By Pepper Parr

Burlington, Ont., April 16, 2013 —Burlington Transit will be increasing fares, effective Wednesday, May 1, 2013. The increased fares will lead to extended services for transit users across the city.  The increases were approved by city council in March.

Director of Transit, Mike Spicer advises that increases  in ridership along many routes calls for extended  services on these specific routes,”

Will there be a reduction in the number of people who use the transit service when the new rates hit May 1st? Probably not – the people who use transit for the most part don’t have a choice.

The following enhanced services will take effect on June 23, 2013:

Route 101 Plains Express:

New all-day service Monday to Friday

Minimum 30-minute frequency

15-minute frequency during peak periods

Additional stops at: Royal Botanical Gardens, Gorton Avenue, Howard Road and Francis Road

Routes 11 and 15

Saturday evening service extended to 10:30 p.m. and adding Sunday service on both of these routes

Northeast employment corridor – Monday to Friday midday by removing the current dial-a-ride Route 54D and extending Route 81 to cover this portion of Burlington.

Bfast, the Burlington transit advocacy group didn’t see the fare increase through the same rosy glasses.

Bus fares are going up 8.4% May 1^st announces Bfast.

Is this because Burlington Transit buses are 8.4% more frequent?

Are buses 8.4% more comfortable?

Do they break down 8.4% less frequently?

 Are they 8.4% more accessible?

Do these buses take us to 8.4% more places?

In short, is our Bus Ride 8.4% better? Is it worth 8.4% more money?

James Smith, part of the Bfast group said: “I think all informed observers would answer NO.

Smith, who might be a potential municipal candidate in 2014, he has run in the past, said:  “The minor improvements outlined by city staff only go part way to restoring the service that was cut in 2012. These so-called enhancements were proposed by city staff in the budget process and are welcome  However, these proposals were also proposed without a fare increase. This 8.4% fare hike has been called ad hoc, but I think of it as a cruel joke pulled out of thin air at city council without consultation”.

“In the March 13, 2013 Toronto Star article on the failures of transit in the 905 Mayor Goldring was quoted without a hint of irony as saying: “They (fare increases) should not be done on an ad hoc basis, … There should be some clear rationale.” 

“Having listened very closely to city council on this subject I did not hear a clear rational for this ad hoc 8.4% increase. Some fees charged by the city have not gone up this year, others have. But I challenge the Councillors who voted for this increase to give us an example of one other city service fee that’s increased 8.4%.”

Burlington Transit does have plans to purchase smaller buses which will see more vehicles on the street and improve service.

“In 2012 city council removed half million dollars gas tax money (earmarked for carbon emission reductions) from Burlington Transit and now use that capital  to pave cul-de-sacs. Most cities use all of their gas tax money for transit. Burlington’s alone in the GTHA as we spend 80% of federal money meant for carbon emission reduction on increasing carbon emissions!”

“By 2015 the city of Burlington will have removed at least two million dollars from the transit capital funding and transferred this money to roads; talk about a carbon shift!”

“On May 1st Burlington will have the second most expensive Bus fare in the GTHA. Does this mean Burlington will get the second best transit system? The answer is no.  By any objective measurement Burlington has arguably the worst system in the GTHA. Burlington has the lowest number of busses per 100,000 population, the oldest fleet,  and the lowest  operational spending per capita, so it is no wonder we also have the lowest number of people per capita riding busses of any GTHA municipality.“

Suits won’t be seen in this bus shelter on John Street in the downtown core – they can drive to wherever they want to go.  Those who don’t have that much income have to take the bus – and use this close to filthy bus shelter.

The funding for road repairs has been so poorly managed in Burlington that the city now, according to Ward 1 Councillor Rick Craven, is short $18 million a year on the amount needed to get the roads to acceptable standards. Shadeland Rd in Craven’s ward certainly needs more than a “shave and pave”, the city’s current approach to fixing its roads.

Using gas tax revenue may be one way to move funding around but transit riders should not be expected to pay more and get less to keep the car drivers happy.

