Edmonton city council approves funding for ICE district upgrades

Edmonton city council debated on Monday whether to proceed with a master agreement for the proposed village at ICE district, including an event park and demolition of the Coliseum.

The plan required significant funding from both the city and the province, allowing the Oilers Entertainment Group to move ahead with infrastructure improvements.

The agreement was released last Thursday, and some councillors said four days wasn’t enough time to make an informed decision ahead of the Sept. 1 deadline.

“We absolutely have a gun to our head,” said Andrew Knack, councillor for Ward Nakota Isga. “We have been held hostage through the entirety of the process because we’ve been unwilling to ever push back.”

Council voted yes to the master agreement — there was nine votes for “yes” and four votes for “no.”

Knack raised concerns about the housing portion of the agreement. While there is a plan included to construct 354 housing units by 2028, Knack says there is no legal requirement in the agreement for the housing portion of the plan.

“Folks aren’t coming downtown because they feel like they’re missing another entertainment space,” said Knack. “They’re not coming downtown, and maybe not always accurately, but they’re not always feeling safe. How does this address safety? How does this address the housing, which you need to have more people living in downtown, which in turn actually improves safety?”

Downtown councillor Anne Stevenson also raised questions about the use of the event park. She says she was surprised to find out the space would be intended for things like conferences and conventions, directly competing with the city’s own event centre.

“That was not on my radar throughout these conversations, and I think it creates a direct threat to our city-owned convention centre, and our EXPO Centre as well,” said Stevenson. “So we need to understand what implications this agreement has for those facilities and tax payer dollars that support them.”

The master agreement includes three parts that are tied together: the village at ICE district, event park, and demolition of Northlands Coliseum, which was originally supposed to be demolished this year. The province would contribute $183.4 million, the City of Edmonton would contribute $137.8 million, and OEG would contribute $87 million.

“This is about investing in our downtown, creating more housing opportunities, creating more event activities where people will come downtown, and last weekend, that area was filled with people at the pride parade, and we want to make sure more events such as that are able to come downtown,” said Edmonton Mayor Amarjeet Sohi.

“Nobody’s going to want to say no to what seems like money that would be pulled away,” said Knack. “Even though the province, to this day, has not clearly stated that they would remove the money if we said no to this specific agreement. All they’ve said is that they’d reconsider. But we’re unwilling to ever push back on this because we don’t want to be seen as throwing away money for the coliseum demolition or other pieces.”