Can I have a chicken in my backyard?

Fresh eggs, what kind of image does that evoke? Farmers' wives with their baskets feeling under brooding hens to take the eggs. The noise and smell of the fowl. Take your pick but what are the rules? Raising chickens is about as "back to the country" as you can get. But is it legal in Cobourg? After spending time with helpful people, in Town Hall, such as Susan Beer and Steve Ashton the legal status of a back yard chicken is still not definite. If your chicken does tricks then it is banned under 59-2004 - a bylaw to prohibit wild or exotic animal exhibitions. But if all the chicken does is produce eggs for the kitchen table it may be legal. Residential zoning bans agricultural uses and the Zoning Bylaw (ZB) allows "general farming". "General farming", the only agricultural reference in the ZBL , is not allowed in residential areas. The legal argument is - "What is general farming" (GF)? How many chickens do you have to have to fall into GF? Can you build a coop that is legal? The answer to that one is easy; keep it under 100 square feet and you don't need a permit. But the general consensus is that if you get on with your neighbours and don't keep too many chickens and house them in a coop less than 100 sf you will probably be allowed to do it. But don't boast about it and don't have a rooster!

If there ever is a "black hole" for policing costs it comes under the heading "Communications". Over the years the amount of money devoted to this subject, Cobourg and Port Hope, has been LARGE. Now a consultant is recommending that PH spend even more. How much will Cobourg spend? Why is it that parochial pols still abound where Policing costs occur? The latest report of the Port Hope Police Services Board exposes some of this thinking. Pull the prisoners out of the Cobourg police station and put them at the OPP station, just to save cents - what shortsighted thinking. How's this for an idea - amalgamate and share the costs!

A linkage between the GM fiasco and Wall St and guess who gets to keep their money? This story links Obama and his car czar to a scheme whereby GM's pensioners will lose their fund to 2 Wall St banks who, in the end, will never share the pain of everybody else in the bankruptcy. In addition the proposal is illegal but being done in the name of Obama and his Wall St buds.

Words of wisdom from our MP. Mr Norlock musing about the prospect of an early election

(snip) Norlock, who was re elected last fall, says canadians clearly don't want another costly election so soon.
He says an early election call would amount to crass political opportunism to try to take advantage of economic hardship in order to win public favour. (snip)

So the question to RN is this - "What about the crass political ministerial responsibility crap that SH , is putting out to sack a Quebec male "swordsman" and to keep his "pet" over identical mistakes. Read Don Martin's comments about the incident here.

Another lost chance to demonstrate integrity

One would have thought that when the Cons and SH have little else to hang on to they might have taken the high road - some chance. In a demonstration of Political Cowardice of the highest order, (story here)  the Minister of Natural Resources, who was responsible for State secrets found out that a binder full of docs marked SECRET was left in a TV studio and not even noticed, the TV people had to phone her office and ask, "Anything missing over there?", the PM-SH dropped the ball. Admitting that he, SH  , had received the offered resignation obviously treated it like a garden party ticket and declined to take her up on it. I can't imagine the oinky squeals of high dudgeon and fake outrage that would have emanated from the opposition benches if SH  , were occupying them today. But another lost chance for integrity and another nail in the coffin of credibility. Sad!

The RCMP may have ineffective tasers but ours are better

Information from the Cobourg Police Services should put the minds of Cobourgers at rest. A headline story last night on the National (CBC) reported that the RCMP is pulling most of their Tasers out of service. They fail to meet standards and are an earlier Mk 1 Type.
In an interview this morning the BurdReport discovered that Cobourg has the newer model, there are only two of them, which are tested yearly, and they issued to Supervisors who are also trained on a yearly basis by Durham Police and only used in situations of "Aggressive Behaviour". Only one is on the streets at a time and in the hands of a trained and capable Supervisor. So ours are safe!

Government goofs!

