 By Pepper Parr
 BURLINGTON, ON September 14, 2011 It’s done. The city’s Community Services Committee approved an Engineering department recommendation to go with the bid submitted by Graham Infrastructure to complete the construction of the Brant Street Pier at a cost to the city of $6,429,700.
Every member of council voted FOR the recommendation – all in favour votes by this Council have not been the norm. The matter goes to a regular Council meeting on September 26th where it becomes legal. You can expect to see construction people on the site the next day.
The Council committee went for the whole package which added $283,360 to the price which included the extension of the promenade from the edge of the pier right up to Lakeshore Road and for the access ramp that will let people get to the small mini beach that has formed on the west side of the pier.
They deferred on a floating dock on the west side of the pier even though councilor Dennison pushed a bit to get that included. What happens next?
Here’s the schedule:
Finalize contract and mobilize the construction team – October 2011
Site preparation/Steel removal – November/December 2011
Much of the steel used in the first phase was found to be deficient and will have to be removed.
Steel fabrication – November 2011 – March 2012
New steel beams that meet the design specifications has to be fabricated and delivered to the web site.
Steel installation – April May 2012
This is the point where it all begins to come together.
Deck and beacon construction May to December 2012
The beacon, which we’ve heard very little about gets built during the phase of construction.
Winter shutdown December 2012 to March 2013
An early winter or a long winter could extend this phase. If it is a mild winter some time may be gained.
Total completion, grand opening – April – June 2013
Council looks for re-lection November 2014
 The first major task is the removal of tons of steel beams that are deficient. Some of the beams that were never used are shown above. Who will get the funds recovered from the sale of this scrap steel? There was a very satisfied feeling in the Council chamber when all seven hands went up approving the recommendation. And they have every reason to be satisfied – they worked long and hard and overcame several significant obstacles.
There are legal points to be argued with the claims the city is making against the original contractor and the designer – but those are matters for another day. Wednesday, September 14th was a win day for this council and they deserved to feel pleased with what they had achieved. The Engineering people deserved the credit they were given
The total project cost, including the nearly $5.98 million spent to date, will amount to a total of $14.44 million, which does not include the legal costs.
There is more to say about where we are with the pier project; how we got here and just what those “lessons learned” were. Agreeing to a $6 million dollar project and ending up with a price of $14. million calls for a hard look at what the crowd at the city hall really did. Credit where credit is due, yes – but accountability and laying the responsibility for the mistakes where they belong is also a part of the process. We will cover that story when city council passes the by-law that lets properly qualified contractors begin their work.
 Much of the steel from the circle area on the left out to the end of the pier has to be removed and replaced. The caissons that dig deep into the lake bed are sound and that portion of the electrical system installed is in good shape. However, three of the light standards seem to have just disappeared. The Engineering department managed to return the light standards that were unacceptable and has bought twelve new light standards The city has a strong legal case and will probably settle with the designer and the contractor at some point in the legal process but, as the Mayor said during the meeting – “that is something we will handle on another day.
Graham Group of Companies is a North American-wide company, with a local base in Mississauga. Graham is the fifth largest construction company in Canada with more than 1,200 salaried staff and a 2010 revenue of $1.8 billion.
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By Pepper Parr
 BURLINGTON, ON September 15, 2011 When city council committees meet to do the business of directing the city they do so in public. They meet with the appropriate staff – in public where all the facts are heard by everyone in the room.
When the bids for the completion of the Brant Street Pier were opened it was done in public – no one knew what the bids were until the envelopes were opened – in public.
This is the process that keeps people honest and allows a public to be informed.
The Burlington city council goes into “closed session” which means the media has to leave the room and a sign gets posted on the door to the Council Chamber saying Council is in closes session.
 Councillor Craven is the best procedural person on council but he too can let something slip by. To his credit, he recognizes his mistakes and does something about them. One of the Council committees recently went into closed session to talk about a matter related to the Paletta Mansion, which Council had learned was losing a pile of money. There was no reason given as to why they were going closed – they just say it is confidential and the media has to accept that. Any council member can ask that they go into closed session. Ward 1 councillor Meed Ward has on occasioned mildly questioned going into closed session but she has never said no – which she has a right to do.
When they come out of closed session council never tells you what was discussed. The Clerk knows but she (usually female) is bound by an Oath of Secrecy..
During one such meeting, the Chair of the committee that was coming out of closed session said they had discussed the Paletta matter – and then added that there were questions raised about the Pier as well. THAT was a no, no.
Your council has a right to decide something is confidential and they can talk about that and only that in a closed session. So when Councillor Craven mentioned that Pier questions had come up I asked him later why that was done..
He agreed that it should probably not have been done. I advised the chair of the committee that I would be writing him formally and lodging a complaint.
Councillor Craven is a pretty proactive chair and he looked into the issue, discussed it with the Clerk and made the following statement last night at a Committee meeting.
It has been pointed out to me by a member of the news media that I made a procedural error at our last Community Services Committee.
I announced that we were going into closed session to discuss the Paletta Mansion
When we came out of closed session I announced that, while we were in closed session, there had also been a couple of questions about the pier.
I have met with the Clerk about this matter.
The member of the news media was correct..
I should not have allowed the pier questions in closed session because the had not publicly stated his intention to ask these questions before we moved into closed session..
In the future I will be more vigilant in ensuring that we stick to the announced subject in the closes session, and I ask that all members refrain from asking questions on other topics, unless they announce their intention in public before we go into closed session.
Now on the surface this might look like someone being overly picky and sensitive. Not the case. Your city council goes into closed session far too often – and when they are there you, the public, have no way of knowing what was said other than the subject they went into closed session to discuss. And, as Craven’s comments show, – they will talk about other issues while in closed session. There is no oversight and while the Clerk has considerable influence legally, there isn’t a member of the Clerk’s office in this city that is going to challenge a chair.
There is a different, healthier ethic developing on this council. Burlington is a better city for it. The information identified in the Shape Burlington report is being narrowed.
Councillor Craven has served notice that he will be more vigilant and he will. Councillor Sharman, the other councillor that chairs a committee, as well as their respective co-chairs now know that they need to respect the public’s right to know.
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By Staff
 BURLINGTON, ON September 13, 2011 The Mayor is ready to put on the third in a series of Inspire sessions that he holds at the McMaster University DeGroote School of Business on Thursday September 29th – 7 pm. This time we get to hear Tom Rand, one of those successful software entrepreneurs that survived the dot com bubble in 2000. He sold his company in 2005 when it had reached the xxx level
 Rand is the Inspired speaker – part of Mayor Goldring’s efforts to bring intelligent debate to the city. Rand now focuses his efforts on carbon mitigation and is active in Cleantech venture capital, technology incubation and commercialization plus public advocacy. Rand is the Cleantech Practice, Lead Advisor at the MaRS Discovery District in Toronto and sits on the board of a number of clean energy companies and organizations, including Morgan Solar.
 The first 100 people at the Inspire event to be held at the DeGroote School of Business on the South Service Road on September 29th will be given a copy of Kicking Tom’s book Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit: 10 Clean Technologies to Save Our Word, will be the focus of his talk on the 29th. In a different approach to getting his books into the hands of people Rand is giving away 100 copies of his book at the event.
Rand has a BSc in electrical engineering from the University of Waterloo, a MSc in philosophy of science from the University of London / London School of Economics and an MA and PhD in philosophy from the University of Toronto. He speaks publicly about the issue because it is his belief that we have yet to have a serious, public conversation about the threat of climate change, and the economic opportunities afforded by the global transformation to a low-carbon economy.
“I’m really just a guy trying to slow our gallop toward an over-heated climate. Doing what I can with what I’ve got.” Is how Rand explains what he does.
 Tom Rand is a part of the group of people who work out of one of the most impressive operations in the country. The MaRs centre is an incredible learning place that brings new ideas to the market. Log into www.marsdd.com Kick is richly illustrated and accessible. It addresses achievable solutions that will have a real and meaningful impact on the future for our children. It’s been conceived to appeal to a broad range of readers on multiple levels. For those who skim read and pull quotes and captions, Kick provides an engaging glimpse of this fascinating subject. For those who seek deeper understanding, the lively, factual text provides an easy-to-understand summary of the technologies and supports all claims with scientifically verified end-notes-from a politically neutral technology expert. Kick will engage, entertain and educate the public about one of the most important subjects of our time. The book deals with Solar, Wind, Geothermal, Biofuels, Hydropower, Ocean, Smart Buildings, Transportation, Efficiency and Conservation and the Energy Internet.
Rand has an interest in the Planet Traveler – North America’s Greenest Hotel. The building was an abandoned structure in downtown Toronto when Tom and his partner Anthony Aarts bought it. During 2008-2009 it was converted into a low-carbon hotel. The target was to reduce carbon emissions from business-as-usual by three-quarters. Using existing technologies, and leveraging only 5% of the buildings value that target is being met. Technologies deployed include geo-exchange heating and cooling, solar thermal and PV, high-efficiency lighting and drain-water heat recapture. The geo-exchange pipes were the first to be buried under a public laneway in the City of Toronto.
