A breeze in the doldrums

Running and gambling and data centres. Happy Friday.

Author

Chris Erl
July 24, 2026

A breeze in the doldrums

Photo by Florian van Schreven on Unsplash - Edited by author

This week in The Incline

…but first, Chris is running ran

Back in June, I ran the 2026 Pride and Remembrance Run in Toronto during Pride weekend. It’s a sort of tradition of mine, trying to stay healthy and give back to the community during the annual celebration of queer resilience and joy that is Pride. For the past two years, I’ve put out calls for donations in The Incline, asking readers to give what they can to support my run instead of sending me “tips” through ko-fi.com.

This year, you all helped me exceed my goal by a lot. Thanks to the generosity of family, friends, and you, dear readers, we raised $1,107.90 for the charities supported by the Pride and Remembrance Run. Your contributions were so incredibly inspiring for me, and were on my mind for the 28 minutes it took me to complete the race (not a super time, but a respectable one for me).

As promised, I’m posting the photos of me during the race. There weren’t as many as there have been in previous years (even though I tried to be as photogenic as possible), but they do feature me wearing the “Proud. Queer. Hamiltonian.” hat that I made for the race.

I’d like to work on getting those patches made up for a future fundraiser, so keep your eyes open for that. There are so many incredible community organizations working to support queer folks in Hamilton that need support, so I’d love to figure out a way to help them while also providing supporters with a little merch.

Thank you again for all the love and support. I guess you could say I’m running I ran because I knew you all had my back. And that means the world to me.

Photos of Chris from the 2026 Pride and Remembrance Run

Okay, on with this edition of The Incline.

Notes on sailing

Summer is slipping by. The stifling heat of early July has given way to a cooler, almost fall-like atmosphere. Bursts of angry summer rain continue to upend countless barbeques and hikes and camping trips. But there’s a feeling of the infinite in this moment; time passes, but it feels static. Heat fades into cool which returns to heat, rain soaks and the sun dries and it doesn’t really matter if one day is too hot or one day is too wet or one day is too smoky because there’s an endless summer before us. There’s always tomorrow. There’s always another chance. In some ways, it’s like we’re stick in the doldrums - that belt of calm and stillness along the Equator that was once the adversary of many a sailor but that provides a respite from the relentless onslaught of time.

There have been a few gusts of wind, so to speak. Particularly when it comes to local politics, periodic bursts of activity snap us out of our summer lull and into the real world where time flies and opportunities disappear.

Some days, it seems as though nothing is moving, the afternoon sun beating angrily down on the fragile tall ship of our democracy, imperceptible movements slowly driving its crew mad. Other days, it’s as though a great hurricane has hit us out of nowhere, tossing our vessel hither and yon, disrupting our journey and forcing us to head to our navigational equipment to figure out a way back.

The biggest gust to hit us recently was last week’s vote on the data centre Interim Control By-Law (ICBL). The decision has rocked the community and threatens to disrupt our previously sleepy municipal election.

Personally, this one hit me hard. Given my…delicate position, there were some extremely tense moments with family and friends after this vote. I had a lot of feelings. Everyone had a lot of feelings. Then, and now, I’ve had to be cautious as to how I’ve addressed things, but, as I have mentioned repeatedly these past few years, I tend to process my feelings by writing. It’s how I make sense of things, push myself to research, and work to understand all sides of some very complex issues.

So, naturally, I looked for guidance in history.

Gambling on data

There have been some pretty impressive grassroots citizen movements in Hamilton’s recent history. The one that sticks in my mind is the anti-casino movement from 2012. What they were able to do - and how council responded to their activism - is in stark contrast to what played out last week during the ICBL vote.

***

Way back in the utopia that was ‘12 (rent was low, music was good, I had hair…), the governing Ontario Liberals proposed a massive “restructuring” of the province’s gaming sector, which included closing some small slot machine sections at racetracks and, in their place, opening multiple new casinos in large cities. Ontarians, souring on the leadership of then-Premier Dalton McGunity, were not on board; a poll from mid-March of 2012 showed that only 24 percent of Ontarians supported opening more casinos. A letter writer to the Spec joked that the languishing pre-condo-ified Royal Connaught could play host to a casino. It was a tongue-in-cheek proposal put forward despite the writer “Not knowing any of the logistics and admittedly not having put a lot of thought into it,” concluding their letter with the deeply sarcastic quip: “Just askin’.”

