Thursday, December 3, 2009

Visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads...

Now here's a great opportunity for Councillor Mitch Tweel to step up to the plate and offer up Victoria Park to the Federal Government as the natural site for a new retractable roof Stadium for Charlottetown to host an Atlantic Football Team... surely Clifford should cough up some City coin to get Mitch a plane ticket so he could meet up with a few infrastructure officials in Ottawa and put the dog and pony sales pitch on for the City... just think of the benefits that an extended tourism season would have as the football season goes well into the fall and could be justification for federal funding... in the summers they could use it for the Festival of Lights and other concerts... and in the winter what a spot for the Charlottetown Winter Carnival... and if all this that doesn't work out well then the City could always sell it back to the Province as a museum... of course "I'm just kidding around" but I can't help but think those "visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads" when our politicians get closer to Christmas break....
Peter MacKay wants football team in Atlantic Canada
Sun. Nov 29th
CALGARY — Gridiron madness has also hit Canada's federal leaders, with one heavyweight politician pushing for a CFL team in the Maritimes. In Calgary on Saturday for the Grey Cup parade, Defence Minister Peter MacKay said he looks forward to the day when Atlantic Canada has its own football team to join in the spirit of the league. Last month, the governments of Canada and New Brunswick announced it would be investing in a regular-season CFL game in Moncton featuring the Toronto Argonauts as the home team. MacKay, who is also the senior minister responsible for Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, and a native of Nova Scotia, said the game will aim to drum up local interest in the idea of a CFL franchise in the Maritimes, dubbed the Atlantic Schooners. "I'm very supportive,'' he said. "It would be good for the league because we would have a coast to coast football league." "I think the economic potential is there.'' He said the Maritimes already have a big football fan base with immense support for high school and university teams. Sponsors will need to get behind the idea but it's already one that has interested CFL commissioner Mark Cohon, he said. "Mark Cohon seems very open about it,'' he said. And MacKay said what better time to add a CFL team to the mix than the 100th anniversary of the league in 2012? "It would be nice to see the league expand in that 100th anniversary year,'' he said. MacKay said he also hopes to share the celebration of the Grey Cup with Canada's troops in Afghanistan. "We hope to get the Grey Cup to Afghanistan — they'd love to see it,'' he said. "It's a strong reminder of home.'' MacKay, who also spent part of Saturday playing in his own football game at Glenmore Athletic Park with friends from university, said he'll be cheering for the Saskatchewan Roughriders when they play against Montreal on Sunday, since some of his pals from his post-secondary years played for the team.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This has already been talked about in local forums. Moncton seems to think they are a front runner, however I cannot see any corporate sponsors who would take a chance on a CFL team in Halifax let alone Moncton.
http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/showthread.php?t=153061