September 15, 2025 • 29 mins
Jeff MacIntyre – Executive Director, Downtown Sudbury BIA | Episode 34 | Sudbury Interviews | September 15, 2025 | Host: Dani Star (Canadian Idol, Season 5) | Find us on Sudztown and join the conversation | If you would like to be a guest on the show, please reach out | Listen on: Sudztown | YouTube | Spotify | Apple Podcasts | iHeart Radio | Pocket Casts | Amazon Music | Audacy | Audible | Listen Notes | Overcast | RSS Feed | Website: https://sudztown.com/show/
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Hi everyone, welcome to Sudbury Interviews.
Today we have a special guest, Jeff McIntyre.
He's the Executive Director of Downtown Sudbury BIA.
And that's the business improvement area and they take
care of businesses down there and just make sure that
everybody's taken care of beforewe begin.
(00:21):
You can find us on Sudstown and join the conversation.
If you would like to be a guest on the show, please reach out.
Hey, Jeff, how you doing? Good.
How are you? Great.
Thanks for coming on. It took a little while for the
the scheduling to to line up. Huh?
Yeah, for sure, But glad to be here.
So tell us, how did you just give us a little history of how
(00:43):
you came to be the executive director of Downtown SEBRI?
It's a bit of a windy Rd. Had a marketing company called
Fuel Media and when I was there I had a lot of clientele that
wanted to see some improvements downtown because a big part of
(01:03):
what we were getting hired for at the time was attracting
people to Sudbury to work. And through that, I ended up
doing some efforts to try and dosome advance and things downtown
and got in contact with the BIA and ended up running to be on
the board of the BIA. And then I became chair of the
(01:26):
BIA and that was God. Probably around 2010 and been
here for quite a while. Our executive director at the
time, Marie Maloma, did an amazing job.
We had some changes over COVID. We had a new executive director,
Kyle Marcus. He left and we didn't have a ton
(01:51):
of notice, so we had to get somebody in quick.
And the board kind of looked at me and said, Hey, is this
something you could do temporarily?
So I took it on temporarily and pretty quickly I, I, I was
really enjoying the job and I had a lot of people twisting my
(02:12):
arm to stick around. So I, I stuck around and now
I'm, I'm not a volunteer anymore.
I work here, but I love it. I guess I got demoted, but now I
get paid. So, you know, it was, it was
just a good timing in my life. I was moving more into
(02:35):
consulting instead of day-to-daywork with my old job.
So the timing kind of lined up. I saw, you know, we're kind of
at a down point in the downtown and it, it, it seemed like an
exciting opportunity at the timeto, to really help start turning
(02:59):
that tide and getting my hands dirty to, to make things happen
as quick as we could down here. Nice.
So in terms of businesses down there, do you know roughly how
many businesses there are in thedowntown core?
There's about 400 between services, retail, hospitality
(03:25):
and event businesses. So quick bet on the on the BIA.
People often get confused what we are.
We're funded by the businesses specifically downtown.
So our map a good we're basically a geography right.
So our map is Paris St. up, Paris St. to Notre Dame, up to
(03:49):
Saint Anne's Road, and then it follows the railroad tracks back
to Paris St. So that triangle is the downtown
Sudbury DIA. There's lots of areas around
that that people consider downtown, but they're not part
of the BIA district. Those members pay into us an
(04:12):
additional levy on taxes and that's what funds the BIA.
We're not the city, but we work with the city on quite a bit.
We're really here to support thebusiness members downtown and
try and make an attractive placefor people to to come.
So you guys are on the downtown side of the tracks like not past
(04:37):
that, like where the courthouse is.
Yeah, we don't go that far. We just go up to the railroad
tracks. Nice.
I didn't know that. That's pretty cool.
Yeah, right. So vacancies, how's that looking
right now for buildings? We, we really saw a lot after
(04:57):
COVID. I mean, the business model
changed for so many types of businesses and then the, the
stress of a lot of places made it through COVID, but they
didn't make it through the payback from COVID.
You know, a lot of businesses don't necessarily have massive
resources in their back pocket to, to survive that kind of
(05:21):
impact. Some of them got government
loans, but then we were trying to pay back those government
loans and still pay your staff and, and, and make it through.
It was hard on a lot of them. It's still hard on some of them.
So we really saw like a bit of adelayed effect on that and it
(05:42):
kind of bottomed out. I'd say around 2023-2024, we
started seeing some new businesses start opening again.
We got a few new restaurants opened up.
And then 2025 we've been seeing,you know, an impressive amount
of new businesses opening up. We had booked 7 open recently.
(06:04):
We've got a few more that are getting ready to open.
So you know, we're starting to see that turn around happen.
It's never as as quick as peoplewould love like to see it, but
we're starting to see that thosebusinesses start coming back
downtown. So I know you guys do a lot of
(06:26):
events, so maybe we can we can talk some some about that.