 It’s a different hotel – Tom Rand thinks it is one of the best examples of how we can cut down on carbon emissions. The overall lesson? “Buildings are really low-hanging fruit when it comes to emissions reductions”, says Rand. “Not only can we reduce emissions by three-quarters or more, we can make money doing it.”
Rand points out that we ” have just left the hottest year on record. While experts again try to ring alarm bells, our media still gives voice to the pseudo-intellectual pursuit of climate skepticism. Perhaps while Rome burned, some bravely questioned the finer qualities of fire. Perhaps on Easter Island, as the last trees fell, some elders courageously debated the necessity of wood. These days, Margaret Wente, Globe and Mail columnist and Rex Murphy, CBC voice, sing in tune with the likes of Glenn Beck, sincerely believing their skepticism to be a form of intellectual virtue. It is not.”
German chancellor Angela Merkel calls the low-carbon economy the “third industrial revolution.” A new energy internet supplied by clean energy sources like biomass, wind solar, hydro, and geothermal has spread across the continent. There are new storage technologies like compressed air and low-friction flywheels. Large-scale efficiencies make economies more competitive. If Canada gets it right, we’ll sell this stuff to the rest of the world.
The transition to a low-carbon economy brings huge economic opportunity, but it is not optional.
While Wente asks whether humans can control the climate, global average ocean temperatures hit record highs. More ominously, as the oceans have warmed since the 1950s, plankton levels have dropped 40 per cent. As goes plankton, so goes the rest of oceanic life.
Skepticism becomes a vice when applied to a broad consensus of expert opinion warning of existential danger. The policy commitments demanded by climate science need broad public support. Skeptics erode that support without intellectual justification.
Let’s be clear, says Rand. We have known since the early 19th century that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, insulating the earth like a blanket. In 1965, the U.S. president’s Scientific Advisory Committee warned the build-up of carbon dioxide would cause changes in the climate. By 1989, then U.K. prime minister Margaret Thatcher declared to the UN General Assembly that climate change was the single greatest threat to our very existence. There are other informed opinions.
Thatcher, no shill for the environmental movement, was scientifically literate. The same cannot be said for those who scoff at the accumulated wisdom of our scientific elite. All national academies of science in the developed world have endorsed the basic premises of human-caused climate change. The only scientific argument remaining is not about whether climate change is real or imagined, but whether the results will be catastrophic or merely disastrous.
Yet untrained skeptics assure us that the dangers of which the scientists speak may not be real.
For Murphy, public acceptance of expert opinion on climate change amounts to religious indoctrination. Wente asserts that climate cannot be controlled by human behaviour. Beck argues that it’s a Communist conspiracy. The purported dangers are at best hypothetical constructions of a few scientists, at worst mere monsters under our bed, easily dismissed with a dose of adult skepticism. The skeptics explicitly cast themselves against the orthodoxy of our time, as noble knights standing up to society’s pressure to conform.
This is nonsense. Climate change is not like politics or a painting. The opinions of laypersons are not relevant. It’s hard science, and the truth of the matter has been settled by those qualified to make the judgment.
But we’re far past the complex theoretical models now. Ask an Australian farmer what climate change means. The same climate instability that brought Australia the longest drought in human memory, now unleashes catastrophic flooding. To B.C. foresters, it’s the pine beetle destroying their timber. Lloyd’s of London, like most insurance companies, faces escalating costs due to extreme weather events. Russia’s scorching summer, which temporarily ended grain exports, and the floods in Pakistan are but appetizers before the main event.
The pseudo-intellectual pursuit of climate skepticism delays Canada’s participation in a new economy, and it makes it harder to have that public and adult conversation we so desperately need: the one about how volatile nature has become, and how angry it will get.
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By Staff
 BURLINGTON, ON September 14, 2011 – Lawrence Solomon, is executive director of Energy Probe and author of The Deniers: The world-renowned scientists who stood up against global warming hysteria, political persecution, and fraud. He says:
New, convincing evidence indicates global warming is caused by cosmic rays and the sun — not humans
The science is now all-but-settled on global warming, convincing new evidence demonstrates, but Al Gore, the IPCC and other global warming doomsayers won’t be celebrating. The new findings point to cosmic rays and the sun — not human activities — as the dominant controller of climate on Earth.
The research, published with little fanfare this week in the prestigious journal Nature, comes from über-prestigious CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, one of the world’s largest centres for scientific research involving 60 countries and 8,000 scientists at more than 600 universities and national laboratories. CERN is the organization that invented the World Wide Web, that built the multi-billion dollar Large Hadron Collider, and that has now built a pristinely clean stainless steel chamber that precisely recreated the Earth’s atmosphere.
In this chamber, 63 CERN scientists from 17 European and American institutes have done what global warming doomsayers said could never be done — demonstrate that cosmic rays promote the formation of molecules that in Earth’s atmosphere can grow and seed clouds, the cloudier and thus cooler it will be. Because the sun’s magnetic field controls how many cosmic rays reach Earth’s atmosphere (the stronger the sun’s magnetic field, the more it shields Earth from incoming cosmic rays from space), the sun determines the temperature on Earth.
The hypothesis that cosmic rays and the sun hold the key to the global warming debate has been Enemy No. 1 to the global warming establishment ever since it was first proposed by two scientists from the Danish Space Research Institute, at a 1996 scientific conference in the U.K. Within one day, the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Bert Bolin, denounced the theory, saying, “I find the move from this pair scientifically extremely naive and irresponsible.” He then set about discrediting the theory, any journalist that gave the theory cre dence, and most of all the Danes presenting the theory — they soon found themselves vilified, marginalized and starved of funding, despite their impeccable scientific credentials.
The mobilization to rally the press against the Danes worked brilliantly, with one notable exception. Nigel Calder, a former editor of The New Scientist who attended that 1996 conference, would not be cowed. Himself a physicist, Mr. Calder became convinced of the merits of the argument and a year later, following a lecture he gave at a CERN conference, so too did Jasper Kirkby, a CERN scientist in attendance. Mr. Kirkby then convinced the CERN bureaucracy of the theory’s importance and developed a plan to create a cloud chamber — he called it CLOUD, for “Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets.”
But Mr. Kirkby made the same tactical error that the Danes had — not realizing how politicized the global warming issue was, he candidly shared his views with the scientific community.
“The theory will probably be able to account for somewhere between a half and the whole of the increase in the Earth’s temperature that we have seen in the last century,” Mr. Kirkby told the scientific press in 1998, explaining that global warming may be part of a natural cycle in the Earth’s temperature.
The global warming establishment sprang into action, pressured the Western governments that control CERN, and almost immediately succeeded in suspending CLOUD. It took Mr. Kirkby almost a decade of negotiation with his superiors, and who knows how many compromises and unspoken commitments, to convince the CERN bureaucracy to allow the project to proceed. And years more to create the cloud chamber and convincingly validate the Danes’ groundbreaking theory.
Yet this spectacular success will be largely unrecognized by the general public for years — this column will be the first that most readers have heard of it — because CERN remains too afraid of offending its government masters to admit its success. Weeks ago, CERN formerly decided to muzzle Mr. Kirby and other members of his team to avoid “the highly political arena of the climate change debate,” telling them “to present the results clearly but not interpret them” and to downplay the results by “making] clear that cosmic radiation is only one of many parameters.” The CERN study and press release is written in bureaucratese and the version of Mr. Kirkby’s study that appears in the print edition of Nature censored the most eye-popping graph — only those who know where to look in an online supplement will see the striking potency of cosmic rays in creating the conditions for seeding clouds.
CERN, and the Danes, have in all likelihood found the path to the Holy Grail of climate science. But the religion of climate science won’t yet permit a celebration of the find.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 14, 2011 – Just so you know and just in case you were confused the Lady Jane sets the record straight. She said:
“In an Inside Halton article a quote was attributed to me that does not accurately reflect my views or those of my Party.
“The PC Party of Ontario and I welcome new Canadians to Ontario. We believe however that Dalton McGuinty’s affirmative action program is wrong. We have 550,000 Ontarians who are unemployed and yet the Liberals want to pay $10,000 each to hire foreign workers.
“I hope this clarifies my position and regret any confusion this may have caused.”
 McKenna: - This is her first significant election and the learning curve is steep and there isn’t a lot of time. Hopefully there will be fewer goofs that become provincial campaign issues. The Lady Jane is Jane McKenna, Progressive Conservative candidate FOR THE Burlington seat in the Ontario Legislature.
