Sometimes you have to be hit between the eyes with a two by four

Some topics that appear on the newscasts ad nauseum are just not newsworthy after the second or third time. The CBC which has made a swine flu news item mandatory for each night for the past six months is a good example of that. BUT yesterday's news about the 13 year old youth who died in his father's arms was certainly the shocker that brought us all to believe that this swine flu is serious stuff for anybody with undeveloped immune systems. There is no excuse now we know that this virus can kill and kill fast.

So Get Out and Get Jabbed

Scheduled H1N1 Flu Clinics in the County

The following clinics have been scheduled in Northumberland County for people in the first phase considered to be the most at risk of developing complications from H1N1 virus.

Cobourg - Thursday, October 29 - 1 to 6 pm at the Cobourg Lion's Centre on Elgin Street

Port Hope – Friday, November 6 – noon to 6 pm at the Town Park Recreation Centre (62 McCaul St.) in Port Hope.

Campbellford – Saturday, November 7 – 10 am to 4 pm at St. John’s United Church (50 Bridge St.) in Campbellford.

Brighton– Wednesday, November 11 – noon to 6 pm at the King Edward Park Community Centre (75 Elizabeth St.).

Cobourg – Friday, November 13 – 10 am to 4 pm at the Cobourg Lion’s Centre (157 Elgin St.).

Port Hope - Saturday, November 21 - 10 am to 5 pm at the Town Park Recreation Complex (62 McCaul St.) in Port Hope.

Campbellford – Wednesday, November 25 – noon to 7 pm at St. John’s United Church (50 Bridge St.) in Campbellford.

Port Hope – Friday, November 27 – 10 am to 6 pm at the Town Park Recreation Complex (62 McCaul St.) in Port Hope.

People are asked to bring their Ontario Health Card and driver's license.

I can't believe I missed this!

A ritual was disturbed this week. The Cobourg Council agenda was late being published and due to a hectic week the website was not rechecked so the items on the agenda never made it to the commenting stage on Sunday. However seeing another outlet reporting that Cobourg Council had voted to abolish paper voting, this morning, certainly forced me to visit the agenda.

So the topic is now "paperless voting" and will it increase participation in the next election? The voting practice will be:

• each voter will receive, if they are on the voters' list, a PIN number.
• PIN numbers will only register once during the voting procedure
  
• the voting period will be extended as voting day will not be voting day but "cutoff" day
• Although there will be an audit trail, all hits will be registered, there will be no paper trail
• recounts will become redundant, after all who can question a machine

What this will do, which may or may not be beneficial according to your point of view, is to lead to the disenfranchisement of those people who refuse to use computers (and there are still many of them). It also may lead to unscrupulous practices. For example: if the PIN numbers are being mailed out - mail theft of PIN numbers in large and unsecure mail spots (some apartment buildings), Make last minute canvassing by candidates absolutely redundant. The fastest way to get rid of a candidate is to tell them that the household has already voted, "And Yes I did vote for you!!" Finally a savvy candidate with a smart-phone will be able to capture a disinterested household vote by offering to vote for them on the doorstep.

But the biggest omission here is the acceptance of "transparency" by not appointing an "Audit Committee" to oversee the vote. This is allowed under the Municipal Act but doesn't appear anywhere in the motion to setup electronic voting in Cobourg.

It should be noted that an exemption to the purchasing policy is being made to award the contract to the same people who did it last time. This must not happen. Even if Intellvote did such a good job last time make them bid on the job again. After all they would prove to be the lowest bidder - all the development costs were paid for last election - this election is pure profit. Bad decision.

Sunday #4

You knew that with all these posts going up in one day there would be one that may off the wall. Here it is, an email from anonymous, if I suggested this I would stay anonymous too!

"At the risk of being written off as nothing but a grassy knoller, I think you should put this idea up before anybody else thinks of it.

Cobourg does not need a new train station. Nobody asked for a new train station. It just sort of popped up, like magic, out of nowhere.

Today, the story is all over the news that the mafia runs the construction industry in Montreal. Montreal-based VIA was up to its ass in the sponsorship scandal. They lost most of their head office over it. It was noticed, over the years, that untendered contracts for new station roofs, a wholly unnecessary design, station signage, uniforms for engineers (unnecessary and unwanted) -Christ, you name it- were legendary and laughable. But God help anyone who questioned any of it. All of it was run from Montreal -all of it.

