Is Councillor Dilkens The Enemy Now Too

Our "enemies" phone booth may have to grow in size. Will Councillor Drew Dilkens be added as another member?

We all knew that Councillor Marra was an honorary member. All that his rail tunnel Motion is doing is signalling that his run for the mayor's job has started.

But Councillor Dilkens? He's just a rookie. He's been exposed to this nonsense only for a year. Wow, must he ever be fed up.

Is this Eddie's worst nightmare now happening: the beginning of the Three Blind Mice and others on Council finally coming together and working for the good of the Public by standing up to a Mayor who has lost touch with the electorate? Is this the Council revolution against Mike Hurst all over again? We shall find out tonight at Council.

I feel sorry for Councillor Drew Dilkens. He obviously took too seriously the Star's editorial, the mention in the Henderson column and my recent BLOGs

Such impertinence. Doesn't he understand that the Mayor wants a "no surprise" environment. He actually introduced a Notice of Motion at Council without telling the Mayor in advance it appears. If you had watched the Council meeting, you will have seen Drew introduce the Motion without giving too much detail. He merely said that it dealt with the flow of information. Several minutes later Eddie came back to it and he made the comment that he and Drew had not talked about this and that Drew might need to consider the Ontario Public Transparency Act since it might apply.

In the Star, we learned:

• "Weary of being in the dark over the business dealings of the city's arms-length corporations, Coun. Drew Dilkens wants minutes of every meeting from those entities shared with all councillors.
  
  Dilkens served a notice of motion Monday that he will bring forward his request to council in the next week or two, once it has been fine-tuned with the help of the city's legal department.
  
  Enwin Utilities, Windsor Utilities Commission, the city's tunnel corporation and the airport's YQG Gateway Inc. are among entities that frustrate Dilkens because only councillors who sit on those boards are privy to minutes of meetings and business dealings.
  
  "For me, it's about openness, transparency and accountability,"

What a refreshing attitude.

What I find very fascinating is that this Motion follows along from the Star Editorial two Mondays ago. The timing of the Editorial, on the day of the Council meeting, was clearly deliberate. I wonder if the Star had an inkling that Drew was going to introduce his Motion.

I suspect that Drew must have had this Motion in mind after the airport Council meeting. He was so disturbed about the course of events. It seems that he and the Star are on the same wavelength. That may be troubling to some at City Hall, especially those who might want the Star's support in future electoral endeavours.

It is so nice to see the Star making it up to him for dropping his comments about DRTP.

The actual wording of the Motion needs improvement. Clearly it should not be limited to Minutes only but financial records as well. They may even want to see copies of reports that are presented so they will really know what is going on. What is also disturbing so far is that the information is to be revealed it seems to Councillors only. Why isn't the public entitled to know this information as well since after all they really are our Corporations.

In any event, don't get too excited over it. It is directed right at the heart of what our Mayor wants to do in secret. Why else were companies set up with him and his subordinates on the Board.

Another Legends sports bet pool should be started. The bets I would include are:

• will the Motion be deferred,
• what will be the excuse and
• for how long?

My bet is that it will be deferred so that Legal can do a thorough report on the subject since there are many complex issues of Corporate Law involved and that the Motion will never get heard for years.

I might add another question... who will lead the attack on the Motion. Obviously, it will not be the Mayor. It will however be interesting to see who it is. I can think of several Councillors, probably those who do NOT want to run for mayor. After all, how can one attack openness and transparency.

Oh I know what you're thinking... here he is being cynical again. I'm not. Just remember Councillor Postma's Motion that has been invisible for years after she introduced it. She, like Councillor Dilkens, was a rookie when her Motion was introduced. She got outmaneuvered and never brought it back.