Junior "BUYS FOREIGN" And More Stories

A few more items of interest for coffee break time

WHY JUNIOR IS SO MAD AT BLOGGERS

Interesting A3 column by Grace Macaluso in the Star today. Now I understand why a nothing announcement about signing a consulting agreement required the Mayor and 2 Councillors to go overseas at taxpayer expense and why we saw the huge front page Star story on Saturday and the Editorial on the airport.

I think Chris Schnurr is right. It looks like confidential information was leaked to the Star after all:

• "Further, as the report reads before you on page 4, confidential issues are involved; and this purchase may be made in a manner that protects the confidentiality of the consultant.
  
  Why is it necessary to protect the confidentiality of the consultant? According to the report, this consultant is simply conducting a feasibility study.
  
  However, “confidentiality” no longer appears to be an issue since the disclosure of the name of the consultant in the Windsor Star was a Lufthansa subsidiary, probably Lufthansa Consulting - but does raise an issue that appears to contravene Section 6 of the Code of Conduct passed by this council.
  
  Who disclosed this “confidential” information before this was discussed tonight?"

• "And Mayor Francis, if confidential information is truly “getting out there,” may I suggest utilizing the services of the integrity commissioner to make an official determination?
  
  If the city can utilize his services for free Spitfire’s tickets for the opening night of the WFCU Centre, then I would presume the intentional leaking of confidential information would be a little higher on the priority list?"

All that taxpayer money wasted to convince Lufthansa to take a quarter of a million dollars from us. How ridiculous!

Naw. I think that Councillor Halberstadt is telling us that there is some deal going on perhaps with Lufthansa until they find out that there is no business at Windsor Airport that can justify them coming here. No wonder Eddie did not answer his question at Council.

However, it allows Lufthansa to do a major cargo aviation study about this region at our expense to see whether they should get more involved in Aerotropolis at Detroit Airport where they fly already. That is the only air transportation hub that will count here.

We are suckers in our Mayor's desperation to look good! Throw out ideas and maybe one of them might stick.

Grace also mentioned that WeACT people spoke at Council about the airport and raised some troubling issues just as they did with WUC where Junior was the invisible Chair during the 86% fiasco when the Mayor did all the talking:

• "Other than a small delegation [4 delegations is small???] from the Windsor Association of Concerned Taxpayers, the Ward 3 representative was the sole councillor to oppose a plan to spend $220,000 of taxpayer money on the study into creation of an air cargo and perishable goods centre at Windsor Airport...
  
  Halberstadt’s rank-breaking isn’t new. But the derision that greeted his concerns are indicative of a herd mentality that seems to be gripping city council...
  
  Lewenza lumped Halberstadt in with the small group of dissidents “who are often negative and like to create a lot of noise.”
  
  Halberstadt’s true constituents aren’t the residents of Windsor, but the online bloggers more interested in raising their profiles than offering constructive ideas, he said."

Fortunately I am not one of those Bloggers nor am I familiar with any in this City. Perhaps Junior is still jet-lagged and is looking at some other Windsor community in the world. Speaking of "jet-lagged" is Councillor Dilkens better now since he missed Monday's Council meeting!

What I think is that Councillor Junior is really furious because BLOGGERS have pointed out his hypocrisy. The Councillor who introduced the BUY CANADIAN Motion at Council BOUGHT FOREIGN AND SOLE SOURCE so no Canadian company could bid on the consulting job and perhaps offer a much lower price too!

I bet his CAW brothers and sisters were not too happy with him either!

EH CHANNEL DISAPPEARING

Canwest has to be a bit happier today. If the story is true that the Star is for sale, its sales price may have gone up because I am certain that its advertising rates will. Who knows, Canwest may decide not to sell the paper because it is effectively now the only show in town.

The DRIC curse continues. There is no doubt in my mind that the Federal and Provincial Governments have decided that they are going to fight issues over funding infrastructure in places like Windsor rather than say fighting over the funding of the subway system extension in the GTA. That is too serious a matter that could impact their own electability. Whatever then is achieved here would be the template for other places within Ontario.