So, propose the question will you: Is Cobourg's new VIA Station going to be built by the Montreal Mafia?"

So there it is folks who is getting the "brown envelopes" in this deal?

And you wonder why people are discouraged -

- From the public consultation process. There is a municipal process underway, and has been for a couple of years now. It is the Official Plan Review. The Official Plan is a mighty document that outlines the rules for the orderly development of the Town for the next decade or so and has to be updated every decade or so. Usually the process entails the Town Planner, the Planning Advisory committee and the pol in charge of planning sitting down with the high priced consultant, who will do the work, and amend the previous document. They will insert the planning flavour of the day, "neighbourhood improvement areas", "Growth Pans", and the current ideas on ways to make the community a better place. Along the way, and following the project management plan - a Gannt chart - there will be spaces for public consultation. The members of the public that actually participate fall into two categories, the idealist and the pragmatists. The idealists are just that, people who see the opportunity to make suggestions about bike paths, trees and sustainable environmetal development. The pragmatists are usually people who can see the way to make a buck. Usually the real estate industry who would like to see more areas of the Town favourably designated. This is an important point because the Zoning Bylaw, which is the document that mandates the mechanism of development, is based on the OP. Get a provision in the OP and you can follow it through to a conclusion that will make you money.
But the point of this post is to show that public consultation is not wanted and in fact discouraged. For example. The final public consultation is taking place next week, but it is an Open House, not a public meeting. This is important as Open Houses, the forum where "tables" are manned by experts to answer the various anticipated questions which can be easily deflected because of the intimate form of the meeting, a far different setup to a "public meeting" where questioners actually have to pose questions at a microphone to a panel or an expert. Two things happen at public meetings: all the audience gets to hear the question posed, and this is good - questions will not be repeated and follow up questions can lead to meaningful discussions about complex issues and the presenters are identified to all.
If an interested party has a serious concern, not satisfied by the answers given at the Open House, they will be asked to put it into writing for the consultant's consideration and to form part of the public record. In the case of the OP review next week the cutoff date for all written responses is the NEXT DAY. So if an interested party has a concern, they had better be prepared to stay up all night reviewing the answers given to them at the Open House, the day before the deadline for submissions. A bad piece of timing, but will in fact discourage some comments.

Sunday #2

Having travelled over 2000 miles this week, and all of it on the 401 between Toronto and Montreal, I can categorically say that the money that Northumberland County has spent on the two signs posted at the County boundary is not enough. These signs are cheap and chintzy in comparison to all of the other announcement signs on the 401. If you want to be in the business of image, image is everything. If you want to see a great sign look at the Napanee sign, followed by the Belleville and Quinte West signs, both good nighttime signs. I just hope that the Northumberland signs are not finished products even the Port Hope sign is a better looking one.

And whilst we are on the topic of roads, all I can hope for next week is that a fairy godmother flies over and zaps all merging motorists. If you can't merge properly onto a fourlane highway don't drive! Almost all drivers this week, coming down an entry ramp on the 401, have done two things: travelled at a speed that would give a travelling driver the impression that they are going to collide if that speed was maintained and two, instead of increasing speed and merging in front of the traveller the merger will slam the brakes on at the last minute and fall in behind. Meanwhile the traveller has been frantically scouring his rearview and mentally calculating whether it is safe to pull into the faster lane to avoid the merger.

Sunday #1

The fundraising issue for the Cobourg Community Centre will be over tomorrow night when the Council accepts it's own recommendation to adopt the Fundraising Committee's recommendation that a couple of low paid clerks will be spending, under the direction of the fundraising committee, $150,000 on consultants' fees. A couple of big issues here: one is the composition of the fundraising committee, which until now has been overlooked and is the fix in to bring back Terry Slobodian, he of hospital fundraising fame.
First the composition of the committee and a potential for local conflicts. A successful fundraiser is only as good as their Roladex - who do they have in their files and how many times can you hit on the same people? In the case of the local oversight committee, it has to be called that as in the words of one of its members, "You can't expect us to drop our day jobs and fundraise" Why not? That's what you volunteered for! Anyway back to the issue. Here we have the two biggest roladexes in Town (Linda Kay's and the United Way, and Rhonda Cunningham of the Hospital Foundation) hiring someone to fundraise. The potential for conflict is simple, both the UW and the Hospital require ongoing fundraising, will their roladexes be opened to the CCC guy? Or will the "whales" in those mighty roladexes be stifled for future UW and HF funding? And if they are will the owners - Linda Kay and Rhonda Cunningham be responsible?
As to Terry Slobodian, formerly of Navion and formerly of the Bridgeport Hospital Foundation, coming back. He is now esconced in his own Company, and obviously looking for business, will he be the elephant in the room when the RFP comes out?