Mayor Bob Bratina took that suggestion and ran with it. By early April, it was reported that Bratina had “put out feelers” to host what he billed as a “world-class casino” in Hamilton. Members of council were taken aback, telling the Spec that Bratina had distributed those feelers of his own accord and without their knowledge. The paper’s editorial board quickly came out with a piece imploring the mayor to include residents in the conversation. “We must keep in mind,” they wrote, “that while a casino will draw gamblers and produce revenue, it is not a city-building initiative…this is an issue that requires study, discussion and a great deal of community input.”

In July, the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (good ol’ OLG) announced 29 “gaming zones” in the province and confirmed Hamilton was on the list for a possible casino. Councillor Sam Merulla, sensing an opportunity, pitched a municipal “referendum” on a casino during the 2014 municipal election.

While Merulla tried to open the discussion to the entire city, the powers-that-be had sought to keep the negotiations quiet. City staff confirmed that “secret” talks had been occurring behind closed doors about a local casino (secret in that even staff did not know who was participating or what was actually said). It was unclear who participated in the talks, but, shortly after the revelation about the secret talks, it was announced that The Mercanti Family of Carmen’s (and now HUPEG) fame had expressed interest in building and operating a downtown casino. It seemed that the ball was rolling faster and faster and faster, barreling straight into a core that was, at the time, just beginning to feel a touch of life after decades of neglect.

Battle lines were drawn. Councillors were divided between firm opposition and being “open-minded” to a downtown casino. Community members stepped up and organized, knowing they only had a few chances to convey to council members how damaging a large casino would be in downtown Hamilton.

Pressure began to mount, especially as the clock ticked closer and closer to the day of the vote on Merulla’s proposed referendum. Given that municipalities are creatures of the province, Hamilton would have needed the approval of the OLG to “delay” talks until after a referendum could be held in 2014. They rejected the proposal outright, leading Merulla to team up with Ward 1 Councillor Brian McHattie on a motion that would force a council vote on terminating talks with the OLG, effectively killing the idea of a downtown casino.

Councillors began informally polling their constituents. Local heavyweights like former Mayor Larry Di Ianni and former Councillor Don Drury came out in favour while Andrea Horwath lined up against (or, more accurately, very pro-referendum). The letters to the editor pages were filled with casino missives while town halls featured passionate debates from Flamborough to the core to Winona.

***

A massive Spec poll dropped in late October, 2012, conveniently around the midway point between the 2010 and 2014 elections. A modest but clear majority of 56 percent of respondents were against a casino. It was evident that momentum was on the anti-casino side.

Another win came when the OLG caved to a request from council to have more time for deliberation. And deliberate they did. A special “gaming subcommittee” was established, though much of its work was derailed by clashes between Bratina and Ward 8 Councillor Terry Whitehead.

Conversations about the casino were everywhere as pro and anti forces lobbied and wrote letters and kept the pressure on council. Neighbourhood associations and community groups started taking sides. It seemed like everyone in the city had an opinion about the casino; even Hamilton’s Chief Medical Officer of Health stepped in to the debate, saying that, if council voted in favour of a casino, there should be safeguards put in place to protect people struggling with gambling and alcohol addictions.

Anti-casino protesters filled council chambers in mid-December to make their position known to the gaming subcommittee. Their demonstration made the front page of the Spec featuring some familiar friendly faces.

The city planned casino “forums” for January of 2013 to hear from residents. At a forum in Flamborough, some residents brought their horses as a way of reminding councillors that the OLG stated they would close the slot machine section of Flamboro Downs racetrack if a new casino opened in Hamilton, which would severely harm the racing industry in the area. The main forum at City Hall attracted over 500 residents, with another 23,000 listening in virtually. The “no” side had the physical advantage, outnumbering the proponents by vast numbers, bringing drums and signs and even more horses.

