Saskatoon mayor urges bold vision for Saskatoon’s future as business leaders await action

Saskatoon Mayor Cynthia Block gave her second State of the City Address to business leaders Thursday. Keenan Sorokan reports.

Saskatoon Mayor Cynthia Block says the city must act boldly moving forward as it eyes a number of significant changes that could be felt for decades, but local business leaders are waiting for these rallying calls to turn into action before it’s too late.

“To be bold is part of the culture of the city,” Block said Thursday. “We’ve seen it throughout the decades. We’ve seen it under many mayors. I think if we continue to lead boldly, especially in this time, where we have an opportunity to capitalize in ways I haven’t seen in my lifetime.”

Block spoke for over an hour at the Greater Saskatoon Chamber of Commerce’s annual State of the City address. During her speech and question and answer period, Block spoke about a number of key issues.

A growing city with worsening homelessness issues, pressures on infrastructure and housing and facilitating additional investment and growth were all mentioned, but Block repeatedly called for bold action as the city gets set to transform.

At last year’s State of the City address, Chamber of Commerce CEO Jason Aebig wanted to see those ambitious plans become reality — and he’s still waiting.

“We also have to follow it up pretty quickly with an urgent plan to get them done, because the world won’t wait for Saskatoon to get its act together. It won’t,” he said.

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Block pointed to three significant projects that will change the city permanently: the downtown event and entertainment district (DEED), Link — the city’s upcoming rapid transit program, and the under-construction new Central Library.

While highlighting those projects, she looked back at the past as a way of noting the pushback these projects are receiving now.

She said during the ’60s there was plenty of concern about how Midtown Mall and Centennial Auditorium would change the city, while some felt they were unneeded projects at the time. In the 80s, the impact of building SaskTel Centre on the outskirts of the city is being felt now, and Block said it also had the community split.

“When we are making on purpose transformational change that can be, that can be scary,” she said.

However, with “a city firing on all cylinders,” she doesn’t want to let the opportunity pass the city by.

“We have a generation of talent that deserves to have what modern cities need and what they want, and I think we should make sure that we get it to them,” Block said.

All three projects mentioned by Block have hit snags.

At April’s regular city council meeting, councillors voted to shelve a crucial part of the city’s Link route where all three lines would meet along 1st Avenue citing a lack of available information for how things like snow removal and emergency response would be handled. Administration will report back but wouldn’t say if the delay could affect Link’s scheduled launch in 2028.

In March, city council voted against having Oak View Group, an American-based venue operator operate the eventual downtown arena and convention centre 17 months after originally striking a deal that would help fund the $1.2 billion project, leaving a crucial portion of funding undecided.

The new Central Library is slated to open in 2027, but had its scope reduced when original tenders for construction came in higher than expected.

With more calls for being bold, Aebig isn’t sure what will happen next without city council’s lead.

“I’m not sure where that leaves us,” Aebig said. “And so that leaves us then to remain very concerned about an action orientation to this bold vision.”

Block said there have been encouraging conversations about the arena. While there’s no imminent announcement, she says this project could “de-risk” the project in significant ways.

“DEED will happen. It is a part of the evolution of our city,” Block said.

As the city navigates some of these large changes, Aebig hopes improvements will be made so he isn’t asking Block similar questions during her third State of the City address as other cities like Regina organize themselves and leverage federal or provincial funding.

“I’d like to be in a position to ask, ‘How’s the first stage of that thing we just talked about coming along? As opposed to just talking about the thing in abstract terms and hoping that we’re finding our way forward in some way,” Aebig said.