The community yard sale was lastweekend.
Yeah, it was actually a lot of fun.
It was actually 3 events in one.It was, you know, yard sale and
a group, Africa Market Connect, a bunch of different African
(06:47):
businesses, little pop up businesses come together to
throw mini festivals. So they had thrown in as part of
that. And then we also had Jazz
Sudbury doing their Family Day, so they had some great concerts
on the street. The same time we had our yard
sales a really good time. Nice.
(07:10):
What about how Palooza? What's that all about?
Oh, that's that. We'll kick off to the Wolves
season, so we'll have a a nice Little St. party that for the
home opener this Friday. So that's going to be a lot of
fun. They're working with the
Townhouse Tavern to have some food on the street and be a
(07:33):
great little party before the game.
Did you always know that you were going to be involved in
this type of work? Oh God, no.
I had no, no concept that this is where I'd end up.
I started in advance, actually. So I was running the ground
(07:55):
closed in the shelf for quite a while.
Started in 2000. I was very young.
I think I started running the place when I was 20 and we had
massive success, huge turnouts and got to bring in some really
great Canadian acts. And then as I was doing that, I
(08:19):
was planning to, to get into restaurants at the time and I
actually, you know, have some schooling in restaurant
management. But then I, I started getting
poached and I ran the Laughing Buddha for a little while,
managed it. And then I started getting asked
by different companies to help them with their social media.
(08:42):
I got involved in social media when Myspace was a thing.
I was the first person kind of commercially doing social media
at the time in, in Sudbury. And then Facebook came on board
and then people started really seeing the value of that.
And I started working with different marketers and
(09:04):
marketing agencies to to help people with their social media.
And then that grew into an ad agent, a full blown ad agency
and was there for in 15 years quite successfully.
(09:25):
COVID hit the same time as AI was really starting to show it's
changes and felt like my value of the company was changing.
So I went into consulting and and was helping businesses kind
of readjust their marketing based on, on, on the changing
(09:47):
world. Value of the website had changed
a lot in the course of two years.
The value of online marketing changed a lot in the course of
two years. How you do all of that stuff
Design changed a lot in two years with products like Canva
and those things really taking over and making it easier for
(10:09):
people to to do their own designwork.
So a lot of people are moving stuff in house and but they
still needed some help in the theory and the strategy behind
it. So I still work with a few
companies on that stuff now and just help them kind of design
the strategies around how they how they market themselves to
(10:30):
the world, but more with an in house team now than than
contracting everything. So when it comes to like
planning the next year or two, how do you keep the train on the
tracks? Like how do you stay motivated
and and on the and the right course with all this?
(10:51):
Well, I mean, there's so much opportunity coming downtown
right now. In some ways it's easy.
There's, you know, with the new Event Center, Library, art
gallery coming downtown for the next few years, we're going to
have some pretty big openings happening on a regular basis.
We've seen some really big successes.
(11:14):
So the farmers market moving into the the mall downtown has
been just a dynamic success. We've seen since that farmers
market moved in, a bunch of new businesses open in that mall.
So we see the success of of, youknow, when you bring in one of
(11:37):
these attractor type businesses and really make the investment
in it, how much of a difference it can make.
And a lot of that's just, you know, people have a little bit
more confidence in what's going to happen.
So people are willing to make those personal investments and
they all start laddering up on top of each other.
(11:58):
So one person starts doing well,another person comes on top.
The first person actually startsdoing better as well because
you, you increase the demand in the area.
So we've seen that happen in a few locations downtown now.
And we're starting, I mean, conversations this morning with
people looking to make investments downtown.
(12:21):
It, it, it's happening more and more.
So it's exciting to see, you know, people locally and then
even people from out of town that are coming into Sudbury and
seeing the investment opportunities because they've
seen what a community looks likewhen it's turning around.
And a community that believes itself in itself and makes the
(12:42):
kind of investment the city's making are are the types of
cities that the private sector likes to invest in.
And we're starting to see those things come forward.
So as far as like new projects you mentioned, the the library
and the art gallery are those combined?
(13:04):
So they're in one building, right?
So that they're both moving intoTom Navy Square.
So the area that everybody's familiar with, where city staff
was working, they're moving overto where the provincial tower
was. And because there was some
(13:24):
vacancy there. And then the library and the art
gallery are both moving into therest of of that Tom Davis Square
building. It's actually like when you go
in there, it's a really impressive building to begin
with. You know, the mayor joked when
he first came on that it alreadylooks like a library and it
does. It looks like a like a feature
(13:46):
library. In other communities, people get
confused by libraries. Now they're like, oh, you know,
I'm like, do we really need libraries anymore?
You know, I go online for my books or I, I read it on my
tablet. I mean, libraries have become so
much more. And when you go to communities
that have like open new libraries in the last 10 years,
(14:10):
they're not what we're used to in Sudbury.
