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Discovery Centre rolls into Capstone

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5 minute read

The City of Red Deer, Land & Economic Development team publicly launched a real estate presentation centre for the Capstone community redevelopment program. The presentation centre has been designed specifically to educate and engage Red Deerians and Central Albertans on the vision of the community and its importance to the vitality and sustainability of downtown Red Deer. The opening marks a new era in the transformation of the area into a master planned urban village in the heart of downtown Red Deer.

While traditional ‘bricks and mortar’ real estate centres are still common practice in community development, The City of Red Deer took a more innovative approach to sharing the vision of the Capstone redevelopment, by converting a decommissioned transit bus into a discovery centre.

Named the Capstone Discovery Bus, the mobile real estate centre allows The City a unique opportunity to travel throughout Red Deer and into smaller areas to broaden interest for and educate on the community vision. Civic celebrations, annual festivals and cultural performances will be regular stops when the bus is not at its main stop near Canada 150 Square inside Capstone.

“Having a community presentation centre that engages and educates the public is a vital part of real estate development as it supports storytelling, which ultimately affects a buying decision,” said Mayor Ken Johnston. “It gives future residents and real estate prospects a sampling of how the community will look, feel, and behave. Importantly, it addresses how the community will meet the needs of its residents.”

Capstone is quite unique in its design and development intentions and represents a new type of community for Red Deer. The vision for Capstone is a mixed use, multi-family community in which 5,000 residents will one day live in some 2,000 condominiums, apartments, and townhomes. Its’ location on the Red Deer River, west of the downtown, means Capstone is both a prime riverside address and an accessible city home.

“The success of the Capstone redevelopment program underpins the future health and vitality of our downtown core,” City Manager, Tara Lodewyk. ‘Our city is expected to grow by approximately 20,000 new residents over the next 10-12 years and accommodating some of this population growth in Capstone is good news for our downtown businesses and services. We have planned for the highest and best use of the lands in Capstone to accommodate for our growth.”

City Manager Tara Lodewyk joins Mayor Johnston and Councillors Buruma, Dawe, and Lee at Capstone Discovery Bus Ribbon Cutting Ceremony

The interior spaces and displays of the remodeled city bus have been meticulously designed to portray the Capstone vision. Within its tiny 280 square foot footprint, the Capstone Discover Bus allows visitors to experience a typical day-in-the-community. An urban condo, a brew pub, a micro grocery store, and a mini park space all come together to describe the personality and built form of the neighbourhood. A 3-D model, depicting the community at full build-out, will be delivered digitally and will orient the visitor to the lands of Capstone, while highlighting the future density ambitions and design aesthetic.

Extensive research was done on the wants and needs of the future resident, and young working professionals and older adults have identified as most interested in calling Capstone home. With nearby retail services and amenities, including an expanded regional hospital, the future Capstone citizen is seeking a community which not only satisfies their social and recreational needs but also offers beautifully appointed and designed homes.

The Capstone Discovery Bus is free of charge to the public and is open 12 – 6 p.m. Thursday through Sunday and on holiday Mondays. No reservation is needed; the public is invited to find us in Capstone and throughout the downtown core this summer. Follow us at #liveincapstone.

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You Are Not Eating Ze Bugs…

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Cricket Farm Axes Jobs

I remember back a few years ago, making my way down to the midway of the Calgary Stampede to check out all of the new flavorful wares.

The Midway hasn’t really offered much by way of new rides since I was a kid, not entirely sure I’d be interested in riding them, even if they did…

The Budweiser beer grounds get old, when a cold beer sets you back over $10.

Mini donuts have lost their luster…

But every year, there are new menu items that had given a reason to at least make the cost of admission worth giving this another shot.

Walking through the grounds, the wife and I noticed that one of the new Stampede Delicacies was pizza with bugs on it…

Scorpion pizza : r/WTF

And I remember commenting to the wife that commercially made pizza has always had bugs in it…just nothing that they’d admit too for fear of being closed down by health regulations.

I mean…what’s next – boasting about mouse droppings in your soup?

But this bug thing has seemingly still managed to take off for reasons I cannot fathom. Are cow farts really impacting the planet that much?

It’d be hard to believe and harder to prove, even if this were true.

