Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi is not revealing much about the discussion he had with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman this week over CalgaryNEXT.

“We had a cordial and candid discussion of different views,” he told reporters Thursday afternoon.

“I’m not 100 per cent that would be all that helpful,” Nenshi said of Bettman’s offer to act as facilitator between the city and the Calgary Flames. “But he certainly did make that offer and I told him if we need him, we’ll call.”

Nenshi says they continue to talk and there will be more discussion with the public about an events centre in Victoria Park.

“I will point out that I made the mistake of reading the comments and it is interesting that the calls to our office, the emails, the comments have been 99.999997 per cent saying ‘please Mr. Bettman stay out of it’ and ‘no there should be no public money for this,” said the mayor.

“It’s both vital and important according to Mr. Bettman, you know we have many things that are vitally important,” he added. “We are in an economic down turn, a lot of people don’t know where their next meal will be coming from, I got a lot of priorities to work on.”

Nenshi says they’ll be good partners in this discussion and will continue to work with the Calgary Flames.

“As always, public money must be spent for public benefit and if we can figure out a way where there is public benefit in an interesting project in Victoria Park, we’ll take that to the citizens and see what they think.”

Bettman spoke to reporters Wednesday ahead of a game between the Calgary Flames and Boston Bruins on Wednesday.