December 19, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. Does a sole source contract fit in with the values of an organization like BurlingtonGreen? Would one not expect a higher degree of transparency from leaders with a strong moral ethic?
Should one expect to see a fully detailed financial statements of the funds BurlingtonGreen (BG) gets and has on hand? And should the public they ask to support them financially get a better look at their financial statements? How much of the BurlingtonGreen funding actually comes from dues paying citizens?
The city is negotiating a two-year sole provider contract with BurlingtonGreen bu the public knows nothing about the finances.
We expect our city Councillors to tell us how they spend the expense allowance they are given and to post the receipts on the city website – but we don’t call for BurlingtonGreen to do the same. Why not?
This issue came to the surface when, at a Standing Committee meeting, Councillor Craven was talking about the plans to add additional community gardens to the existing, and very successful Central Park operation one might add, run by Burlington Green.
The staff report being discussed has BurlingtonGreen as the sole provider for services that could reach $50,000 a year; Councilor Craven commented that he wasn’t all that comfortable with just the one provider being considered.
BurlingtonGreen is the strongest advocacy group in the city. They have put Burlington on the may environmentally.
A number of years ago BurlingtonGreen applied for a provincial grant to open a community garden that is now tucked in behind the Seniors’ Centre north of New Street. In order to get the grant BG needed the city with them as a partner. It took some fast footwork but BG eventually go the city to make the needed contribution as an in-kind offering – the city put in the fences and did the early prep work on the plot of land that has 29 individual garden sites that are rented out for $50 a year.
The city is committed to the idea of community gardens. It had to decide which of several delivery models it would use. The possibilities were: Community based operations; operations handled by a service provider and operations run and delivered by the city. The BG community garden program was designed to be a resource for other community groups that wanted to start a garden.
The official opening of the Central Park community garden. It was a pivotal point for BurlingtonGreen that wasn’t evident at the time.
The provincial grant covered the administration costs and an individual was hired to do the work. We don’t recall ever seeing a “public” call for someone to do the job. It was just given to the person that did all the work to get the grant. Were city hall to do something like that – there would be howls of derision – some of which would come from BurlingtonGreen.
BG has an Executive Director; a very competent individual. We assume this is a paid position but the public has no idea how much the Executive Director is paid. That figure should be a public number and the public should know as well the length of any contract in place.
We don’t have a problem with BurlingtonGreen as an organization. But we do have a problem with the level of transparency they have chosen to settle for.
We covered the BurlingtonGreen AGM recently. They had a very good speaker. We did not hear anyone talk about the financial affairs of the organization nor did we see any financial statements set out on the information table. We covered the previous AGM and was told later that the financial information was not public
There is a cardinal rule for organizations that accept as much as a dime in the way of public funding – the kimono is thrown wide open; the public gets to see everything. It’s called accountability.
The Central Park community garden has been so successful that the city decided to look for ways to do more of them. It developed several models to meet the different situations that were presented.
A group in the Francis Road part of the city wanted a garden but there was a problem getting access to the water needed. Rather than installing a municipal water source at a cost of between $25,000 and $30,000, the city is working with RealStar Property Management who have offered a water source for the community garden. The cost to design and construct the community garden will be $21,500.
In September 2013, ward 3 Councilor John Taylor provided Parks and Recreation staff with correspondence from residents, along with 64 signatures, requesting consideration for a community garden in Amherst Park. Preliminary discussion with the Taylor suggests the group doesn’t wish to form as an organization to administer and operate the garden.
It is becoming clear that there is an interest in community gardens and that the Community Development policy that includes leisure services has merit. Determining how best to actually deliver on the policy is where some thinking has to be done.
City staff along with significant input from BurlingtonGreen has resulted in three different models.
Michelle Bennett checking out a community group model garden in the east end of the city.
Community Group based: An identified group willing to deliver a community gardens leisure service as guided by the Community Development Policy. This model has the group handling the administration and operation of a Community Garden.
The group would work directly with city hall for any help they might need in getting started. There are groups within the city that have been around for some time and operating quite well. The city’s Community Development/Leisure Services Policy was designed to encourage additional groups to come forward and develop new gardens. The objective is to have community gardens in every ward in the city – at least in the urban parts of the city.
The Service Provider model is considered when there is an identified group or organization willing to deliver a community gardens leisure service as guided by the Leisure Services Policy. This approach would be considered when the local community just isn’t able to take on the administrative tasks, may not have the expertise or local leadership to get a project off the ground. At this point in time there is just the one service provider – BurlingtonGreen.
City Direct Operation is an approach used when there isn’t an identified group or service provider willing to deliver a community gardens leisure service as guided by the Community Development Policy or Leisure Services Policy.
This is a situation where the city finds itself in the business of delivering a service that can often best be done by others. It is not likely to be a service we will see much of, especially at a time when the city is looking at everything they do and asking the question: Is this a service we should be providing? The answer to the question will be heavily impacted by where the money to pay for the service is going to come from.
BurlingtonGreen has done much of the early stage work; were it not for their initiative in getting the provincial grant and convincing the city to work with them – there wouldn’t be much, if anything, in the way of a community harden program. That was the purpose of the provincial grant they were given. They developed an on-line registration process to receive gardener’s requests and conduct a lottery to award garden plots then manage the waiting lists. Many of those people became volunteers.
The city reports they did not receive any negative feedback from the 118 applications for the 29 plots that were available in the first year.
BG collected the fees and provided the city with revenues which was used to offset the cost of municipal water. They recruited and trained volunteers. In the first year: 41 adults and 7 children volunteered an estimated 274 hours of time to garden operations. They also pulled in approximately $3,690 was provided through gifts in kind and funding.
BurlingtonGreen provided day to day oversight of the Central Park community garden ensuring adherence to the user agreements and regulations. No reported incidents of conflict were reported, suggesting BG were effective in conflict resolution. They were the primary contact with gardeners handling day to day inquiries, conducted gardeners meetings and website updates. BG proved they could be successful in establishing effective communications with the gardeners.
As the moves forward with its Community Development/Leisure Services Policy the costs have to be considered. Working with the three models it has been estimated that the costs for various numbers of sites would break out as follows:
OptionsPresented
|
(2- sites)
|
(3-sites)
|
(4-sites)
|
(5-sites)
|
(6-sites)
|
Option 1-CommunityGroup Based
|
$3,410
|
$5,500
|
$6,800
|
$8,900
|
$10,200
|
Option 2-Service Provider
|
$31,610
|
$36,075
|
$40,175
|
$45,575
|
$49,425
|
Option 3-City Direct Operation
|
$17,660
|
$20,378
|
$22,306
|
$25,536
|
$26,967
|
BurlingtonGreen’s responsibility for the Central Park community garden concludes at the end of 2013. The current budget and capital impacts of continuing to administer, operate and build new community gardens will be part of the 2014 budget.
That pilot was a success, primarily attributed to the administrative efforts, oversight and program provided by BurlingtonGreen. In particular staff believes a presence on site made a significant contribution to the success.
Considering the options in the context of the Community Development/Leisure Services Policies, the following were considered in providing the recommendation:
A group is currently not identified to operate the Central Park garden as a Community Based model
The Warwick-Surrey Community organization have indicated they don’t have the capacity to operate the proposed Francis Road garden under the Community Based model
There is a service provider (BurlingtonGreen) that is interested in providing the service of community gardens
The BurlingtonGreen proposal includes program elements that may not be considered necessary to administer and operate the community garden
There is merit in negotiating the scope of the tasks and costs of working under the Service Provider model with BurlingtonGreen to meet the city’s requirements
The city now wants to consider BurlingtonGreen as a sole source provider within the Strategic Alliances Policy that is in place to establish, maintain, or enhance partnerships with external agencies to ensure a cooperative approach to service delivery.
Does the city want to continue with this model?
City staff recommended the Service Provider model for administering and operating the existing and future Francis Road community gardens for the next two years. They did so for the following reasons: The model is consistent with Community Development/Leisure Services policy; it provides oversight that limits staff requirements along with guidance and customer service. Staff was confident that an appropriate scope of tasks and costs could be negotiated with BurlingtonGreen and that any agreement provides an opportunity to work with other groups who might want to operate under the community based model
The recommendation had BurlingtonGreen as a single source provider, which is where Councilor Craven voiced his concern. Right now BurlingtonGreen is the only known group that can provide the service the city is looking for and so city staff asked that Council authorize the Director of Parks & Recreation, Manager of Purchasing and City Solicitor to negotiate and sign a sole source agreement with BurlingtonGreen to provide a service to administer and operate city community gardens for the 2014 and 2015 seasons with an option to extend the term of BurlingtonGreen’s services.