In comments to the Chamber of Commerce recently Mayor Goldring said “Suits in this city, don’t ride the bus.”  Could that be because of the condition of those buses and the shelters along the bus route?

By Pepper Parr

BURLINGTON, ON  March 19, 2013  Ward 2 Councillor Marianne Meed Ward was the only Council member to come up with very specific suggestions on how to reduce the spending, which she feels is creeping outside what this city can afford.  While Meed Ward doesn’t bring to the table the depth and understanding of municipal budgets that other council members have, and she doesn’t have anything in the way of a financial designation, she does know how to add up the numbers and she doesn’t think this city has to spend what it plans to spend.

Meed Ward would reduce the human resources merit fund from 1.5% of the HR budget to 1%.  Savings: $157, 000

Meed Ward would eliminate the E-gov facility rentals. Savings: $165, 000

Meed Ward would eliminate the Risk & Consulting services. Savings: $909, 000

Meed Ward would eliminate additional leadership training; she argues there is already  $500,000 in the budget.  Savings: $80,000

Meed Wards wants the Brant House Museum to find the $7,000 they wanted for part-time curatorial services within the 2%  increase they were given.  Savings: $7,000

Meed Ward wants to take out the sum that was set aside for the Burlington Arts Centre foundation board restructuring.  Savings: $100,000

Meed Ward didn’t want to give the Performing Arts Centre any more money.  Savings: $488,000

Meed Ward, who doesn’t sit in the Burlington Economic Development Corporation board wants to reduce the BEDC ask to $160,000 from $370,000.  Savings $210,000

Is she right?  She is certainly worth listening to.  She argues that “some of the spending increases are hidden because they are “onetime” funding not counted in the tax levy, and result from raiding our Tax Rate Stabilization reserve fund drawn to the tune of almost $2 million.”

What we saw this budget session was a tougher Meed Ward.  Her view seemed to be that ‘if you can`t show me real savings and that you are going to do things differently – then I don`t want you to have any more of the taxpayers money.’  With that tone she is certainly playing the kind of music her people want to hear.  She is a politician and she fully intends to be Mayor of this city – sooner than many in this city are ready for.  My guess – it`s not a bet yet –  within five years.

Let`s look at the specifics of what Meed Ward wanted to cut.

Merit pay: The city allocates 1.5% of the human resources budget as an amount managers can allocate to deserving employees as merit pay.  Some of the people at city hall do a superb job and deserve an additional reward; that`s how you keep good people.  The finance department has been doing a great job.  That 1.5% is not given to every employee – it is allocated by the managers – some may get 2.4% while others get nothing.  It is merit pay which the city manager will sign off on – fully expect Jeff Fielding to ensure that the merit pay is merited.  Meed Ward wants to cut that 1.5% of the human resources budget back to 1% of the HR budget.  That won`t be popular with staff but the voters will like it – is it good financial stewardship?  It`s not bad.

E gov facilities:  The city currently has three full-time people working on what is called E-gov; an approach that uses technology to get information out to people and to get information from people and to provide services faster, easier and more cost effectively.  The city has yet to tell its E-Gov story.  There is no space at city hall for these people – so the city went looking for a place to house them, found what they needed for the next three years and budgeted $165,000 to cover the rent.  Where did Meed Ward expect these people to work – they need an office, preferably one that is heated.

Risk consulting: The city’s audit department is beefing up how the city manager checks on how money was spent.  It is one thing to say we are going to have Results Based Accountability – but someone then has to go into each department and look at the projections and the results and report on if the objective was reached and if not – why.  That stuff doesn’t just happen; there are procedures and processes that are put in place and followed.

The city manager is making the city hall bureaucracy much more professional – and that does not come cheaply.

Three people were brought in and will be added to the staffing compliment over the next three years.  Why not put them all on staff now – that would mean upping the staff count and the city doesn’t want to do that.