***

Amidst all that, the Mercanti’s unveiled their downtown casino proposal. At a nightclub in Hess Village, the Mercanti’s and their business partners in the proposed venture - the Mancinelli’s from LiUNA and the Hard Rock Café - announced “RockHammer”, a consortium dedicated to building, not just a casino, but an “entertainment complex” somewhere in the core. What they pitched was beyond a complex, bordering on an entertainment leviathan. Over 1,200 slot machines, a rooftop nightclub, a 280-room hotel, a comedy club, a Canadian rock ‘n’ roll hall of fame, and some kind of homage to the city’s many waterfalls. And, of course, a “gambling addiction program offered in partnership with Mission Services.” The $200 million proposal was touted by proponents as transformative, with the potential to become “one of the largest private-sector employers in Hamilton.”

The announcement wasn’t all glitz and rock; speaking with the Spec, Mercanti family patriarch Peter poo-pooed the anti-casino crowd, saying “Who are these people? What is their background? What have they done?…They get almost all the same weight as the people who really count. It shocks me.”

Oof.

The RockHammer proposal wasn’t the only one floating around. Among the cavalcade of pitches that bounced around the city, one of the most interesting came from a local entrepreneur who pitched a “casino boat” and banquet centre at Pier 8, using a decommissioned restaurant ship from Toronto to host a permanently-moored gambling boat at the waterfront.

As the proposals swirled and council deliberated, local artists and venues stepped up to voice their opposition. A bombshell open letter signed by, among others, Young Rival, Terra Lightfoot, The Dirty Nil, Monster Truck, Alexisonfire, and the Arkells said that, not only did they oppose the casino, but would refuse to play at it if it opened.

Every day, it seemed like more and more Hamiltonians were against the casino. All that was needed was council’s decision.

After months of debate, council finally came to the table with a motion. It amended Merulla and McHattie’s original motion of total opposition, instead reaffirming Hamilton’s support for the Flamboro Downs slots. The catch was that, if Flamboro no longer met the criteria established by the province, Hamilton would be open to a casino elsewhere.

The compromise made almost everyone happy. The pro side believed the door was still open while the anti side knew that Flamboro Downs was unlikely to go anywhere and, even if it did, there would still be another public debate on the future of a Hamilton casino. There were still a handful of grumpy columnists and letter writers who decried the compromise as a backward, anti-business, anti-investment move that squandered a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. But it seemed almost everyone saw the casino for what it really was: a gamble.

The motion passed unanimously.1

Today, we have no downtown casino and Flamboro Downs operates a racetrack and slot machines, providing revenue for the city and a place for those who truly want to gamble to go. But we only got to this point after nearly a year of vigourous and spirited debate across Hamilton allowed enough time to study the issue, hear from every side, and make a measured, responsible decision.

Just like always happens in Hamilton.

smash cut to…

Six weeks of data crunching

A total of 41 days. That’s all there were between the contentious Committee of Adjustment (CoA) meeting on the proposed Steelport Data Centre and the council meeting where a draft ICBL was rejected.

The timelines, players, and circumstances can be hard to untangle, but they’re important to understand.

***

Hamilton’s CoA met on June 4 to hear an application from Slate Asset Management regarding 386 Wilcox Street, home to Stelco’s main Hamilton Works. The property is a complicated mess of lines that follow industrial rail connections, the swaths of infill that created Piers 16 and 17, and Industrial Drive. One of its western neighbours is the Chernobyl-style sarcophagus that has capped Randle Reef, the toxic mass that poisoned the harbour for a century.

The rough outline of 386 Wilcox Street

In total, 386 Wilcox is around 286 hectares of industrial land (I know it’s hard to visualize, but that’s like 9.5 Gage Parks, 54.4 Lime Ridge Malls, or 608.5 Gore Parks). Slate’s application to the CoA was to sever just over 76 hectares of the property fronting Ottawa and Industrial in the bottom right (southeast) corner of the property.

The application was originally scheduled to come to the CoA on May 19, but, due to public interest in the application, it was pushed to their June 4 meeting. The community, having gotten wind of the application and Slate’s desire to use the severed property to house a data centre, flooded the CoA with correspondence. The nearly 1,690 comments submitted may have broken a record for most comments on a single application in the city’s history.

On paper, the application should have been approved. Opposition to data centres aside, there was little wrong with the raw planning rationale backing up the application. But the CoA could see which way the winds were blowing and unanimously rejected Slate’s application. In their decision, they said the application conflicted with Hamilton’s Official Plan, is not keeping with other developments in the area, and is not necessary for the proper and orderly development of the lands.