If acceptable terms cannot be reached with BurlingtonGreen, staff will request Council authorize them to administer and operate the Central Park and Francis Road community gardens for 2014 and 2015 season, through the City Direct Operation model for the 2014 and 2015 current budgets.
This allows staff to operate the existing garden and undertake the process of Community Development to increase the opportunity of community groups coming forward to operate community gardens. If community interest is not evident, Parks and Recreation will conduct a Request for expressions of interest to provide the service of community gardens for the 2016 season.
The Central Park community garden was a success because of the site oversight of BurlingtonGreen. It is now clear that an organization with the experience and commitment to community gardens is needed. What is also needed is an organization with a commitment to transparency. BurlingtonGreen has yet to show that kind of a commitment.
Background:
The seed of an idea is planted.
Community garden opens.
December 18. 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. Been awhile since we’ve heard anything on the pier. Like children – when there is no noise you want to look in on them.
That mediation many thought was going to take place in January is not likely to take place for a number of months. Why?
It was a great day in the history of the city. The official opening of the Brant Street Pier – now the problems its construction created have to be cleaned up. Looks like a Court room is the only place we can get this done.
Well turns out some “realizations” have brought about a shift in the thinking of several of the players in this rather expensive game. You’ve heard the phrase – “there is an elephant in the room” – those involved in the pier litigation are realizing that the contractor was not the problem.
And the company that is the problem has recently realized they have a problem on their hands and they didn’t have their homework done and now they need time to dig through the mounds of paper and be ready for a trial.
Mediation is a step that must be taken before a trial can take place. There is at least one player in the game that doesn’t see mediation as a solution to the grief they have had to go through – so mediation, when it does take place, might be very short.
We actually built the pier twice. First time it was built a crane toppled over ad revealed problems with the steel being used – it was all taken out. They ordered new steel and built it again. Now all the parties squabble over who is going to pay for the mistakes.
Getting trial dates set with so many companies involved is never easy. Having a trial start in the middle of the summer would certainly tighten up things in the municipal election.
What is clear is this: there is a bit of a mess to clean up. Under normal circumstances this would come under the normal day-to-day business of a municipal government but the pier became such a defining issue that took on a life of its own.
It became part of the agenda for three different mayors; each handled it quite differently. For Mayor MacIsaac it was part of a dream that he left in decent shape as he turned over the chain of office. For Mayor Jackson it was a problem he had hoped to ride all the way to the top – until the crane accident took place. Then it became an issue that gave a freshman candidate an issue to get elected on. It wasn’t the pier and its problems that cost Jackson the election.
That young man will return to the pier for many years to see his hand print. At some point he will read about and understand how convoluted an exercise it was to get that pier built.
The Goldring administration thought their task was to clean up the mess and get the pier opened but along the way they missed several opportunities to keep the city out of a court room. Those failures, when combined with the city’s significant and serious financial problems, are like chickens coming home to roost. And coming home during an election year isn’t the kind of good news story people running for office like to tell.
Some distraction might take place in the Spring should the provincial government decide they need to get a majority and Kathleen Wynne decides to ask the Lieutenant Governor to call an election.
Much of January will be taken up with budget deliberations. The 10% increase over the four-year term that Mayor Goldring tied himself to will weigh him down a bit – it will be interesting to see what this Council decides it is prepared to give up.
Once the budget for the next year is cast – the election race will take on energy of its own. And that is just about the time that the whole story behind the pier might come to the surface.
Background:
Pier legal problems always discussed behind closed doors.
Pier gets a soft opening.
New steel girders begin to arrive – progress.
New pier tender opening delayed.
December 19, 2013
By Ray Rivers
BURLINGTON, ON. First it was the milk man and now it’s the letter carrier. The post office is losing money, again, and will be shedding eight thousand letter carriers as it brings an end to an era of time-honoured service. Losing money is not a novelty for Canada Post Office. This organization, originally created as a government department at the time of Confederation, last spent 32 years in the red (1957 to 1989) only to get out of that hole by lifting the price of stamps. And I presume it hopes that strategy will work again this time.
I examined alternate-day mail delivery while at Canada Post back in the seventies and discovered that cutting delivery in-half wouldn’t automatically cut labour costs in-half. Even worse, valuable customers like Time Magazine might have been lost with such a radical service change. I suspect the current postal management will experience some of that. For example, installing and servicing group boxes in built-up areas may end up being more costly than originally imagined by the bean counters at Canada Post. And watch the movement to e-mail accelerate.
Another study, I reviewed, demonstrated the potential cost-effectiveness of Canada Post installing facsimile machines in every Canadian household, as an alternative to letter mail. This was before Al Gore had been credited with inventing the internet. Isn’t that what is happening now? I already receive and pay most of my bills via the internet, and next year my Christmas cards will all be electronic. Mailing is becoming too expensive.
A picture is worth a thousand words.
Isn’t Canada Post heading in the wrong direction? Buy anything on the internet and it’s delivered to your door pronto, sometimes by the Canada Post owned Purolator. There will always be a demand for to-the-door delivery; for the junk-mail distributors, political pamphlets and for all those on-line purchases. Perhaps their strategy is to make letter mail so pricey and unattractive that you decide to choose their premium Express Post service rather than lick a stamp. It’s called up-selling.
There was a time when a penny got the letter mailed. Today – $1.
But Business 101 tells us that increasing your price while simultaneously reducing the quality of service is a mug’s game. Only a mad man would do this, unless he/she wanted to go out of business. If that is Mr. Harper’s strategy, then why not just privatize mail delivery while there is still market share and value, as other nations have done and some pundits are demanding?
It’s hard not to be suspicious that something else is in the soup, as we hear more and more about how pensions are imperiling the profitability of Canada Post. That seems to be the flavour of the month for a government that has no truck with enhancing the nation’s pensions. The federal finance minister just shut the door on expanding the miserly Canada Pension Plan (CPP), at a meeting this week with his provincial counterparts.
Better pensions – for everyone?
He called it a payroll tax and mumbled something about not wanting to raise taxes. But he is only partly right since half of the CPP contribution is paid by the employee, as a kind of forced saving in order to be able retire with dignity. You see Flaherty knows that we either consume stuff or we save our money. And this government wants us to spend more on consumption in the run up to the 2015 election, so his GDP numbers will look healthy as we go to the polls. Retirement issues are too far off in the future for a government determined to win a second majority mandate, and complete it’s transformation of Canada from that liberal society Mr. Harper inherited
Flaherty either doesn’t know or doesn’t care that two-thirds of Canadians don’t have a workplace pension scheme, and a third of Canadians have no savings at all. Today’s CPP is a light-age away from what it was originally intended to be. At about $12,000 a year it is pathetic. Yet, for the first time in over a decade Canadians have started saving more of their own money, so wouldn’t this be the perfect time for an expanded CPP program to lock in those savings?
Finance Minister Flaherty – the man with the answers.
The irony is that instead of enhancing CPP so people can live on their savings, the Harper government would prefer that the federal government keep on handing out Old Age Security (OAS) payments. OAS is a kind-of senior’s welfare program – where the working generation subsidizes those retired. How could that make any sense to a government that claims to be big on fiscal responsibility? Why would saving so you can live off your own money, instead of the government’s, be anathema for a government that believes in personal responsibility? It makes no sense.
Chopping 8000 letter carriers as early as possible will save the mismanaged Post Office pension scheme some money, no doubt. And Deepak Chopra, the CEO of the Crown Corporation. is also asking postal employees to allow him to cut their pension entitlements. But I have to ask why Mr Chopra, a passionate, modern executive with a very impressive biography, doesn’t offer to lead by example. For that matter, what about the minister responsible for the Post Office, Lisa Raitt , Mr. Flaherty or Mr. Harper. Why don’t they offer to cut their gold-plated pensions if they really feel public sector pensions are too generous.
Background:
Canada Post Changes History of Canada Post Privatization Privatization 2 Privatization 3 Pensions CEO Canada Post
Ray Rivers writes weekly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking. Rivers was a candidate for provincial office in Burlington where he ran against Cam Jackson in 1995, the year Mike Harris and the Common Sense Revolution swept the province. He developed the current policy process for the Ontario Liberal Party. While employed as a civil servant Rivers worked at Canada Post.
December 16, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The provincial government has been popping out media releases faster than most rabbits give birth to little bunnies. The latest has some interesting potential for the small but growing Farmers’ Market that operates during the warm weather on John Street just in behind Centro.
Imagine – maybe a couple of Ontario wine tasting tables set out at the Downtown Farmer’s Market. Province says it could happen.
