To the editor:
I know this won't sit well with a lot of the bleeding hearts constantly advocating to use the allotted funds set aside for the new arena to help the homeless but the common sense reality is that would be a horrible waste of money.
Homelessness will never be solved at a municipal level. The City could spend 50 or even 100 million to build free housing and whatever else you can think of and the only thing that would happen is an increase in our homeless population. People would come from far and wide to take advantage of these services bringing with them more drug use and crime with ZERO return on investment.
Investing in state-of-the-art facilities will attract the right kind of people to our city. People who are employed will help grow North Bay instead of bringing it even further down. Those who have lived here a long time see every day the shocking state of our city, and making the city a haven for the homeless will only make it worse and drive more of the right kind of citizens away.
I understand wanting to help those in need but the reality is no amount of money that the City of North Bay can come up with will ever solve this issue. Endlessly delaying the arena for that reason is wasted energy.
Lobbying the Provincial and Federal governments is the only way to put even a small dent in the homeless, mental health and addiction crisis.
Aaron McCrea
North Bay
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