They're, they're community groupspaces, places where people can
go and have like community meetings.
You know, I've seen like knitting guilds in libraries.
My nephews in Vancouver use their library quite a bit.
(14:32):
You know, there was opportunities to like practice
the guitar at the library, whichis a fantastic thing for like a
lot of families. You know, if you can't, you buy
your kids, you know, a guitar and then a drum set and then you
know, the next hobby. Sometimes you know, it would be
nice that be able to send them somewhere and try something out
(14:54):
for a little while, find out if they like it and then make those
purchases once you're sure. That's the types of things that
libraries are doing now. So even our local library, you
can borrow snowshoes for the dayand go try snowshoeing.
You can use the Maker's Market and go down and like make
yourself custom buttons or 3D printouts and all of these types
(15:19):
of things that people don't realize is part of what a
library's become. It's just really a place to have
a lot of shared assets where people in the community can try
and do new things and explore new ideas.
And it's not just books anymore.Books are still a part of it.
Book lovers, don't despair. Your books will be there, but
(15:42):
there's so much more to what a library can be now.
It's really a a starting point for creativity.
And, and I'm really excited to see what they can do with a
space that's built for a modern library.
I'm not like trying to shoot a horn into the old ones that we
have. And, and you know, hopefully
(16:02):
that that spurs some new creativity in the community.
The art gallery coming in is Franklin Carmichael Art Gallery.
So a group of seven artists world famous has their his
family has agreed to put his name on this art gallery.
(16:23):
There's Kleinberg has a group ofseven art gallery as well.
The McMichael Art Gallery gets the significant amount of
tourism to it. Kleinberg is a gorgeous small
town and one of the main driversof their economy is that little
library. It, it has spectacular displays
(16:50):
on a regular basis. We have some great art sitting
in our art gallery right now that's not able to be displayed
just because it it, it's not in an art gallery of appropriate
standards. So there's a certain standard
that art galleries need to have to display certain types of art
(17:12):
because these are historical artifacts and, you know, they
deteriorate in the wrong environment.
So by having another gallery that can house the the art of
this group of seven artists, Franklin Carmichael, it also
means that we can tour other other equally impressive art
(17:34):
shows into that art gallery thatwe weren't able to do in the
past because we just didn't havea venue that was suitable.
So having that will, you know, bring that into our community.
You know, if you go to any town in Northern Ontario, they can
tell you all of the NHL players that that grew up in their town
(17:58):
and came up in their town. And the reason they had they all
have NHL players is they've all made these investments in the
sports, right? Sudbury's got lots of great
little arenas or people can, youknow, go from baby steps of
learning how to skate, becoming a great skater to becoming a
(18:18):
really good hockey player and, you know, cheering on the wolves
and dreaming of becoming a wolf and then dreaming of becoming an
NHL player. Not every kid was suited to be a
hockey player. Some kids were suited to become
an artist or a musician or, you know, something else.
Those kids are born in Sudbury, too.
(18:39):
They just don't necessarily havethose opportunities.
So downtown's becoming a really great place.
Now we're not only do we have the Oichel Arena, we're going to
have this amazing art gallery where people can come and see
the work of Franklin Carmichael that did his art in in the areas
around Sudbury and became world renowned.
(19:00):
We've got great music venues nowlike Place the Zah or Knox Hall,
where you know, both local musicians and touring musicians
are able to hold those stages and do some amazing shows.
We're giving opportunities to our kids, regardless of of where
their dreams may lie to, to see those opportunities.
(19:25):
So I think it's a really big winfor the community.
Is that going to be happening like this year or next year?
The moving into the Tom Davies. So they're currently doing the
renovations right now. They're moving city staff over
to the old provincial side and they're starting some of the
(19:46):
renovations. 2027, I believe is the current opening date.
And then 2028, we'll be seeing the new, new arena open up.
So I mean, it's a significant investment happening in
downtown, but it's an investmentthat'll pay across the city.
(20:12):
In big dividends, you know, downtown when people build and
invest downtown, there's no new expenses to the general taxpayer
because those that those new on the private building side, those
new private builds don't requirenew sewers, new roads, new
(20:33):
electricity. All of those types of
infrastructure improvements are already being serviced in the
downtown. So as the downtown grows and the
downtown's vacancy rate lowers, the tax impact of the downtown
provides to the rest of the community is massive and it
continues to grow Every time we do that, you know, we're only
(20:56):
about .1% of the built form of, of Sudbury, but we contribute
way more in taxes back than that.1%.
So you know, having a thriving downtown is a success for
everybody, whether you live in the valley or or downtown.
(21:18):
So we have about 8 minutes left Jeff and two questions.
OK. The first question is going to
be about the arena and where that's at with the the lots and
stuff. Can you tell us about that?