Staff training: The city manager realizes there has to be a huge cultural shift at city hall.  Doing things the old way is no longer working.  People who work in the municipal sector are a product of the business they are in.  Don’t expect them to do things differently; that’s not the way the business works and Fielding understands that, which is why he entered into an agreement with McMaster to have them train city hall staff.   The 200 men and women taking these courses, amount to an Executive MBA with one fifth of the classes focused on municipal administration.  Meed Ward thinks the city manager should make do with the $500,000 he was given.  Is she right?  On this one – she would be wiser to go with the request.  The city will get, is already getting value and that will only increase.  The down side is that Burlington is probably in the process of training people who will move on to other municipalities.  We will be the best-managed city in the country and the place that everyone poaches to get first class staff.

The Museum got the $7,000 they wanted – but it was an abuse of process making that happen. And the museum needs a lot more than $7,000 to do justice to the role Joseph Brant played in the development of this country.

Brant Museum. Meed Ward opposed the $7,000 the Brant Museum wanted for part-time curatorial.  Many felt Councillor Craven abused the delegation process by asking his colleagues to make an exception and have Burlington Museums Executive Director Barbara Teatro plead for the funds – which she got. The Brant Museum needs a really hard look in terms of the job it does researching and promoting the story of Joseph Brant before it gets any additional funding.  Craven pulled a fast one and got away with it.

The Burlington Art Centre is going through a very tough stage.  They have, in the recent past, had to turn to the foundation and draw down funds from them to meet operating costs.  The foundation currently has a meager $35,000 on hand – not a healthy place to be.

The BAC Board and the Foundation Board were once one and the same – they have  been divided into two separate boards which is how most places set these things up.  The Foundation is usually the fund raising arm; the BAC board handles governance and oversight.

The BAC knew that it had to better define its role in the community.  It is getting harder to capture any mind share with all the competing demands for attention.  The creation of the Performing Arts Centre took away a lot of the attention the BAC used to get.

They asked the city for $125,000  and wanted to put $50,000 of that into the foundation as a reserve.  They wanted to use the rest of the money to put together a marketing/business plan as well as a branding program that would set the BAC apart from other cultural institutions in the city.

They got $100,000 in one time funding to do what they’ve explained they feel they have to do.

Meed Ward doesn’t feel their funding should come from the taxpayers – she doesn’t seem to appreciate that the Art Centre is there for the taxpayers.  The city might be dipping into the reserves – that’s what reserves are for.

The Performing Arts Centre was never supposed to make money – the public just wasn’t ready for the place to lose as much as it lost or to need as much to stay alive.

Performing Arts Centre: Meed Ward was one of the Council members that did not attend the Official Opening of the Performing Arts Centre.  She has an understanding of the way the place should work that many don’t understand.  Her view is that the professional events brought to the PAC have to pay their own way and at the best of times earn enough to leave funds available to support the community events, the non-profit groups that were supposed to be making great use of the space.

Meed Ward wants the profit-making types to subsidize the non-profits.  She doesn’t think the PAC needed money to pay for an additional technical person – the increased business would cover that cost and if there were no increase in business then the PAC wouldn’t need the additional technical person.

Meed Ward didn’t see any value in the additional sales associate.  The amount they would be adding to the revenue side wasn’t worth the cost or the risk.

Meed Ward doesn’t bring an “artsy” view to the PAC.  For her it has always been a nice to have but now that we’ve got the place she doesn’t want to see it sucking up all the funds the city has in reserve.  On that one – she should have gotten more in the way of support from her colleagues.  That the Executive Director resigned the day after the budget was approved messes up that situation somewhat.

Meed Ward is tough on what the PAC can and should do for the city.  A more developed appreciation on the part of what the PAC can do for the city would help – but Meed Ward has a constituency and they like what she is saying.

The city needs to see more photo ops like this. The business model the BEDC had in place was a close to total failure. It took a shock from the city manager who reported Burlington was going to experience negative commercial growth in the tax base for 2013 to motivate the BEDC board to do something. Meed Ward wants more information on how they are going to solve the problem before she approves funding. Council decided to give them what they were asking for.

