Happy Town News Touts Happy Goat Coffee

10/03/2023

A match made in heaven … a Happy Goat for a Happy Town. Such a match even as at the same meeting city staff trotted out horrible housing-start numbers in the midst of our city’s much-vaunted housing crisis.

But no news of that in this release which summarizes today’s finance committee meeting (see previous post) because that wouldn’t be happy.

Yes our friends at Happy Town News (the city media department) could find a joyous lede for a story even after armageddon, if municipal elves survived the catastrophe. If they failed to survive, there would be silence which is often the MO of HTN when bad news strikes. And armageddon would be some kind of bad news so the silence of a destroyed HTN would be business as usual.

Ottawa Housing Starts Plunge As ‘Crisis’ Deepens

Of course, HTN, in telling us that the Happy Goat has first right of refusal of perking in O-Train stations, neglected to tell us of the plummeting housing starts that gave lie to city measures to deal with the housing crisis (sorry, what measures?). You see HTN likes happy and what could be happier than Happy Goat Coffee. And what could be unhappier than the city failing to help in the housing crisis?

Please note that HTN tells us that HTG has first right of refusal for caffeinating transit passengers, not that the company is putting its perkinistas in the stations. You’d have to be a fool to put a coffee shop in a transit stop when the train goes down with some regularity. A month of no sales is hard to stomach.

As well in the release, municipal staff wheels in from the city morgue the corpse of the Municipal Price Index which always shows the city hall is terribly poorly served during time of inflation (or any other time). Oh that taxpayers face galloping food inflation is of no matter. The Consumer Price Index never reflects the fiscal crisis at the city. But the stacked MPI, which favours our local government, is always on the cusp of armagedon (again). So taxpayers should be glad to fork out money to our municipality despite a recession coming and inflation here. What comes first? Always the municipal government.

Council OKs New Waste Collection Rules

All this will be rubber-stamped at council on Oct. 11.

And oh yes, did we mention that the release below is not reality but the city’s rose-coloured-glasses view of reality or put more harshly, propaganda.

Below is the release on today’s finance committee meeting:

The Finance and Corporate Services Committee approved providing Happy Goat Coffee Company the first right of refusal for five future commercial/retail spaces at Stage 2 O-Train stations.

The committee waived the section of the City’s Leasing Policy that requires public notice of leasable City space and staff have begun working with the company. The future commercial/retail spaces would be at Trim, Place d‘Orléans, Alqonquin, Bayshore, and Lincoln Fields stations.

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The committee also received information on the Municipal Price Index (MPI) Feasibility Review. A MPI measures the yearly change in the cost of providing municipal services. It is used to used to quantify the difference between costs to provide municipal services and the Consumer Price Index (CPI).

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Staff’s research and assessments find that the City’s current practice of identifying inflationary pressures based on negotiated contract increases, commodity specific inflationary indicators for utilities, and fuel as examples are more reflective of actual increases for the various specific commodities and services to consider when developing an annual budget. These, along with historical trends and current market pricing provides a more accurate budgetary estimate and a MPI or other inflationary index to develop an annual budget would not be sufficient to meet all requirements or be cost-effective.

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Items from today’s meeting will rise to Council on Wednesday, October 11.

And so now you know why HTN gets so criticized in The Bulldog. Advice to end this? Tell the truth.

Ken Gray

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Tags: finance committee. Ottawa Happy Goat

Andrew Zenner says:
10/03/2023 at 5:30 PM
What do you want to bet that Happy Goat will require that any contract that it signs with OC Transpo will include a clause that OC Transpo won’t rent space to any other coffee shops at any stations where Happy Goat is located ? And what do you want to bet that all those progressive types around town who were aghast that Stella Luna, who had a similar clause in their contact on Wellington West, exercised their legal rights and used the clause to force their landlord to shut down a waffle outlet selling coffee, will think that Happy Goat should have such a clause because Happy Goat tends to follow the right type of politics for the same progressives?
Ron Benn says:
10/03/2023 at 6:51 PM
In a related news story, from a few weeks ago, Happy Goat Coffee has:
> closed its coffee stand at the Rideau Station; and
> not opened its coffee stand at Tunney’s Pasture.
Both of these decisions reflect the real value of holding a right of first refusal/exclusive coffee shop arrangement with OC Transpo.