Yeah, so excited. The arena ground breaking is
happening very soon. They are already, I mean,
(21:43):
there's already some shovels on site, but we're seeing things
start to move forward pretty quickly on that.
I mean, these are always kind ofa hurry up and wait kind of
project, right? It it, it takes a lot of
(22:06):
planning to get something like this off the ground, but all of
those elements now are lining up.
So we're going to see the the beginning more happened.
I believe the 24th is the the official groundbreaking for the
(22:27):
arena or sorry, the 23rd is the construction kick off for the
Event Center. So it's it's on schedule so far
from when when the mayor and council move to to get the
downtown Event Center going, theLand's all assembled,
(22:52):
everything's ready to go. Shovels are hitting the ground
in days, so you know, we've got a lot, a lot happening there.
Take about 2-3 years to get the thing built, but you know 2028
is when they expect hockey to tobe being played in the center.
(23:15):
And that's being built like beside the current the the
current arena. Yeah.
So it'll go right next to where the current arena is.
That current arena there's, you know, still discussions
happening exactly what what's going to happen there.
The hope is that we'll see a hotel Convention Center in that
(23:36):
space, private sector funded. But you know, it sounds like
there's a significant amount of interest in that type of build.
You know, if we can get a Convention Center in Sudbury,
it's a massive amount of tourismdollars that those bring in and
(23:56):
a massive amount of opportunity for local businesses.
That's really exciting. I didn't even know that they
were going to start building it this month, September 23rd.
Yeah. That's great news.
Cool. I'd, I probably should watch the
news once in a while and see what's going on.
OK, so the last question here, Jeff is the daily segment.
(24:17):
And it's it's a question that I ask every guest, but we've been
talking about Sudbury the whole time.
But I'm going to ask you anyways, what is one thing that
you feel would make Sudbury greater?
You know what I think it's if wecan all start hoping for each
(24:40):
other to win. I think Sudbury, there's so much
opportunity in this community. When I go visit friends and
family, they look at at Sudbury and they go, God, why aren't you
guys just kicking it out of the park on a regular basis?
You've got a, a beautiful area to live, unbelievable natural
(25:03):
resources. You've got, you know, a great
like structure for your downtown, like physical, you
have good bones in the downtown.You have everything it takes to
have just an amazing city. And sometimes we have a hard
time seeing the forest for the trees on it, You know, there,
(25:26):
there's a certain amount of looking down on ourselves in
Sudbury because of our, our mining history.
And I was actually talking to some young folks just a few days
ago. I'm not that old, but they,
they, you know, the, the, the people that are just starting to
(25:50):
work in our community from Sudbury have 0 recollection of,
you know, the Black Rock in the community driving by Big Nickel
Mine Rd. that they had no idea that those used to be slag
heaps. You know, they don't remember
(26:10):
the re greening of Sudbury. They hear about it, but they
don't, they don't remember it right.
And it's intrinsic to some of usand it's such a spectacular
achievement that was made, but it, it's almost an achievement
that we're ashamed of that the, the city had gotten so bad.
(26:31):
But I think it's something we need to remember.
And, and I'd love to see some posters up about how bad things
were 'cause like, I go to BC andthere's these huge trees and I
come back to Sudbury and the trees are kind of small.
And I'm like, yeah, but it was rock.
Like it was, it was barren rock when I was a kid.
And, and, you know, just to see how far we've come in, you know,
(26:55):
one generation and just my generation is spectacular.
And, you know, I'm not dead yet.I still got a fair bit of life
to go. So, you know, to see how far we
can continue to go just in my generation and and, you know,
start having pride in the amazing success that we've had.
(27:17):
Jane Goodall comes to Sudbury and goes, you know, you're the
example to the world. God, if Sudbury can do what it's
done to regain itself, what can the world do if we started
working together and if we starttaking pride in those successes
and start looking at, you know, not this neighborhood versus
(27:40):
that neighborhood, But I want tosee every neighborhood in
Sudbury just succeed and thrive because it's just a win for for
everybody, right? Like I want to be a local
tourist. I want to go to neighborhood
after neighborhood and experience the different
uniqueness of, you know, what's happening in Capriole or what's
happening in the valley. What's happening lively.
(28:04):
We've got so much opportunity inthis community.
My my biggest thing for making Subway crater it's just we all
gonna just start believing in each other.
Wow, good answer. I I remember those those slag
rocks too, Jeff. Like when I was a kid, it was
all black. And, you know, especially that
(28:26):
road, Big Nickel Rd. Yeah, that was just, you know, I
didn't even know what that was. It looked like Mars or
something, you know, but good answer.
So Sudbury interviews everyone. Jeff McIntyre, you're, you're a
gem to all of us, to our community, to our downtown.