I know that we want to castigate government severely for anything they do because it is usually perceived as incompetent. But two examples hit the ether this morning, three if you count the secret papers left behind by Lisa Raitt for reporters to read, one was a federal story and one was a Provincial story thus putting the lie to the theory, at the moment that the Libs know how to do the job!
Number one - the Feds have lost some gold and silver at the Royal Mint. Here's the story.
Number two - the Provs have been accused of all sorts of nasty things including mismanagement and insider deals as the honchos of E-Health have pocketed huge wages and still claim for cups of tea on their expenses. A comment by Christina Blizzard here. The sad thing about this E-Health fiasco is that it was setup to take the place of an earlier Agency that spent over 600 million and failed to connect the provinces computers to deliver E-Health.

Yet another tale of Wall St ripoffs here is a detailed story of how Wisconsin School Boards lost a pile of dough by falling for Wall St's slick salesmen. It even makes a Canadian Bank look bad.

A classic play to the crowds

In a masterful piece of political puffery the Cobourg Council led by the Mayor played to the standing room only crowd in the room. This story recounts the action last night. Essentially the Mayor trotted out some memories of a free beach and said he would do what he could. Which by the way, if the owners stand firm, is very little.
If the Mayor and Council were serious about this they would have studied the existing legal opinions gathered over the past four years and actually done something. Blaming failed negotiations and obdurate owners is not good enough. If expropriation is an answer do it. Council was approached by a citizen in 2007 who asked for something to be done. and nothing was done. Amazing what can be done with a packed room. But remember when we were told that 2500 names on a petition was not good enough, good on the 150 who went to Council last night. Getting in the faces of Pols actually does work. But as with many other Councils this Council has been guilty of saying yes to a crowd and then disappearing into the backroom to discover that it could not be done. So the crowd should expect to be disappointed. And as for the offer that the Beach Society is making, "We will clean it up and police it" Didn't work so well for the Ecology Garden did it?

A suggestion from Michael Moore designed to drive the Cons nuts. In this story MM, the filmmaker of "Roger and Me" fame suggests what Obama should do to make GM work.

Local Art or just a good warning?

Correction, this was art: These signs appeared to be at the edge of the "nasty lady's" house at the west side of the Bagot St road allowance on Sunday. A local artist had told me over coffee that something along these lines was being planned but having seen the end result it looks like more than just art but could be utility. I mean who would be stupid enough to cross this line in ignorance if they ever saw them. But on the other hand would the perpetrator stand charged with crimes in violation of the "Art in Public Spaces Committee?"

On a National level, the election drums are beating, An NDP bill is being proposed that would make changes to EI. With all opposition parties in favour of changes and this bill being a confidence vote if it passes we could be off to the hustings. Locally the Libs are drooling, salivating and generally slobbering over the very thought. In fact there is, behind the scenes and out of the spotlight, quite a vigorous nomination race going on. Paul Macklin's people are jousting with Christine Stewarts people and it is all coming to a head soon. But back to the prospect of an election a blogger who describes himself as "Angry in the great white north" writes here that Jack Layton has cooked up a deal with the devil himself - SH - to put the boots to Iggy and foil an election.
In a nutshell here is the leaked stratagem: "What Jack Layton has done is to give the Conservatives their way out. The NDP tables the bill. The Conservatives offer an amendment or two (no doubt already agreed to, in advance, between the Conservatives and the NDP). The Liberals offer their own amendments. Votes are taken. With NDP support, Conservative amendments pass. Liberal amendments are rejected. No election. So there no election. The other reason, for no election, is that the next installment of election money ($1.95 per voter) is due in August, so who is going to pass that up in a needless election?

At tonight's meeting of Council, after all the histrionics and public outrage abates (the beach debate) a sensible letter will be accepted into the public domain. This letter here is from the Cobourg Sustainability Committee and outlines what they think about the proposed Community Centre's design. The committee suggests a green building (not the colour of paint but the actual design!). All sensible measures and has been referred to the Community Centre Feasibility Committee. I doubt it will get a mention in publc but will be buried in the bureaucratic paperwork of the project. Still nice try!

