NOTL has main character energy this week

~ NOTL News Crew

NOTL doesn't usually feel like it's happening in four places at once, but this week it does. Supercars with a Four Seasons Bahamas sponsor attached roll through town this afternoon as part of a luxury rally that didn't exist three years ago. A hotel that neighbours fought for eight years quietly opened its doors this morning, three kilometres away. Two packed candidate forums spent the week arguing about drainage ditches and development moratoriums, the unglamorous stuff that actually decides what this town looks like in ten years. And then there's the fourth NOTL, the one playing out in the comments under every local Facebook post, where the tone is a lot more direct than anything said out loud in a school gym, and where not everyone doing the talking wants you to know who they are. Pick your NOTL this week.

The third annual Niagara 5000 kicks off today with a Supercar Parade and Cruise: exotic cars fresh off a show at Fallsview Casino cruise through the region and arrive in Niagara-on-the-Lake around 4:30pm. Organizer Alana Hurov has spent three years building this into something with real international reach, and this year she's not being subtle about the ambition. "We're combining aviation, automotive, marine, helicopters and luxury buses," she said at a launch event at Reif Estate Winery. "We have a destination partner this year, it's the Four Seasons Bahamas Ocean Club."

Saturday brings the Hangar Experience back to the Niagara District Airport, a showcase Hurov describes spanning culinary, beverage, design, hospitality, fashion, lifestyle, aviation, automotive and marine experiences, before the weekend wraps with a masquerade party at STK Steakhouse in Niagara Falls. The sponsor list reads like a world tour: Blancpain, the French luxury watchmaker, is the event's official watch; the Italian Chamber of Commerce of Ontario is bringing Ferraris and Lamborghinis; Buffalo Bills lineman Dion Dawkins signed his Schnow Motorsports brand on as official water sponsor. Melanie Villeneuve, daughter of F1 legend Gilles Villeneuve, is on hand to talk about a documentary on her father premiering at TIFF this same weekend.

"We're putting the spotlight on Niagara as a global luxury destination," Hurov said. "Look around, beautiful cars, beautiful people, and a stunning vineyard view, this kind of thing usually only happens in California."

It's easy to be cynical about an event this polished, and a NOTL Local column this week took aim at exactly that vein of local politics, candidates spending campaign time cozying up to wealthy winery interests while regular residents deal with flooding and property tax hikes. The Niagara 5000 isn't hiding what it is: a luxury spectacle built for content creators and influencers, several of whom turned out for the promotional event in full glam. Hurov is candid about the strategy. "It's a marketing strategy that we're really buying into this year," she said. "Without our sponsors, this event doesn't happen."

But there's a real number behind the glamour. What started as a 2023 celebration of McLaren's 60th anniversary has become a fundraiser for McMaster Children's Hospital, where Hurov's daughter Katherine received care. Last year's event raised $12,500; this year's goal is $30,000. Mac Kids saw 450,000 patient visits in 2025, 55,000 of them from Niagara families. Whatever you make of the yachts and the vlogger swarm, that part of it is real, and it's the reason the whole thing keeps expanding instead of fading out after year one.

Monday's NOTLRA forum was the real test of this Lord Mayor race, and it came down to infrastructure, not slogans. Vaughn Goettler called for a moratorium on new development until the Town understands its own infrastructure, citing a St. Davids resident whose home flooded three times and left her out of the house for six months. Andrea Kaiser rejected a blanket moratorium as legally reckless ("random moratoriums bring us back to court") and pointed to the Town's new official plan and forthcoming zoning bylaw as the real tools. Erwin Wiens took the long view: drainage ditches were brushed instead of cleared back in 2014-15 based on the best information available then, and a new asset-management review of roughly 30,000 municipal assets is now mapping the funding gap left behind. All three agreed future growth belongs in Glendale, not farmland, though they split on how far: Kaiser wants it to get its own grocery store and pharmacy, Wiens sees a transit hub, Goettler warned against turning it into a dumping ground. The St. Davids Ratepayers ran their own all-candidates forum Wednesday with all 14 candidates on stage, too fresh to recap here. If you missed both: Voter Information Letters are already in mailboxes, and online voting opens Oct. 5, running through 8pm Oct. 25.

