontario Court of Appeal has dismissed a legal effort to stop the redevelopment of Ottawa's Lansdowne Park.
In a unanimous ruling delivered Monday, three judges agreed with an earlier ruling that the city legally entered a partnership with the Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group for the project and that the deal doesn't constitute an illegal subsidy for a private business.
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They rejected the case brought by the Friends of Lansdowne.
"It is not for the courts to second guess or reweigh policy and financial considerations that informed the city's decision to advance this development," the ruling says. Whatever the merits of the Lansdowne plans, it says, there's no proof the city conceived them improperly or did a dirty deal with OSEG to make them happen.
The unanimity means that the Friends of Lansdowne don't have an automatic right to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada: a further appeal is still possible, but it would require the Supreme Court's permission.
Councillor Tim Tierney clapped his hands and pumped a fist when he heard the decision was unanimous. "Yes!" he said. "Let's get going!"
The case, a challenge of the city's plans to work with a group of private developers and sports businessmen to renovate Frank Clair Stadium -- for the return of a Canadian Football League to the city -- add a park to part of the property and commercial and residential buildings to the rest, was heard in November.
The Friends of Lansdowne argued that the deal with the Ottawa Sports and Entertainment Group amounts to an illegal subsidy of their business, that the agreement was reached in bad faith, and that it violated the city's own procurement bylaw.
-- Postmedia News
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition May 1, 2012 C6
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