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Does it get anymore Canadian than a backyard hockey rink?

Alas, the City of Markham doesn’t care for such structures. Just ask Martin Ross.

As we reported last week, the City of Markham is not happy that Ross built a hockey rink in the backyard of his heritage home. We have no idea why. The rink does not alter the heritage home one iota, which is a no-no. The rink can’t even be seen from the sidewalk.

But the city has been relentless on this file. The rink must go – or the municipality will remove it at an extraordinary fee. Markham originally said the demolition would cost a mind-boggling $500,000; that sum has since been lowered to $352,000. Gee, thanks…

As well, the original deadline to tear down the rink was Oct. 28. That has been extended to Nov. 18. How generous!

Missing from our original report was the city’s side of the story. And with good reason: nobody from the city would return our emails for comment That includes Graham Seaman, the city bureaucrat responsible for issuing numerous threat letters to Ross as well as the local councillor, Reid McAlpine, and even Markham Mayor Frank Scarpetti.

On Wednesday, Rebel News paid a house call to Markham City Hall. During a break in the council meeting, we asked Councillor Reid and Mayor Scarpitti point-blank to justify their actions regarding Ross’s rink. The end-result? Security frog-marched Rebel News out of council chambers. Alas, not only are these politicians vindictive, but they are shamefully non-transparent.

By the way, we also brought along our jumbotron-equipped truck to promote out latest petition: www.SaveTheRink.ca. Please visit this website to add your signature.

Of note, the support for Martin Ross has been overwhelming. We would estimate that 99.9% of the comments online are pro-hockey rink.

Here’s a small sampling of the online feedback:

@haileysmom2358 writes: “You can’t have a rink in your backyard but you can put drug injection sites near schools. This is sick and tyrannical.”

@logiczchance101 writes: “Not even in totalitarian authoritative states you don't get this sort of oversight from the government.”

TheBBodyBuilder writes: “Mayor Frank Scarpitti step in and stop this madness. Zero common sense. Poor Markham City Council…those behind this should be ashamed.”

@ridingwithmike7455 writes: “Tell the City the rink identifies as a lawn, boards identify as bushes and the lights identify as trees.”

This outrageous dispute is heading into overtime. Stay tuned.