Up until very recently Burlington had this problem with a pier that wasn’t getting built. Media throughout the province had us looking like country hicks and the pier was becoming known as “the mistake on the lake”. But we persevered and got that problem back on track and are in the process of becoming known as a community that knows how to overcome adversity.
Then Wham! – a candidate in the provincial election comes out and says something really, really dumb, a comment that was against everything most Canadians stand for and hold dear.. Try as she might, Jane McKenna, Progressive Conservative candidate for Burlington isn’t going to be able to get this albatross off her neck easily. Watch for it to come up during the local debates.
And now Burlington is becoming known as the home of the lunatic Conservative fringe. At least the members of the local Progressive Conservative association can’t be blamed for the candidate – they didn’t pick her.
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By Karmel Sakran, Liberal candidate, Burlington.
We asked each of the candidates to tell you, our readers, what they thought was wrong with the election platforms of the opposing candidates. We asked that they write about “the other guy”. In a future feature each candidate will write about their party platform. We wanted to attempt to create a bit of a debate between the candidates. The Progressive Conservatives advised that they “will not be participating in the first half of our request. “We will get back to you ” they advised “with the 2nd half of the request regarding the PC Party Platform and what it will do for Ontario and for Burlington.” Here is what the Liberals had to say. The New Democratic comments appeared earlier.
 BURLINGTON, ON September 12, 2011 – For weeks now, on doorsteps and events all over Burlington, I’ve been working hard to bring the message about our party’s positive approach to health care, our world-beating education system and the green jobs of tomorrow.
But here’s my main message for Burlington: it’s hospitals – not highways.
Jo Brant Hospital – not the mid-Peninsula highway
True to form, the Ontario Liberal government has approved the redevelopment plan for Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital, while clearly stating that the mid-Peninsula highway that PC leader Tim Hudak wants so badly, will not pave over north Burlington’s valuable agricultural and sensitive environmental lands.
 Karmel Sakran in front of his campaign office, which is located north of the QEW – a change from the usual campaign office locations on Fairview. Sakran says the decision to be north of the QEW was strategic. The recent Jo Brant Hospital announcement was a long-awaited one that will benefit all Burlington residents. It came after two years of hard work by hospital officials, the City of Burlington, citizens and a group of private donors.
Rather than celebrate this decision as a good for Burlington, the opposition PCs and NDP chose to attack the efforts made by their fellow citizens, calling the announcement’s timing pure politics. Nothing could be further from the truth.
As someone who sat as a Hospital board member for five years, I know the province requires a “state of readiness” before providing capital funding for a project of this nature. As a community, we rose to the challenge and did just that – and within the all-important five year funding window.
That we now have a commitment for provincial funding is a huge step forward for Burlington, one that I’d hate to see disrupted or revoked by a Hudak-led Tory government, a regime that favours highways over hospitals.
We build hospitals – not close them like the PCs
This Liberal government builds – not closes – hospitals. In its first two terms, this government has built or launched 18 hospital projects. Compare that to the previous Mike Harris Tory government, when Mr. Hudak was a minister, which closed 28 hospitals.
As a founding board member of Burlington’s Carpenter Hospice, whose 10 bedrooms provide end-of-life care to about 110 residents annually in a home-like setting, I was delighted when our government increased its funding, August 31. The additional $320,000 added to base funding will strengthen Carpenter’s nursing and personal support services and enhance its ability to deliver palliative care in Burlington.
We strongly focus on education
The government’s relentless focus on education is paying off in our schools and the economy. Test scores are up: 69 per cent of grades 3 and 6 students are mastering reading, writing and math – a 15 point increase since 2003. We’re expanding online math tutoring for students from grade 7 to 10 and doubling teacher education to two years to give student teachers more practical classroom experience. Ontario Liberals are the only party with a plan to keep students on track, from full-day kindergarten right through post-secondary and into a good job.
Home care strengthened
The government continues to strengthen health care by bringing back house calls – a boon for some Ontarians with ongoing medical issues that make it hard for them to arrange office visits. Seniors especially will benefit because it will be easier to stay in their own home and remain independent while enjoying better health through regular check-ups and medical attention.
Tuition grants for university & college students
By creating a tuition grant that takes 30% off the average undergraduate tuition in Ontario, the Liberal government is moving Ontario forward by keeping the cost of post-secondary education within everyone’s reach. Annually, the grant will save families $1,600 per student in university and $730 in college.
Contrast this with the Harris-Hudak PCs, who cut post-secondary education by $435 million, slashed student aid by 41%, allowed fees to skyrocket by 67% and provided no help to middle-income families.
 Karmel Sakran is a lawyer by profession and so it wasn’t all that difficult to convince the provincial attorney general to pay the city a visit. It was apparently a relaxing day for all. The Hudak PCs’ $14 billion hole in their platform means they won’t help middle-class families afford post-secondary education, and will make deep cuts that send tuition through the roof, again. The current NDP platform barely mentions education but their legacy is clear; they were the party that eliminated up-front student grants, before we brought them back.
Let’s build on our progress & continue to strengthen Ontario
No question: Ontario needs the strong, steady hand of the McGuinty Liberal government to keep moving forward.
Over the past two terms, this government has hired thousands of doctors and nurses, built 18 new hospitals and improved access to primary care. Our health investments helped us go from having the longest to the shortest surgical wait times in Canada and 1.3 million more Ontarians now have a family doctor.
We lowered early-year class sizes, improved school buildings and introduced the continent’s first full-day kindergarten program. We’re also increasing post-secondary attainment by adding 60,000 new spaces – including three new undergraduate satellite campuses.
And to further help seniors remain in their own homes – in safety and dignity – we’re introducing a Healthy Home Renovation Tax Credit for things like ramps and walk-in baths.
Our platform also promises to create 50,000 new clean-energy jobs through Ontario’s world-leading FIT program. And we’re reducing electricity bills by ten per cent through the Ontario Clean Energy Benefit.
Liberal platform fully audited. PC & NDP platforms: hundreds of uncosted promises
The Hudak PCs’ platform – with its $14 billion hole – has 229 uncosted promises. And that will mean deep cuts to health care and education. The NDP has 119 uncosted promises in their platform and a crushing $9 billion tax increase.
Our platform features just 45 new, fully costed commitments to help Ontario families stay on track.
We’re the only party with a platform that has been audited by an economist – Scotiabank Chief Economist Warren Jestin – who confirmed that our numbers add up.
McGuinty Liberals support Burlington commuters
I also don’t hear any positive emanations from the PCs or NDP about the major transit and highway programs that have helped Burlington commuters go to and from their jobs. What we do know is that between 1999 and 2003, the PC government contributed nothing to GO transit leaving municipalities to carry the load. During the NDP time in office, they invested less than a third of what our government has invested and were the first to privatize highways.
Since 2003, the City of Burlington has received more than $48.8 million to support public transit plus nearly $13 million in gas tax funding. As well, the government added 600 new parking spaces at the Burlington GO Station, new weekday bus trips from McMaster to the Burlington GO, and a seasonal weekend and holiday Toronto-Niagara Falls train service with one of the stops in Burlington.
We’ve committed to $434.1 million to Halton Region for highway improvements since 2003. All this with a dedicated gas tax to municipalities. Not only are we improving transportation in Burlington and Halton Region, we’ve brought in tougher penalties for drinking and driving, speed limiters on most large trucks and banned the use of hand held devices while driving.
Powerful reasons to vote Liberal on October 6th.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 13, 2011 – They were all smiles – there was finally much more in the way of confidence on the part of Council – and now the city – that the expansion to the Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital is really, really going to happen. Hospital CEO Eric Vanderwall was there to tell Council that the hospital expansion would be complete in six years and open late in 2016 or early 2017. And oh, he almost asked, could we have the first payment on that $60 million you agreed to provide.
When the hospital held a little mini gala sort of event early in August, with a tent outdoors and waiters walking through the crowd – and it was a crowd – serving hors d’oeuvres, we were all waiting for a Minister from the government to arrive and make it more official – and tell us that the hospital expansion was really going to be funded.
 Architects rendering of what the hospital will look like after the expansion has been completed. Plans are for an opening in late 2016 or early 2017 But the Minister didn’t make it – we were told that she got tied up in QEW traffic – poetic justice there for sure. Ted McMeekin, the man who lost his Cabinet seat to Sophia Aggelonitis, the Minister who didn’t make it to the meeting, handled the event and stretched it out as long as he could – and enjoyed every minute of his time holding the microphone.
But we finally all went home not exactly sure what had happened. Something was going on but no one in Burlington knew what the bureaucrats were up to. Well today we know – they were doing all the paper work and the background stuff; the scheduling and making the need for funds fit in with what the province will have in their piggy bank when it comes time to write cheques.
And the province won’t be writing cheques anytime soon. But Erik Vanderwall has a letter from the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, Deb Matthews, saying that the province has us in the system and we are now part of the flow of funds out from them and in to us.