Economic Development Corporation: We now have Meed Ward who is a more involved Councillor on things economic, which up until now has not been one of her strengths.  She still struggles with some of the concepts but she knows how to add and she brings the view of the average person to the table.  For Meed Ward the “what”  has to be done is no longer the issue – the city needs more jobs; the city has a great story to tell potential corporations looking for a place to locate and we have the economic land needed.  That the land isn’t ready for occupancy is an issue that can be resolved.   For Meed Ward, the issue is  how we are going to do this and she doesn’t believe the BEDC has a grip yet on the how part and she doesn’t want to give them anymore funding until the “what” has been made very clear.

For her, and her constituency – it is pretty clear.  The nuances that BEDC Executive Director Kyle Benham talks about are beyond the ward two council member.  Those two are never going to agree on much but she has clout at the Council table – Benham approaches as a supplicant.

Meed Ward argues that the Sound of Music produces revenue for the city. The numbers in the right hand column are monies paid to the city for services the city provides – that’s SOM money being paid to the city.
Meed Ward says they pay the city $96,200

Sound of Music: Meed Ward isn’t afraid to spend money.  She thinks the Sound of Music is one of the best deals the city has going for it and she was quite prepared to let them have the $37,000 they were asking for.  She would be inclined to give them more if they asked and would love to see the Performing Arts Centre delivering economic benefits the way the Sound of Music does.

Meed Ward wanted to cut spending – that’s good, politicians have an ability to spend and try later to duck the consequences.  Not this lady.  Unfortunately some of the cuts she proposed were ill-advised and not thought out thoroughly.  One of the problems is that Meed Ward antagonizes people; she pushes buttons and moves people out of their comfort zone.  And so they push back.  We saw Councillor Craven pushing back in a most inappropriate way.

Meed Ward is learning – and she does have the capacity to learn.  No one is really sure who is advising her – she doesn’t have an advisor, a trusted confidant she can bounce ideas off.

She does have a constituency and they love her.  How large is that constituency and can she grow it to the point where it will carry her to the point where she wears the chain of office.  Too early to tell – but she gave them all a run for their money this budget session.

Meed Ward doesn’t like the direction the tax curve is taking and fears for the impact this could have on the seniors who have fixed incomes.  She asks if the tax dollars are being spent in the right places.

For Meed Ward it is all about the tax rate which she says has increased 60% in the past 10 years. The graph shown  is not something she is proud of and not the kind of city she wants to run.

By Pepper Parr

BURLINGTON, ON  March 19^th, 2013   Nothing changed but we did get a look at the way this city of ours intends to handle the development of its budgets in the years ahead; where the priorities will be and where the problems that need to be resolved are as well.

We learned that when Councillor Craven was first elected the annual shortfall on infrastructure maintenance was $6 million.  That was the annual shortfall more than ten years ago.  Craven now tells us that the annual shortfall is now $18 million annually – which put another way means we should be spending $18 million to get our roads up to standard but have not been doing that.

That is a mess that this Council hopes to get out of starting in 2018 when the hospital levy will have been paid down and the city can start spending serious money on getting the roads fixed.

Councillor Taylor meeting with staff to check up on some of the numbers in the budget binder. Taylor suspects the hospital has another big financial ask of the city up their sleeve.

Not so fast advised Councillor Taylor, who pointed out that the city’s $60 million to the hospital will cover phases 1 and 2 – he suspects there is a phase 3 out there which we will have to pay for.  No mercy for us at that level.

Council Craven decided the 2013 budget was one he would vote for – he didn’t vote for the 2011 or the 2012 budgets.

Councillor Meed Ward didn’t vote the 2013 budget but the rest of the crowd did, except for Councillor Dennison, who sent his regrets and was not present in the Council chamber.

That red light was a sign – Sound of Music didn’t get the $37,000 they felt they needed as fall back money if the weather turned on them and events had to be cancelled. Note that the pier in this 2011 picture isn’t visible because there was nothing to see. The city plans on officially opening the pier during the Sound of Music festival this summer. SOM should charge the city a fee for horning in on their event.

