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9| W aterloo C hronicle | T hursday,M arch 29,2018 w aterloochronicle.ca It's exciting for me to watch new businesses open in Waterloo. I espe- cially like seeing a tired space, once thriving in the core, come back to life as something new. Over the past few months, I've been watching the building at the corner of Erb and Regina go through that process - the old Viet Sun building, emp- ty for a few years, now re- freshed into the Patent So- cial, a bar and eatery in up- town Waterloo. I popped in to see Rami Said, a fellow Waterloo Ro- tarian and the engine be- hind the Patent Social, while the space was in transition from old to new. Rami is always the guy with a vision. You may remember him from when he ran for may- or in 2010, when he was on- ly 25 years old. He is inno- vative, bold and not afraid of challenging the status quo. His vision for Patent So- cial was clear - a new kind of space in uptown Water- loo, featuring things that are unique, including built-in Super Nintendo and N64 gaming consoles, and a steady offering of live music. Opening a new business is risky and expensive. Re- furbishing a tired space presents a unique set of challenges. A few years back, the City of Waterloo took a strategic step to encourage entrepreneurs to invest in the core, by launching the Uptown Community Im- provement Plan (CIP). The incentives are not huge, but they are often just enough to make a new busi- ness viable. Rami and I talked about how he was able to leverage parts of the CIP to get the project rolling, including an interest-free loan and a facade improvement matching grant to enhance the building's appearance and improve the street- scape. Patent Social was the "guinea pig" for the new Uptown CIP, essentially testing the process, so there were a few bumps along the way and bit of a delay in opening. Rami was able to pro- vide feedback to the city, including ways to expedite the process and how to bet- ter align policy with practi- cal, on-the-ground busi- ness development applica- tions. But all in all, Rami tells me that he is a fan of the program and believes it will help the city achieve its policy goals of a more vi- brant and successful up- town commercial district, full of successful small businesses, run by local en- trepreneurs. Rami and his Patent So- cial team are hosting their grand opening event Satur- day night (March 31). And if you're thinking of opening a business in the uptown, I'm sure that Rami would offer his advice to help make it happen. - Karen Scian is the co- founder of the Talent Busi- ness Solutions, an educator and a community advo- cate. She is also chair of the Waterloo Public Li- brary Board. You can email her at bein- scian@gmail.com or follow her on Twitter @ karenscian. OPINION Putting all the CIPs on the table City's Community Improvement Plan helping businesses get started in the core, says Karen Scian KAREN SCIAN Column Lately I've found myself mesmerized by the wave- like motions of an aquatic species appropriately known as mystery snails. My family recently in- troduced two of these fas- cinating creatures to our 45-gallon fresh water tank, home to mollies, guppies, platies and tet- ras. To our surprise, one of the mystery snails laid an egg sac within an hour of arriving in our tank, with more to come in the follow- ing days. Curious to learn more about this process, I chat- ted with Jamie McDou- gall, store manager of Big Al's Aquarium Super- centre on Fairway Road. "Whenever I get a ship- ment of mystery snails, the next day the whole edge of the tank is usually covered with egg cases," he told me. "I think it's a change in environment or a change in temperature that sets them off as far as breeding goes, and it al- ways seems to be within a day of their arrival." I asked McDougall where our mystery snails come from. "Mystery snails are originally from Asia, but most of the ones we get now are raised in ponds in Florida," he said. "And I have local fish breeders who breed them in indoor set-ups. If you get too many in your tank, the best thing you can do is bring them back to our store." So that's what we did with the ones that grew to over a centimetre, as our tank cannot sustain so many snails. "The fish in your tank eat most of the babies, and people who overfeed their fish tanks tend to have more food available, so more snails survive and grow more rapidly," said McDougall. "But essen- tially, they're cleaning and eating the algae off the glass along with the left- over waste on the bottom of the tank." I told McDougall how our oldest daughter is a collector of all things snails - stuffies, jewelry, figurines - and how fasci- nated we are with the varying colours of mys- tery snails (gold is my fa- vourite). "There's also burgundy, blue, ivory and yellow mystery snails, and then there's the traditional brown with a little bit of striping on them," he said. "I think they're all just col- our variations on the same species, but they could be different types that inter- breed, and I think that's where the name mystery snail comes from, as no one quite knows what type they are after a while." I feel fortunate to have a place in town where I can bring our mystery snails if the population grows to be too large for our tank. "We take in fish every day from customers, so as a store we can rehome just about anything, as we want our customers to stay in the hobby," said McDougall, who has been working in pet stores and museums since the age of 15. My family is grateful for his vast knowledge of aquarium life - even if some aspects of it remain a tantalizing mystery. - Marshall Ward is a freelance writer and art- ist. Email is welcome at marshall_ward @hotmail.com. Mystery solved in this fishy tale Mystery snails an interesting addition to the aquarium, says Marshall Ward MARSHALL WARD Column Everybody should have to reveal their names in OMB dispute RE: OMB says Muslim centre opponents can't re- main anonymous How about the OMB board that made that decision provide both parties in the dispute their full name, home ad- dress and home pho- ne?And don't quote any "privacy law" crap either- .Because if they refuse to do that, they should be compelled to use the same (excuse) logic not to di- vulge their personal infor- mation to both par- ties.How's that for a fix to resolve this ridiculous de- cision? Brian King London World TB Day a wake-up call for all of us Saturday was World TB Day, a day to raise aware- ness that TB is not only a disease of the past, but the top global health threat of today. In 2017, it was the lead- ing cause of death from in- fectious disease, surpass- ing even HIV/AIDS, claim- ing 1.7 million lives, about 10 per cent children. Venezuela is a perfect example of what can hap- pen when we let our guard down. Its tuberculosis pre- vention and control pro- gram was once among the most robust in the hemi- sphere. The country's health system has fallen in to disarray largely due to the elitist government of Nicolás Maduro who since his election in 2013 has slashed social spending. As a result, many of the poor have lost their homes and are forced to live in a close quarters and are malnourished from food shortages, conditions ripe for the spread of TB. Some clinics have reported inci- dent rates as high at 40 per cent while others have stopped giving tests com- pletely due to a lack of sup- plies or trained personal. Furthermore, many are fleeing the authoritarian regime to neighbouring countries, potentially ex- porting an illness that knows no borders. To make matters even worse, Maduro has refused to re- lease any health statistics for fear it could undermine his government. Playing politics while his actions could destabilize the en- tire region is reprehensi- ble. This should serve as a wake-up call to world lead- ers that TB is a clear and present danger. The de- cline global funding for R&D into new diagnostics and medicines must be re- versed and a TB-free world must a priority at the high- est level. Stephen St. Denis Ottawa Everybody should have to reveal their names in OMB dispute