But then to read about some massive cricket farm in Eastern Canada, where cricket proteins were to be used in the mass production food items – chips, crackers, protein and energy bars and even flour – were soon to become a thing made me even more leery of processed foods.

Acheta Powder, by listing in ingredients…because this is the soft way to slip something onto the “may contain”, listings…which seems more innocuous than bugs or crickets…

But because my consumption of processed food items is low, were never much of a consideration and hunting for this on items I had no intention on purchasing anyways, seemed an awful waste of time.

The Eastern Canadian Cricket farm was built by Aspire Foods, for the tune of about $90 Million Bucks…$8.5 million provided by yup – you guessed it, Your Taxes, through federal grants.

Which, while is nothing in relation to the $40 Billion that has been extorted by the governments, out of your hard earned paycheque, to subsidize EV Batteries, with a 20 year ROI of ZERO…is still as big of a loss because…apparently, like the failure in trying to force people into expensive and unpractical EVs or turning plants into meat looking substitutes…

Is this really what people think vegans want to eat? : r/shittyfoodporn

Mmmmmmmmmmmm…

Is also a Huge Failure.

Not enough people are eating Ze Bugs…which has turned out to shutter 2/3rds of the staffing in the workforce, in London, Ontario at the Aspire Cricket Farm.

Massive cricket-processing facility comes online in London, Ont. | CBC News

Now…I’m all for innovation.

It’s what has created the device I’ve used to create this post and share it with all of you. I love some of the items that have leant to making my life easier and reduced efforts for tasks that offer little by way of satisfaction or payoff…

But with this being said…the market will always be the decider on what will or will not take off…and even with the bombardment of fear mongering around climate change and sustainability, bugs as a protein substitute are rapidly proving themselves out of market because…like me, you are not eating Ze Bugs!

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Business

Sanctuary State Told To Cut Spending On Hotel Stays For Migrants As Costs Expected To Hit $1 Billion

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation 

By Jason Hopkins

A state commission is encouraging Massachusetts to cut costs on emergency shelter services for migrants and other families by spending less on expensive hotels.

The emergency shelter system in Massachusetts housing migrant families and others experiencing homelessness is expected to spend over $1 billion in fiscal year 2025, according to a state commission report investigating the matter. The report comes as Massachusetts, a sanctuary state that limits cooperation with federal immigration authorities, is continuing to experience financial hardship over the border crisis and an influx of migrants into their communities.

The draft report proposed spending less on the most expensive accommodations for migrants — which would include hotels and motels. Prior reports have found that housing migrants in hotels or motels in the state can be as costly as $300 per night.

“Since the EA shelter system reached capacity at 7,500 families last year, approximately 50% of families have been in hotels and motels across the state,” the report stated. “The Commission recommends limiting reliance on hotels and motels to best serve families and increase the financial and operational efficiency of the system, while recognizing that hotels and motels may be a last-resort option for surge capacity at times of rapid changes in demand.”

“Data suggests that hotels and motels are the most expensive type of shelter in the EA system,” the report concluded. It also noted that the state’s shelter caseload and system costs have skyrocketed to “unsustainable levels” since 2022.

The immigration crisis taking place under the Biden-Harris administration has hit Massachusetts particularly hard. Roughly 355,000 illegal migrants and other inadmissible foreign nationals live in the state, and approximately 50,000 have arrived since 2021, according to the Center for Immigration Studies.

Democrat Gov. Maura Healey, in her efforts to clamp down on the state’s crisis, has publicly called on illegal immigrants to not go to Massachusetts, offered plane tickets for them to leave, and has asked residents to take in migrant families. The state has also experienced a rising number of deportation cases as illegal migrants continue to flock there.

Despite the growing pains with mass illegal immigration, the governor has remained steadfast in her opposition to President-elect Donald Trump’s plans for an immigration crackdown, and she confirmed that her state’s law enforcement would “absolutely not” help with mass deportation efforts. The entire state of Massachusetts is considered a sanctuary for illegal migrants for its laws limiting cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents.

The state legislature appropriated $639 million to the emergency assistance shelter system for fiscal year 2025, according to the report. However, expense projections are expected to hit $1.094 billion – leaving a shortfall of roughly $455 million for the fiscal year.

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