Get This … Good News From City Hall

06/08/2023

It’s hard to understand why the City of Ottawa doesn’t shout this from the rooftops.

The city has had no end of bad news, most of it brought on by itself, but when it has good news, it just whispers it. Or it trumps up the purchase of an automatic pothole filler as big news to mask the fact that Ottawa’s roads are a mess. That sort of PR is rather pathetic.

Back to the rooftops. The Bulldog received a press release yesterday from the city touting Tony Graham’s Toyota purchasing naming rights from the city and supporting youth fitness. The car dealership and family approached the city to honour the late proprietor of the business.

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But what prompted my call was the fact that the amount of the donation was missing from the release. That tends to get your reporter antennae up wondering why such a basic fact was missing.

Anyway city recreation manager Dan Chenier cheerily returned my call and he shared the good news … that is the purchase was for $1 million. Hard to know why communications wouldn’t mention that figure in the release. It reflects the generosity of the Grahams.

It was nice talking to a real human being again at city hall as was common so many years ago. Now it’s all formal PR from Happy Town News.

This will come as a surprise at the epicentre of city government in Ottawa, but I’m confident that Chenier will report that The Bulldog has had all his shots and hasn’t bitten anyone in weeks. It was a fun conversation.

Good on Chenier and the Grahams for helping out the kids. Money well spent.

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And maybe Happy Town News could help itself and the city by providing real human beings to speak to we unwashed journalists.

Below is the release from the City of Ottawa:

Tony Graham sponsorship agreement roll-out_EN

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