The same now applies for television stations it seems. Fight the battle over a small, local television station like the one in Windsor rather than a major market area. Use the closing to try and put pressure on the CRTC:

• “'A' Television Stations in Wingham and Windsor to be Shut Down
  
  TORONTO, Feb. 25 /CNW/ - CTV Inc. announced today that, given the ongoing structural problems facing the conventional television sector in Canada and the current global economic crisis, it will not be applying for renewal of the CKNX-TV Wingham and CHWI-TV Wheatley licences (and its rebroadcaster in Windsor).
  
  "This decision was difficult but necessary. The traditional economic model for Canadian television is broken. The financial pressures facing our conventional television operations are further compounded by the Commission's decision to turn down requests to implement a fee-for-carriage regime for local television in October 2008," said Paul Sparkes, Executive Vice-President, Corporate Affairs, CTVglobemedia. "Unfortunately, we may need to consider similar actions in other local markets given the current regulatory framework."

What the networks are talking about is that their incomes may be reduced and so they need an additional source of revenue. Here is what fee-for-carriage means

• “Canadian cable company leaders are trying to get the CRTC to back down on the idea of charging fees for TV programming on monthly cable, satellite or telco bills. Fee for carriage has been proposed by broadcasters headed by Global Television. The proposal would have Canadian viewers pay an additional monthly fee on their cable, satellite or telco TV bills for local channels such as Global, CTV and CBC.

Thus it would appear that Windsor will be another test market. Close our local station down, threaten to close other local stations down, wait for the public outcry and hope that Government officials will get involved to pressure CRTC to allow all the networks to get five dollars a month or so extra per viewer. How else can the CBC budget issues be solved too! They need $65M.

Remember when I was talking before about an online newspaper to compete with the Windsor Star. It will be even more important now given the almost complete domination that the Star will have in this area. I wonder if one of the out-of-town chains might decide to set something up here, say a local version of the Toronto Star or the Toronto Sun.

What I am thinking now is that there might be a good business opportunity for local people to get together to create a combination online newspapers/TV station. Who knows but there are some interesting business opportunities that I can see.

HERE COMES THE AT GRADE DRIC ROAD

As I am sure we can all agree, Windsorites have been Delrayed over the construction of a new border road. We cannot afford a DRIC Road nor a Greenlink.

When Infrastructure Ontario confirms that there is no P3/AFP money around, at that time I expect the Minister of the Environment to kick out the DRIC Road.

Oh my goodness you may think, that means the process has to start all over again and will take more years.

Oh no, just like with windmills, the Province will wipe out local opposition to important projects. Here is a recent story that will show you exactly what I mean:

• "Residential and Civil Construction Alliance of Ontario
  
  RCCAO report calls for elimination of environmental assessment red tape
  
  Red tape delaying shovels from breaking ground on projects needs to be cut now more than ever before, the Residential and Civil Construction Alliance of Ontario (RCCAO) says.
  
  “There has to be a political will for streamlining the EA (environmental assessment) process and I think there is a real appetite to make it happen,” says Andy Manahan, executive director of RCCAO. “Unless red tape is eliminated, there will be delays for projects to come on stream.”
  
  The RCCAO is not saying that environmental concerns should be minimized, but its recent white paper, Environmental Assessment Reform: A Tool for Economic Recovery, says that time-consuming and, at times, repetitive legislation is inefficient and could hamper the quick roll-out of economic stimulus projects...
  
  The RCCAO white paper urges that Ontario immediately unveil a Declaration Order to simplify EA requirements, as it already has done for transit projects. The required consideration of “alternatives solutions” for a project would be removed, especially for those that are part of economic stimulus packages."

Amazing, this economic crisis is permitting all kinds of things to happen that would have been unthinkable before. No wonder Eddie is so quiet now on the border file.

Bye-bye Greenlink.

COLLEGE STREET BRIDGE

Speaking of the RCCAO, I found this note in one of my past BLOGs:

• "As the Residential and Civil Construction Alliance of Ontario report on bridge improvements tells us… it looks like we need to spend $5-7 Million per year annually. The 2007 budget is $1.5 million. Fingers crossed we do not have a tragedy here."