Had Dennison been at the horse shoe Meed Ward believes the Sound Of Music would have been given the $37,000 in fall back money they asked for.

Bfast, the city’s transit advocacy group asked that the 8% transit fare increase be deferred until there was a clear policy on new equipment acquisitions in place and when there was decent public input.  Other than delegations during the budget process the public was basically shut out of any opportunity to have some input.

Good debate on the why of the fare increase and the usual mumblings about better community engagement but come May 1^st – there will be a transit fare increase.

Councillor Craven wasn’t flashing this smile at Councillor Meed Ward on Monday during the budget debate. It was getting close to ugly between those two

Councillor Marianne Meed Ward: She gave as good as she got in her slug fest with Councillor Craven during the budget debate

For reasons that were never clear Councillor Craven had a real “hurt” on for Councillor Meed Ward; they were slugging it out frequently during the evening.

The debate on the budget left things just the way they were at the committee level.  The good news was that the Burlington Teen Tour Band won the All-Ireland Championship.  The city had put a chunk of change in the budget for the BTTB – can we expect to see an increase of tourists from Ireland this summer?

By Pepper Parr

BURLINGTON, ON  March 9, 2013   Are things heating up in Ward 5?  At the Capital Budget debates in February, the suggestion that something bigger and better could be done with the Skyway Arena site if it were tied to the Lakeside Village  Plaza and offered to developers.  The words were no sooner out of the mouth of Jeff Fielding,  the city manager,  than Councillor Sharman, Ward 5,  was on top of the idea and talking about how he would craft a Staff Direction.

That caught the attention of people in the ward who are rather fond of their one pad ice rink and wanted to ensure their views were heard and that they would be at the table when discussions took place.

The SAVE SKYWAY ARENA website, with the headline:  Because city hall doesn’t listen to its residents, was put together by Ward 5 activist and former candidate in the ward James Smith, who is also very active on transit issues in the ward and president of the Friends of Freeman Station where he has been very successful in keeping that structure out of the hands of those who wanted to make kindling out of the structure.

Seems as if Smith has a bit of a track record in the community.  Is he lining himself up for another run at the Council seat.

It is reported that six people showed up at the community event, including the ward councillor.  The important thing, commented one person, was that the Sharman “for the most part did not attempt to take over the meeting.  The group also believes it won the “concession that any Request for Proposals or Expressions of Interest would include the ideas that we’ve drummed up – not his , and that community involvement will be part of the process.”

Sharman is reported to have done a lot of qualifying as to what the city can or can’t do and the impact of budget restrictions.  One obviously biased attendee said:  “No one came away impressed with the fellow.”  As one said after the meeting: “Sharman would not be listening to us unless you launched this – thanks”.

It looks like things are heating up in ward 5.

By Pepper Parr

BURLINGTON, ON  February 28, 2013  “The impact per $100,000 CVA for an urban residential property is $16.32 with respect to the 4.46% city portion.”  Those were the words straight from the horse’s mouth – Director of Finance Joan Ford, who shepherded city council through a marathon city council committee meeting at which the budget was basically set.

It will go to a city council meeting and be cast in stone.  All kinds of detail to come but the basics are: Performing Art Centre got their money $225,000 to cover the short fall and money for two years for a technician (expect that to become full-time)  and money for a sales associate who is going to get behind and push to ramp up the sales numbers – especially on the rental side where the Centre fell very flat last year.

The Burlington Art Centre got the funding they needed to recast themselves and to figure out who they want to be, where they want to go and then how they will get there.  They didn’t get the chunk of change they needed to pay their staff what they felt they were worth.  That’s an ongoing problem they are going to have to deal with – and it might result in their losing some key people.

Finance department staffers excelled once again not only with the detail and the way they were able to grab numbers out of the air when questions were asked but with the way they presented the data so that council members could see the impact on the tax levy as they debated different sending requests.

