Housekeeping for the Community Centre Contract

Monday evening will take us further into the CCC project. The Project Managers - mhpm - have submitted a couple of subcontracts for Council's approval. One for a Compliance Consultant, that's the guy that will check to see if what we get ,is what has been promised. Whether they check just the specifications or the costs is not known but it is comforting to know that somebody is going to watchdog the project. But was the choosing of the consultant transparent as the PMs made up a list of firms that should be invited to tender. When only two of the seven invitees responded the PMs reviewed the applications and then made a recommendation. So the guy doing the job gets to pick the guy who is going to watchdog? This is standard management practise after all why would the PM want a company that would be hard to get along with?
The other point that jumped out at me is seen in this extract from the letter to Council from the PM.
If you click on the pic you will read that because the budget for all four phases of the compliance contract was $125K and the successful invitee's bid was $255 - $140K overbudget, the PM recommended that the invitee only be awarded the first two phases for a cost of $107K. So are we overbudget already, and this is only the first subcontract from mhpm?

A second contract is going to be awarded, one for an Accessibility Consultant, presumably to check out the drawings for accessability problems, the BurdReport has been told that this building will be the most accessible building to be built in Ontario when it is finished. According to the report submitted to the Council the Chair of the Accessibility Committee did an exhaustive search and then discovered that very few firms or individuals are capable of all aspects of peer review. Obviously this time consuming process (tracking down a qualified firm and then negotiating a contract) is a difficult job for a committee so it has punted it off to the PM. He has the authority to conduct a search, and sole source the contract. What is not made clear in the paperwork is the fact that although the contract may be sole-sourced from a list of names given to the PM by the committee, the awarding of the contract is still subject to scrutiny by the committee. A good process adopted by the Committee.

Sunday #1 - A fog of confusion

This week's CRTC hearings cap a month's cacophony of attack ads from both sides in the dispute. Cable Companies snatch TV transmissions from the airwaves, package them into incongruous bundles and then peddle them to TV owners who don't have TV towers, or want more TV channels than offered on the airwaves. The TV companies spend great gobs of money on US shows that are supposed to attract plenty of eyeballs, then those eyeball stats are sold to ad buyers who think that huge numbers of people are watching their ads. That was the model up to a few years ago.
Then came the diversity of interests produced by alternate media, and timeshifting with PVRs. Ad revenue started to slip for the TV companies. The TV companies also made boneheaded decisions to get bigger, financed the aquisitions with debt that the operating costs funded by ad revenue had to support and suddenly the once wealthy TV companies were struggling to get by on a couple of hundred million a year. The Cable companies, also ravaged by aquisition fever now found it uneconomical to support both their capital costs of getting bigger by building transmissioin networks and cannibalising themselves and also found themselves in a fight with the TV companies who want to charge the Cable companies for the transmissions that are free.
As a consumer how can you not be confused by the conflicting claims. There is a whole bunch of bad in this issue. Cable companies assembling their retransmissions into "bundles". These bundles are a mess and don't have an affinity of interest and also force the consumer to purchase many bundles just to get the few channels they want, thereby increasing consumer costs. TV companies claiming that unless they get more money local TV stations will be shut down. Oh what a mess.
Then in the middle of this is the regulator - the CRTC. This august body is at its wits end and the Chair has expressed his frustration with both sides often. He doesn't want to make the hard decision of making the consumer pay just because the two sides are intransigent.They have a mandate to protect the consumer and make sure that the players get along. So what's the answer? If I was the regulator this is what I would do.

• Establish that both parties are at fault, because of bad business decisions and tell them their is still enough money in their bottom lines to support themselves.
  
• Tell the Cable companies to stop bundling and establish a price per channel and allow consumers to purchase individual channels.
  
• Acknowledge that there is an obligation for the Cable companies to pay for their channels from the sky and not to pass the fees they will have to pay to consumers.
  
• Mandate a higher level of Canadian content in the TV companies programming so that they would have less airtime to fill with their expensive American shows.

Now this list comes from a not so ignorant consumer, but one who is still confused by the issue, so please comment on this and perhaps we can prepare a consumers' response to the issue.

