Last June, city council voted to team up with the Ottawa Sports Entertainment Group and give Lansdowne Park a radical makeover.

These days, when we hear any discussion at all of the redevelopment, it sounds like mere details of a done deal, like the identities of key tenants (Whole Foods and Empire Cinemas are in, the Ottawa Art Gallery is out), or the fate of the heritage Horticulture Building, which the city and developers want to uproot and move, against the advice of the province’s Conservation Review Board.

But just try telling Stephen Richer it’s all over but the digging. The retired sociology professor, activist and musician is an outspoken member of Friends of Lansdowne, which is still vying to stop the sole-sourced OSEG deal in court and keep the park in public hands.

“I’ve invested two-and-a-half years in it and if I thought it was a done deal, I sure wouldn’t be doing that,” he says.

He has heard all the criticisms of his group, that it is a NIMBY phenomenon entirely composed of Glebe and Old Ottawa South residents (“Bull,” he retorts, pointing to supporters from Kanata, Orleans and New Edinburgh) and they oppose any redevelopment of the park.

“We want something done there,” he insists. “We hate the way it is. I mean, it’s an eyesore. But we want it done right and we want it done honestly and transparently, and we want to end up with a product that is not a shopping mall.”

Supporters, he says, have already raised approximately $180,000 to fight their case, with two more events this weekend, including a second instalment of The Lansdowne Follies at the Mayfair Theatre Sunday. That fundraiser will feature the Council of Canadians’ Maude Barlow and performances by songwriter Terry Tufts and Juno Award-winning singer Kellylee Evans.

“Song is a weapon, I’ll tell you,” says Richer, who once taught a course on the history of protest songs and brought his own banjo to bear last week on CANSEC, the weapons show held at Lansdowne.

“I think a song can reinforce and build a sense of community among people,” he says.

“At the CANSEC arms show we had 150 to 200 people singing in one voice, protesting what was happening. Singing reaffirms community, that’s what it does. It gives collective voice. It makes you feel part of a larger collective, a larger movement.”

It can also fill the activists’ legal war chest.