The province wants to make it easier for consumers to choose Vintners Quality Alliance (VQA) Ontario wine by expanding the LCBO’s new “Our Wine Country” destination boutiques and allowing VQA wines to be sold at farmers’ markets through the renewed Wine and Grape Strategy.
I’m certainly on for easier access to provincially grown grapes and I really like the idea of a couple of those wine tasting stations being set up at an outdoor market.
Is that man on the right about to become the chief sommelier at the Downtown Farmer’s Market next Spring. That would be an achievement.
The province is throwing $75 million at a Wine and Grape Strategy to help the sector grow. That chunk of change is spread out over five years. There is going to be a Wine Secretariat to be a one window point for discussions between the province and industry and identifying ways to reduce red tape to help make grape growers and wineries more competitive.
The winery’s would certainly like the LCBO to be at that window and make their lives a little easier.
Ontario has significant winery developments in the Niagara Peninsula, Prince Edward County and Lake Erie North Shore.
Ontario’s wine and grape industry contributed an estimated $3.3 billion to the province’s economy in 2011.
Background
Chef’s battle it out at Farmer’s Market.
Farmer’s Market move to a Sunday schedule.
December 16, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. Hydro, the guys that keep the lights on and send you a bill every second month that never gets smaller – unless you are in Florida for the winter, wants to “find some efficiencies” and get more out the company’s assets.
Burlington Hydro has one shareholder – YOU; the company is a wholly owned subsidiary of the city of Burlington and pays the city dividends on a regular basis. There are times when Hydro looks like either a rich uncle the city begs money from or a piggy bank that gets raided frequently.
The City of Burlington and Burlington Hydro Electric Inc., jointly announced the appointment of Archie Bennett as director and chair of the Burlington Hydro Electric Board following the resignation of Charles Keizer.
Charles Keizer leaves Hydro board to consult for the organization.
Keizer, a partner and co-head of Torys’ Infrastructure and Energy Practice, (Torys is a leading Ontario law firm with probably the bluest pedigree in the province) resigned as Burlington Hydro Electric Board Chair to provide legal services to Burlington Electricity Services Inc. and BHEI in partnership with the City of Burlington.
“As lead counsel on a number of generation and transmission projects, Keizer has provided solid strategic advice and has a strong understanding of project development,” said City Manager Jeff Fielding. “On behalf of the city, BESI and Burlington Hydro Electric, Charles will lead the charge in finding efficiencies and cost-saving opportunities that will help benefit ratepayers and taxpayers.”
Keizer brings considerable depth in hydro transmission and grid operations to his new consulting assignment. It should be interesting to see what he comes up with.
Keizer had to resign from the Hydro Board if he was going to provide services for which he will be paid. In the energy business payment for services is very healthy.
In addition to Bennett, a former BHEI board director and chair, the BHEI board also includes Darla Youldon, a former executive at John Deere & Co.; City Manager Jeff Fielding; Phil Nanavati, vice-president at FENGATE Capital Management; Don Dalicandro, CEO of Azertech Inc.; John Maheu, Association of Ontario Road Supervisors; and Burlington Mayor Rick Goldring.
“We’re very pleased that Charles Keizer will put his extensive industry experience into play as he undertakes the task to assess potential service delivery opportunities between the City of Burlington and Burlington Hydro Electric,” said Gerry Smallegange, President and CEO of BHEI. “In the interim, and until further notice, Archie Bennett has agreed to step in as chair of the company, providing his very capable and experienced leadership on the BHEI board.”
Bennett returns to an old stomping ground after retiring in 2007 completing a 45-year career in senior management, engineering and construction including leading the Burlington-based Zeton group of companies since 1989 to become the global leader in its field. He continues to serve on the parent and Dutch subsidiary boards of Zeton, and provides consulting services on management matters.
Bennett has the look of a place holder until Burlington Hydro has a sense as to what Keizer suggests the corporation can ger into to dig out those “efficiencies”.
Can Hydro be more than an energy transmission company. They should have kept the fibre optic network they once owned.
City manager Jeff Fielding has always believed that Hydro can and should play a bigger role in the financial evolution of the city; he has cast a covetous eye on the head office Hydro property on Brant street and wondered aloud if the city could not get more out of that asset.
Burlington is beginning to realize that we have a city manager who while good on the administrative side happens to be very good on the thinking side and has in the short time he has been at city hall managed to completely shake up the way the city puts together its budget and has everyone in every department taking a much closer look at the service they deliver. He is asking them to ask themselves: Is this a service the city should be delivering? This is radical within the municipal sector.
Fielding has permission from city council to explore the idea of “enterprise corporations” that will be like Burlington Hydro, stand alone, wholly owned subsidiaries that have the potential to generate revenue and perhaps even find a cheaper way to deliver services.
Hydro has been paying the city significant dividends over the years. That spike is the year the fibre optic network was sold.
Fielding knows better than anyone, except for Joan Ford who knows every number in every account of the city budget, how desperate the city’s Industrial, Commercial and Institutional (ICI) tax revenue situation is. The Economic Development Corporation has done such a terrible job of both attracting new companies to the city and positioning the city as a place corporations want to locate.
Jeff Fielding – proving to be a very strong conceptual thinker as well as a decent administrator.
The ICI side of the tax revenue stream for 2013 is going to be a negative number when measured against 2012 – and things right now don’t look a lot better for 2015. If the funds don’t come from the ICI side then they have to come from the residential side or spending has to be cut. In an election year? Financially the city is not in a healthy situation even thought our reserves are in very good shape.
Given a five or six snow storms like the one late last week and we just might have to dip into the snow removal reserves.
The Burlington Hydro announcements are good news in that they show some movement. Task now is to see which direction they actually move in. Hydro is one of those fat calves with all kinds of revenue and not a lot in the way of transparency.
December 16, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The city is having a little difficulty attracting some of those new high-tech, high paying jobs. The arts community has found a way to help – they are going to move a theatrical production along the QEW from Oakville to Burlington and bring a truck load of Leading Ladies to the city
The Burl-Oak Theatre Group (BOTG), which is presenting Leading Ladies by Ken Ludwig, at the Burlington Performing Arts Centre on Thursday, January 23 and Friday, 24 – show time for both days is 8:00 pm.
Fun, light hearted comedy – great way to start the New Year.
This is a new venture for BOTG, they tended to like the climate in Oakville but the digs at the Performing Arts Centre were just too good to pass up. Now of course they need to sell tickets for each performance.
Jim Clemens, who usually spends his spare time on Heritage matters explains this production as a “hilarious comedy, in which we meet an elderly lady on her deathbed who is looking for two relatives, Max and Steve, whom she has not seen since they were children. She plans to bestow her fortune upon them, to be shared with her one remaining niece, Meg.”
Clemens goes on to explain: “Enter Jack and Leo, two down-on-their-luck Shakespearian actors who plot to pose as the missing nephews and arrive in time to claim their inheritance.”
For the rest of the story – you need a ticket and Clemens has come up with an angle that he believes can’t miss. He wants to see a full house and explains that BOTG has a special Yuletide ticket price for their friends and colleagues. You can purchase any number of tickets to Leading Ladies at $18.00 each directly from Clemens who will look after the box office hassles.
Here is how it works. Jim Clemens has figured out a way to let his vast circle of friends in on a bit of a deal. There is a group discount available. Clemens had a brain storm and came up with the idea of forming a group, buying the tickets for that group and giving them all the benefit of the group discount. Jim’s price is $18 per ticket. The Box Office price is $25 – the difference will get you a decent glass of wine at the theatre which will put you in just the frame of mind you want to be in to fully enjoy a lark of a play.
You have to let Clemens know that you want in. Email him by December 30, 2013, Email Me and tell him which date you wish to attend and the number of tickets you wish to purchase. He will order the tickets and send you an e-mail confirming the order.
You have to pay Clemens – make your cheques payable to Jim Clemens, and not the Burl-Oak Theatre Group or the Burlington Performing Arts Centre. Mail cheques to 1296 Knights Bridge Court, Burlington, or pay either Miki or Jim when you see either of them. Clemens adds that he knows where his vast circle of friends lives and doesn’t expect to have any problems collecting.
BOTG has taken a huge leap of faith in the Burlington market. They have arranged for billboard ad signs in four locations in Burlington in the next few weeks along with a mail drop to selected postal code locations around town.
Jim Clemens has a deal for his vast circle of friends – take him up on the offer and use the money he saves you for a decent glass of wine at the Performing Arts Centre to watch the Leading Ladies.
Clemens has found the new administration at the Performing Arts Centre to be more than accommodating. A number of months ago there was to be a BOTG production mounted in Burlington that just couldn’t get off the ground. Brian McCurdy, Executive Director at the Performing Arts Centre, used his experience and understanding of the problems small theatre groups have and found a work around some of the problems the group was having and for them into the Centre for the January dates.