And thank you for your your timetoday because I know that you're
(28:50):
a busy guy. And sincerely thank you on
behalf of me and all the listeners for taking a moment to
talk with us all. Right.
Thanks, Daddy. Yeah.
Anything else you'd like to add before we go?
No, that's great. OK man, thanks for your time.
Bye all. Right, bye.
Hi everyone, welcome to Sudbury Interviews.
Today we have a special guest, Jeff McIntyre.
He's the Executive Director of Downtown Sudbury BIA.
And that's the business improvement area and they take
care of businesses down there and just make sure that
everybody's taken care of beforewe begin.
(00:21):
You can find us on Sudstown and join the conversation.
If you would like to be a guest on the show, please reach out.
Hey, Jeff, how you doing? Good.
How are you? Great.
Thanks for coming on. It took a little while for the
the scheduling to to line up. Huh?
Yeah, for sure, But glad to be here.
So tell us, how did you just give us a little history of how
(00:43):
you came to be the executive director of Downtown SEBRI?
It's a bit of a windy Rd. Had a marketing company called
Fuel Media and when I was there I had a lot of clientele that
wanted to see some improvements downtown because a big part of
(01:03):
what we were getting hired for at the time was attracting
people to Sudbury to work. And through that, I ended up
doing some efforts to try and dosome advance and things downtown
and got in contact with the BIA and ended up running to be on
the board of the BIA. And then I became chair of the
(01:26):
BIA and that was God. Probably around 2010 and been
here for quite a while. Our executive director at the
time, Marie Maloma, did an amazing job.
We had some changes over COVID. We had a new executive director,
Kyle Marcus. He left and we didn't have a ton
(01:51):
of notice, so we had to get somebody in quick.
And the board kind of looked at me and said, Hey, is this
something you could do temporarily?
So I took it on temporarily and pretty quickly I, I, I was
really enjoying the job and I had a lot of people twisting my
(02:12):
arm to stick around. So I, I stuck around and now
I'm, I'm not a volunteer anymore.
I work here, but I love it. I guess I got demoted, but now I
get paid. So, you know, it was, it was
just a good timing in my life. I was moving more into
(02:35):
consulting instead of day-to-daywork with my old job.
So the timing kind of lined up. I saw, you know, we're kind of
at a down point in the downtown and it, it, it seemed like an
exciting opportunity at the timeto, to really help start turning
(02:59):
that tide and getting my hands dirty to, to make things happen
as quick as we could down here. Nice.
So in terms of businesses down there, do you know roughly how
many businesses there are in thedowntown core?
There's about 400 between services, retail, hospitality
(03:25):
and event businesses. So quick bet on the on the BIA.
People often get confused what we are.
We're funded by the businesses specifically downtown.
So our map a good we're basically a geography right.
So our map is Paris St. up, Paris St. to Notre Dame, up to
(03:49):
Saint Anne's Road, and then it follows the railroad tracks back
to Paris St. So that triangle is the downtown
Sudbury DIA. There's lots of areas around
that that people consider downtown, but they're not part
of the BIA district. Those members pay into us an
(04:12):
additional levy on taxes and that's what funds the BIA.
We're not the city, but we work with the city on quite a bit.
We're really here to support thebusiness members downtown and
try and make an attractive placefor people to to come.
So you guys are on the downtown side of the tracks like not past
(04:37):
that, like where the courthouse is.
Yeah, we don't go that far. We just go up to the railroad
tracks. Nice.
I didn't know that. That's pretty cool.
Yeah, right. So vacancies, how's that looking
right now for buildings? We, we really saw a lot after
(04:57):
COVID. I mean, the business model
changed for so many types of businesses and then the, the
stress of a lot of places made it through COVID, but they
didn't make it through the payback from COVID.
You know, a lot of businesses don't necessarily have massive
resources in their back pocket to, to survive that kind of
(05:21):
impact. Some of them got government
loans, but then we were trying to pay back those government
loans and still pay your staff and, and, and make it through.
It was hard on a lot of them. It's still hard on some of them.
So we really saw like a bit of adelayed effect on that and it
(05:42):
kind of bottomed out. I'd say around 2023-2024, we
started seeing some new businesses start opening again.
We got a few new restaurants opened up.
And then 2025 we've been seeing,you know, an impressive amount
of new businesses opening up. We had booked 7 open recently.
(06:04):
We've got a few more that are getting ready to open.
So you know, we're starting to see that turn around happen.
It's never as as quick as peoplewould love like to see it, but
we're starting to see that thosebusinesses start coming back
downtown. So I know you guys do a lot of
(06:26):
events, so maybe we can we can talk some some about that.
The community yard sale was lastweekend.
Yeah, it was actually a lot of fun.
