And More Thoughts

Too many things to think about at this time of year. So here are a few musings that I had.

SNOW JOB

Nice picture of the Coco Paving truck cleaning the snow. I'll bet the storm helped a lot of contractors with some extra money before the holidays.

The headline in the Star certainly helped the Mayor and Council but made a joke out of Councillor Brister's remark re saving $200,000:

• "Snow removal cost to jump... It's $250,000 and counting, say city staff"

After all, if you want your snow cleared, you have to pay taxes don't do.

Of course, nowhere in the story does it say how much the costs jumped. The City would normally expect that there would be a major snowstorm that would cost some money and would budget for it. How much was budgetted so that we can see how much costs increased? Nope nothing about that.

I just hope that there are no accidents along a local road. The City maintenance managers said that residential streets will not be cleared to the bare pavement. He said there might be snow or slush on the streets but I think he forgot to mention the word ice. Yes we will be able to drive down them but will also be able to skate down them as well. He may have potentially opened up the City to a major legal claim in case of an accident.

BIG BORDER MEETING

That is what the agenda will be for the first Council meeting in January. Frankly I can't see the point of it but I guess I will have to wait until I see exactly what the agenda says.

Here's what we will not talk about:

• failure on the US$75 million deal with Detroit on the Tunnel
• failure on the Tunnel Improvement Project
• failure on Schwartz #1 report
• failure on a tunnelled solution to the border
• failure on a Schwunnel to the border
• failure to explain how a fully tunnelled solution became a partially tunnelled solution without a Reconsideration of Council's Motion
• failure on Greenlink
• failure to get the County onside with the City
• failure to convince the Province to support Greenlink
• failure to file a response to DRIC
• failure... oh I just can't go on anymore.

What can the purpose of the meeting be then? The only thing I can think of is that our fearful Leader of the Council and the Voice of Council on the Border file needs to keep the Councillors in line in 2008. Make them vote on something, no matter what, and tell them they have to remain united. If they try to change down the road, rub the vote in their faces. OR, if at Council, wave the Procedural By-law and scream Reconsideration.

Too bad that Eddie cannot use Schwunnels any more as his stalling tool!

AMALGAMATION IS DEAD

The discussion at Council on the Convention Bureau certainly suggests to me that the rift between the City and the County is growing.

It should hardly have been a surprise when Councillor Dilkens appeared at the County asking for money. I guess he forgot that the Gazelle Feeders were there a few weeks before asking for money for the Economic Development Commission without a business plan and without saying who was going to contribute the $150,000.

The County politicians paid their $50,000 once but to expect them to pay half a million on blind faith was asking too much.

ARENA SIGNAGE

Now wait a minute here. What's this deal about signage at the arena? Was there a tender for it? Why are the Spits announcing it and not the City? Who owns the arena after all?

I see that the Windsor Electrical Contractors Association and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 773 paid for the signs but will also have billboard ads for 10 years on the signs. Is that worth $300,000, the cost of the signs, or is it worth more or less. Does anyone know in the City Administration?

Are the only ads that are going to be shown on those signs from those two groups alone or are other ads going to be sold? If so who gets the proceeds, the City, the Spits, the two groups or a combination thereof.

Wouldn't it be nice to know.

WINDSOR TRANSIT BUSES TO BE PURCHASED

This is quite strange. The Star Reported that Transit Windsor received almost $4 million in gas tax funding which is going to be used to buy new buses along with other capital acquisitions. Interestingly, the Transit Windsor general manager said:

• "Windsor's share is consistent with the funding allocated in previous years... that amount has been fully allocated in our 2008 budget."

How can that be when the Mayor said previously:

• "Before we buy new buses, I'd like to streamline practices," Francis said. "I move we not buy new buses and reconsider the issue in 2008. Before we add to services, we need to get a handle on the service we provide."

Did 2008 come early?

ANOTHER WHITEWASH WUC AUDIT NEEDED

Monica Wolfson of the Star is certainly not letting the Windsor Utilities Commission file disappear. Unbelievably, she reported that notwithstanding the huge increase that the Commission has been charging its customers and the sorry shape of our watermain system, the amount spent on capital replacement of watermains will not increase.

You have to ask then why we have to pay so much money. And even when money is to be spent it is about $4 million less than consultants said were necessary.

I am so glad to be told that this is merely something we are going to have to "deal with" by the acting general manager, Max Zalev. Don't you get the impression that Mr. Zalev has learned from the Mayor and has just "dismissed" us.

If that is bad enough, 46% of the work that they were too this year has to be carried over into next year. Lack of coordination with the City was blamed. Imagine that, one City department cannot coordinate with another City department. What system can the Mayor point to to say that this is now under control and will never happen again. I thought that this co-ordination issue had been solved before. How much money was wasted and went down the drain?

I'm getting lost in numbers... the budget is $2 million short, services fees to Enwin increased by million dollars, extra engineering staff and call center staff have to be hired...

Well Council Marra, after the first Ministry whitewash audit is reported, and citizens are not happy, will you be asking for another one to try and satisfy the demands of citizens for a full investigation into this farce?

IS "RECONSIDERATION" THE MAYOR'S NEW SILENCE TOOL

The Mayor tried to close down Councillor Halberstadt when he started asking questions about the LAS agreement by saying it was a Reconsideration. That ridiculous proposition was shot down. It was an agenda item after all. Fortunately the Clerk said it was not Reconsideration and the Councillor was allowed to continue.

His questions must have been difficult ones. When Councillor Halberstadt started asking questions about the role of LAS and Amberley Gavel Ltd. the Mayor chose not to answer the questions but told the Clerk to do so. Such deference to the Clerk or was it rather to let her take the hit if there is a problem in the future. She must realize now what is NOT included in her job description!

What Councillor Halberstadt was driving at was what is the role of the principals of Amberly and is there a conflict with the City. Fred Dean who is an experienced lawyer who has "acted extensively for municipalities and municipal associations in Ontario" is involved with Amberly. I believe as well that Mr. Dean acted for our Mayor in his issue with respect to his possible conflict of interest in the WUC matter.

The Clerk's position was that since Mr. Dean would actually not be doing any of the work since it would be the job of outside retained individuals to do investigations, there was no conflict.

The good news is for the first year it least citizens will not be charged with fees for investigations. Get your requests in early before Council changes its mind.