When Vanderwall was giving all this good news to your city council Mayor Goldring had the cheek to ask if he could perhaps see a copy of that letter. Eric, who really knows how to handle people, demurred and said while he had no problem with giving the Mayor a copy of the funding letter he didn’t think it was his place. Now the good Eric didn’t offer to ask the Minister if she would mind if he gave a copy to the city – nope, he suggested the Mayor contact the Minister and ask for a copy.
Golly gee – Burlington has been asked to put up $60 million of the “hundreds of millions” it is going to cost to do the expansion – you think the least they could do is get the city a copy of the letter that says the cheques will be in the mail.
Turns out that the money to pay for all the early stage work is going to come from Burlington. Vanderwall gave the city the schedule the hospital needs to get this project going.
Here is the schedule:
2011/12 $7.5 million
2012/13 $7.5 million
2013/14 $7.5 million
2014/15 $7.5 million
2015/16 $15 million
$2016/17 $15 million
for a total of $60 million which the city has committed itself to and already has a large chunk of the first payment in the bank.
The hospital wants that money pronto so they can get on with building a parking garage which will free up the land the expansion is going to be built on.
So Burlington is going to carry the can and pay the bills through to about 2014 (which is when this council is going to come to you to get re-elected).
 Hospital CEO Eric Vanderwall entertained the crowd for as long as he could last August but even he could only do so much. The Minister with the Announcement didn’t make it to the party so we all went home Vanderwall told council that the hospital will be completed in six years and that the Hospital Foundation has committed to meeting the city contribution of $60 million on a dollar for dollar basis. We were also advised that while nothing public could be said they had about $7 million already committed.
The hospital foundation has its Board of Directors in place. There is a Campaign Cabinet and an Ambassador Council in place to get the word out to the community and drum up those dollars. They have a lot of raffle tickets to sell.
Burlington has been sadly served by its hospital in the not too recent past. There were c.Difficile deaths that rattled the community and destroyed a lot of the confidence a public should have in its hospital. Eric Vanderwall deserves credit for re-building the level of medical service delivered by the hospital and spearheading the drive to get the funding needed from the province – which is why we pay him the big bucks.
But he could have gotten the Mayor a copy of that letter.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 13, 2011 – The ethic of a city council takes a little time to develop. Some city council’s play fast and loose with the rules and others are super tight. Every city council has a procedural by-law and there is always at least one member of council that knows the thing inside and out – often better than some of the Clerks.
In Burlington that would be Ward 1 councillor Rick Craven. At one point he was carrying the by-law under his arm and quite willing to read sections out to a council member who was being too casual with the rules.
 Councillor Lancaster of Ward 6 can at times take an ethical issue a little too far but she is on the right side of the conflict of interest question and for a former beauty Queen – what is seen is important. At every committee meeting the chair is expected to ask if there are any conflicts of interest and during my time in watching this Council I’d never ever seen anyone declare a conflict. Jack Dennison should be declaring a conflict on a number of issues but he tends to disregard the question – if he does make a comment he tends to mumble it.
This Council has Blair Lancaster, the rookie member for Ward 6 – and Blair is a real stickler for the rules – sometime too sticky. There was an occasion when the Downtown Core Commitment was being discussed and Lancaster, who owns a downtown business that she doesn’t operate chose to declare a conflict and for the part of the meeting that was discussing that matter – Lancaster left the Council table and sat in the public gallery. We had not seen THAT before.
And then guess what happened. A week or so later councillor Dennison declared a conflict of interest on a matter and he too left the Council table and sat in the public gallery. Dennison looked a bit like a school boy who was sent outside the classroom.
This Council is finding itself and making it mark as to how it is going to do business.
Quite a change – a welcome change. The principle matters.
Dennison has frequently had conflict problems. He and his family own Cedar Spring Health and Racquet Club which provides some services to the city which require Dennison not to discuss or vote on issues that re related to parks and recreation use of outside services.
Dennison got himself in a bit of a pickle during the 2008-2009 recession when his sports club took a serious financial hit when membership declined seriously.
 Jack Dennison, councillor for Ward 4 has one of the bettr business minds on Council and knows where are the bones are buried – struggles with conflicts of interest due to his ownership of a sports facility in the city. Always honest – but his situation gets a little sticky at times. Dennison did what any prudent business man would do – he cut back on his expenses. Problem was one of those expenses was city property taxes which the club didn’t pay for a period of time. And that is permitable – when you don’t pay your taxes you pay an interest penalty – which made prudent business decision.
The tough part is how does a corporation not paying its property taxes when one of the officers and a director of that corporation sits as a member of Council. Sticky wicket that one – but Dennison got away with it. His constituents re-elected him.
There was never any question about Dennison taking advantage of his vote on council. He never takes anything that he hasn’t earned and deserved.
But Blair Lancaster has brought a higher ethic to the Council chamber and we can expect the Councillor for Ward 4 to be in the public gallery more often.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 13, 2011 “If this one doesn’t want to make you throw up, nothing will. That was Warren Kinsella’s opening line in his blog on comments local Progressive Conservative candidate Jane McKenna./ Kinsella is a born Liberal – he can’t help himself and he plays the game for keeps – no prisoners for this guy – knee cap them and leave them at the side of the road. He goes on to say:
Tea Party Tim Hudak’s campaign of intolerance swung through Burlington, with his hand-picked candidate smearing new Canadians with the sort of language that will blow your mind.
Jane McKenna, a failed municipal candidate whose previous priority was getting more booze outlets in her area, told the Burlington Post that she opposed helping new Canadian citizens get the certification they need to work in their chosen profession. If that’s not enough, McKenna then went on to say:
“When did we become for immigrants?” That’s a quote.
 Bought the blue pin strip for the election. Suits her? Here’s a newsflash for McKenna, and her “leader,” who have piloted Ontario campaign 2011 straight into the gutter on only day three of the contest: Canada and Ontario have always been “for” immigrants. We are, in fact, a nation of immigrants.
As former PC leader John Tory has said, Hudak has been “stirring up envy and negativity” in the election campaign. And, like John said, Hudak himself favoured a more generous plan to assist newcomers just a year ago. (Meanwhile, the Ontario Liberal plan, Tory noted on his drive-home radio show, was “one of the best investments” we could make. He’s right.)
Hudak and McKenna’s attacks on hard-working, tax-paying citizens demeans them, and their party.
I’d say they should be ashamed of themselves, but I think they lost their capacity for shame long ago.
I’ll be watching the local contest—Burlington—closely to see whether the Liberals or the NDP can break the decades-long grip the Progressive Conservatives (PC) have had on the local seat.
Russ Campbell, a respected commentator on things conservative and Conservative who gets his mail delivered to a Burlington address wasn’t about to let Kinsella use up all the oxygen and piped in with:
“This is an important choice for PC party members in Burlington, for the odds favour our party beating the Dalton McGuinty Liberals in the Oct. 6 general election. And wouldn’t it be nice to replace retiring incumbent MPP Joyce Savoline with another PC, continuing the riding’s PC-blue tradition for another four years.
 With the support of Ted Chudleigh who is running in Halton and Joyce Savoline who is retiring from public office Jane McKenna on the left was able to handle one of her early press event quite well. Regular readers will know that I was less than impressed with the PC nomination process that unfolded in Burlington. However, in Jane McKenna, we seem to have a local candidate with a chance of keeping the seat for the Tories. Oh, I’ve expressed reservations regarding Ms. McKenna’s lack of related experience and the fact she never had to undergo the scrutiny of a nomination contest—as the only candidate seeking the nomination, she was acclaimed. But when you’ve been given cream, you set about finding a way to make something nice, like ice cream.
One of the indispensible benefits of a nomination contest is the need for candidates to go through a mini-campaign, during which riding association members can assess each candidate’s organization skills, media savvy, personal background and related professional experience, not to mention their ability to communicate effectively. With luck, the candidates’ core values and beliefs may also be revealed, because, during the time they are seeking the nomination, they don’t have to toe the party line and keep “on message.”
But we have what we have, so I took advantage of an offer to meet Ms. McKenna, which she’d made a couple of weeks or so ago. In chatting to her, I sought answers to the sort of questions I would have expected to come up during the nomination process. And I got answers; she ducked none of my questions.
I won’t go into much detail here since the meeting was meant more for background than as an interview per se. I will, though, share some of my impressions.
Overall, Jane McKenna is a very presentable candidate: she’s local, intelligent, articulate and shows spunk. I pressed her at times, but she remained composed and stuck up for herself. And, when I expressed criticisms, I didn’t get the sort of defensiveness one too often gets from politicians. She basically acknowledged my criticisms when she felt they were accurate and otherwise gave me reasonable-sounding explanations.