We are seeing much more community use of the Performing Arts Centre. A church group is going to be holding a Christmas Eve Candle Light service in the Main theatre, in January Tony Bewick is going to produce the first Poetry Slam to be held at the Centre and now the news that the Leading Ladies are going to be on stage as well.
One of the complaints many people had, was that the Centre was not catering to the local needs – that all we were seeing was groups who were passing through the city, and while Roseanne Cash was nice, the public thought there would be more local material. We appear to be seeing that change – refreshing.
Keith Strong had his guiding hand behind much of the Magic Moments event that added to the Halton Heros fund.
The re-establishing of relationships between the Centre and some of the people who did that “in the trenches work’ when the place was not much more than an idea are coming along just fine. Keith Strong, who was a major player in getting many of the early donation cheques in, has had a chance to meet with Brian McCurdy; those two should get along very well. The Mayor, city manager, Strong and McCurdy had a meet which we are told went very well.
While Strong doesn’t always get it right – when he does – it is both right and strong. The kind of guy the Performing Arts Centre wants on its side.
The BOTG appears to be going all out on this their first event at the Performing Arts Centre; like every smart marketer – there is a clip on YouTube. Go for it.
December 16, 2013
By Staff
BURLINGTON, ON. The city’s promise to its citizens is to have the roads cleared within 24 hours AFTER the end of a snow storm which, according to the Roads and Parks Maintenance people, the target is to have all roads cleared by 3:00 am tomorrow (Monday) for this storm. We currently have the following equipment deployed, with each section consisting of a mix of City and contractor units:
One of 46 road units that cleared city streets
– 46 road units
– 14 sidewalk units
– 5 smaller specialized units.
December 15, 2013
By Staff
CATCH (Citizens at City Hall) is a citizens organization in Hamilton that documents Hamilton city council meetings. The organization has a strong environmental bent to it and has watched the Enbridge Line # 9 and the National Energy Board proceedings which are relevant to Burlington because Line #9 runs right through the city just north of Side Road #1. This report is from CATCH – we pass it along because of its relevance.
BURLINGTON, ON. Controversy continues to swirl around both the National Energy Board and Enbridge Inc’s Line 9 proposals that the NEB is expected to rule on in January. Revelations this week include a large Line 9 spill that the company failed to report to the affected municipality and evidence that an association representing Enbridge and other energy corporations virtually dictated federal changes to the NEB that restricted public input into the regulator’s decision-making process. Those changes were among problems cited last month by “Ontario’s voice on public policy” in a remarkably frank discussion of the pluses and minuses – mostly the latter – of the effect of tar sands pipeline proposals on Canada’s largest province.
The Mowat Centre was set up at the University of Toronto five years ago by the Ontario government. Its pipeline review co-authored by founder and director Matthew Mendelsohn points to severe climatic impacts, safety concerns, damage to the manufacturing sector and the minimal economic benefits of oil sands expansion as reasons for the province to demand a different approach by Alberta and the federal government.
One of the pipeline station control points is located on Walkers Line. Thousands drive by it every month.
While noting Ontario’s support for “Alberta’s continued prosperity” and inclination to therefore support pipelines, the Mowat review points to “legitimate concerns regarding environmental safety” that are “real and should be treated as such”. It also contends that “new oil pipeline infrastructure is only needed if expansion in the oil sands is envisioned” which it says is completely undermining efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“For nearly a decade, Ontario has confronted a federal government that refuses to recognize the contribution that Ontarians are making to reducing emissions while allowing the emissions from the oil sands to continue increasing unabated. So long as the federal government – and the government of Alberta – support a climate change policy that asks Ontarians – and other Canadians – to carry the largest burden and pay the biggest financial cost for reducing emissions, there are good reasons for Ontario to oppose pipeline development that will only exacerbate climate change.”
The review is equally blunt about the direct economic impact of tar sands expansion where “almost all of the economic benefits flow to Alberta” – 94% by some estimates” while Ontario industry pays a steep price in lost exports and jobs.
“There is a wide consensus that developments in Canada’s resource sector, particularly in oil and gas, have contributed to a rapid escalation in Canadian exchange rates, and that these have had a negative impact on the Ontario manufacturing sector.”
The Mowat Centre also believes “unreasonable restrictions on public input” to the NEB “do not serve the interests of Ontarians.” New restrictions imposed by the Harper government last year required individuals and groups concerned about Line 9 to fill out an application form to get permission to even send a letter to the NEB.
Those changes and similar ones introduced to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act “were taken directly from an August 2012 oil industry report” according to an analysis completed by Forest Ethics Advocacy Association.
“The energy industry told the government what to do, and the government did it. It’s as simple as that,” says their chair Clayton Ruby in a media release from the organization. The group’s spokesperson Tzeporah Berman charges that “Enbridge and the industry lobbied aggressively to get these rules put in place because they don’t want Canadians getting in the way of their profits.”
The City of Hamilton was one of 175 organizations and individuals that applied to submit comments to this fall’s NEB hearings on Line 9, and like other Ontario municipalities it particularly pushed Enbridge to provide much more information to local emergency response personnel. Revelations this week at provincial hearings underway in Quebec indicate municipalities have reason to worry about the company’s transparency.
Few people in Burlington are even aware that one of the most controversial National Energy Board hearings concerns a pipeline that runs through the northern part of our city.
The city of Terrebonne has only now learned about a 4000-litre spill from Line 9 that took place within its municipal boundaries more than two years ago. It was reported to federal and provincial authorities but not to the municipality.
“We are of the opinion that a 4,000-litre oil spill, even if it was contained within your facilities, is not an insignificant event,” Terrebonne’s director general, Denis Lévesque, wrote in a letter sent to Enbridge last week. “In our opinion, a spill like that should have been officially reported by Enbridge to our municipal services, all the more at this time when citizens are rightly concerned about ecological risks associated with oil transportation.”
And while Enbridge continues to promise that the Line 9 changes are not to facilitate export of tar sands bitumen, there are more indications to the contrary in Portland, Maine – the ocean export port that Enbridge identified in its 2008 Trailbreaker plan. In the latest developments, the American Petroleum Institute is threatening to sue Portland’s municipal council if it imposes a moratorium on “development proposals involving the loading of unrefined oil sands onto marine tank vessels docking in South Portland.”
The council move responds to a citizens’ ballot initiative that was narrowly defeated in Portland’s elections last month. It sought to block plans by the Portland to Montreal Pipeline Company to bring Canadian bitumen to the port.
Background:
Ontario’s voice on public policy” in a remarkably frank discussion.
The energy industry told the government what to do, and the government did it.
Enbridge donates $7500 to Burlington fire department.
December 15, 2015
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The city got the main roads cleared – those trucks roared by our front door – and they were not doing the posted 40 kph. We heard them going by throughout the night.
They call it quality time.
This isn’t a city worker – this is a neighbour being a good neighbour.
The city doesn’t give all that much information on its website – just that they are out there.
A copy of the map showing the order in which streets get cleared in set out below.
The Mrs. get to put her vehicle in the garage.
This morning the part of our driveway that didn’t get done before I called it a day, had a little schnapps to ease the aching bones, had been done by my neighbor. Thanks Rob – there’s a 12 pack on the way to you – just as soon as I can get the snow off the car and drive the thing.
Meanwhile people are out on the street with their own equipment doing what you do in the suburbs when there is a heavy snowfall.
December 14, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The snow plow roared by our driveway – it looks like it is going to need another touch from the new snow shovel my wife bought. I have to add that she was the one who tested the shovel.
The city has a full fleet out clearing primary roads, parking lots and walkways and adding extra buses to meet public transit needs.
They move at quite a clip – full fleet of city trucks is out this evening.
As of 4 p.m. today, all facilities remain open, except for Rotary Centennial Pond. The outdoor ice skating surface in Spencer Smith Park is snow-covered and subject to high winds. It will reopen on Sunday.
The city has received about 20 centimetres of snow as of 3 p.m. today, with another seven to 10 centimetres predicted by early tomorrow.
Updates on snow clearing are posted three times daily on the city’s website at 9 a.m., 4 p.m. and 11 p.m. during winter control operations.
Burlington Transit has added extra buses and maintenance staff to keep buses on schedule. Nice little bit of overtime for the boys at transit.
Birds aren’t going to be out much today.
“City staff has been working hard around the clock since yesterday to make travel safe in Burlington,” said Cathy Robertson, director of roads and parks maintenance. “While the storm continues, most of our resources are focused on clearing primary and secondary roads. Please be patient if your road has not been reached. The city aims to have all roads plowed within 24 hours following the end of a storm.”