Guest Post #3

Deb O'Connor
MAKING POLITICAL STEW

Inspired by William Hayes' recent guest column about the moral rot in our institutions, I've been thinking about the particular rot in our political system, and its effects on ordinary Canadians. Having voted in every federal and provincial election since 1971 I figure my opinions are as good as anybody else's, so here goes.

The problem with the liberals is that they don't really stand for anything in particular besides holding power. They are all for sunshine when it's sunny and they welcome the rain when it comes. Whatever Joe and Jane Public want that week, the liberals will promise to deliver. They believe in polls, pragmatism and expediency; the cornerstones of keeping power. There doesn't seem to be any ideological or philosophical basis behind their platforms, they just go whichever direction the wind takes them. Over the last 20 years, that direction has been a wobbly right turn.

The tories definitely believe in something, namely the Upholding and Advancement of the Status Quo. They fervently want to return us to an earlier time when men were men and women did what they were told. Don't get me wrong, they are ok with women working outside the home, as long as dinner is ready on time. They are passionate about their belief system and frequently attack and ridicule those who are progressive. To their credit, we always know exactly what they stand for, and what we are voting for with the tories.

Now, the NDP, a party and a cause that has struggled in Canada since its formation in the 1930's. Most of our vital social programs, like old age security, unemployment insurance, and health care, historically have emerged from their hard work. Never mind that the liberals stole most of them and then implemented less than perfect programs, we still owe "the socialists" a huge debt of gratitude for their contributions. But do they have a future? In recent years they appear to have abandoned the basic principles the party was built on, and they are scrambling in a fairly desperate bid to continue at all. But, even today's watered down policies offer a clear alternative to the others.

Trouble is, the credibility of all politicans has taken a nose dive over the last few years, and many people can't bring themselves to trust or believe what any of them say. These are the voters who just stay home, and there are more of them with every election. Somehow people have to be convinced anew that politics do matter, that they need to pay attention all the time, not just before an election. If they do that, they will know what the parties stand for, and which one they want to entrust with their precious vote.

At least that's how I see it.

How's this for a shocker

Our very own PM - SH admits in this story he doesn't watch Canadian News - just the American news. Sad!

Another guest post

Fom Deb O'Connor
Northumberland Today: Lost in the Wilderness

Has anyone else noticed the joke our daily newspaper has become? Day after day I click on their site, expecting to see local news and opinion on the issues of the day. What do I find? Endless stories about thefts of ATVs, car break-ins and hapless shoplifters. The few readers left must be scared shitless about the apparent soaring crime rate, huddled in their damp basements lest they be victims of a home invasion. If fear sells newspapers their numbers must be high indeed.

Alongside the fear mongering we find the sickening cheer leading type stories generated by our local movers and shakers, dutifully re-gurgitated for our consumption. Then, the endless editorials written by the geniuses at the Toronto Sun, all with the same right wing message.

For the few real journalists left at the paper, it must be painful going to work every day. Do they know they are the walking dead? It's not like they had any control over what happened to Canadian print jounalism, but they, like the readers, are paying the price now in spades.

It is a sad end to our four former local papers that used to do the honourable job of keeping residents informed of events in their communities. If this is progress, include me OUT!

Finally a truthful protest group

Usually when one reads about protest groups the aims of the group, i.e. to stop whatever is being proposed are couched in high falutin' scientific or environmental reasons as opposed to the unadulterated truth - "My property value is going to be affected". Now a group in Colborne, read about it here, has made that reason the main one in an attempt to stop an apartment building from being built in their neighbourhood. Good for them. Now all we need to do is to impress upon the powers to be that if taxpayers don't like certain ideas it is a legitimate beef to say they don't like it, and not be forced to hire experts to manufacture reasons that sound a lot better to other powers that be.