It was actually 3 events in one.It was, you know, yard sale and
a group, Africa Market Connect, a bunch of different African
(06:47):
businesses, little pop up businesses come together to
throw mini festivals. So they had thrown in as part of
that. And then we also had Jazz
Sudbury doing their Family Day, so they had some great concerts
on the street. The same time we had our yard
sales a really good time. Nice.
(07:10):
What about how Palooza? What's that all about?
Oh, that's that. We'll kick off to the Wolves
season, so we'll have a a nice Little St. party that for the
home opener this Friday. So that's going to be a lot of
fun. They're working with the
Townhouse Tavern to have some food on the street and be a
(07:33):
great little party before the game.
Did you always know that you were going to be involved in
this type of work? Oh God, no.
I had no, no concept that this is where I'd end up.
I started in advance, actually. So I was running the ground
(07:55):
closed in the shelf for quite a while.
Started in 2000. I was very young.
I think I started running the place when I was 20 and we had
massive success, huge turnouts and got to bring in some really
great Canadian acts. And then as I was doing that, I
(08:19):
was planning to, to get into restaurants at the time and I
actually, you know, have some schooling in restaurant
management. But then I, I started getting
poached and I ran the Laughing Buddha for a little while,
managed it. And then I started getting asked
by different companies to help them with their social media.
(08:42):
I got involved in social media when Myspace was a thing.
I was the first person kind of commercially doing social media
at the time in, in Sudbury. And then Facebook came on board
and then people started really seeing the value of that.
And I started working with different marketers and
(09:04):
marketing agencies to to help people with their social media.
And then that grew into an ad agent, a full blown ad agency
and was there for in 15 years quite successfully.
(09:25):
COVID hit the same time as AI was really starting to show it's
changes and felt like my value of the company was changing.
So I went into consulting and and was helping businesses kind
of readjust their marketing based on, on, on the changing
(09:47):
world. Value of the website had changed
a lot in the course of two years.
The value of online marketing changed a lot in the course of
two years. How you do all of that stuff
Design changed a lot in two years with products like Canva
and those things really taking over and making it easier for
(10:09):
people to to do their own designwork.
So a lot of people are moving stuff in house and but they
still needed some help in the theory and the strategy behind
it. So I still work with a few
companies on that stuff now and just help them kind of design
the strategies around how they how they market themselves to
(10:30):
the world, but more with an in house team now than than
contracting everything. So when it comes to like
planning the next year or two, how do you keep the train on the
tracks? Like how do you stay motivated
and and on the and the right course with all this?
(10:51):
Well, I mean, there's so much opportunity coming downtown
right now. In some ways it's easy.
There's, you know, with the new Event Center, Library, art
gallery coming downtown for the next few years, we're going to
have some pretty big openings happening on a regular basis.
We've seen some really big successes.
(11:14):
So the farmers market moving into the the mall downtown has
been just a dynamic success. We've seen since that farmers
market moved in, a bunch of new businesses open in that mall.
So we see the success of of, youknow, when you bring in one of
(11:37):
these attractor type businesses and really make the investment
in it, how much of a difference it can make.
And a lot of that's just, you know, people have a little bit
more confidence in what's going to happen.
So people are willing to make those personal investments and
they all start laddering up on top of each other.
(11:58):
So one person starts doing well,another person comes on top.
The first person actually startsdoing better as well because
you, you increase the demand in the area.
So we've seen that happen in a few locations downtown now.
And we're starting, I mean, conversations this morning with
people looking to make investments downtown.
(12:21):
It, it, it's happening more and more.
So it's exciting to see, you know, people locally and then
even people from out of town that are coming into Sudbury and
seeing the investment opportunities because they've
seen what a community looks likewhen it's turning around.
And a community that believes itself in itself and makes the
(12:42):
kind of investment the city's making are are the types of
cities that the private sector likes to invest in.
And we're starting to see those things come forward.
So as far as like new projects you mentioned, the the library
and the art gallery are those combined?
(13:04):
So they're in one building, right?
So that they're both moving intoTom Navy Square.
So the area that everybody's familiar with, where city staff
was working, they're moving overto where the provincial tower
was. And because there was some
(13:24):
vacancy there. And then the library and the art
gallery are both moving into therest of of that Tom Davis Square
building. It's actually like when you go
in there, it's a really impressive building to begin
with. You know, the mayor joked when
he first came on that it alreadylooks like a library and it
does. It looks like a like a feature
(13:46):
library. In other communities, people get
confused by libraries. Now they're like, oh, you know,
I'm like, do we really need libraries anymore?
You know, I go online for my books or I, I read it on my
tablet. I mean, libraries have become so
much more. And when you go to communities
that have like open new libraries in the last 10 years,
(14:10):
they're not what we're used to in Sudbury.
They're, they're community groupspaces, places where people can
go and have like community meetings.
You know, I've seen like knitting guilds in libraries.
My nephews in Vancouver use their library quite a bit.