The city asks residents to:
Drive safely, if you must drive
Avoid shoveling snow from driveways onto the roads
Clear fire hydrants near your home
Keep parked vehicles off the roadways so snow plows can get through
The Gazette learned earlier in the day that the library was closing for the afternoon. We passed that information along to the city’s media people. If you’re aware of anything else you think they should know – send the information our way and we will get it to them.
In an earlier edition of the paper we incorrectly named the PSW’s. Our apologies.
December 14, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. During the several debates at city council last week mention was made frequently of the difficulties Personal Support Workers had in getting to some of their clients in the east end of Lakeshore Road during the Chilly Half Marathon race that takes place in March of each year with some 4000+ runners on the road.
The Personal Support Workers (PSW’s) work to very, very tight schedules. If you have a 10:30 appointment it takes place at 10:30 – there is next to no wiggle room in their schedules. The problems the Personal Support Workers run into were brought up by a number of the delegations that didn’t want the race run on the route it is run on.
Personal Service Workers strike for decent wages.
Turns out that getting to their clients isn’t the only problem the Personal Support Workers have – they want a decent wage as well and have walked of the job effective Friday.
According to their union the 4,500 personal support workers walked off the job yesterday to support their demands for justice and a living wage.
“These workers are tired of being pushed around and taken for granted,” said Sharleen Stewart, president of SEIU Healthcare. “They are paid poverty-level wages of $15 an hour and are expected to pay for gas out-of-pocket when they drive long distances to make home visits.”
Ontario’s Minister of Health spent a day with a PSW worker to see first hand what they do – so the government knows that the issues are.
In the last two years PSW earnings have been reduced by about 7% as a result of a wage freeze combined with inflation and a massive increase in the price of gas.
The Canadian Reed Cross created a new home care agency and merged that operation with Care Partners in 2012.
“We estimate 50 cents of every dollar given to Red Cross ($143 million this year) is skimmed off for bureaucracy, excessive executive pay and profit. Where is the accountability in this system for delivering quality care to seniors and vulnerable clients?”
Last year the CEO of the Red Cross Society was given a 9% pay increase, bringing his salary to $297 thousand, which is 11 times the average salary of a PSW.
A couple of dozen PSW’s were out on the street on one of the coldest days of the year. A hundred or so people in Burlington who needed care on Friday just didn’t get it.
December 14, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The Halton Regional Police Services board has released the Draft of the 2014-2020. The Police Service, in cooperation with the Police Services Board is in the process of undertaking a review of its goals and objectives for the next three years. These goals are important as they guide the service in the delivery of services that are vital in maintaining the safety of the residents of Halton.
The the public are encouraged to have a say on what they feel is important by contacting Keith Moore, Senior Planner at 905-825-4747 ext. 4830 or by email at Keith.Moore@haltonpolice.ca
The material is organized into four themes with a series of points listed under each theme. Unfortunately, there is no comment on any of the points. The draft consists of a list of things the police plan to do during the next four years.
Community safety, Outreach and collaboration, Organizational capacity and Organizational excellence
Under Community Safety the Board lists:
Identity theft and bank scams are a continuing public threat. HAlton Regional Police have led a number of successful multi-jurisdictional investigations.
Ensure that Halton maintains the lowest overall crime rate and Crime Severity Index of any comparable-sized community in Canada.
Deter criminal activity— strengthen crime prevention, community policing and safety initiatives – and relentlessly pursue criminals.
Improve crime clearance rates.
Focus on key areas of concern to the community; traffic safety and enforcement, growth in illegal drug activity, gangs and organized crime,assaults and sexual assaults, domestic violence, youth and young adult crime, victimization of seniors/youth/children, technology-based crimes (e.g. Cyber-bullying; internet financial crimes and fraud). , monitoring and tracking of offenders, hate crimes and human trafficking.
Engage and mobilize the community to collaboratively share responsibility for keeping our region safe.
Establish and practice leading-edge emergency preparedness measures, including ongoing business continuity during emergencies and special events.
Under Outreach and Collaboration the board lists:
The police are out at hundreds of community events.
Build public awareness of and trust/confidence in the Halton Regional Police Service and policing in general.
Educate the public about safety and security issues through an inclusive approach that respects the diverse composition of our community.
Reduce the fear of crime — help those who live, work and play in Halton to feel even safer.
Define and clearly communicate the areas for which the Halton Regional Police Service is responsible.
Strengthen communication and community dialogue (e.g. using social and other media).
Collaborate with our communities in the prevention and solving of crime – and contribute to overall safety and wellbeing.
Strengthen relationships with youth and diverse communities to establish a solid foundation leading to improved understanding of policing, recruitment opportunities and other policing initiatives.
Continue to strengthen working relationships and information exchange with other law enforcement agencies.
Under Organizational Capacity the Board lists:
There are community police stations throughout the Region. Police appear to want a new headquarters building as well.
Ensure that police resources and funding responsibly address operational requirements and changing demographics.
Enhance the use of police analytics to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the organization.
Be the leaders in the application of new technologies and maximize innovation, responsiveness, outreach and service delivery.
Ensure that all employees are well-trained and well equipped in accordance with provincial requirements and in areas of emerging concern — and that support of the front line remains paramount.
Strengthen police ability to effectively address situations of elevated risk (e.g. mental health-related incidents).
Embrace human resource best practices and customize them in support of: employee recruitment/retention, diversity, career development, succession planning, performance management, and positive labour relations.
Strengthen employee understanding of the Halton Regional Police Service and its initiatives, and secure support for future strategic directions.
Ensure that police facilities adequately meet current and future needs.
Under Organizational Excellence the Board lists:
Do the police deliver the service the public needs? The RIDE program is a proven service.
Ensure that the Halton Regional Police Service demonstrates the highest levels of ethical and professional standards.
Strengthen service delivery and positive interactions with the community.
Ensure that our Police Service is an employer of choice for both uniform and civilian positions.
Strengthen employee motivation and engagement — foster a sense of employee pride and high job satisfaction, and a belief in the value of individual contribution.
Ensure that our police service culture emphasizes respect, responsibility, accountability,relationships and results.
Meet or exceed all current and future provincially mandated police service requirements.
Be the leader in identifying and implementing innovative policing practice
What is the Police Services Board telling us? Is this list a collection of clichés and self-serving statements? Is the Board, which oversees policing in the Region, calling the people who police the community to account?
Government services employ people to communicate with the public. Major corporations have public relations departments that are in place to tell their story to the public. These are companies that are in business – they are there for the most part to make a profit for their shareholders which are often large pension groups.
Public services are considerably different. They are in place to SERVE the public and to seek the advice of the public they serve.
This DRAFT plan for the next three years is the first step in the process of making their plans public.
Let us see how the public reacts to the document.
The following data for the fiscal year 2011 puts who the police serve and what the public pays for that service into perspective.
There are 178,232 households in the Region
The police budget for 2011 amounted to $116.4 million.
There were 629 men and women in uniform .
There were 282 civilian people working for the police service.
Calls to the police for service amounted to: (2009): 124,503; (2010): 129,971; (2011): 128,202.
The annual cost to each person in the Region for the police service we get amounted to: (2009): $224.66;(2010): $225.83 and (2011): $236.08
December 13, 2013,
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The Region had issued a cold weather alert but that didn’t seem to deter the small crowd that showed up to stand underneath a railway grade separation and watch ward 1 council member Rick Craven wave his hands and shout: “Yeah, we did it”.
This is a view that thousands of drivers are going to enjoy from this moment forward – no more waiting for the rail barrier to go up and the flashing lights to go off. Waiting for the trains to go by is a thing of the past on King Road.
And did it they most certainly did. It was last Thanksgiving when after 96 straight hours of work, and the removal of nearly 800 trucks of fill, this five million pound concrete tunnel we are standing under was hydraulically pushed into place while freight trains rumbled overhead throughout that weekend.
Mayor Goldring cranks the siren on the antique fire engine that was the first vehicle to drive the the King Road grade separation. In the rear waving to the crowd is Councillor Craven pleased as punch with the completion of a project he has championed ever since he got himself elected.
Once the structure was in place construction crews started building the aqueduct that allows Indian Creek to flow over the realigned road. That aqueduct was about twenty feet above those of us standing in the cold weather.
When the aqueduct work was done construction crews were able to start the road and then asphalt n was laid down. There is still some sidewalk work to be done but today you can peddle a bicycle underneath multiple sets of railway tracks on what was described as the busiest railway line in the country.
No more waiting for the flashing red lights to stop and for the traffic barrier to rise on King Road – it’s now non-stop from Plains Road up to the North Service Road.