I was most interested in hearing Ms. McKenna’s position on local issues like hospital funding, mid-peninsular highway, urban growth and mineral extraction on the Niagara Escarpment. Ms. McKenna seems to have a sound grasp of local issues, and she did not repeat party “talking points,” instead she gave real answers. These were not always the answers I wanted to hear, but they did seem genuine. I also tried to gain a sense of how deep were her commitments to those positions.
Basically, her positions seem to align with those I believe are most widely held in the riding. She’s obviously done her homework, is a quick learner and seems to understand the core concerns of her constituents. If she didn’t always have a grasp on these local issues—and I’m not saying she didn’t—she obviously has used her resources and intellect to get up to speed before the election officially kicks-off.
 McKenna used to sell advertising – she knows how to listen and she knows how to make her point. With some luck and all her pluck working for her she just might convince enough of the Tory vote to get out on October 6 – there is enough blue blood in the city to win it – just as long as they don’t listen too closely to what se has to say – according to Warren Kinsella We here in Burlington don’t live on an island and must take into consideration the realities and pressures we face as a part of a broader community, at both the regional and the provincial levels. Ms. McKenna gets that.
In short, folks, Jane McKenna will do fine. At least, that’s the way I see it.
Well that wasn’t quite the way Campbell saw it at first glance but then, for an old Tory like Campbell, seeing the Burlington seat go to a Liberal was perhaps more than he could swallow – so he instead gulped and decided to go with the devil that he at least knew something about.
Sort of like horse racing – you pick your winner and you place your bets. What I want to know is this: Did Campbell send the Party a cheque?
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By Peggy Russell, Candidate for the New Democratic Party in Burlington
We asked each of the candidates to tell you, our readers, what they thought was wrong with the election platforms of the opposing candidates. We asked that they write about “the other guy”. In a future feature each candidate will write about their party platform. We wanted to attempt to create a bit of a debate between the candidates. The Progressive Conservatives advised that they “will not be participating in the first half of our request. “We will get back to you ” they advised “with the 2nd half of the request regarding the PC Party Platform and what it will do for Ontario and for Burlington.” Here is what the New Democrats had to say. The Liberal comments will appear later this week.
BURLINGTON, ON September 13, 2011 – I was honoured when I was approached to seek the candidacy to represent Andrea Horwath and the Ontario New Democratic Party in Burlington.
For the past 10 years I have been working to help build a stronger community as an elected School Board Trustee with the Halton District School Board. The opportunity to continue to represent families in Burlington as the MPP for our community within a party that is presenting a positive alternative to the negative politics of the past truly motivated me to continue the progress that so many of us have been able to achieve together.
In this election, I am looking to once again earn the trust of Burlington families so that we can continue some of the positive initiatives that I have helped to achieve for our community and so that I can work to deliver affordable change for families who are feeling squeezed in this economy.
Our party has a clear plan to help make life more affordable for families and seniors while improving healthcare and education, supporting job creation, protecting our environment, and working to change the negative, partisan politics of the past.
I hold those who choose to seek public office and to represent their community in the highest regard. I feel this way because democracy matters and government matters. We are so fortunate to live in a province and country where young people can aspire to great things including elected office. It is up to us who seek and who have held such positions to inspire these young people and to encourage participation in our great democracy.
Over the next weeks of campaigning, I will be joined by other candidates who are also working hard to seek your vote and your trust. They should be proud of the contributions that they are making to our community and to our democracy. Of course, we will be debating ideas and often we will not agree. I believe that residents will see a clear distinction between the plan that our New Democratic Party Team and I present and that of my opponents.
 After ten years service as a school board trustee Peggy Russell wants to head for Queen’s Park and doesn’t feel her loss in the last municipal election is going to hold her back. Solid candidate with a very clear point of view. Is Burlington ready for a New Democrat at Queen’s Park ? Our plan believes that there is a positive role for government to play in job creation and building a better society for all.
The no-strings attached corporate tax give-aways that the other two major parties promote have failed to deliver the economic success that has been promised.
The laissez faire approach of the other two parties to job creation needs to be replaced with a targeted plan to invest and help those businesses that actually create and sustain jobs in Ontario.
Our party believes that the current government has wasted too many of our tax dollars that hard working Ontario residents have contributed on failed schemes, overpaid consultants and runaway CEO salaries. This will change under an NDP government where CEO salaries will be capped and tax dollars will be invested in frontline services, not on overpaid consultants.
We disagree with a government that has made life more difficult for families by introducing an HST tax on families during a recession. We have seen how this has contributed to skyrocketing energy and transportation costs. Our plan will provide relief for families by removing the HST from essentials such as gas, hydro, and home heating.
The other opposition party is also promising change, but change to what – and is their change affordable? They have yet to demonstrate how they can create jobs, keep Ontario affordable for families, and preserve the kind of educational, health and other services that make Ontario a great place to live
I look forward to having the opportunity to share more of my ideas over the course of this campaign and debating the direction that our province should go with the other candidates for Burlington. On October 6th the residents of our community get to have their say. That is the beauty of our democracy.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 9, 2011 The Engineers have done their work and come to the conclusion that Graham Infrastructure of Mississauga should be the company that completes the construction of the Brant Street Pier. Hallelujah!
The recommendation is part of a report that will go before Council September 26. This has been a long protracted project and it looks as if the light at the end of the tunnel is not a train coming towards us.
The city received and publicly opened four bids from pre-qualified contractors to complete the pier project on Aug. 26. Prices ranged from $6.5 to $10.5 million. Those numbers included 13% HST; municipalities pay just 1.7% HST. The lowest bid came in from Graham Infrastructure.
The city reviewed all four bids to ensure they complied with the requirements of the tender documentation issued to seven prequalified contractors in July 2011. The total contract price of Graham’s bid is $6,429,700, including net HST at 1.76 per cent.
 The natural beach was a gift nature gave the city. Does the city have to spend additional money to build an access ramp to the location? And is the access ramp proposed the most cost effective solution? And will we call it the MacIsaac ramp? The bid includes two optional items: a beach access ramp and additional concrete work for the waterfront promenade in Spencer Smith Park. Interesting that the city does not break out the cost of the waterfront promenade part that is needed and the ramp to the natural beach that was formed by current that developed around the pier.
The concrete work for the promenade is necessary – this Council can and should seek some public input on the access ramp to the natural beach. We have a council that talks about getting input from the community but we don’t see this council asking people in the community what they want.
Our Mayor has stayed the course and held firm to his belief that the pier could be completed for the amount that was allocated. And he has done so with a considerable amount of uniformed opposition from a group that want the thing torn down. Well the Mayor has done his job – his council has been with him – well everyone except Ward 2 Councilor Meed Ward who voted with against going forward with a tender because she thought a deal could have been worked out with the contractor that walked off the job. She now takes the position that she will work with whoever wins the tender award. Good for her.
City staff have done a superb job of keeping this very difficult phase of a problem task on point. It has not been an easy job but they’ve done it and done it with all the expertise and professionalism that was missing when the project got started two council terms ago. Again – kudos for a Mayor that stuck to his guns.
I’m looking forward to our Mayor asking each Council member to hold a meeting in their ward at which the Mayor will listen to opinions on whether or not the access ramp should be included in this second phase of the construction project.
There’s nothing wrong with the ramp and it makes economic sense to include it in the next phase of construction – but this city has put up with a lot of delay and a pile of additional expense and they deserve the right to have this all be it small addition explained to them and given a chance to voice there opinion.
Ward 4 councilor Jack Dennison commented that “municipalities certainly no how to spend money” when the idea of an access ramp was first proposed by city engineers.
The Graham Group of Companies is a North American-wide company, with a local base in Mississauga. Graham is the fifth largest construction company in Canada with more than 1,200 salaried staff and a 2010 revenue of $1.8 billion.
Graham is an employee-owned, industry-leading construction solutions partner. They are a diversified and growing company active across North America.
 Sounds like a pretty decent organization. They are certainly big enough and appear to have the scale needed to get our pier built. Let’s see what Council decides when they discuss the staff recommendation. Graham covers the entire construction lifecycle and every contracting mode: general contracting, CM/GC, project management, design-build, design-bid-build, integrated project delivery, turnkey solutions, renovations/upgrades, Public-Private Partnerships (P3s) and partnerships, commissioning and post-construction management. This versatility is underpinned by our major competitive advantages:
Extensive integrated capabilities, based in Graham’s offices and shops in more than one-dozen centres across North America, lifting us far beyond a standard general contractor or construction manager;
Large, company-owned equipment fleet to help us self-execute construction work;
A unique, industry-leading integrated information system that creates a seamless and accurate project execution platform from first contact through final reconciliation.
Two questions: Where were these guys when we began the pier construction project and do they have a trestle of their own?
Assuming council accept the staff recommendation – will we hear jackhammers on the site before we see snow?
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 12, 2011 It looks like it might be choo choo Dalton. The Premier of Ontario, Dalton McGuinty, told the Toronto Board of Trade today that his government was going to create 68,000 GTA jobs as the province expands GO train service.