The CoA is an interesting body. It derives its powers from the Planning Act and operates as a “quasi-judicial” body, meaning that it weighs applications against a municipality’s official plan and zoning by-laws and makes decisions. It doesn’t make laws, it just interprets existing ones. That’s why the CoA is made up of citizen appointees and not members of council. That doesn’t mean CoA members aren’t political, of course. Past political candidates, the civically-engaged with a keen eye for rules and regulations, and individuals encouraged by elected officials to bring their expertise to the table are often appointed to bodies like the CoA. They aren’t elected by the people, though, so for them to reject the proposal meant that they acutely understood the anger in the community.

***

Three weeks after the CoA rejected Slate’s application for severance, City Council met to discuss a proposed Interim Control By-Law (ICBL) regarding data centres. Also part of the Planning Act, an ICBL serves as a “pause” on developments of a certain kind while a municipality conducts studies and adjusts policies to ensure the orderly development of lands in their jurisdiction. It basically means that things are put on hold until staff and councillors can get up-to-speed on the matter.

The motion on the ICBL was first brought to council’s Planning Committee, where it passed unanimously. The following week, it was put before the full council, where it passed 15-to-1 with Ward 9 Councillor Brad Clark opposed. All that vote did was direct staff to put together the wording of the ICBL and report back to council on July 15.

At the June 24 meeting of council where the ICBL was sent to staff, there were some rumblings about the signal it would send. Questions and comments bounced around regarding whether Hamilton would appear anti-business and the city’s acting general manager of planning and ec. dev. said the debate may have caused “some reputational damage” for Hamilton.

But, everyone broke for Pride/Canada Day/early July fun, and staff went off to draft the ICBL, getting things ready to bring back to council for July 15. The only real blip between June 24 and July 15 was that Slate appealed (expectedly) the CoA’s decision on June 30.

Then came Friday, July 10.

***

As first reported by Joey Coleman, Mayor Horwath announced, seemingly out-of-the-blue that a “special” council meeting had been called for the following Tuesday, June 14. The purpose of the meeting was to hear from pro-data centre speakers in advance of the Wednesday, July 15 meeting to vote on the ICBL.

To say the reaction in the community was “stunned” would be an understatement. The online anger was unrestrained. Conversations I had in person were incredulous. I, myself, thought there must have been some mistake and that the meeting would hear from both pro and con speakers.

Half of council did not attend the Tuesday meeting. Some genuinely had other commitments, some boycotted it due to the nature of the meeting. The speakers presented a handful of facts and answered some questions, but it seemed like the presentation muddied the waters, rather than clarifying anything of substance. A host of new words and phrases like “hyperscale”, “closed-loop cooling”, and “direct-to-chip” were entered into the record. One of the speakers said that “one computer” can constitute a data centre. Spectators heckled, councillors tried to get clarity on procedure, tension grew. As if to add to the tension, Hamilton West-Ancaster-Dundas MP John-Paul Danko hosted an AI townhall the same night where he stated he wasn’t pro- or anti-AI, just “pro-business, pro-economic development, and pro jobs for the future.”2

And that set the stage for Wednesday.

After lunch, council entered closed session. They stayed in that closed session for hours. When they returned, the only piece of information shared was that a proposed data centre at the old Spec building on Frid Street - part of the McMaster Innovation Park - would be automatically exempted from the ICBL because Ontario’s Planning Act exempts universities from zoning controls.

There wasn’t much more after that. In under an hour, a few councillors provided their perspectives and gave their explanations. There was some talk about losing opportunities, but most of the conversation centred around what council didn’t have control over and what other levels of government needed to do. Hanging heavy in the air were the unspoken concerns raised in closed session that hinted strongly at anticipated legal action if the ICBL passed. A jurisdictional washing of the hands while furtive glances were thrown at the city’s legal team, if you will.

After that, they voted.

The ICBL was defeated 10-to-6.

Compare and contrast

I’ll give council this: municipalities really don’t have a lot of direct powers.