Scott Stewart, General Manager for Development and Infrastructure paid a compliment to what he called “our funding partner” CN – “this project would not have been possible without your commitment.”
How cold was it? Cold enough for the pastries on the reception to freeze. The significance of this picture is the large concrete piece at the top to the rear. That is the aqueduct that was built to allow fish to swim over the road that was built. Sound fishy? Next to the aqueduct is the bridging that carries the train tracks.
It wasn’t a commitment willingly made by the railway – the city had to take CN to the Transportation Safety Board to get the funds needed to build the grade separation. Perhaps that is why the railway people had the crossing bells ringing throughout much of the ceremony.
For the most part these events are photo ops for the politicians but this event was a milestone. A major traffic bottleneck was fixed and the opportunity to open up the development of some major employments lands on the west side of King Road south of the QEW was more feasible. Getting the developer to the table will not be as difficult as it was to get CN to pay for the building of the grade separation.
There were no developers in the audience this afternoon.
There were however a number of staff people who deserved to be both mentioned and applauded for the construction of the underpass.
General manager Scott Stewart made a point of recognizing the individuals and groups who were instrumental the project done. Finishing the job within that 96 hour window was a very significant feat.
Staff from various city departments included: Tom Eichenbaum, Scott Hamilton, Bob Jurk, Derek McGaghey, Genevieve Jane, Jason Forde – from Engineering, Ron Steiginga, from legal, Helen Walihura from Community Relations, and Steve Vrakela from Roads and Parks Maintenance.
Cutting the official ribbon is, from the left, General Manger Scott Stewart ward 1 Councillor Rick Craven, Mayor Goldring and Director of Engineering Tom Eichenbaum.
The Ontario Public Works Association advised the city earlier in the day that the King Road / CN Grade Separation Project received the 2013 OPWA Project of the Year Award in the Transportation, in the $10 – $50 Million Category.
In a perfect world the Mayor and the General manager would have taken that list out to a local pub and hoisted a few and charged it all the ward Councillor’s expense budget. Rick Craven will be telling anyone with even just one ear how significant this project is – it is certainly one he has pushed since the day he was elected ten years ago.
Background:
Mammoth construction task underway on King Road
Graphic representation of construction task.
Web cast of construction site didn’t please US security types.
December 13, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. As part of the mandate of the Human Trafficking and Vice Unit and in partnership with the Canadian Border Services Agency and By-Law Enforcement Officers from Burlington, Oakville and Milton, several Halton businesses were visited on December 11, 2013 and inspected for municipal By-law infractions.
It’s certainly not show business.
The following businesses were found to be in violation of by-laws specific to their industry and as a result received Provincial Offences Notices and/or had the business licence revoked:
Accu Green Health – 774 Brant Street, Burlington – licence revoked
Cara Studio – 4180 Morris Drive, Burlington – Notice of Violation to be served on owner and charges pending
Body & Sole – 550 Ontario Street, Milton – closed operating no valid licence
Mary Gold – 43 Main Street South, Campbellville – Closed operating unlicenced, charge issued
Tai Chi – 2544 Speers Road, Oakville – issued zoning notice for closure, charge issued
Ivy Spa – 119 North Service Road East, Oakville – issued zoning notice for closure, 2 charges issued
The Human Trafficking and Vice Unit is responsible for all human trafficking investigations (both domestic and international – including but not limited to the sex trade, forced labour or domestic servitude), all prostitution investigation (including street prostitution, escort services and disorderly houses – common-bawdy houses), all adult entertainment premises investigations (including commercial massage parlours), all gaming related investigations and all liquor license premises investigations.
Anyone wanting to provide confidential information or tips related to suspected human trafficking is asked to contact 905 825-4747 x8723, via email at HTVICE@haltonpolice.ca or anonymously by calling Crime Stoppers at 1 800 222-TIPS(8477) or through the web at www.haltoncrimestoppers.com.
If you are a victim of human trafficking, dial 9-1-1 or contact the Chrysalis Anti-Human Trafficking Network for free, confidential telephone trauma counselling and referrals for anyone who has been trafficked or exploited at 1-866-528-7109.
December 12, 2013
By Staff
BURLINGTON, ON. All that cold weather we have been experiencing will begin to pay off for us Friday afternoon.
The pond at Spencer Smith Park will open at 4:00 pm where the skating is free to everyone.
Pond opens to the public Friday afternoon.
The pond is open daily from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. with patrollers working on Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. and on weekdays from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.
The holiday schedule includes:
Christmas Eve, December 24th : 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
CLOSED Christmas day
New Year’s Eve December 31st 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
New Year’s Day January 1st 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Please remember that you must wear skates to be on the ice and children 6 years of age and under must wear a helmet.
You can call the Pond hot line for ice conditions – 905-634-7263 or visit the web site for temporary closure information, updates on pond conditions.
December 12, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. The Liberal Party of Canada will be holding its Biennial Convention in Montréal in February of 2014 – the Burlington federal Liberals are asking their members to sign on for a weekend trip to Montreal.
While a federal election is not on the calendar until 2015 – the Liberals in this town need all the name recognition a candidate can get – and with the federal Conservatives in the mess of their lives – it would make some sense to find the candidate that can win in Burlington.
Its going to take more than a high-profile name to make Justin Prime Minister.
If the Liberals can get their BOY to be seen in the House of Commons a little more often and begin making comments that make sense rather than make him look a little foolish – there could be a different political party running the country. But – it is going to take more than just the Trudeau name to form a government.
Provincially – with the chances of an election in the Spring better than even – the Liberals are still scurrying about to find a candidate to run against Jane McKenna who has done little if anything for Burlington, but she has managed to become a close to rabid partisan. Should McKenna survive the next provincial election she will become close to impossible to remove.
Tim Hudak is not likely to survive the next provincial election – which will raise the star of our Lady Jane.
Burlington seems to vote solid Tory blue unless there is a really strong name candidate – then they go with the national flow. Should Justin Trudeau up his game and begin to be seen as seriously credible a decent candidate will come forward and Mike Wallace would be in for the fight of his life.
But candidates are not like mushrooms – they don`t grow in the dark; they need sunshine and exposure; they need the interaction of vigorous debate so that voters can see the differences in character and ability and not find themselves having to rely on the political party label to make their decisions for them.
Burlington doesn`t have much in the way of a tradition to be proud of in picking candidates that are superior and able to really represent the city. For a community that is made up of people who are for the most part well-educated and in the top half of the income charts – we can and should be able to do much better than we have done in the past in terms of our political representation.
It`s not the political labels that are the problem – it’s the people wearing the labels.
December 12, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. Regional Council approved the 2014 Budget and Business Plan earlier this week marking the fourth time in the last eight years (2008, 2010, 2011 and 2014) that Halton Region has achieved a property tax reduction for Regional tax supported programs and services.
What is the Region doing that Burlington seems unable to do? Halton Region has one of the best records in Canada for keeping taxes low while maintaining and enhancing service levels.
Regional civil servants.
“This is great news for residents and businesses in Halton,” said Regional Chair Gary Carr. “We are one of the few municipalities in all of Canada that has actually reduced taxes. By maintaining our AAA credit rating and keeping our taxes low we ensure Halton is competitive which attracts jobs and investment to our community.”
Highlights of key investments in the 2014 budget include:
$177 million in transportation capital investment
$405,000 to create additional child care subsidies
$721,000 to maintain service levels for waste management services
$300,000 to increase the number of SPLIT passes available in the community (subsidy for bus passes for low income residents)
British Royalty paid the Region a visit lat year. Regional Chair Gary Carr was delighted t squire the couple through the Region. Lord and Lady Action are on the left with a beaming Burlington Councillor John Taylor in the centre. The Action’s were in Burlington as part of a farm tour organized by the Region.
$65,000 to support the development of an Agri-tourism Program to attract more tourism to Halton’s rural communities
$195,000 for Locates (Ontario One Call) a new underground infrastructure notification system
$600,000 to support initiatives outlined in the Comprehensive Housing Strategy
$320,000 for assisted housing programs including continued implementation of subsidies for low income residents
The Regional government maintains a stable of about nine communications specialists – these are the people who pump out the press releases and make sure the good news stories are spread far and wide.
The Region is just one of the levels of government represented on your tax bill. The city takes its share, then the school boards ask for their share as well.
The people who do all this work on your behalf are the beneficiaries of one of the best pension plans in the country.
December 12, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. They weren’t exactly made welcome at the city council Monday night. At one point it looked as if it was going to be just the one person speaking about the Chilly Half Marathon that is run on Lakeshore Road every March.
Diane Leblovic was before city council to follow up on her Standing Committee delegation over the route used for the Chilly Half Marathon that runs along Lakeshore Road every March – some 4000+ strong.