(14:32):
You know, there was opportunities to like practice
the guitar at the library, whichis a fantastic thing for like a
lot of families. You know, if you can't, you buy
your kids, you know, a guitar and then a drum set and then you
know, the next hobby. Sometimes you know, it would be
nice that be able to send them somewhere and try something out
(14:54):
for a little while, find out if they like it and then make those
purchases once you're sure. That's the types of things that
libraries are doing now. So even our local library, you
can borrow snowshoes for the dayand go try snowshoeing.
You can use the Maker's Market and go down and like make
yourself custom buttons or 3D printouts and all of these types
(15:19):
of things that people don't realize is part of what a
library's become. It's just really a place to have
a lot of shared assets where people in the community can try
and do new things and explore new ideas.
And it's not just books anymore.Books are still a part of it.
Book lovers, don't despair. Your books will be there, but
(15:42):
there's so much more to what a library can be now.
It's really a a starting point for creativity.
And, and I'm really excited to see what they can do with a
space that's built for a modern library.
I'm not like trying to shoot a horn into the old ones that we
have. And, and you know, hopefully
(16:02):
that that spurs some new creativity in the community.
The art gallery coming in is Franklin Carmichael Art Gallery.
So a group of seven artists world famous has their his
family has agreed to put his name on this art gallery.
(16:23):
There's Kleinberg has a group ofseven art gallery as well.
The McMichael Art Gallery gets the significant amount of
tourism to it. Kleinberg is a gorgeous small
town and one of the main driversof their economy is that little
library. It, it has spectacular displays
(16:50):
on a regular basis. We have some great art sitting
in our art gallery right now that's not able to be displayed
just because it it, it's not in an art gallery of appropriate
standards. So there's a certain standard
that art galleries need to have to display certain types of art
(17:12):
because these are historical artifacts and, you know, they
deteriorate in the wrong environment.
So by having another gallery that can house the the art of
this group of seven artists, Franklin Carmichael, it also
means that we can tour other other equally impressive art
(17:34):
shows into that art gallery thatwe weren't able to do in the
past because we just didn't havea venue that was suitable.
So having that will, you know, bring that into our community.
You know, if you go to any town in Northern Ontario, they can
tell you all of the NHL players that that grew up in their town
(17:58):
and came up in their town. And the reason they had they all
have NHL players is they've all made these investments in the
sports, right? Sudbury's got lots of great
little arenas or people can, youknow, go from baby steps of
learning how to skate, becoming a great skater to becoming a
(18:18):
really good hockey player and, you know, cheering on the wolves
and dreaming of becoming a wolf and then dreaming of becoming an
NHL player. Not every kid was suited to be a
hockey player. Some kids were suited to become
an artist or a musician or, you know, something else.
Those kids are born in Sudbury, too.
(18:39):
They just don't necessarily havethose opportunities.
So downtown's becoming a really great place.
Now we're not only do we have the Oichel Arena, we're going to
have this amazing art gallery where people can come and see
the work of Franklin Carmichael that did his art in in the areas
around Sudbury and became world renowned.
(19:00):
We've got great music venues nowlike Place the Zah or Knox Hall,
where you know, both local musicians and touring musicians
are able to hold those stages and do some amazing shows.
We're giving opportunities to our kids, regardless of of where
their dreams may lie to, to see those opportunities.
(19:25):
So I think it's a really big winfor the community.
Is that going to be happening like this year or next year?
The moving into the Tom Davies. So they're currently doing the
renovations right now. They're moving city staff over
to the old provincial side and they're starting some of the
(19:46):
renovations. 2027, I believe is the current opening date.
And then 2028, we'll be seeing the new, new arena open up.
So I mean, it's a significant investment happening in
downtown, but it's an investmentthat'll pay across the city.
(20:12):
In big dividends, you know, downtown when people build and
invest downtown, there's no new expenses to the general taxpayer
because those that those new on the private building side, those
new private builds don't requirenew sewers, new roads, new
(20:33):
electricity. All of those types of
infrastructure improvements are already being serviced in the
downtown. So as the downtown grows and the
downtown's vacancy rate lowers, the tax impact of the downtown
provides to the rest of the community is massive and it
continues to grow Every time we do that, you know, we're only
(20:56):
about .1% of the built form of, of Sudbury, but we contribute
way more in taxes back than that.1%.
So you know, having a thriving downtown is a success for
everybody, whether you live in the valley or or downtown.
(21:18):
So we have about 8 minutes left Jeff and two questions.
OK. The first question is going to
be about the arena and where that's at with the the lots and
stuff. Can you tell us about that?
Yeah, so excited. The arena ground breaking is
happening very soon. They are already, I mean,
(21:43):
there's already some shovels on site, but we're seeing things
start to move forward pretty quickly on that.
