By Pepper Parr

July 21st, 2018

BURLINGTON, ON

Ray has gone fishing.

He will be back soon – he doesn’t really catch very many fish.

Give him a week – maybe two and he will be back at his keyboard explaining a government policy, giving us background and insights.

The change of government at the provincial level has Rivers pulling back and wondering if we are on our way to the days of Mike Harris. Thinking about just how big the provincial deficit is and how the Liberals will reinvent themselves and wondering as well just how efficient a Leader of the Opposition Andrea Horwath will be.

Great times for a political pundit – and given that Rivers couldn’t hook a fish if his dinner depended on it – expect him back soon.

Ray Rivers writes regularly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking.  Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington.  He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject.     Tweet @rayzrivers

By Ray Rivers

July 13th, 2018

BURLINGTON, ON

“What good is NATO if Germany is paying Russia billions of dollars for gas and energy?” (Donald Trump July 11, 2018)

It’s not often that the US president is right but Trump’s argument here is pretty solid. His European bloc allies are still living in the ’90’s when Russia was (maybe) one of the good guys. So when Russia was invading Ukraine, France and Germany, the two strongest mainland powers just watched in dismay. Only after a Malaysian air flight carrying some two hundred European civilians was blown out of the sky by a Russian missile did they impose some economic sanctions on the aggressor.

Does anyone trust either of them?

Perhaps the US president is just trash talking Russia to quash criticism of his summit next week with Mr. Putin. But to his point, even after Russia invaded Georgia Germany was still training Russian soldiers, and the French were building two of the largest helicopter carriers ever for Mr. Putin. Still, Germany’s leader, Merkel, claims she doesn’t need any lectures on the evils of Russian occupation, having been raised in East Germany.

The other shoe Trump dropped on his breeze through Brussels was about the disproportional commitment to national defence by his NATO partners. Canada’s position on military spending is untenable. We did agree to commit more money into our military, we need to bite the bullet. And yes, so long as the US military can be relied upon to respond to any violation of our sovereignty under NATO, Mr. Trudeau can be smug about our need to spend more on our own defence.

And it’s not that Canada shouldn’t be enhancing its defensive capabilities, certainly when it comes to that sparsely populated part of our geography facing the Russian bear. Defence of our interests in the north will become more critical as the ice continues to recede with climate change, facilitating greater international navigation. And the best argument for meeting our 2% commitment may be to get the Donald off our back.

The PM boasting about how we’ve had a role in every NATO mission doesn’t buy him any credit with the US president. And seriously, one has to ask about the merit of some these NATO adventures the US has pushed us into. What does Afghanistan have to do with the defence of the North Atlantic? And if NATO is supposed to be strictly defensive, what were we all doing bombing Gaddafi in Libya?

Russian ice breaker at the North pole.

Has NATO so outlived its original purpose – its usefulness and rationale – that it has to go looking for fights? Perhaps Trump is right – it’s time to pack it in. Why did NATO bomb Serbia in response to its military aggression in Bosnia, but not Russia for its aggression in Ukraine?

To be clear the US maintains a large military establishment with bases and troops in many places, largely of its own volition and mostly to defend its own interests. A Russian annexation of much of western Europe, for example, would weaken US economic and political influence even more so than when the Soviet Union controlled only eastern Europe – the cold war. And that would hurt the US more than any kind of America First would ever compensate for.

So it’s all about managing potential strategic threats to America. And Trump either doesn’t get that or is talking through his fake hairdo when he makes the argument that America is defending Europe and Canada. America is only, after all, defending America. But America’s boss is less than happy with its partners. Perhaps that is because their governments are largely run by weak democratic leaders in his eyes, unlike his tyrannical heroes running China and Russia.

America First in all things but starting with trade. There must be enough economists in the US who if stacked end-to-end would reach to the moon. And they are all of one mind except for the man advising the president on trade. The US economy would only be smaller without trade and immigration, After all the dust has settled on all the tariffs and other trade and immigration barriers, US GDP and the US standard of living will be lower, not higher.

It takes some Canadian steel to manufacture these tanks in Lima, Ohio.

But Trump doesn’t need to hear from the elitists. You need steel for tanks and aluminum for jet fighters. And in Trump’s world America will never be secure until and unless it controls every aspect of its economy and doesn’t have to rely on trade with the rest of the world. That is also his point about Germany and Russian gas.

But cutting trade and possibly military relations with America’s closest neighbours will only push Canada into a closer relationship with Europe. It’s just across the pond so why wouldn’t Canadian snowbirds think about moving their winter homes to Spain and southern Italy, instead of a Florida soon to be under water anyway.

As for Trump’s musing about leaving NATO? How comfortable would the next American president be with a nuclear armed (non-US) NATO sitting on her Canadian border? Trump sure says some of the darnedest things.

Ray Rivers writes regularly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking.  Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington.  He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject.     Tweet @rayzrivers

Background links:

Trump and Germany –     Trump and NATO –     NATO Spending –

By Pepper Parr

July 9th, 2018

BURLINGTON, ON

City council will be debating a staff recommendation for the proposed development on Brant street, opposite city that starts on the SW corner of James and will run south to Kellys Bake Shop and include the full block.
The developer is asking for 27 stories – the city planners are recommending 18.