A popular race that brings thousands to the city; Unpopular to some of those who live south of Lakeshore Road.
Ms Leblovic had asked if the Marathon portion of the Festivals and Events could be deferred to a date she was available and Council agreed to do so. Last night was to be her opportunity to deliver some additional “significant” information. It wasn’t going to be quite that easy for Ms Leblovic.
The list of delegations had three names of people who were to speak about the Marathon which is not the way Councillor Dennison saw things playing out. He took the position that it was Diane Leblovic who asked for the deferral and it was Diane and Diane alone that was to speak.
That brought out the liberal in John Taylor who was close too aghast that a city council would limit the right of a person to delegate to their city council.
Much toing and froing on that issue with the Clerk being brought in to read through the various pieces of correspondence and the decisions made at previous council and Standing Committee meetings. Taylor managed to get in several Points of Order and told Council he was going to challenge the Clerk’s decision. Mayor Goldring finally brought the matter to a close: Diane Leblovic, her husband Nick and Donald Belch were to each get their five minutes at the podium.
It was worth listening to; both the Leblovic’s dumped on just about everyone.
Diane was there to tell Council that the concerns they had raised were valid and that changes to the marathon race were both possible and reasonable without affecting the integrity of the event..
Ms Leblovic reminded council that on May 21st, Council, without prior notice or discussion, reneged on its earlier commitment to hold a public consultation on this event.
Ms Leblovic explained that their group needed to clearly understand the reason for this unexpected reversal of position. She asked the Mayor to meet wither and he did so along with Councillor Dennison on May 28th.
As race directors, the VR Pro people are good at their job. Working with difficult situations – perhaps not as good.
At that meeting Mayor Goldring said he had been told by Kelly Arnott, a principle in VRPro, the company that organizes the race that they were about to get a new name sponsor for the event and that the sponsor, who turned out to be Trillium College, would not sign on if there was going to be a public meeting or any controversy relating to the race.
It was at that point that an offer was made, according to Diane Leblovic, for another meeting which would involve the Mayor, Councillor Dennison, Kelly Arnott and Peter Peebles, a staff member who knows the most about setting up this kind of race event.
Ms Leblovic said she had two concerns with any ‘next’ meeting. She apparently didn’t like the idea of an “open agenda which would permit consideration and discussion of all aspects of the race”. Ms Leblovic sent the Mayor a list of proposed agenda items and the Mayor provided a detailed response in which “he either rejected or put limitations on many of our suggested agenda items”.
The second issue was to determine the reason for Trillium’s sensitivity over a public consultation about the race. Ms Leblovic explained that her husband Nick, who was to delegate later, called the president of Trillium College and learned that the College had never heard of the Leblovic group and their efforts to have a public meeting held and denied ever putting pressure on VRPro.
The cat was now out of the bag.
Ms Leblovic explained that the working group was “very unhappy with the outcome of these two events and “concluded that any meeting would be a waste of time” – it would allow the Mayor to “check the box” saying he had met with the group and “that would be the end of the discussion”.
Ms Leblovic wasn’t done yet.
“We are deeply disappointed that the Mayor and four members of Council and city staff supported a process that was flawed and unfair and that there was an appearance of favouritism to a for profit private business over the legitimate concerns of residents which Leblovic underlined by telling Council that Kelly Arnott was the first name on the list of delegations and should have been the first person to speak at the Standing Committee meeting but “I have it on good authority” she said “that Councillor Sharman who chaired the meeting directed the Clerk’s office to move Arnott’s name to the bottom of the delegation list thus giving her an unfair, tactical advantage to listen to and rebut the presentations of prior delegations.”
Ms Leblovic still had more arrows in her quiver. She advised the Council meeting that Councillor Dennison sponsors the Chilly Half Marathon and that his place of business is used for another VR Pro event.
More yet: Ms Leblovic told Council that VR Pro sponsors the Healing for Woman’s Cancers of which Kelly Arnott is the race director. The race, according to Ms Leblovic benefits Breast Cancer Support Services whose Chief Executive Officer is Blair Lancaster. Councillor Lancaster had advised the Mayor at the beginning of the Council meeting that while she did not believe she had a conflict of interest she was nevertheless not going to take part in the debate and would not be voting on the matter. And she didn’t.
Wow! Diane Leblovic had done her homework and did a very impressive scorched earth exercise. Council had yet to hear from her husband Nick.
Nick and Diane Leblovic have been “players” in the political life of the city for some time. Diane served on the school board of trustees and Nick was the chair of the Waterfront Access and Protection Advisory Committee created by former Mayor Cam Jackson as the city was heading into the 2010 municipal election.
That committee had its life cut short when city council sunset the thing in December of last year. At the time it didn’t look as if that committee, which many felt wasn’t all that effective, was going to have anything in the way of a legacy. Some of the material they pulled together on possible uses for the Beachway Park and the excellent work that was done by Les Armstrong and his sub-committee on public access to the lake and the Windows on the Lake program, proved to be useful during the debate on the waterfront property on Lakeshore Road between St. Paul and Market streets. The city has not heard the last of that matter.
Of the two, Diane Leblovic is the better speaker but the lawyer in Nick Leblovic came across strongly when he pointed to what he called a fundamental flaw in a report put out in 2009 when the race was being proposed. At that time, according to Nick, the report had the eastbound lane of Lakeshore Road closed for 90 minutes – from 10 am to 11:30 am. while the race was run. Leblovic released email that confirmed this information and added “as we all know now the eastbound Lakeshore road has been closed each year since 2010 for between 4 and 4.5 hours” – which Leblovic maintained was not some kind of a “rounding error” but it almost 300% longer than estimated.
Leblovic wanted to know: “How did this occur?” Was it incompetence? Or was there a subsequent change to the event that required a significantly longer closure period? Or was the time intentionally underestimated in order to get the new route by Council?
“Given the size of the discrepancy” asked Nick “one would have thought this issue would have been raised in the post-race evaluations…”. Nick Leblovic could find nothing in any of the documents he was able to read.
Leblovic asked some leading questions: “Would you have approved the route change in 2009 if the report had contained an estimated closure of Lakeshore Road east of over 4 hours rather than 1.5 hours?”
Nick wanted Council to do two things. Find out why the 1.5 hour race time grew to 4 hours and require than in future Lakeshore be closed for no more than the 1.5 hours in the original plan.
The length of time Lakeshore Rod as closed is not the only issue for the Leblovic`s and their working group. The Community Care access organization (CCAC) people who meet the care needs of people who are unable to get out f their homes for the care they need, work to very tight schedules. They drive from location to location with next to no wiggle room in the schedule. Nick Leblovic pointed out that there are people who have to go without the care they need for a full day because the CCAC people are not able to double back to drop in on a person just because the road id closed.
Leblovic maintained the one situation they brought forward was not an isolated one and that there is a high concentration of seniors in retirement homes and multi-residential buildings in the east end. Like most lawyers Nick was able to see the potential liability to the city were someone to suffer an injury because their care givers were not able to get to their residence. “You are now on notice of this problem and cannot ignore it” he intoned.
Nick had one last suggestion for Council: “One obvious solution would be to eliminate the back and forth aspect of the race which would permit a normal traffic flow along Lakeshore during the race.”
They come by the thousands.
Well that didn’t happen. Council which had approved all the other Festivals and events at a previous meeting – they had agreed to defer a decision on the Chilly Half Marathon to meet the interest of the Leblovic’s – voted to proceed with the race based on the route used in the past. Councillor Lancaster had advised earlier that she would not be voting on the matter. Mayor Goldring, Councillors Sharman, Dennis and Craven voted to follow the Staff recommendation and keep the race route for 2015. Meed Ward and Taylor voted against the Staff recommendation. It was a recorded vote – expect Meed Ward to use that as she campaigns for re-election in Ward 2 and sets herself up for a run as Mayor in 2018.
In comments made before the vote Meed Ward was passionate about what the Leblovic’s had had to put up with and applauded them for having the courage to come back to Council again and again to argue their concerns.
What we did learn was that the Ms Leblovic met with City Manager Jeff Fielding who is apparently going to arrange a meeting with Arnott and Ms Leblovic – that should be fun after the mudslinging Ms Leblovic did in her delegation.
Why this issue has ended up on the City Managers desk does raise several serious questions. The Lakeshore residents had real issues that needed to be dealt with. One cannot hold people hostage in their homes while several thousand people run a race.
Yes, the date of the race is known well in advance, and the average person should be able to make other arrangements but there are people who are not average in that part of the city; there are people who have special needs.
Imagine for a moment there were e death that a Coroner’s Inquest decided was preventable if a care giver had been able to get to a residence. Do you want to guess how fast that race would be cancelled forever and would you like to guestimate what the lawsuit might be?