I mean, these are always kind ofa hurry up and wait kind of
project, right? It it, it takes a lot of
(22:06):
planning to get something like this off the ground, but all of
those elements now are lining up.
So we're going to see the the beginning more happened.
I believe the 24th is the the official groundbreaking for the
(22:27):
arena or sorry, the 23rd is the construction kick off for the
Event Center. So it's it's on schedule so far
from when when the mayor and council move to to get the
downtown Event Center going, theLand's all assembled,
(22:52):
everything's ready to go. Shovels are hitting the ground
in days, so you know, we've got a lot, a lot happening there.
Take about 2-3 years to get the thing built, but you know 2028
is when they expect hockey to tobe being played in the center.
(23:15):
And that's being built like beside the current the the
current arena. Yeah.
So it'll go right next to where the current arena is.
That current arena there's, you know, still discussions
happening exactly what what's going to happen there.
The hope is that we'll see a hotel Convention Center in that
(23:36):
space, private sector funded. But you know, it sounds like
there's a significant amount of interest in that type of build.
You know, if we can get a Convention Center in Sudbury,
it's a massive amount of tourismdollars that those bring in and
(23:56):
a massive amount of opportunity for local businesses.
That's really exciting. I didn't even know that they
were going to start building it this month, September 23rd.
Yeah. That's great news.
Cool. I'd, I probably should watch the
news once in a while and see what's going on.
OK, so the last question here, Jeff is the daily segment.
(24:17):
And it's it's a question that I ask every guest, but we've been
talking about Sudbury the whole time.
But I'm going to ask you anyways, what is one thing that
you feel would make Sudbury greater?
You know what I think it's if wecan all start hoping for each
(24:40):
other to win. I think Sudbury, there's so much
opportunity in this community. When I go visit friends and
family, they look at at Sudbury and they go, God, why aren't you
guys just kicking it out of the park on a regular basis?
You've got a, a beautiful area to live, unbelievable natural
(25:03):
resources. You've got, you know, a great
like structure for your downtown, like physical, you
have good bones in the downtown.You have everything it takes to
have just an amazing city. And sometimes we have a hard
time seeing the forest for the trees on it, You know, there,
(25:26):
there's a certain amount of looking down on ourselves in
Sudbury because of our, our mining history.
And I was actually talking to some young folks just a few days
ago. I'm not that old, but they,
they, you know, the, the, the people that are just starting to
(25:50):
work in our community from Sudbury have 0 recollection of,
you know, the Black Rock in the community driving by Big Nickel
Mine Rd. that they had no idea that those used to be slag
heaps. You know, they don't remember
(26:10):
the re greening of Sudbury. They hear about it, but they
don't, they don't remember it right.
And it's intrinsic to some of usand it's such a spectacular
achievement that was made, but it, it's almost an achievement
that we're ashamed of that the, the city had gotten so bad.
(26:31):
But I think it's something we need to remember.
And, and I'd love to see some posters up about how bad things
were 'cause like, I go to BC andthere's these huge trees and I
come back to Sudbury and the trees are kind of small.
And I'm like, yeah, but it was rock.
Like it was, it was barren rock when I was a kid.
And, and, you know, just to see how far we've come in, you know,
(26:55):
one generation and just my generation is spectacular.
And, you know, I'm not dead yet.I still got a fair bit of life
to go. So, you know, to see how far we
can continue to go just in my generation and and, you know,
start having pride in the amazing success that we've had.
(27:17):
Jane Goodall comes to Sudbury and goes, you know, you're the
example to the world. God, if Sudbury can do what it's
done to regain itself, what can the world do if we started
working together and if we starttaking pride in those successes
and start looking at, you know, not this neighborhood versus
(27:40):
that neighborhood, But I want tosee every neighborhood in
Sudbury just succeed and thrive because it's just a win for for
everybody, right? Like I want to be a local
tourist. I want to go to neighborhood
after neighborhood and experience the different
uniqueness of, you know, what's happening in Capriole or what's
happening in the valley. What's happening lively.
(28:04):
We've got so much opportunity inthis community.
My my biggest thing for making Subway crater it's just we all
gonna just start believing in each other.
Wow, good answer. I I remember those those slag
rocks too, Jeff. Like when I was a kid, it was
all black. And, you know, especially that
(28:26):
road, Big Nickel Rd. Yeah, that was just, you know, I
didn't even know what that was. It looked like Mars or
something, you know, but good answer.
So Sudbury interviews everyone. Jeff McIntyre, you're, you're a
gem to all of us, to our community, to our downtown.
And thank you for your your timetoday because I know that you're
(28:50):
a busy guy. And sincerely thank you on
behalf of me and all the listeners for taking a moment to
talk with us all. Right.
Thanks, Daddy. Yeah.
Anything else you'd like to add before we go?
No, that's great. OK man, thanks for your time.
Bye all. Right, bye.
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