Burlington Economic Development got the money they needed to come up with an organization that can attract new business to the city.  Burlington has reached residential build out – there ain’t no more land to put those housing projects on – unless we try to go north of Dundas- 407 and that is not going to happen.

So – find the analysts who can figure out what there is for us out there and then put a marketing genius in place who can do the work that has to be done to make Burlington a city that at least gets some serious attention.

Our Mayor can’t help himself when he says we are the greatest place in this province to live in but he has not managed to attract people to the city.  In some municipalities,  the Mayor is the #1 sales person and works the phones tirelessly to let people know why Burlington deserves a really close look.

That’s not the kind of Mayor we have – a Lee Iacocca he ain’t – so the city will have to find someone who can do the selling.

Transit got basically all it asked for – but you dear transit user are also getting what you didn’t ask for and that is a rate increase – 8% across the board with special situations we will set out for you later.

The fire department got an additional mechanic so that the fire trucks will be able to get out the door when the fire alarm is sounded.

The city manager has a pool of money that he dispenses to each department that is used as merit pay for staff that go above and beyond.  And many of them do.  The crew that pulled together the presentation of all the financial data, deserved no less than a double scotch or a bag of cookies – whichever they preferred, for their efforts today.

The ‘bean counters’ set up a computer that handled transactions and then fed the data into a second computer that projected the information on a large screen and also onto the monitors sitting in front of staff and council members.

Every time a decision was made to spend dollars the number would appear on the screen showing how much was spent and what that impact was on the tax bill.

It was a tough, tough day for Councillor John Taylor.  He sits on the board of the Burlington Art Centre and is passionate about the operation and the staff but he wasn’t able to get council to go along with an allocation that would allow Art Centre management to correct the significant imbalance between city hall staff and Art Centre staff salaries.

At around 2:30 pm it Councillor  Taylor who was chairing the meeting began to lose it.  He was deeply hurt when he realized the Art Centre staff were not going to get what he believed they deserved and that weighed on him.  He was tired and dis-spirited and suggested the meeting adjourn and come back to it tomorrow. His colleagues were not on for that and suggested he turn the chair over to Councillor Meed Ward and she ran the show for the balance of the meeting.

There were no delegations – this was council members dealing with the projects they wanted to see go forward.  Then Councillor Craven snuck one in and asked if the Director of Museums could plead for $7000 for a curator.  She got it – and Craven broke every rule in the Procedural Manual to pull that one off.

It was sort of like driving through a super market aisle and dropping items into your cart and seeing a screen with your total spend on it.  Throughout the day – the session went from 9:30 to 4:00 pm with a 25 minute lunch break – the number went up, then down, but mostly up.  As the budget session was near its end council members looked at the numbers and wondered where they could cut.  They had given out a lot of money, which they felt was needed and that old shave and pave spend kept coming back.  Councillor Dennison was merciless at getting every dollar he could grab.  He argued, again and again, that every dollar spent now was $3 saved down the road.

Council decided to take the $2.2 million in surplus from last year and put it in the tax rate stabilization fund and transfer funds to accounts to pay the bills out of that account.  The spending done amounted to $1,938,360 which when taken out of the $2.2 million surplus they had to play with – there wasn’t much to leave on the table.  Some would treat the difference as a rounding number.

In the closing minutes of the meeting Mayor Goldring wondered what the city was going to do for what he called “opportunity” money; those situations that come along and shouldn’t be passed on.

By Pepper Parr

BURLINGTON, ON  February 26, 2013  This time the Board members showed up.  This time they did the talking and didn’t leave their Executive Director to carry the flag by herself.  This time the two Board members said they are a start-up and that many of the numbers they used in their original rosy projections were short of the mark.  This time they apologized – well sort of.  This time they said they would talk to council members and do a business review well before budgets were being considered.   And this time they said that if the projections they had on the table today didn’t come true – they probably wouldn’t be the people appearing before the council next time around.

Keeping the lights on – and putting bums in the seats.

It was a healthy and very welcome change by a Board that has been high-handed and close to insolent to a council that very much wants them to succeed.