“Our goal is to build a high-skills, high-wage Ontario economy. To get that, you need to keep goods and people moving,” said McGuinty. “That’s why we’re expanding GO train service to two-way service, all day, on all corridors.”
Two way service – all day. What exactly does that mean? Will we see a schedule during the off peak hours that is better than the basically hourly service we have now? This government is throwing the words jobs, jobs, jobs around like curses in a grungy bar. A little more detail please. We get that we have an economy that is under a little stress. And there are people out of work – we have something in the 7%+ unemployment range – so new work is good.
 Improved GO service is another election promise. Mark that one down and see if they come through on it. Will this promise take as long as the hospital to come through ? And by the way the hospital funding is just that at this point – a promise. The upgrade to the GO service will mean jobs in construction and engineering. Good high paying jobs – but there were no times lines attached to the announcement.
According to the Premier there are some 45,000 people from communities like Hamilton, Barrie and Oshawa take the GO train to Union Station. If all those people drove to work instead of taking transit, the GTA would need to build four more Gardiner Expressways and four new Don Valley Parkways to accommodate the extra cars. We certainly get how packed those four lanes on the QEW are and what a mess when there is an accident.
All good news – but why do we have to have an election to hear all this good stuff?
The Premier said the province has invested $4.7 billion since 2003 to build new lines, improve stations, add new trains and increase service. Now, there are 12 million more people riding GO than in 2003 — a 28% increase. Today, 94% of all rush-hour trains are on time and passenger satisfaction with GO is 82% — up from 59% a year ago.
The Premier used the occasion to remind us that the last PC government recklessly gutted transit — and made a mess of GO Transit in particular. First, they downloaded GO to the municipalities, then uploaded it again. Now, the Hudak PCs are at it again. They have a $14 billion hole in their platform — which would mean deep cuts to transit at a time when transit is most needed.
The last NDP government also cut GO service and now would introduce a crushing $9 billion in job-killing taxes.
Those are acceptable comments during an election. Are they true ?
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By Pepper Parr
 BURLINGTON, ON September 12. 2011 End of the first week – and where are we in the provincial election? Well it is getting a little heated.
The biggest event was the visit to the Liberal campaign offices by the Premier. The campaign office was packed – and it wasn’t exactly a small office. A number of Tories were seen in the crowd. Liberal candidate Karmel Sakran was ecstatic.
Then there was the war of words over the immigrant job tax credit of $10,000. That was part of the Liberal platform. McKenna came out swinging on that one and managed to make a couple of solid points.
Where is the race going? The Liberals certainly have the best campaign at this point but they have been gearing up for some time and their candidate has been in place for months whereas the New Democrats have had their girl in place for less than a month while the Progressive Conservatives were a last minute nomination situation.
The Liberals however cannot win this seat without pulling some support from the traditional New Democratic base and that base is still very solid – more so since the tragic and untimely death of national New Democratic leader Jack Layton. The NDP locally still hopes for a bit of that orange wave to work itself into the provincial campaign, not likely, and then to have some of it seep into the Burlington campaign – very unlikely. However their base will hold and they may succeed in pulling back those who voted NDP in the past.
The Liberals appear to have woken up their base. It has always been around, part of the Paddy Torsney legacy. But if the Liberals hope to make this riding Liberal red they are going to have to attract some of the softer NDP vote and hope that the Progressive Conservative base continues to sit on its hands. Have you noticed that the Liberals aren’t using the bright vivid red of the past – more of a wine colour.
The Progressive Conservative base is unhappy. They did not like the way Tory headquarters in Toronto kind of imposed a candidate on them – but they have only themselves to blame for that debacle. Had they managed to develop a really solid local candidate the Toronto PC’s would have left them alone. Joyce Savoline, the current member of the Legislature for Burlington, didn’t leave the new candidate anything in terms of an election organization. She has been out on the campaign trail with McKenna and Ted Chudleigh, the member for Halton, which includes part of Burlington has shared events with McKenna while she learns the ropes.
The nomination mess has left a bit of a bad taste in the mouths of the quieter stories in town. There is nothing a political party likes more than a local constituency organization that has money in the bank and a local favourite with a good profile. Brian Heagle thought he had that to offer but he brought too much political baggage with him. Rene Papin was certainly a “good old boy” – having been a past president of the association, but for reasons that are not yet clear Papin was sort of asked to step aside. Could it have been his being a man of colour? Karmel Sakran wants to hope that if that was the case that the Tories were dead wrong?
Does Burlington want just white people representing them? Rude question perhaps but a question that the people of this city want to ask themselves.
McKenna to her credit appears to be putting up a stiff fight and talking back very loudly but then Jane McKenna has always been a very “in your face” person. If will take another week to figure out if she is more soundly briefed then when we first talked to her. If she is – look out folks. This is a driven woman.
A bit too early to tell if the lawn signs are really an indicator of support. Every political party has friends with commercial property that are made available for signs – those are expected. It is the lawns signs on the residential streets that tell the tale. If those Tory blue signs don’t sprout up quickly – that would suggest the base is going to sit on their hands and that would mean the end of a reign that started in 1943.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 12, 2011 – The city is without a City Manager. The task is being done on a rotating basis by the three General Managers with Scott Stewart, GM for Community Services doing duty in September and October, Kim Phillips, GM, Corporate Services will take the helm for November and December and if Roy Male, Director of Human Resources is right – the city should have a new City Manger hired by the end of the year. “We want to have the new city manager in place within 90 days” is the way Male see this happening.
Steve Zorbas, Acting General Manager for Development and Infrastructure has handled the city manager job on a few occasions while others were on vacation.
Burlington has not had that many City Managers – “Just four” advises Male who will oversee parts of the hiring of a new city manager but the bulk of the work on that assignment will get done by the Executive Search firm the city hires.
There is a lot of work to get done before the job is opened up to a competition that will see city council actually make the decision. Male advises that there will be two sets of interviews – the first at which all those who meet the criteria and are recommended by the search group and then those who make the short list.
The rules of the game are that Council members have to attend all the interviews. If for some reason a council member misses an interview then they have to drop out of the interviewing process. So every council member is going to have to find time on a busy schedule to interview what could amount to perhaps as many as a dozen candidates.
So, if your Council member takes a little longer to get back to you on a problem – you know what they are up to – hiring.
 Roy Male runs the Human Resources department for the city. He hopes to see the new city manager in place before the end of the year. Male has been with the city during the reign of the four city managers the city has employed Burlington has a solid reputation within the municipal industry and the job pays well – in excess of $200,000 annually. The city has a lot to offer and at least one very senior staff member intends to be one of the candidates applying for the job says the city is going into a very exciting phase. And indeed Burlington is about to clear a number of significant hurdles.
We will have a contract signed with a contractor to complete the construction of the Brant Street Pier. The Strategic Plan will be in place. We will be well on our way to working through just what it is the city wants in the way of a transit service.
We will have the “community engagement” staffer in place soon – this is the person that was recommended in the Shape Burlington report to help citizens engage with city hall. The Burlington Performing Arts Centre will have part of a season under its belt and they will begin to get a sense of how the community is going to take the place.
Not quite sure what the city is going to do if all those problems are put behind us.
Roman Martiuk left the job of city manager before the end of his five year contract and at the time it wasn’t all that clear just why he left. Martiuk said he “stepped aside” – probably the right thing to do when he realized his contract wasn’t going to be renewed. There was a rather unfortunate social event for Martiuk at which some of his comments were not taken very well by many of those who attended. Martiuk chose that occasion to make comments that didn’t need to be heard about the people he had worked with for the past four years. Sometimes it takes a little stress to being out the true colour of a personality.
The process of selecting the new city manager starts with a profile of the job and the kind of person the city needs to get the job done. That profile is created by council with input from the senior staff and, according to Roy Male, some of the Team Burlington people as well as some community leaders who will be asked to sit in on the creating of the profile.
Team Burlington is a collection of organizations that develop and promote the city. Tourism, Economic Develop are part of the Team.
This profile is a critical part of the process – it sets out just what the city wants their new city manager to do. Maybe the document should be made public – see if there is agreement from the people that pay for this high priced piece of talent as to just what the job entails.
 Roman Martiuk had a very short term with the city. He chose to step aside when it was clear to him that his five year contract would not be renewed. . Tim Dobbie, a former city manager has had a street named after him. Will we see a Martiuk Street? Martiuk was quite candid in an interview when he said he wasn’t all that keen in city engagement and he had major problems with the significant shortfall in infrastructure funding – meaning that we didn’t have the money to pay for the road repairs that have to be done.
It will be interesting to see how council decides to work with the community on how it goes about defining the profile for the job. That’s probably a more important document than the Strategic Plan.