Municipal Campaign Reform

Campaign Reform is usually spoken about in America where huge money is raised, extorted, solicited and cajoled to and from candidates and donors to political campaigns. A move in Toronto might spark reform all over Ontario but don't bet on it happening here. A major part of the reforms that Toronto is discussing is the banning of donations from Corporations and Unions. Provincial reform now limits donations from those sources to a maximum of $750 to an individual and a total of $5,000 during a campaign to all candidates, from the same donor. If banning corporate/union donations ever took place here no candidate could afford to run. In every municipal election that I have ever seen, every financial report filed six months after the election has been shown that donations from individuals have been as scarce as hen's teeth. Almost all of the candidates declaring donations revealed that the sources were local developers. In fact it was so bad, a few years back, that one particular development company donated substantial sums to incumbents and none to newcomers. It was probably just a coincidence that this particular developer had a planning application before the incumbents which needed to be voted on just before the election took place. The public only found out about it six months later when the incumbents were re-elected and the developer got his planning permission. When asked about the linkage, one incumbent muttered, "It's not illegal to take donations so I did!"
This Cobourg Council, just like every other small town entity will be dragged kicking and screaming into campaig reform, because the status quo is mighty fine for them. Nobody has ever spent the maximum amount allowed and nobody ever queries where the money has come from. After all the donations do not have to be declared until six months after the election.
In fact them only piece of meaningful election reform will never happen here because the move would be too transparent. I refer to the notion of declaring donations within 30 days of receiving them. Imagine going to the election booth knowing just who was bankrolling a candidate, an amazing piece of knowledge. Never happen!

The chickens have come to roost

Port Hope Council really has a problem that has to settled very shortly. The issue of the facilities that house the Port Hope Police will not go away this time nor can it be put off any longer. The PHP need a new building and in the light of potential inadequacy reports from the province need a new home right away. A newly released report quotes a consultant as saying a total cost of $6.21 million, and that doesn't include the cost of any land is needed to build a facility to Provincial standards. Two reports were presented to the PSB: in addition to the facilities report thare was a report that outlined the expenditures for a new communications system - $1.6 million.
So if the PH PSB votes to go ahead with an independent police service renewal program the taxpayers of Port Hope will pay for it when Port Hope Council votes to approve the Police budget. A total of $7.81 million over the next ten years with the majority of that upfront for a building program. Just how long the province will allow the PSB to operate under inadequate standards is another question.

Crunchtime is here. What will Port Hopers do? Especially when the Ward 2 residents have no love for the urban Ward 1 force, they prefer the OPP.

A lively three way debate. The OPP boosters in the former Township (Ward 2) haven't forgotten the loss of the proposed shift to the County OPP, the Port Hope Chauvinists who will not consider anything other than a home-grown solution and the pragmatists who will look at anything that will save money and makes sense (even a collaboration with Cobourg).

Guest Post

Deb O'Connor

LAWYERS: FORCE FOR GOOD OR EVIL?
First off, let's be clear that I am not a lawyer, but I worked in a legal environment long enough to have an informed, but informal opinion, of the genre. Second, the lawyers I came to know and respect worked for Legal Aid in the clinic system, so they have made a choice to work exclusively for the disadvantaged. While I don't know it for a fact, I suspect these are a different breed than the Bay Street shark variety.

But one thing most lawyers have in common is their adherence to the Law, and to their Rules of Professional Conduct. Make no mistake, lawyers are a distinct sub-set of the human species, and their peculiarities set them apart from the rest of us. When they rattle on about Conflict of Interest and other legalities that make little sense to mere humans, they really mean it! Nothing matters more, in fact, and the only thing they fear is the Law Society of Upper Canada, which wields a big stick.

They understand there can be a huge difference between Justice and Law, the former being what society aspires to, and the latter what we actually have. No amount of teeth grinding or wishful thinking can make the two the same, although as laws change, the line is always blurred. Those lawyers unwilling to accept that, or simply wanting to change it, often enter politics where our laws originate.

Lawyers don't generally see their clients as people; they just represent whatever legal issue they are pursuing. Lawyer wear blinders in that regard; they are only interested in the facts of the issue and how to prevail, not in the client's personal life problems. What can sometimes seem like coldness and disinterest is simply a focused lawyer doing their job, which they clearly see as solving the legal problem in front of them.

What lawyers often have, in my experience, is a wicked sense of humour. Not generally shared among outsiders, it's their own personal safety valve to stave off the effects of work stress. Believe it or not, lawyers can be a veritable barrel of fun given the right occasion and enough good scotch.

