SOS! Help Save Arrowdale from Destruction.
We need your support NOW more than ever! As city council is reluctant to hear our voices of opposition, we need to think bigger, and this requires funding- ALOT of it! Alleviating expenses accrued through fundraising and community education efforts, lawn signs and merchandise to spread awareness and ultimately legal pursuits. This is far from a done deal! There are many steps still required before a market-value housing development can advance on Arrowdale lands. We just need the support from YOU to continue on with this fight. Please help our community and non-profit organization to protect this irreplaceable treasure in the heart of our City, allowing it to be enjoyed for endless generations to come.
100% of donations acquired are focused towards the fight to save and preserve Arrowdale Municipal Golf Course.
Arrowdale Municipal Golf Course, located in the heart of Brantford, Ontario Canada, is a lively 49 acre 9-hole golf course with extraordinary historical and cultural ties to both the city and its residents. Arrowdale was formally established as a municipal course in 1927 sharing ties to the Brantford Golf Club, the 4th-oldest professional golf club in Canada. In affiliation with the original 5 golf clubs in the Nation, among Niagara-on-the-Lake, Toronto, Royal Quebec and Royal Montreal; Arrowdale remains to be the only 9-hole golf course in its original location. All the other clubs have either expanded greater than 9-holes or have moved to alternate properties. The first professional golf tournament on Arrowdale lands was held on November 8th, 1883, this would age this course and property at 136 years old!
In late November 2019, Brantford City Council revisited the option to sell Arrowdale (previously voting unanimously to save in 2016) under a guise of affordable housing. The Council stated that proceeds from the land sale would be allocated to a reserve fund for municipally subsidized housing units. These units are planned to be built over a 10 year period at now undetermined locations around the city, NOT upon Arrowdale lands. The Friends of Arrowdale group immediately reconvened and, within a month, grew from a few hundred supporters to a few thousand. Dispite over 200 sale-opposing citizens in attendance at City Hall and 14 delegate speeches; council proceeded to vote 8-3 in favour of disposing the land for development on December 17th, 2019. The motion for a referendum was also opposed at this council meeting, with a vote of 8-3, preventing the sale decision from being deferred and put to a citizen’s vote. As the vote to sell was done quickly, without proper public consultation and with a great deal of misinformation, we exist to provide the whole story surrounding the implications of this vote. Our platform embodies key elements that represent what this 49-acre property has to offer our community: Recreation, Environment, Heritage, Community Engagement and Indigenous Interest.
We cannot afford to lose this green space! Not only is it loved by those who enjoy the sport of golf (seniors, youth, friends, families and more), it is cherished by the community as a whole through walking, tobogganing, cross-country skiing, snowman-building, star-gazing, nature watching, worm-picking etc. The outdoor activity list is endless and showcases the true value of this land.
Arrowdale Municipal Golf Course is one of the most environmentally responsible courses around. Grounds maintenance staff use minimal pesticides and fertilizers on the property to ensure a healthy, balanced relationship with the wildlife and vegetation that share the landscape. Fertilizers and pesticides are only used on the golf greens, with secondary disposal of extra product on the tee-off areas. The fairways and all boundary areas are proudly chemical free, it has been this way since at least 2011!
Located on the property are numerous Kentucky Coffee Trees, known to be a rare Carolinian tree species listed as a species-at-risk in Canada. There are both male and female types in close proximity to each other, which is critical to reproduction and survival of the species. Male and female types in this close proximity on the same property is extremely rare, documented in as little as 4 known locations within Southern Ontario in 2000.
Transforming Arrowdale into a housing subdivision would be extremely detrimental to our already fragile environment, one factor being water usage, reflective of one's environmental carbon footprint. Developing the proposed 32 acres of land into roadways and housing would attribute to a water usage INCREASE of at LEAST 2.52x the volume of water currently used on the property. This is a significant surge in carbon footprint levels that will undoubtedly cause irreparable effects to the critically feeble climate we are facing on this planet today.
There are several alternative solutions to finance our growing subsidized housing demand, than the sale of Arrowdale. The land sale proceeds would contribute less than 14% of the finances required to fulfill the 10 year, $108,000,000 municipal housing plan. City officials indicated remaining affordable housing costs will be alleviated through "creative financial planning, partnerships with non-profit housing sectors, and federal and provincial funding streams". With such a miniscule financial contribution Arrowdale supplements in this cost structure; additional creative planning from the city could accommodate that portion of costs, rather than the disposal of a heavily-utilized recreational green space. A city reserve fund currently holds $29,236,800 earmarked for a $55 million sport complex/area in the West end of Brantford. This project could easily be delayed or cancelled and the funds reallocated into the affordable housing reserve, thus, relieving the "necessity" of selling off an already established, community-revered asset. In recent years, the City of Brantford has also annexed 90+ acres of agricultural land from the County of Brant along Powerline Rd. for future population expansion projects. 32 acres of this redundant land could be sold off today, in place of Arrowdale, in order to attain the costs "required" for the City's Affordable Housing Plan.
For more information please follow "Friends of Arrowdale- Info Page" on facebook for additional facts and details.
Website Available:
www.friendsofarrowdale.com
Thank you for your support! One-by-one, our numbers grow, together we fight for what is right-for our children, neighbours and community. If we do not stand up now, what will be left to cherish in this city we so happily call HOME.