Approved.

The development on the NW corner of Brant and James has been approved at 23 storeys – why are the planners recommending 18 storeys for the second building when the one across the street has been approved for 23 – seems like a reasonable question – and for the developer it is a difference of six floors of condominium units

The 421 – 431 Brant Street development – it hasn’t been given a name yet – has been approved and will consist of:

• Twenty-three (23) storey building, which includes a 1-storey rooftop amenity area;
• Four-storey podium;
• 760 square metres of ground floor retail / commercial space;
• 365 square metres of 2nd floor office space;
• 169 residential units (maximum);
• A parking ratio of 1.2 parking spaces per residential unit in the below-grade parking structure, in addition to 8 dedicated visitor parking spaces and 1 car share space;
• Appropriate building setbacks from Brant Street (2.95 metres), James Street (2.6 metres) and John Street (1.8 metres);
• A 128 square metre (16 metre x 16 metre) visibility triangle (publicly accessible open space) at the corner of Brant Street and James Street;
• Appropriate building stepbacks and terracing above the 4th floor and above the 18th floor

The planners point out that the site is located within the Downtown Urban Centre and within the Downtown Core designation. They add that it “is important to note that the existing OP (that is the one in place before the Grow Bold OP – which was approved and sent to the Regional government for approval at that level), included a site specific exception for a portion of the site (421 – 427 Brant Street) which recognized the site as appropriate for increased height and density.”

What that means is that part of the land assembled for the development had an exception attached to it for height above the permitted heights for neighbouring properties. The way these things work is that the highest height is frequently applied to all the properties when they are assembled.

“The exception set an increased maximum height for the site of seven storeys with taller buildings up to a maximum height of twelve storeys permitted where they provide a sense of compatibility with surrounding land uses and a sense of pedestrian scale by the use of terracing above the second floor. The exception for 421 – 427 Brant Street also set out an increased maximum floor area ratio of 4.5:1, except that higher floor area ratios were permitted subject to community benefits provisions.”

“It is also important to note that the timing of the 421 Brant Street application preceded emerging policy directions for the Downtown Urban Growth Centre, which are now incorporated as a part of the Council Adopted Official Plan: Grow Bold.

The view from Civic Square looking east at the two “landmark” towers. The one on the left (shown as a shadow) has been approved. The one on the right is before Committee of the whole today – planners want this one cut back to 18 storeys.

“On Sept. 28 2017, the draft new Downtown Mobility Hub Precinct Plan was presented to Council for the first time for discussion and feedback at a Council Workshop at the Committee of the Whole. No decisions were made.

“On November 13, the 421 Brant Street applications were approved in principle.

“On November 30, 2017 a staff report on the Draft Downtown Precinct Plan and proposed Official Plan policies contemplated modifying the building height permissions at Brant Street and James to recognize that node as an area appropriate for landmark buildings and to reduce the building height permissions in the Cannery Precinct for the property located at Brant Street and Lakeshore Road in light of the 421 Brant Street application.”

What the city did was decide to live with height across from city hall and limit height along Lakeshore Road. Councillor Taylor was very specific when he said that he went along with the 23 storeys for 421 Brant on the understanding that Lakeshore heights would be limited to 17 storeys. That’s planning on the fly!

There is a lot of detail in this map- you can identify the precincts that planners use to describe parts of the city and the kind of development permitted.

The Revenue Properties application (409 Brant) now has to find a way to work through and around a thicket of precinct plans, mobility hubs, the Urban Growth Centre and transit issues.

Those red lines are the buses that come down Brant and loop along James into the bus terminal that got an upgrade and is now called a Mobility hub anchor. Traffic nightmare!

And, speaking of transit issues – there is a drawing that was part of one of the staff reports on the 409 project that showed the number of bus routes that flow into John Street, which is the street the garages for both 409 and 421 will exit onto – there is a nightmare of a continual traffic jam waiting to happen.
“No Staff/Council motion was made to increase height permissions in the Special Planning Area at Brant and James Streets as a result of the approval of the 421 Brant application on November 13th, 2017.”

What that seems to say is that the height 421 was given isn’t going to be available to 409. It is going to be interesting to see how that works out.

The Revenue Properties proposal is before Planning and Development Committee on Tuesday -July 10th in the afternoon and in the evening.

By Ray Rivers

June 30th, 2018

BURLINGTON, ON

“Overall, NAFTA was neither devastating nor transformational for Canada’s economy. Opponents of the 1988 free trade agreement had warned that Canada would become a glorified 51st state. While that didn’t happen, Canada didn’t close the productivity gap with the US either…” (NAFTA’s Winners and Losers by David Floyd Jan 30, 2018 – Investopedia)

And that is perhaps because NAFTA has always been a free trade agreement in name only. You see that every time you cross the border and some official asks you if you have something to declare. Try ordering something on-line from a US supplier and you’ll find yourself waiting a long time until the customs have been cleared and after you’ve paid the duty.