But would you want a lawyer in your own family? They can also be royal pains in the butt, especially when they insist on pointing out the Law and its ramifications. And, they stubbornly refuse to give legal advice in areas of the law they don't practise, so your real estate lawyer cousin will not provide advice on your divorce no matter how many times you ask.

Good or evil? Depends on who you ask, and who the lawyer is! But even if you hate the breed, most of us can agree anarchy is not a reasonable alternative, and that's what we would have without the Law and lawyers to navigate them.

Welcome to the new readers

Welcome to the BurdReport, I am repeating this as a story, in the NNews, mentioned the BurdReport and published a link.

For those who haven't been here before please click on all the links, especially the archives on the left. I have been at this a long while and there's plenty of content. I write about anything that strikes my fancy, especially local news. You will get both sides of an issue and probably an analytical opinion to boot and the chance to make an instant comment.

And so it goes on

To my astonishment the Norlock story and his crown for being the Champion leafleteer is marching on., and the election approaches. To this end Party PR is flooding in.This press release has come in, and before the Ruddites get shirty about not having the same privilege I will print all that comes in. The Ruddites do not have the BurdReport on their media list so we don't their pearls of wisdom - send 'em in it gets printed.

The HST is an issue that crosses Provincial boundaries, the Feds have to approve the HST bribe money, consequently Mr Norlock is on the hot seat as he takes orders from Harper that conflicts with "Little Mike" Hudak's campaign against the HST.

click on the image to enlarge

A question for the Cramahe watchers

Bylaw Officer Jim Harris appears to be taking it on the chin, producing reports that Council doesn't either like or take much notice of. His latest, a treatise on the legality of a patio fence at the Queen's hotel, appears to have produced an interesting Council meeting, to say the least. Bob Owen, of Cramahe Now reports that Mr Harris introduced his report about the option and legality of a year round fence around the patio at a Council meeting. The owner of the fence, Councillor Tim Gilligan Jr (he of baseball bat fame) promptly declared a conflict of interest and then moved to the delegation table and debated the issue with Council. A most innovative use of the C of I regulations.
The upshot was that once again Cramahe Council put the boots to a report produced by Mr Harris, a previous one being the Farmers' Market bylaw controversy, now what? Will Marc "quick draw. I can fire you" Coombs get rid of this officious man, just as he has removed all of the people who displease him. Remember Lee Dekeyser, Ken Wood and other minions of the Township?

The HST - what do we know about it?

OK this is from a non-economist so don't get wound up about the numbers just critique the reasoning. We are going to get a new tax and people will get tax rebates and business will get a lower corporate tax rate. This where it gets sticky. Consumers pay more actual cash but will get tax rebates (up to $1,000 cheque in the mail) and the promise of more jobs from a more efficient business sector. The business advantages are becoming quite clear, they will get a lower tax rate and relief from paying tax on items purchased for the business. The HST is widely seen as a contributor to making businesses more competitive because it does not tax businesses' purchases, including many capital items, that were subject to the old retail sales tax. If this is true then that help for business is good. What isn't good is the lowered corporate tax. Corporate taxes are paid on net income, just like personal tax. You reach the net by deducting expenses from the gross income. The more allowable expenses there are will determine the amount of net income. The rest is profit. Profit can be used in many ways but is usually taken out of the business by the owners. So, in my reckoning if a business owner has profit and don't forget that there is a high amount of net income that is not taxable before hitting the threshold, it's all gravy. Why are we making it easier for a business owner to cut his costs (and increase productivity) - good and allowing the owner to keep more profit - bad?

People with hurt feelings, please line up

Are there any more groups out there that need apologies? If so get in line because there will always be craven, grovelling and vote-seeking ploiticians willing to utter any apology necessary. Today it was the Australians apologising for accepting thousands of kids, who would have starved, and the British PM will follow suit next month (Extracting the most political mileage from the situation Gordon Brown announced he will apologise next month!). As readers may deduce from the words today I have little truck or trade with political apologies. They are a political device that works for Pols but not people. If Pols want to apologise for their transgressions why don't they apologise for not fixing Society's ills. The 30 odd billion spent on the war in Afghanistan could have paid for an expanded heath care sytem an unemployment relief system that maintains families and a host of other remedies to lift us from this man-made recession.