The Our Town - Clarenville Blog by Paul Tilley

The 9th Season of Arts Under the Stars is underway! Here's a video selecton of the acts as they play Thursday evenings this summer in Clarenville.  Artists this year include Goowiddy/Ches March and Leland Wareham, Three Shades of Grey, Scalliwag, Quickdraw, Terry Penney, Sweet Voices of Youth and The Dimmagios. You can see photos of each night's performance at  http://goo.gl/nom8y0 August 7th Performance Terry Penney is a fantastic storyteller in song.  Below is a selection from the performance that includes not only the song but the always fascinating background story behind it. Give them all a listen...    July 31st Performance This week's performance featured the four man band Quick Draw from Clarenville.   Quick Draw is Kip Strong, Frank Newcomb and Jason and Dave Saunders. The band plays country, classic rock and Newfoundland Irish tunes for all to enjoy. Check them out on Facebook at  https://www....

On June 17,  Minister of Health and Community Services, Paul Davis; MHA Ross Wiseman, Mayor of Clarenville Frazer Russell and CREST chair Larry Reid announced the launch of the local senior's bus service in front of a crowd of over 70 people - many of whom were seniors. The Clarenville Region Extended Seniors' Transportation (CREST) is a Clarenville based pilot project under the Age-Friendly Newfoundland and Labrador Transportation initiative. The CREST bus service will operate within Clarenville and travel as far as North West Brook, Harcourt and Elliott's Cove on a shared-ride door-to-door basis. The service is intended for people age 60 or over and for people confined to a wheelchair.  The volunteer enabled service will commence July 7, and will operate on a scheduled route that covers the majority of a 20-kilometre radius of the town of Clarenville.  The 16-passenger/wheelchair accessible bus will operate Monday-Friday, 8:30 a.m...

This is the script to my address to the Regional Meeting of the Odd Fellows where I was invited to represent the Town and to be the guest speaker...  Many thanks to the local Odd Fellows organizing committee. I appreciate the invitation and the opportunity to speak. Making a Difference Thank you… Newfoundland and Labrador delegates of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows., On behalf of Mayor Frazer Russell, Council and the entire town, I would like to wish you a warm welcome to Clarenville.   I trust your meetings over the course of this weekend will be productive and you fellowship inspiring. It always gives me great pleasure to see people from all over the province come to Clarenville because I know that the people in this town, especially the people who make up this lodge locally are some of the same people who have contributed to making Clarenville such a great home for me.   I also know these people embody the ideals of the IOOF within our communi...

What's not to love about winter?  That was the theme of last Wednesday's Chamber luncheon. Jason Crawford, White Hills Resort's General Manager gave a complete overview of the 2014 season and outlined his and the Boards vision for the future in a speech he gave to the Clarenville Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday May 14th. This past winter, White Hills Ski Resort had its best year ever. 2014 saw the community owned resort draw approximately 20,000 ski visits which yielded about $1 million in direct revenues - all this despite being closed for 5 weekends due to electricity conservation or weather - That's a 30% increase over last year. Crawford pointed that the Resort's benefits stretch well into the community.  Research from New Brunswick has shown that each ski visit generates approximately $118 into the local economy, and that number jumps to $172 per day if the person stays overnight.  That translates into a $2 million annual benefit to the local economy. ...

Clara Hughes is a six-time Canadian Olympic speed-skating and cycling medallist and the national spokesperson for Bell Let's Talk. Clara's Big Ride for Bell Let's Talk is a 110-day national bicycle tour through every province and territory, beginning in Toronto on March 14, 2014 and concluding in Ottawa on July 1, 2014. As part of Clara's Big Ride, Clara Hughes will cover 12,000 km and visit 95 communities along the way. One of those communities was Clarenville, NL.   Over 120 people came out to White Hills resort on Friday, April 25 to hear Clara's story - It is an inspiring and thought provoking talk.

On April 3, Justice James Adams of the NL Supreme Court ruled on a case that pitted the Town of Gander against Trimart Investments Limited.  The thrust of the case was the Town sought to bill back owners of  commercial properties owners adjacent to a municipally owned parking lot for town provided services such as snowclearing, repairs & repaving.  The court held on the one hand the T own could impose charges to the business owners in respect of the parking lots; but on the other hand t he Town could not impose a charge in respect of the parking lots as a user fee and could not impose charges on the defendants in respect of the service roads.  ( Read the full judgement here )  This ruling has significant implications for Clarenville because of its similar situation with the Lower Mall parking lot. The Town has gained significant leverage to charge back for repairs to the parking lot.  The Town wants to see this resolved and now it finally has ...

In this week's edition of THE PACKET  Shawn Hayward's  lead story "Weather, economic uncertainty affect real estate" suggested that short term factors like winter weather and economic uncertainty pointed to some sign of cooling in the hot Clarenville economy. Granted the late arrival of spring and a less than expected impact of Hebron will tend to push down home sales but these are short term hiccups rather than long term structural problems with the Clarenville economy. Realtor  Neil Norcott's insight was key and I want to make sure we all recognize it.  At the end of the story Neil rightly points out that  "Many people who move back to Newfoundland from wherever they are now, not necessarily from the Clarenville area when they left, are picking Clarenville as a destination, mostly because of the amenities we have, the quality of life our community offers, and its geographic location. All are reasons people want to move here, and I don'...