Burlington has about 1600 people on the payroll with a significant number working part time. There are 850+ working full time. The city has a number of senior level committees in place with the three general managers and 17 Directors running the departments that keep the city going day in and day out.
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By Staff
BURLINGTON, ON September 8, 2011 An organization that has fostered, nurtured and developed creative talent in Burlington announced yesterday that it will cease operation at the end of September. This is not good news for Burlington.
 Creative Burlington, an organization that has struggled since its very inception but nevertheless managed to make huge strides in the development of the arts community in Burlington and was a leader in the campaign to develop the Burlington Performing Arts Centre that opened its doors less than a month ago. A sad, painful irony for the people that were in the trenches when an arts centre wasn’t much more than a gleam in the eyes of many.
In an announcement Board president Paul Mitchell said: “We reached the decision with great reluctance and regret but knew we could not continue without long-term financial support. We have concluded that the financial stability of the organization is too uncertain despite our efforts to obtain sustainable funding through events, programs and other vehicles, including a request to the City of Burlington.”
Mitchell took the opportunity to” thank the many people who have supported us over the years, including our generous corporate partners, our 400 plus members and our dedicated staff. We are proud of our highly successful programs to promote arts and culture in Burlington, including the Arts Recognition Awards held last February, our magazine Artworks and various festivals and events. It would be a shame if these initiatives disappear, but we are not in a position to continue them.” Mitchell said.
 Deb Tymstra was both all business and all about the performing arts and a large part of the reason we have a Burlington Performing Arts Centre is because she was in the trenches more than ten years ago developing the idea and raising money. Deb Tymstra, Executive Director, said the decision to cease operations was especially regrettable because of the demonstrable need to promote and support the arts in Burlington. “We have been advocating for the City of Burlington to give significant recognition and support to arts and culture in its new Strategic Plan, including the establishment of a Burlington Arts Council.
Arts and culture are vital to a successful, creative and inclusive community. We believe the City must be a leader in supporting this important sector,” Tymstra said.
Creative Burlington began in 2000 as Performing Arts Burlington, a community-based group to advocate for a performing arts centre. It raised $64,000 for the facility and provided experts to help design the centre and serve on the Project Management Team.
 Passionate about everything she does Deb Tymstra put her heart into what is now Creative Burlington. But the support she needed from within the community just wasn’t there and the city was not about to offer any ongoing funding. At the same time the organization provided programs and events to strengthen the recognition of the performing arts in Burlington. It later expanded its mandate to include all art forms and was renamed Creative Burlington in 2010.
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 10, 2011 – I guess it’s something we have to do – but these are our children and that we have to train people to see what we as parents sometimes do not see – a very disturbed child that chooses to act out and harm members of the community.
A media release from the Halton Regional Police Service explained that ” in conjunction with the Halton District School Board, Halton Catholic District School Board, Conseil scolaire Viamonde, Conseil Scolaire de district catholique Centre-Sud and the Provincial Schools Branch (Milton), continues to provide its staff and community partners with exceptional training in the field of student threat assessment.”
People are being taught to assess and interview students they suspect could be a threat to the community. Given the tragedies that have taken place in schools in the past, and we are not talking about just the United States, it has happened in Canada as well, prudent policing would call for this type of training.
The media release went on to say: “Professionals in the school and community system participated in Level 1 Threat Assessment Training this past June. This month Principals, Police, Social Workers and Community partners will gather for additional in-service Threat Assessment Training referred to as “Clinical Interviewing in Threat Assessment.”
“The intensive two-day training session on September 13th and 14th funded by the Ministry of Community Safety and Correction Services focuses on strategic interviewing of key individuals including the threat maker(s), target, collaterals and parents/caregivers as part of the threat assessment process. A more comprehensive look at types of high-risk youth is presented to the participants.”
And so we have Correctional Service people teaching school board staff how to identify, evaluate and asses our children? Looks that way.
Family life is not what it used to be. Separations, divorces, unemployed parents – all this bring stress into a household and children react to that stress. One of the way they react is to act out against the community they don’t understand and have difficulty living within. We are doing something wrong as a society.
The press release went on to say that: “The Canadian Centre for Threat Assessment & Trauma Response, led by Mr. J. Kevin Cameron assists schools and other professionals in understanding the impact of trauma on systems and how to respond in ways that allow schools and communities to deal with serious situations in ways that encourage healing and foster growth rather than divisiveness.”
J. Kevin Cameron we are told, led the crisis response team following the 1999 school shooting in Taber, Alberta and was subsequently seconded by the Alberta Government to the Taber Response Project. He spent 13 months consulting with U.S. sites that experienced school shootings as part of his study of traumatic aftermath including threat related behaviour. Mr. Cameron is an official with the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress and a Board Certified Expert in Traumatic Stress. In concert with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Behavioural Sciences Unit he developed Canada’s first comprehensive, multi-disciplinary threat-assessment training program.
The in-service training will be held September 13th and 14th at Gary Allan High School 2350 New Street, Burlington. For more information, please contact: Inspector J Gordon at 905 825 4749.
Someone somewhere has decided we need this kind of training. I think the money would be better spent on more phys-ed teachers and an upgrade to the library.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON — Premier Dalton McGuinty highlighted the Ontario Liberal Plan to build a high-skills, high-wage economy during a visit to Burlington today.
“Whether you’re raising a family in Burlington, Hamilton, Oakville or anywhere in between, our plan to move forward into a better future for your family is working,” McGuinty said. “Across Ontario, all families need a stronger economy to support our schools, hospitals and quality of life. Our Ontario Liberal Team is working hard to help build that quality of life.”
 The politicians want to create excitement and as much buzz as they can. Thus the big campaign buses and the building up of anticipation. The handlers move the crowds up close to the bus and create a line the candidate walks along shaking hands. All the true believers get to these events. Here Premier Dalton McGuinty steps off the bus to a campaign event for Karmel Sakran. McGuinty was joined at the event by Burlington candidate Karmel Sakran, along with fellow candidates, Sophia Aggelonitis, Mark Cripps, Ted McMeekin, Donna Tiqui-Shebib, Indira Naidoo-Harris, Kevin Flynn, Katie Trombetta and Greg Crone.
“In a world where 70 per cent of all new jobs will require a postsecondary education, we are committed to investing in our people — in their skills, in their education — to build the world’s best-educated workforce,” said McGuinty. “We’re creating the advantage needed to compete in the new economy.”
It was the same old, same old canned political speech – the kind of thing her will be doing every day of the 29 days left in this campaign. I am waiting for the day that a Premier or the leader of a political party sits down and talks with people and gives up on the idea of saying something that will make the six o’clock news.
Earlier in the day McGuinty apparently tested an all-electric car and them immediately touted his plans for a solar society. I wanted to hear what the car was like to drive and I suspect everyone else in the room wanted the same thing.
The Premier did get a great reception. Karmel Sakran’s campaign office on Guelph Line was packed – it was standing room only with a couple of dozen people who had to stand outside.
 Didn’t expect to see Ward 3 councilor John Taylor on hand to see the Premier but there he was along with Ward 1 councilor Rick Craven – each getting their handshake and political blessing Ward 3 Alderman John Taylor was also in the crowd wearing his best grey pin stripe suit, as was Ward 1 councilor Rick Craven wearing his best red shirt. The crowd, and this was a crowd also included Ward 2 councilor Marianne Meed Ward who was the Liberal candidate in the last provincial election and gave current member Joyce Savoline a good run for her money.
As people streamed out of the room, which wasn’t all that large, there was a look on the faces of the people, – almost a bit of a glow on their faces – and I thought to myself – it looks as if they have been blessed. I’m not making this up. There was a buzz in the small plaza.
Premier McGuinty is not the greatest of campaigners – he gives the speeches but his strength is one on one and why he didn’t engage a half a dozen people individually and then apologize that he couldn’t talk to everyone and explain that there were a couple of stops left before he could tuck in for the night.
Candidate Sakran was of course ecstatic. People in the small but very crowded plaza were saying that they couldn’t remember every seeing premier of the province in Burlington.
McGuinty worked his way through the crowd, boarded the bus and left for the next destination. Burlington had gotten its visit.
Sometime later in the month Tim Hudak will come through town and do his thing and it will be on the six o’clock news. If the crowd isn’t as large or as enthusiastic – get ready for a shift in the political culture of this city.
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By Staff
 BURLINGTON, ON September 9, 2011 – Not many organizations can look back over their shoulders and realize they have completed 100 years of continuous operation. But this Saturday Sandy Thomson will tell friends and colleagues that his company is moving into its second century.
