Coming year won’t be all about pandemic

Climbing case counts and vaccination updates were top of mind for Peterborough residents during the holidays, but the coming year won’t be all COVID-19 all the time.

Most new or continuing advances will generate mixed reactions.

What’s considered good news by some inevitably has a downside for others.

It’s not always fair, but a reliable measure of progress is change that does the most good for the greatest number.

Here are some of the opportunities that will arrive over the next 12 months.

People will have their own ideas on order of importance.

Supervised consumption site: A particularly contentious one. An Opioid Hub almost certainly will be developed in the former bus station at Aylmer and Simcoe streets. Federal and provincial approvals are needed to add supervised consumption status so victims of the opioid crisis that has killed nearly 70 local residents over the past two years can legally receive both drugs and the treatment needed to overcome their addiction.

Downtown is the best location. City officials and MPP Dave Smith, who self-identifies as a champion of curbing opioid damage, need to mediate the gulf between developers who want the Hub moved elsewhere and agencies who will provide the service.

It will be a step backward if the developer planning a multimillion dollar housing, office and retail project on the vacant Aylmer-Bethune block of Simcoe Street pulls out as threatened, but only a step. Projects of this size routinely stretch out over time, often with ownership changes. There is money to be made developing that block and someone will make it.

Arenas, and more arenas: One more opportunity for joint government and private sector co-operation. A combination of city’s former works yard and the privately owned Market Plaza has been identified as the best site for a Memorial Centre replacement. City council should get behind that option so the city can start negotiating a public-private partnership, along with provincial and federal funding help.

The roving twin-pad arena project seems to have settled in at Morrow Park. Whether or not that’s the best and highest use of the “jewel of Lansdowne Street,” it would be good to see the park’s future finally settled.

Homeless housing: Peterborough has made a lot of progress on the “housing first” approach over the past two years. Shelters are still needed, but money and effort is shifting to permanent assisted housing where the homeless get counselling and care that can pull them back from life on the streets.

Those projects can’t and shouldn’t all be downtown. A plan to develop the largest assisted housing project yet on Monaghan Road near Kenner Collegiate will be a test of the community’s commitment to a real solution for homelessness.

Canadian Canoe Museum: A somewhat downsized new museum on Little Lake can still be a spectacular addition. A new design is coming, more than $40 million has been pledged and with any luck construction should start this year. This is no time for supporters, including the city, to roll back their commitments.

The pandemic: Unfortunately, impossible to ignore as the biggest concern locally, provincially and nationally. Large-scale vaccination won’t reach Peterborough for months. When it does, co-operation and patience will be required.

Stay safe, stay healthy and give some thought to the good that 2021 will inevitably bring.