And while NAFTA is supposed to include services as well as goods, there is no free trade in labour services – you can’t just waltz across the border and get a job there. NAFTA and its Can-US ‘free trade’ predecessor were implemented to assist large corporations enhance their profitability, particularly in the auto sector which needed to update the 1960’s auto-pact.

And over the last twenty five years NAFTA has benefited consumers with lower prices on a good number of items and some services. But like every good economic idea, NAFTA has had consequences on Canada.

Rivers does make a strong point about how much damage those trucks do as they move parts and produce across the border.

One we almost never hear about is transportation and the environment. The auto industry likes to brag about how often an automobile crosses the border before its final assembly and sale. That crossing is accomplished mostly by trucks rushing to fulfil their just-in-time assembly line orders, zig-zagging half way across the continent.

So there is all this truck congestion at the borders and all around us on our highways. Transportation is inherent in the definition of freer trade. Trucks, trains and ships move goods and components across even greater distances. And these vessels all use fossil fuels to operate. So the biggest casualty of free trade is the environment and how we are accelerating global climate change.

More congestion translates into gridlock – more time for the daily commute and the immeasurable costs of lost family play time. Then there is the added noise and that smog inducing pollution. There is danger in sharing road space with those massive speeding trucks. And of course there is the cost of road bed maintenance and highway reconstruction – and the inconvenience of it all.

President Trump seems to have to show off his signing of Executive Orders. Raw political power on display.

It’s not that Canada wants to tear up NAFTA but Mr. Trump does, and he’s going to do it. In any case, there won’t be much left after softwood, aircraft, metals and autos – his next target. When the Canada-US free trade deal first got off the ground there was a huge sucking sound as manufacturing jobs and incomes headed down to the US. Companies decided they could still sell to Canadian customers duty-free while being better located for the much greater US market.

Ontario and Quebec were particularly hard hit, but we adjusted and we’ll adjust again once Trump has rendered NAFTA into the dust bin of history. And that could be as soon as he announces his upcoming tariffs on autos.

Toyota estimates a 25% auto tariff will push up the cost of a Camry – currently the most popular car in the US, and built there – by $1800 for its US customers. And as Toyota goes so goes the rest of the industry. But that simple reality hasn’t deterred Mr. Wreck-it Ralph in the White House from his path of destruction.

And autos? They’re changing. The electric vehicle is simpler to manufacture, not needing the complication of the myriad of devices used with gas engines to help detoxify car emissions. And batteries which last a minimum of eight years have eliminated the need for a dealer network to service the vehicles once they leave the showroom – no more oil changes.

That means it should be a lot easier for new entrants to get into the auto industry – who needs the big three anymore and their integrated vehicle assembly plants anyway. Those corporations are yesterday’s business model. They need to move over for a new breed of smaller auto manufacturers who sell the products on-line or in shopping malls and Costco. Is there a Canadian entrepreneur, our own Tesla inventor, up to the challenge?

The factory that manufactured the first Rivers family freezer.

My parents bought their first food freezer from the Guelph appliance company W.C. Wood Co. Ltd.. It lasted for over forty years without a breakdown. Mr. Wood recounts that…“In 1964 37 Canadian companies manufactured washing machines, stoves and refrigerators. Today, there are four. Workers in the industry used to total 10,000. Now, there are 2,500… By next year, Mr. Wood said, he’ll be looking at just three manufacturers (here).” Try to get 40 years out of one of the US built models today.

And what is Trump talking about. Canada has an overall trade deficit in the billions with the US, although we have a surplus on goods. But that is mostly our export of crude oil, and we all know where that will be going as fractured drilling is making America more oil independent every year. Sure manufacturing and manufacturing jobs are declining in the US for a number of reasons, including automation. But they are declining even faster in Canada – we’re not gaining at America’s expense.

And why didn’t someone tell the Donald that Canada actually buys more steel from the US than it sells – $2.1 billion more. And we buy more military hardware from the US than anywhere else in the world – over a billion a year on average. We pay more for our pharmaceuticals and intellectual goods because we have conformed to US rules on patents and copyrights.

Is this the direction Canada is going in? Is t the direction we have to go in?

We’ll survive as we did for over a century before NAFTA or the Mulroney deal. And Trudeau is right – we’re not going to be pushed around. Canadians have got the message – we love our American neighbours but there is a trade war and we need to defend ourselves. So a lot of us are responding the best way we can. We have stopped buying US gods and services, even if that means buying Chinese.

I noticed the last few times shopping in the liquor store that people were asking more and more about alternatives to US wines. That should be our next target in this ever growing trade dispute with the US. I’d rather drink Ontario or B.C. fine wines anyway.

But I rarely see the B.C. wines in the LCBO. Perhaps that is where we need to make sure free trade is really working – right here across Canada. After all we are on the eve of Canada Day – more important for us now than ever.

Ray Rivers writes regularly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat to his thinking.  Rivers was once a candidate for provincial office in Burlington.  He was the founder of the Burlington citizen committee on sustainability at a time when climate warming was a hotly debated subject.     Tweet @rayzrivers

Background links:

NA Free Trade –    Manufacturing Decline –    Tariffs Hurt –

Appliance Makers –    Toyota –