 Sandy Thomson, the man at the helm of the now century old organization and the person running the show during one of its most dynamic phases, will celebrate their success at an event this Saturday. The firm was founded in 1911 by Army Major George J. Thomson, and his brother William, who opened an industrial distribution business in Hamilton, Ontario. Later the brothers took on a partner named Earl Gordon and changed the name of the firm when it incorporated in 1916 to Thomson-Gordon Ltd. By 1936, the company was involved in manufacturing a variety of applications for industrial engineers, and it flourished. George J.V. Thomson, son of the founder, was an architect graduate from Pratt Institute of New York and after working several years in New York answered the summons of his father to return to Canada to help run the family business.
In 1967 his son, George A. (Sandy) Thomson succeeded George J.V. Thomson. Sandy, who graduated as a Mechanical Engineer from Northrop University, Inglewood, California, is presently CEO and sole owner of Thomson-Gordon.
The non-metallic Thordon bearing business began in a small corner of the plant in the 1960’s on Queen St. in Hamilton; a simple experiment in reacting synthetic elastomer chemicals by the firm’s third generation leader, Sandy Thomson and production foreman, Arnold Lange. Since that time Thordon has continued to develop, test and introduce new polymers in a search for new innovative products that solve our customer’s most demanding bearing applications and problems. His stepdaughter, Anna Galoni, is a Polish-born epidemiologist by training and is now the firm’s Vice Chairman. She will eventually succeed her stepfather.
Thordon Bearings Inc. designs and manufactures a complete range of non-polluting bearing and shaftline products for the global marine, clean power generation, pump, offshore and
industrial markets. Recognized internationally for superior performance in eliminating oil and grease from bearing applications, Thordon Bearings has a worldwide customer service network in over 100 countries.
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON September 9, 2011 – On Sunday, September 11, from 2 to 4 p.m., Sean Bray’s Peach Trio will kick off the third season of the popular Jazz at the Museum series at Halton Region Museum, located in Kelso Conservation Area in Milton.
“Take a break from the back to school hustle and enjoy the last days of summer with a performance at the Halton Region Museum by this talented trio,” said Halton Regional Chair Gary Carr, who probably won’t be on hand. The setting, which is inside an old barn is really quite nice and the music is as good as it gets in any Jazz Café in a large urban center. Somebody at the Region cam up with a good idea – take it in. I’ve been and will go again.
 The trio includes Sean Bray on guitar, Mark Dunn on bass, and David MacDougall on drums. A respected guitarist, composer and teacher, Sean Bray studied at the prestigious Manhattan School of Music in New York. He now teaches at The University of Guelph and has played with and/or recorded with George Garzone, Pat LaBarbera, Bob Mintzer, Jon Faddis, Liberty Silver, Matt “Guitar” Murphy from the Blues Brothers, Mike Murley and Vincent Wolfe. His compositions have been featured in films and television shows.
Mark Dunn has appeared in the Toronto Downtown Jazz Festival, Markham Jazz Festival, and performs regularly in Toronto area clubs as a sideman. Drummer David MacDougall keeps time through the trio’s songs that include an honest hybrid of instrumental Americana Roots with Jazz Improv sensibility.
 Accomplished Jazz guitarist Sean Bray will be at the Halton Regional Museum – worth the time and a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Limited tickets are available at the door for $20 per person and include light refreshments. The performance, a fund raiser for the Halton Museum Foundation, takes place in the Hearth Room in the Museum’s historic Alexander Barn from 2 to 4 p.m. Doors open at 1:30 p.m.
“We’re delighted to welcome Sean Bray’s Peach Trio as our first performer of the fall Jazz at the Museum concert series,” said Nancy Field, Manager, Heritage Services. “According to jazz guitarist John Abercrombie, listening to Sean Bray is a real treat, so join us for a lovely fall afternoon in the Hearth Room”.
To purchase tickets or for more information on the event, call 905-875-2200, ext. 27
The Halton Region Museum is located inside Kelso Conservation Area in Milton – the site that was originally settled in 1836 by Scottish immigrants. The Alexander family farmed the 200-acre property through four generations. Today, one of the Museum’s focal points is the Alexander Barn with additional buildings to be opened to the public over the coming year. The upper two floors of the historic building feature exhibits and artifacts that reflect Halton’s natural and cultural heritage. Two unique meeting and reception rooms located in the Barn are available for corporate or social events, group presentations and educational programs.
This first seasonal event is part of a program that runs through to December. Tickets are very reasonably priced $20. Call 905-875-2000 extension 27 to order. More details at https://www.halton.ca/cms/One.aspx?portalId=8310&pageId=44998
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By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON – September 1, 2011 With the campaign offices opening up and the official start of the campaign beginning on September 7th – well, the feathers are flying.
Respected Conservative blogger Russ Campbell posted a piece on what he thought of the McKenna nomination. (See Tim Hudak and Jane McKenna: I’ll hang onto my money and sit this one out.), in which he lamented the loss of a decent democratic process. He didn’t quite get away with his comments – an anonymous writer took exception to some of the Campbell statements but Campbell came right back and put that whipper-snapper in his place. Here is a taste of how that dialogue went.
 Some tough words are going to get thrown around during this election. Is Burlington going to change it’s political stripes from Blue to Red? Campbell said he felt the Burlington Progressive Conservative riding nomination process has been hijacked by PC headquarters in Toronto. “Such is the state of what passes for democracy in my riding”, he lamented.
“Following my article”, said Campbell, ” I’ve received two comments from an anonymous “PhilC” who has taken me to task over my disappointment that Jane McKenna was, apparently, the only PC candidate qualified to represent Burlington in the upcoming Oct. 6 Ontario general election. PhilC wrote:
“It is gotcha journalism like this that discourage Canadians from running for public office, which they have every right to.”
“PhilC then went on at great length to tell me Ms. McKenna is “a passionate community advocate,” among other things.
“In my essay, I expressed concern regarding Jane McKenna’s suitability to be a candidate. The relevant quote from my essay follows:
“As far as I could tell, McKenna had no previous political experience other than losing badly in the 2010 municipal election—she ran as a candidate for Ward 1 City Councillor against winner, Rick Craven, and placed a poor fifth out of five candidates. I was shocked for I thought that surely we PCs could do better than a candidate that could only garner 565 votes for a fifth place finish in the Ward 1 race.”
“To that, PhilC wrote, “Who cares what place you come in?”
“I wrote a comment of my own to answer PhilC, but decided to share the debate with others. So, here is a more complete response to PhilC.
“Of course we should care how McKenna placed in her only election. Did you miss the point that we PCs want to “win” the Burlington riding.
“As to your comment: “That’s why she won the nomination.” Nonsense. McKenna won nothing; she was acclaimed—there is a big difference.
“Your words: “Heagle and Papin, on their own accord dropped out because people started to support the better candidate.” Again nonsense. I know both of those candidates, and your claim is far from the truth, but I think you know that very well. According to Mr. Papin’s—a former president of the Burlington PC Riding Association—media release at the time of his withdrawal:
“I have been advised that my candidacy, at this time, does not fit the strategic direction of the party, and that it would be in the best interests of the party if I were to withdraw.”
“This sounds nothing like your claim he dropped out on his “own accord.” When you make such outlandish claims anonymously though they may have been made, you could at least offer a reliable source or two.
“And this silliness: “Even though everyone thinks this election is about Burlington and that’s all that should be discussed, it is really about Ontario.” Nonsense! Wherever did you get the idea that “everyone thinks this,” I don’t. I would remind you, however, that to win Ontario, we Burlington voters have first to win Burlington riding. Voting for a dud does nothing for the residents of Burlington.
“And finally: “Jane McKenna is by far the most qualified candidate for the job… .” Bollocks! Give a single scrap of evidence to support this outrageous claim.
“The purpose of a nomination meeting is for voters in a riding to select the person they want to represent them; not to rubber stamp some candidate selected for them by PC headquarters.”
Now that my friends is spirited debate – we need more of it and I am indebted to Russ Campbell for using the King’s English the way it was intended and the way Sir John A himself also expected us to use the language.
 Liberals accusing Tim Hudak of breaking a promise. He says he’s just “thinking” about a change. The Liberals weren’t prepared to devour their own the way the Progressive Conservatives are but they are certainly out there throwing big punches. The Mayor of Ottawa, speaking at the annual conference of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO) expressed concern that a Hudak government would not honour an agreement Ontario municipalities had with the government on the downloading of services that took place during the Harris reign. The agreement was to last through to 2018 and had a value of $1.5 billion placed on it.
Tim Hudak, leader of the Progressive Conservative opposition told the municipal politicians at the AMO conference that he would honour what had been done to date but he wasn’t as certain that he would honour the last half a billion. And that certainly put a fright up the skirts of the municipal people.
We can expect to see all kinds of accusations flung about and promises galore made – but don’t forget folks – this is YOUR money they are spending.
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BURLINGTON, ON September 14, 2011 It’s done. The city’s Community Services Committee approved an Engineering department recommendation to go with the bid submitted by Graham Infrastructure to complete the construction of the Brant Street Pier at a cost to the city of $6,429,700.
