Paul Dechene

All day, I listen to the podcasterati lamenting how billionaires destroyed community media. "Oh, if only we still had community media, the mindscape would be so much more intellectually verdant!" they say, weeping.
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Feb 12 2026 - Megaproject Failure-In-Waiting — Queen City Improvement Bureau Greetings from The City Adjacent To The Future! In this episode, we discuss the AI datacentre that's to be built near the Queen City. Plus council is back from a long hiatus so we talk about some of t...

In case you missed it, here's the latest Queen City Improvement Bureau. We discuss that AI data centre proposed for the RM, of which we are rather skeptical (no surprise). Also, the OCP growth plan update, of which Aidan is more skeptical than I am. queencityib.com/podcasts/202... #yqrcc

Council ignored the NIMBYs and approved the prayer centre. Again, I don't know if it's still there. That was also a long long time ago.

But you can be sure that if you say something gross & racist in council, the QCIB will remember & mock you for it for years.

/9 #yqrcc

Their other argument was that people coming to use the prayer centre would drop garbage out of their car while they were there. It was lunatic. Normally, I don't play clips of delegations on the show but that was a case where I had to b/c the claim was SO racist it needed mockery. #yqrcc /8

There was never going to be a loudspeaker blasting the call to prayer outside the centre. That was entirely a fiction. But that didn't stop a bunch of local NIMBYs from standing up in Henry Baker & informing council that "that's what Muslims do." So fucking awful. /7 #yqrcc

Their arguments were, like in the RM, gross & racist. They argued the prayer centre shouldn't be allowed b/c neighbours would be woken up at all hours of the night by the call to prayer being blasted on speakers outside the strip mall. /6 #yqrcc

From that story, we slipped into referencing a story about how an Islamic group wanted to open a prayer centre in a strip mall in east Regina. 'Natch, the community came out in droves to oppose it. /5 #yqrcc

In the end, the City Of Regina welcomed the mosque into, I think, the Tuxedo industrial park? I'm not sure if it's still there. That was like 10 years ago. Anyway. Gross bit of RM history that ended happily in the City Of Regina. #yqrcc /4

I can't remember all the arguments against the mosque. They were so gross. The RM demanded obscene concessions like the folks using the mosque couldn't hold events outside in the parking lot. It was just nuts. Fucking sickeningly racist. #yqrcc /3

First, we mentioned how maybe if the AI data centre in the RM of Sherwood fails, they can use the building for a mosque. That's funny b/c of course that won't happen b/c there was ALREADY an attempt to build a mosque in the RM & it was rejected b/c: racist NIMBYs. /2 #yqrcc

Feb 12 2026 - Megaproject Failure-In-Waiting — Queen City Improvement Bureau Greetings from The City Adjacent To The Future! In this episode, we discuss the AI datacentre that's to be built near the Queen City. Plus council is back from a long hiatus so we talk about some of t...

In the latest QCIB we started talking about 2 different cases of extremely gross racist NIMBYism at the same time & I'm not sure we did a great job of explaining what we were talking about. So I'm going to clear that up now. /1 #yqrcc
queencityib.com/podcasts/202...

But you'll note that Cathedral is not really included very much in the city's intensification plans. Heritage, downtown & North Central get singled out. Cathedral is left off the list.

Cathedral needs population if it wants to stay relevant. They (/we) really shot themselves in the foot. #yqrcc

Recent Housing Accelerator Fund-inspired zoning changes have made it so that developers won't have to go through council to get their designs approved so much anymore. So maybe Cathedral will see a little developer interest going forward. #yqrcc

I interviewed a local developer a couple years back. He talked about how that 13th & Elphinstone project getting killed really turned developers off building any kind of missing middle in the Cathedral neighbourhood. They did not want to deal w/ community pushback. #yqrcc

So yeah… NIMBYs killed the 5 storey apartment building on 13th and Elphinstone. But so did the city's parking minimums.

At least, the city has since gotten rid of parking minimums. #yqrcc

Incidentally, the corner of 13th & Elphinstone was zoned to allow the 5-storey apartment. The only reason it went to council is b/c they were going to knock down an adjacent old catalogue house to put in parking to get up to the city's parking minimum. #yqrcc

Oh yeah… I think the original was 40+ units of rental apartments? What was built has 8.

One of 13th's biggest problems is a lack of residential density around it. Contrary to popular belief, Cathedral's population is falling in most areas. The businesses could've used another 32 households. #yqrcc

Yeah… the proposal for 13th & Elphinstone had a brick exterior. Looked very much like the heritage apartments downtown but included a whole floor of retail. I heard they had an organic grocer lined up as a tenant. But yeah, Cathedral wasn't having it. Instead we've been blighted by beige. #yqrcc

In developers' defence, you won't be spared the NIMBY's wrath if you build something nice. The original proposed mixed-use 5-storey apartment building for Elphinstone & 13th was lovely. The neighbourhood fucking killed it. So we got some cheap spite architecture instead. Nice work, Cathedral! #yqrcc

I don't know what it is about the word "prairies" that makes architects think "beige & boxy" but that seems to be what we're stuck with. The Maritimes got the best designs of the bunch, imo. #yqrcc

www.housingcatalogue.cmhc-schl.gc.ca

City of Regina | CMHC Housing Design Catalogue City of Regina

It's why I'm a fan of pre-approved missing-middle housing plans. Unfortunately, that's something the city is still "working on." Also, the plans they picked to highlight on their website are among the lamest that CMHC put out last year. www.regina.ca/bylaws-permi... #yqrcc

Jun 06 2024 - A Man Named Stu — Queen City Improvement Bureau We speak with Stu Niebergall from the Regina And Region Homebuilders Association about council's efforts to remove exclusionary single-family zoning and the impacts that may have on the city's residen...

He basically suggested that NIMBYs should put their efforts into pressuring builders to build nice buildings. It's a nonsensical position. Communities don't have the expertise & have zero pull with developers. That's why they just push to kill projects at the council level. #yqrcc

We had the head of the Regina Homebuilders Assn on our show & I asked him what they were doing to educate their members about the advantages of not always building shit-ugly buildings. He got really evasive with his answer. It was pretty disappointing. #yqrcc

Incidentally, we discuss the new OCP Growth Plan which council passed on Wed. But I don't really know what I'm talking about. Good thing we have Deb Bryden, the city's mgr of planning, & Luke Grazier, the city's mgr of projects, on the show on Feb 26 to clear up any inadvertent misinfo. #yqrcc

Feb 12 2026 - Megaproject Failure-In-Waiting — Queen City Improvement Bureau Greetings from The City Adjacent To The Future! In this episode, we discuss the AI datacentre that's to be built near the Queen City. Plus council is back from a long hiatus so we talk about some of t...

NEW Queen City Improvement Bureau! AI data centres! Growth Plans! Our Innovative Revenue Tool involving OnlyFans! We're going to make a fortune!

queencityib.com/podcasts/202... #yqrcc

Listen here, Connections… Wayne, Kent, Stark & Banner are Superhero Secret Identity Surnames. I want my dot back.

Well, hard to do when the federal government abandons half its climate policies.

Analysis: China’s CO2 emissions have now been ‘flat or falling’ for 21 months - Carbon Brief China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole.

Analysis: China’s CO2 emissions have now been ‘flat or falling’ for 21 months
www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-chi...