The city has general managers who have direct oversight over how the various departments work. It does not require a degree in rocket science to figure out ways to get help to people who cannot leave their homes or who have other sound reasons for being able to get out of their streets that are on the south side of Lakeshore Road.
Someone at city hall hasn’t been doing their job on this one. The race is a hugely popular event, brings in thousands of visitors who spend their money in the city and has to be hugely profitable for the race organizers. Good for business and good for the city – now find a way to manage the problems of a small group of people. It’s just a matter of better communication and being sensitive to the real needs of people who need help. .
At the same time let us not see a situation where the genuine needs of a few people are used as a ruse to bring to an end an event that benefits thousands because a neighbourhood does not want to give up a portion of one day in the year.
December 11, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. They refer to it as “the panel” – it’s a collection of people who want to be on a citizen’s panel that the city will turn to with questions they would like to ask.
A lot of market research companies create these panels of people that they run questions by almost instantly – the trick is to have a panel in place ready to use. A number of months ago Angus Reid, the Godfather of the polling business in this country, was in town to tell an audience about a service he had developed called Critical Vision that he had sold the city on.
Leah Bisutti, a city hall staffer, has been working out of the city manager’s office on the setting up part of the operation which the city hopes will go live sometime in late January.
It will be a very soft start – the objective is to get a panel with as many people as possible on it – the more people the more accurate the response will be as a measure of opinion on an issue in the city.
Hundreds of Burlington citizens attend budget meetings and give their opinions. The city wants thousands to take part in a panel that can be reached in seconds and get back responses very very quickly.
There were some concerns that the city would know who the people on the panel are. The only thing the city will know is the name you give yourself. The rest of information is on computers to which the city does not have access.
The people who manage the back-end of this computerized poll will want to know your gender, probably your postal code and the ward you live in. They might want to know your age as well.
This allows them to ask you questions that are appropriate to who you are as a demographic and where you live. Ward 4 issues don’t mean all that much to people who live in ward 6.
The Vision Critical operation is very good at managing polling data and they can arrive at pretty valid conclusions based on a decent sample. City hall wants more than a decent sample – they would like to be able to say that we have a significant portion of the panel who tell us they either want or don’t want a particular service provided or they are prepared or not prepared to pay more for a service.
Can we expect to see posters like this on city streets as the city looks for the thousands of citizens it wants to see on its opinion panel.
There is some concern at city hall that too few people will register to be on the panel. City manager Jeff Fielding points out that Vancouver, another city using the service, needed a year to pull in 1000 people to their panel.
It can be argued that Burlington has a more active community – we get 200 people out to the Mayor’s Inspire Series and when there is a serious community issue it is not unusual to see 400+ people crowding the Mainway Arena.
The panel, which is a significant, and if responded to by enough people, could become a close to vital tool for the city to get response from people who are busy and not able to get out to meetings but still want an opportunity to voice an opinion.
But it needs people – and that’s you. If you are a regular Gazette redder and there are now more than 20,000 of them, this is something you want to be in on.
Click on the linkwhich will get you to a box into which you can type your email address. The people in the city manager’s office will add your name to the list of those interested in taking part.
Background:
City announces plans for a citizen’s opinion panel.
December 11, 2013
By Pepper Parr
BURLINGTON, ON. City Council meetings are a legal requirement. In Burlington when your elected representatives meet as a Council they usually approve the recommendations that were made by the Standing Committees.
Council adjourns every meeting with a reminder as to when Council is scheduled to meet next and the Mayor, who chairs the Council meetings, states that Council can meet at the call of the Mayor. During the regular Council meetings various bylaws get passed. It is the bylaws that give the city the authority to do certain things as set out in the bylaw.
Monday evening Council met and passed six bylaws. A bylaw was passed to authorize the temporary borrowing of funds from the Royal Bank. There was another passed to approve the appointment of municipal law enforcement officers for the city of Burlington. There was also a bylaw to amend the parking bylaw to allow changes to the on-street parking rules and municipal facility parking.
The view from Lakeshore at Elizabeth street with the hotel on the corner and the seven story condo further south on Elizabeth – closer to the water. Elizabeth will run south of Lakeshore. The 22 story condo is on the eastern side.
Slipped in was a bylaw removing the H designation on the biggest development project Burlington has seen for some time – biggest in the sense of the impact it is going to have on the downtown core and the way the citizens of this city see their town.
The developments is taking place in the very core of the city and has been on the planning boards since 1985 when city council approved the project as a “landmark” that was going to put Burlington on the map. The pier was supposed to do that wasn’t it?
The Bridgewater project is a development on the south side of Lakeshore Road the runs from east of Elizabeth, a street that now ends at Lakeshore but will be extended down to the walkway along the lake’s edge.
The project will consist of three structures: A 22 story condominium apartment on the east side of the property, a seven story condominium apartment that will be on the south-west section of the property and an eight story hotel that will be on the northwest corner of the property and will be operated by Delta Hotels.
The H part of a zoning designation is put place to signify that there is a hold on the property until certain undertakings have been completed. In this case there were wind studies to be done and a traffic study to be done. The city wants to know what the wind patterns are going to be like when a 22 storey building goes up close to the edge of the lake.
This is how the buildings are going to be sited on the property. The opening into the public area from Lakeshore Road between the hotel on the west and the 22 storey condo on the east is just 50 feet wide. The public area does widen once you get into the property. shown on the western side is what they are calling Lakeview Square. The grading is going to be quite steep as indicated by the steps south of the Square.
View from the lake with the smaller condo in the lower left and the 22 storey condo on the upper right and the public spaces in between. There are a lot of stairs shown just above the promenade which is already in place.
The opening off Lakeshore into the public space is just 50 feet wide. The public may have been expecting a wider “window onto the lake”
With 150 apartment units in the condo plus 33 other residential units and a hotel with 152 rooms, traffic along Lakeshore and Elizabeth will be different. The entrance to the hotel will be on Elizabeth as will entrance to the underground parking.
The property that is being developed was at one point home to the Riviera Motel. The environmental people needed to know what the condition of the earth was – a certificate was need to certify that it met provincial environmental standards.
This is what Lakeshore will look like once construction is completed. Elizabeth will be on the right and Pearl which ends at Lakeshore will be on the left. The people currently living in the condominiums on the north side of LAkeshore might end up with less of a view.
With the removal of the H designation all the variances that were approved close to a year ago can come into effect. Some of those variances, approved by the Committee of Adjustment, had conditions attached to them. These included the provision of various securities – all part of the paperwork that lays behind a development.
When the conditions are met the draft site plan is submitted and assuming that clears the planning hurdles, and there is no reason to expect there to be any problems a building permit can be issued and work can actually begin – shovels in the ground as the politicians like to say.
Couple of things come to the surface on this process. Council met on Monday and removed that H designation – yet in their remarks neither the Mayor nor the ward 2 council member uttered as much as a word about the project. It was as if it was a ship that was passing quietly in the night.
Whenever there is good news the politicians are real quick top pick up on it and make sure you know about it. Monday’s Council meeting had a nasty brutal streak to it with pointed comments being made by almost everyone. Perhaps the bruises that were left from the meeting were healing.
If this rendering is accurate the site will have a lot of trees which once they mature should make for a very pleasant part of the city. The objective is going to be to get quality commercial operations on the project – the fear many have expressed is a massive Tim Hortons.
Or perhaps there is a problem with the time frames Mayrose-Tyco and Delta have to work within. The intention was to have the hotel open for the PanAm Games scheduled to be held from July 10–26, 2015. Officially these are the XVII Pan American Games or the 17th Pan American Games and while Burlington missed out on the opportunity to actually host any of the events the City View Park will be used as a practice field for some of the soccer teams. The public however will not get to see any of those practices – the PanAm people gave the city a fat cheque that will allow them to take over the grounds. You probably won’t even be able to walk your dog on the grounds.
City View Park is ready for the Pan Am Games – will hotels rooms be available?
The City View Park will be ready – the same cannot be said for the Bridgewater project. Officially the project is not yet approved. Mayrose Tyco and Delta have 18 months to dig the hole in the ground and put up the eight story hotel. Theoretically it can be done – but this project, first approved back in 1985 when it was called Waterfront East and approved when Roly Bird was Mayor and Walter Mulkewich was a member of Council
Was the possibility that the project will not get done in time to be used during the PanAm Games explain why the politicians said nothing before they all scooted away for the holidays?
Background:
Why is waterfront development taking s long?
Bridgewater edges closer to actual construction.
Riviera Motel set ablaze, doesn’t burn down; wreckers will be on site real soon.
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