Municipal government in Canada is extremely limited in what it can do. Constitutionally, municipalities don’t have a leg to stand on. They exist at the whim and pleasure of the provinces, acting as local service delivery units for all those responsibilities granted the provinces way back in 1867. The world has changed a lot since then. But thing are very, very, very slow to change in Canada. So we’re stuck with what we have for the time being.

What we have now is a tangled web of provincial legislation, legal precedent, and local policies that form the basis of municipal government.

Sometimes, the province will involve themselves more vigourously in the actions of local bodies, as has been the longstanding policy of Doug Ford, Lord Island Protector and “Mayor” of the definitely not cursed Ontario.

Sometimes, the courts will make a ruling regarding one municipality’s actions that forces other municipalities to act a certain way, as was the case when Justice Michael Valente ruled that Waterloo Region couldn’t clear an encampment in Kitchener, creating the conditions whereby Hamilton created the 2023 Encampment Protocol.

Sometimes, a municipality’s own rules prevent it from acting quickly or responding to a unique challenge, as has been the case with the data centre issue, given that Hamilton’s zoning by-laws aren’t equipped to deal with a rapidly-evolving technology.

How a council addresses those factors matters. And it is growing increasingly clear that residents are not satisfied with the response from their elected officials.

***

Councillors will inevitably have a multitude of opinions on their responsibilities as they interpret them. These will be based on their understanding of the job, their own philosophies, and the skills and perspectives they bring with them when they are elected.

I, as we all well know, haven’t been elected to jack squat. I’m just a 30-something nerd with a PhD in municipal government that is currently hanging slightly askew on my wall (note to self, straighten degree frame). But I’ve been bumming around local government enough over the past few years to have seen how the civic sausage is made and develop my own ideas on how councillors should approach the job.

My belief is that a member of a municipal council is both a legislator and an advocate for their constituents. They legislate as a voting member of the “corporation”, meaning they have the power to introduce motions, debate them, and vote on them. But they also have a duty to be advocates - to take a stand and speak up for their constituents on matters of importance in the municipality. Council members are elected by voters not just to be a passive board member; they are elected to be the voice of a community on matters of civic importance to that community.

Can a member of council direct the police to “tackle violent crime”? No. But they can advocate on the issue of crime while simultaneously legislating on policies that will help bring crime down, whatever they believe those to be.

Can a member of council unilaterally fix a dangerous intersection? No. But they can advocate for safer streets and legislate with their fellow councillors on safety measures for that intersection.

Can a member of council “create jobs?” Of course not. But they can advocate for economic development and legislate on tangible policies that might impact employment in their community.

A councillor can take a stand and use the tools at their disposal to back up that stand. Even if it means the threat of a lawsuit or provincial intervention or some other possible hiccup, it’s the stand that matters.

And it isn’t like this is some novel idea. It’s happened before.

***

In 2016, the Hamilton Mountain branch of the Christian Heritage Party (CHP) bought a handful of bus stop ads. The dull, black-and-white advertisements featured a photo of a man in a heavy winter coat and baseball cap entering a door marked “ladies showers”. The ads read “Competing Human Rights…Where is the Justice?” The spacing between the words was all off, capitalization was used haphazardly, and, to most people, the ads must have been all-but inscrutable.

The intent behind the ads was to peddle transphobic hate, building off the entirely imagined worry that a cis man would simply “identify” as a woman to enter a single-sex washroom or shower space to assault the people within. This is despite the fact that such events simply do not happen and that allowing people to use the spaces that align with their gender identity does not also magically eliminate protections against sexual assault and that its trans people who are way more likely to be the victims and not the perpetrators of harassment and violence in washrooms. Just more of the weird social conservative obsession with other people’s genitals.

The city removed the ads not long after they went up. The CHP sued and the city lost, with a judge saying the city didn’t follow its own policies when responding to the ads. Humiliatingly, the city dropped an appeal of the ruling in 2018 and ended up owing the Christian nationalist party $44,000.

But that was a learning experience for the city. They put new policies and guidelines in place to ensure that, if it came up again, they would be prepared.

And of course it came up again. Christian nationalists have enough money and time and anger to keep these things going until judgement day. In 2023, the CHP wanted to run another series of transphobic bus shelter ads, but was denied before the ads could go up. The party dragged the city to court again. But this time, the judge ruled that the city’s decision “showed a rational chain of analysis” and was justified. An appeal by the CHP was rejected because, again, the policies were there and the logic was sound.

