It is … adequate, in a barely sort of way, that Kiwanis has stepped into the hole left by the City’s food concession embarrassment at ARC to provide food and earn some money to fund their good work.

Still, this embarrassing misjudgement is typical of Abbotsford City Hall  and Council and yet again leaves one slowly shaking one’s head sadly at yet another faux pas.

Leaving aside the fact that the only way the public, the people who pay for City Hall and Council’s numerous misadventures, have any idea of what is going on is because the family who operated the Café had an opportunity to share their take on the situation with the public in the newspaper …

As a city you know that in February 2010 ARC will be hosting the Japanese speed skaters and the Russian figure skaters which will mean crowds and foreign visitors; that after that ARC will serve as an Olympic live site with more crowds and (possibly) visitors; so of course the course of action to take, if you are Abbotsford City Hall and Council, is to close down the Café in November

If you are the City of Abbotsford  you don’t wait until after the Olympics to address the situation –– that would be far to sensible. No you close it immediately in order to highlight Abbotsford’s inability to manage something as simple as a food concession

City Hall and Council spend over a hundred $million$ on vanity projects under the mistaken assumption they can buy their way into being considered a ‘Big’ city. They don’t understand that it is the little things, a decent place to have coffee after 11 pm or dinner after the movie or a hot chocolate while watching the skaters at the arena that are important. The little things that are the difference between being a well run, urbane metropolis as opposed to Abbotsford’s maladroit Keystone Kops routine.

Given the secrecy and behind closed door proceedings taxpayers cannot know the details of the dispute between the City and the operators of the Café. In light of the City’s ‘mushroom’ policy towards taxpayers (keep them in the dark and feed them lots of bu**s**t) the best information we have on the matter is the newspaper story giving the facts as the operators sees them.

I do know that, as so often happens, the City has taken actions without any consideration of the effect it will have on the Café. Actions that have had negative financial consequences for the Café; so that the claim the ex-manager waived the rental increase as fair compensation is realistic and believable.

However, the details and who is right or wrong is not what the City needs to focus on. The City needs to focus on answering the question of whether they want a food concession in ARC or not?

If they do not want a food concession at ARC management and council are behaving in a manner that will achieve that goal.

If however they want a food concession at ARC they must move away from their pie-in-the-sky, dollar signs in their eyes behaviours and get in touch with reality.

They could start by speaking to the long term regular pool patrons.

Of course they will need to hurry if they want to find any since more and more long-time pass purchasers are dropping ARC and moving to the less expensive private facilities.

Long term regulars would tell management and council that, in light of the market at ARC and the resulting fiscal realities for the operators of any food concession the city should be focused on the quality of the food and operation and that if the City wants a quality food concession the City will have to be prepared to charge minimal rent.

The reality here is that there were originally two families involved with the operation of the Jolly Time Café but the operation could not support two families. It cannot really support even one family and the operating margins are so thin that wages paid to a non-family worker results in an operating loss. Given the operating realities the market at ARC imposes it is hard to see finding a replacement that provides the quality product the ex-operators provided.

I know it is totally against their standard operating procedures and behaviours, but if city council wants a quality food concession at ARC they are going to have to acknowledge financial reality.

Should city council not want a food concession operating at ARC they are well on their way to achieving that.