Niagara Gorge Jet Boating and the Town have settled a dispute over unpaid Melville Street dock fees that dragged on since 2019, when high water levels and then pandemic restrictions gutted the company's ability to pay. The Town cancelled the licence in 2022, the fight went to arbitration, and the roughly $330,000 settlement resolves it: instead of a cheque, the jet boat operator is building the Town a new public dock for kayaks, canoes and paddleboards at 1 Melville Street, covering installation, maintenance and winter storage for seven years before ownership transfers outright. Mooring blocks go in this fall; the docks themselves are ready for the 2027 season.

The Clayfield, a four-storey, 102-room hotel at Clayfield Commons, opened its doors today, eight years after 164 residents signed a petition against it over parking, height and traffic worries. Developer John Hawley says the project was "planned for it not to be" a congestion problem, pointing to 448 parking spaces built across the development and multiple access points designed to spread out traffic. Rooms start at $429 a night; there's also 5,400-plus square feet of meeting and event space if you're the type to host something.

The Regent Street Culvert Replacement, underway since July 6, is expected to wrap this month, on the roughly 13-week timeline the Town gave when it started. New drainage, better pedestrian access and upgraded roadside safety are the payoff. Worth noting alongside it: Council also just approved a $425,000 drainage plan responding directly to this summer's floods. The culvert closes one chapter, the new spending opens the next.

Ten months after a Barrie jury found Jeff Cowan guilty of fraud and forgery for his role selling fake Norval Morrisseau paintings, in what was supposed to be the last case in the scheme, he's still waiting to be sentenced. Cowan represented himself at trial but hired a lawyer for the sentencing phase, arguing the sheer scale of the fake-Morrisseau market (in the "hundreds," court heard) should count in his favour. The Crown isn't buying it: other people's conduct doesn't excuse Cowan's, prosecutors argued, and Cowan didn't need to paint the fakes himself to be culpable. Two other men connected to the local area already pleaded guilty and got house arrest. The judge hasn't said when sentencing will actually happen.

After a summer of flooding that dumped six inches of rain overnight in late July and another four in early August, Niagara's grape growers are surprisingly upbeat. Thicker-skinned varieties like Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Chardonnay handled the wet stretch well, and the extra moisture built unusually healthy canopies going into harvest. "It could be our best harvest in 10 years," says Southbrook Vineyards' Bill Redelmeier, high praise from someone who's seen a few. A dry, sunny stretch heading into September has the timing working in growers' favour, for once.

Niagara-on-the-Lake's Quinton Spagnol, 29, aced the 129-yard fourth hole at the NOTL Golf Club last Thursday during the men's league, a pitching wedge from the black tees that he didn't even see go in. "All I hear is the group on number five tee block. They're like, 'No way!'" His regular Thursday-night group of 16 golf buddies mobbed him on the green, and he was still buzzing enough afterward to shoot a personal-best 37 for nine holes and take low net too. Nobody at the pro shop can remember the last ace on men's night. The celebration after, per Spagnol, came with "a hefty" bar tab.

Burciul first showed up at Red Roof, a Niagara-on-the-Lake non-profit that provides recreational and respite programs for children and young adults with special needs, as an A.N. Myer Secondary student assigned to volunteer in a special-needs class. "I absolutely fell in love with it," he says, enough that it set the direction of his entire career, through Niagara College's educational assistance program, group homes, and personal support work across the region.

Now 30, Burciul is back at Red Roof as program co-ordinator, right as the organization prepares to open a new 5,700-square-foot facility on Concession 6 Road in January. Until then, he and the team are running programs out of Cornerstone Community Church. What hasn't moved, he says, is the community itself: "I've been gone for 10 years and I still know pretty much every single person that comes to our programs." He points to something he doesn't see in other settings, genuine, mutual friendships among clients, not assumed ones. "I find that really meaningful."

Red Roof serves more than 200 families across Niagara. If you know a family who could use what they offer, or you're looking for a place to volunteer the way Burciul once did, redroofretreat.org is the place to start.

Now that Melville Street is getting a real public dock for kayaks, canoes and paddleboards, tell us: what's the one spot in NOTL you wish had better public access to the water? Reply and the best answers make next week's issue.

Reply to this email. Best answers run next issue.