The city took a stand, had policies to back it up, and won in court. They knew a lawsuit was possible because it had happened before. But that didn’t stop them from doing what they believed was right. It took a frustrating legal battle and a long process of developing policies, but it paid off in the end.

The city could have rolled over in 2016, saying that the policies in place didn’t allow them to stop the ads or that the threat of a lawsuit was enough to get them to back off. They could have balked at new policies, voting against them with the justification that things like transphobia and freedom of expression are outside their jurisdiction. But they didn’t. They responded to a situation using the tools they had and they won, signaling to Hamilton’s queer community that they would advocate for us, even when it was tough.

***

Almost one year passed between the idea of a Hamilton casino was floated and council’s final compromise decision in 2012. There were countless townhalls, debates, discussions, lobbying pitches, meetings with other levels of government, and hours of deliberation.

During that debate, the city had to return to the province multiple times to ask permission to pursue a policy or make a decision. The referendum proposal was an attempt to poll the public on whether Hamilton should continue to negotiate regarding a casino. The vote on the compromise motion was a signal that Hamilton wanted gaming at Flamboro Downs and that negotiations with the province would ultimately focus on that. Council was using the tools they had to be the advocates that we expected them to be.

Contrast that with the data centre debate.

There were about six weeks between the data centre issue appearing on the radar of many Hamiltonians and council’s rejection of the ICBL, one of the only policy tools they had to address the issue. During the debate, councillors were informed of the limitations placed on their power by the province, by possible legal action, and by their own policies. Members of council, in that moment, had a choice to defer to the institution or to advocate for their constituents, even if speaking up was doomed to fail.

And, let’s be honest, it was probably doomed to fail. The Slate project is almost assuredly going ahead, whether we want it to or not. There’s a boatload of loosely-allocated federal money just floating around that Slate is not going to pass up and the Carney government is going all-in on AI because of course they are (even if Hamilton Centre MP Aslam Rana recently came out against the proposed data centres in the city). The Ontario Land Tribunal (the appeals body for CoA decisions) will absolutely side with Slate, the property will be severed, and the project will move forward. And the McMaster project, preemptively carved out of the ICBL, is probably going to chug along at its own pace independent of whatever was decided by the city.

But the ICBL provided a few different things. It would have given city staff time to develop policies, given councillors time to hear from community members (not just from proponents in hastily-called meetings), allowed everyone time to get up-to-speed on this rapidly evolving file, and would have signaled to the community that, even if provincial policies and the courts and time make it inevitable that data centres will spring up in our communities, that at least council used what little was at its disposal to try and slow the process. Passing it would have shown the community that, even with its limited powers, a city council can still influence the conversation and advocate for residents.

And that, I think, is the biggest issue with the ICBL vote.

Yes, there’s palpable anger in the community. Yes, there are talks of people organizing to run against the councillors who voted down the ICBL. Yes, there’s continued activism and pressure from the anti-data centre crowd.

But the biggest issue is that so many people will now look at council and say “what’s the point?” Why bother voting if council preempts challenges to its power by rolling over? Why participate in local government if councillors themselves admit they have no power to change things? Why get involved if councillors keep pointing to other levels of government or obscure policies or recommendations from lawyers, saying “see, our hands are tied!”

In an age when so many people are tuning out, this decision threatens to discourage even more people from heading to the polls. No matter how many city ads say “your vote matters”, no matter how much enthusiasm may come from some campaigns, no matter how many other pressing issues need to be addressed, if people don’t see council responding in a meaningful way to things about which they have expressed genuine concern, then it’ll be that much harder to motivate them to cast a ballot.

The fallout from the ICBL vote remains to be seen. Maybe there will be a groundswell of opposition and the coordination of new campaigns against sitting councillors. Maybe the focus will shift to pressuring the province and feds to develop better policies regulating data centres.

But maybe, and most worryingly, the ICBL decision will just push Hamilton’s voters deeper into the doldrums. Maybe people will just tune out this election. Maybe they’ll ignore the big debates, thinking their local government won’t step up to help even if they could.

Maybe they’ll lose what little faith remains in our civic democracy.