Today was budget delegation day and most, if not all of the Boards that are funded by the city, appeared before the Budget and gave it their best shot.  Some, the Burlington Economic Development Corporation (BEDC)  were there arguing for a stay of execution while the Library Board argued for the funding needed to pay for the staff needed to operate the new library in the Alton Village.

We will cover those budget requests in separate articles.

Richard Burgess, current vice chair of the Burlington Performing Arts Centre board explained why the Centre needs significant funding for at least the next three years.

Rick Burgess,  a former city mayoralty candidate, he was beaten out by Cam Jackson in 2006, a lawyer by profession and currently the vice chair of the Burlington Performing Arts Centre incoming chair of the organization along with Peter Ashmore, treasurer with many years of experience in the management of assets and the development of new enterprises.

It was difficult to get a handle on exactly what the Performing Arts Centre wanted in terms of real cash.  Councillor Taylor, who was chairing this meeting of the Budget and Corporate Services committee, complained about data being given to him the day before the delegation was to appear.  The real numbers will come out during the debate that will take place on Thursday.

It was clear that rentals was the biggest problem – the team just wasn’t able to rent out as much space as they had planned.  And, their original rosy projections, based on a consultant’s report turned out to be weak.

The Board directed management to cut back and that meant events that might have been put on were not put on which weakened the revenue stream.

It is now evident that there was a bit of panic going on as the Board struggled to get a handle on how it could support management – but all this was behind the scenes.

What was evident, clearly evident, was a council that did not want this venture to fail but found itself with not nearly enough information and basically out of the loop while the Board went its own way.

To say Burgess and Ashmore were somewhat contrite but fully aware that a newer more collaborative relationship was needed would be a stretch.  Just what they took away from the meeting is not clear – but know this – things are different.

Most disturbing is that Mayor Goldring and Councillor Craven sit on that Board and should have been fully aware of the problems and how severe they were.  The rental situation is one that they had to be aware of – does management not give the Board a report every month on how many events took place and how many seats were sold?  If they aren’t doing this – then this city has a major problem on its hands with the Performing Arts centre.

If the information was made available to the Board and the two city representatives did not convey this to their council colleagues – well that`s a pot with a lot of flame underneath it that is going to boil over at some point.

Councillor Dennison, who always brings his business acumen to budgets wanted to see the people on the marketing side given base salaries and then bonused for the added business they bring in.  Ashmore didn’t think they could pull this off with the staff in place now; truth be told, he didn’t appear to have any appetite for taking aggressive steps.

Some wondered if raising the ticket price would do the trick.  Burgess explained two fundamentals which council members did not appear to appreciate.  Upping the price of tickets for commercial events will increase revenue but it will also reduce the number of people who attend.

What isn’t as clear as it could and should be is this.  Does the city have a situation where they are dealing with what Peter Ashmore called a start-up that is having its teething problems or are there some fundamental problems with the business plan.

I suspect Ashmore isn’t certain as to just what it is yet and if the treasurer doesn`t know – then the Board members are a little adrift.  That`s not to suggest Ashmore isn’t competent; this is his fourth year counting the beans.  Entertainment is a different business; it is more art than science and they are still learning the ropes.

Councillor Craven explains that the Board has leaned some lessons and that management has also learned some lessons – which is good – but they are doing all this learning on the public’s dime and the fear is that they may fail and Burlington will be in the same mess Hamilton is with their facility.

There are solid, competent people on staff who have yet to get a solid understanding of the city and what it thinks it wants in terms of culture.   The city has an executive director, Brenda Heatherington,  in place who brings loads of experience on growing and nurturing the appetite for culture.  What she may not yet have is a solid understanding of the market she is catering to – the public letters between the city hall reporter from the Post and Executive Editor Brenda Heatherington’s response made that clear.

This story isn’t over – council will have a very focused debate on this later in the week.  What the city does not want to find itself having to handle is a facility that many in the city didn’t want that now requires a million dollar annual intravenous line to keep it alive.

If that happens Burgess was very right – it will not be him serving as chair for very long.