OK lets go again

Don't tell me that the Canadian Jewish Congress is just another lobby group. Read this story and discover that all the snivelling pol Braunnosers are off to Toronto to rub noses (??) with Bernie Farber and his gang. Just how much power this group has is demonstrated by the people speaking to it. Name another "lobby group" that gets this kind of turnout!!

The first op-ed piece that makes sense

One of the problems of short term fixes is that they become long term problems and the issue of EI exhaustees is such a problem. The Preem of BC, I'm not a fan of this guy, has published an op-ed piece in the G&M here that talks about what happens next. What will the thousands of people who began their claim last year do this year? His solution - have the province pay what it would if they were on assistance and the feds top it up. For the first time we a pol making sense. If you want a functioning society you have to pay for it. And as for blaming the deficit on EI what a bunch of fatuous nonsense. If the government, of both stripes, hadn't stolen the EI money years ago then the deficit would have been a lot less.

Our cultural correspondent, Mr W Keeler has published an excellent review of what our young artists are up to - and it all good. Check it out here

Another one for the cynics. here is a story about Larry Summers, the guy Obama put in charge of the bank mess. Charged to fix the mess he helped create. This time around a story surfaces that he is now profiting from his own work as Obama's Mr Fix-it"

Are they "bulldogs" or just a pain in the arse? That is the question posed by the latest letter by Mr John Dietz, from Port Hope to Port Hope Council. Mr Dietz has, as his hobby horse, the affairs of the Port Hope Harbour Commission. This Commission is surrounded in secrecy because of its very makeup. Deemed to be an independent entity owned by Council it is not sure whether it rports to Council and Mr Dietz is determined to find out. Not only that because the meetings of the HC are held in secret he wants find out just what they are up to. But is does pose the question of the lead: when do bulldogs become pains in the arse - depends just who is being asked the questions!

Where have these people been?

The Cobourg Beach Society, website here, has emerged to lead a way in attempting to create a shoreline public park from the factory Creek to the Water Filtration Plant - good for them, but I have to ask "where have you been?" Nobody heard of them until they released information about themselves in the furor about the nasty lady and the older gent with the walking stick. Upon investigation it was discovered that they have a website and have had one since the 27th of January. Mr Cairns, the present spokesperson has written one letter that I'm aware of and has obviously kept the existence of this group quiet. But like all good PR people, the fracas has illuminated the issue, he is taking advantage of it and urges people to go to Council on Monday June 1st. I just hope that they don't have the indecency to ask what Council did with Pat Stanley's presentation in 2007 when Council diligently listened to her talk about the same thing.

Any sane and thinking conservative must be really in trouble reconciling their core beliefs with the current PM's way of leading the Country out of the deficit and into majority land. Yesterday things became more bizarre in Ottawa, as if they could, when in answer to Iggy's demand that he fire the Minister of Finance the PM answered. “I can't fire the Leader of the Opposition. With all the tapes I've got on him. I don't want to.”. Harper of course was referencing the fact that the Con war room has been trolling the world for any mention of Iggy and his media background. I can just imagine spotty faced fifteen year olds being let loose with a couple of million dollar's worth of mutimedia equipment and charged to troll the internet using key words and metadata tags to assemble the dirt. What can they find that you and I can't find by going to Youtube.com and searching on "Ignatieff"? But even sillier, what will they do with it all? I would put one silly pic of SH against all of the musings of a Harvard Prof or an English journo (both fishing holes for the Cons) and the silly pic would win the pile of public disdain. The silliest pic so far is the one on the right.

Congratulations. It was reported yesterday - BT on CITY, that the owner of Gig's Music Store on Division St N had won the big house lottery with the BMW in the driveway. Makes the rest of us kick ourselves for not buying more tickets, but at $100 a pop one would do, and in this case it did!

Remember when the Puffster actually worked for a living?

One of the last pieces that the Mike Duffy CTV worked on was a set of interviews during the last election wherein Stephane Dion was ridiculed because he muffed a couple of "facetimes". The Puffster then started to run them and the rightwing press couldn't get enough of them. Well in this story the interview has been ruleded unfair and violated broadcast codes,