And some people think we ought to have a Public Authority running an international Bridge in Windsor!

Speaking of Public Authorities, I saw this article:

"GOLISANO, MAZIARZ LAUNCH ASSAULT ON BRIDGE COMMISSION'S SECRECY: Lawsuit promised to force agency to comply with New York law"
http://www.niagarafallsreporter.com/cover2.10.09.html

Obviously, I have no idea if it is true or not but it makes for an interesting read.

WHAT FORTUNATE SCHEDULING TIMES

There was supposed to be a Tunnel Commission meeting on Thursday at 3 p.m. Unfortunately, the meeting was cancelled due to this:

• "Due to the special in-camera meeting of Council scheduled for tomorrow, the meeting of the WINDSOR TUNNEL COMMISSION SCHEDULED FOR 3:00 P.M., ON THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2009 HAS BEEN CANCELLED AND RESCHEDULED TO THURSDAY, MARCH 5, 2009 AT 3:00 P.M., IN THE WALKERVILLE MEETING ROOM."

On the City's website, the following was written:

• "Special In-camera meeting of Council regarding a Border Update to be held Thursday February 26, 2009 at 3:00 o'clock p.m. Town of Walkerville Meeting Room, Windsor City Hall."

This has to do with the City's response to the DRIC environmental assessment. It must be a meeting to approve what Estrin has written since the deadline is only a few days away.

However, the Mayor could have held that meeting early in the morning on the 26th or later in the day and still had the Tunnel Commission meeting. I'm sure he did not want to do that because he knew that members of WeACT were going to be there to ask some very difficult and awkward questions. He got his last-minute reprieve until the fifth.

In fact, this came from the Clerk:

• "Please be advised that the time for the Special In Camera meeting of Windsor City Council originally scheduled for Thursday, February 26, 2009 at 4:30 pm has been re-scheduled to Thursday, February 26, 2009 at 3:00pm."

Those Bloggers and WeACT reps are mean. Just ask Junior!

If only the Mayor had rescheduled for the 15th. Then I could have said "Eddie, Beware the Ides of March."

A LOVELY EDITORIAL BUT WHAT ABOUT POOR SANDRA

The Praise from the Windsor Star is amazing. Lufthansa should be thrilled:

• "Airport hub
  
  A welcome initiative...
  
  Given the attributes of Windsor and Essex County -- the water, the thriving agricultural industry and the proximity to major centres in Canada and the U.S. -- it would seem at first blush to be a viable proposition."

I wish though that the Editorial writers would actually read their own newspaper before they write this piffle. The Star should realize that this is another pipe dream. Junior gave it away:

• "Coun. Ken Lewenza, who was named to the board last week, said redevelopment of the airport could take years but "it's something we have to do, I believe, if we're to bring about diversification of our local economy.
  
  "It could be breathtaking in its scope because of the number of jobs in warehousing, logistics, skilled trades, trucking, technology and other sectors," said Lewenza, who toured Frankfurt Airport's facilities during a brief weekend trip to Germany."

All that information gathered in a "brief" trip by amateur aviation/distribution experts. Sure it "could" be but then again, perhaps it "could not" be.

The Editorial writer did put in this line which I thought was rather hilarious:

• "Last February, those officials told city council that Essex County was an ideal site for quickly moving fresh fruits and vegetables, and pointed out that we had both commodities at our doorstep.
  
  "It is incredible what has not happened here in the past," said one executive. "I would say it's a crime not to develop such an airport."

I agree that it is a crime. It is a crime for the Mayor to sit on his rear end and do little for one year. Isn't that the reason that the Mayor said:

• "What we have been doing the past year was investigate, research and develop partnerships that can develop the air cargo business in the Windsor-Essex region," Francis said as he left Windsor."

If he has done something, then let us know exactly what he has done. He could have saved us a ton of money because then we would not need the Undevelopment Commission.

Did you read a word of praise about Sandra's initiative which is real and could actually create jobs now? Why not even though the Star is a sponsor?