Tag: Politics

Pledging to stop Property Taxes – apparently easier than stopping them.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 2 Comments.

This story made me laugh. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is asking Mayoral and Council Candidates to commit to not increasing property taxes at a rate higher than inflation without either a referendum (yeah, there’s a fiscal plan), or Council pay cuts.

Not surprisingly, few incumbents are signing it, because they know the reality of municipal budgeting, and how tax increases are being forced upon them by agents well beyond their control, like aging infrastructure and senior government downloading. They understand that “no new taxes” is a silly pledge to make, as costs are rising, and the demands for services and amenities only goes up.

I especially laughed because of the guy behind the campaign: new CTF campaign manager BC Director, Jordan Bateman.

If that name is familiar, he not only worked on several BC Liberal campaigns for Provincial Lord of the Sith, Darth Colemen. He was also, until very recently, a Municipal Councillor for the Township of Langley!

So is this a simple case of another BC Liberal insider telling people to “do as I say, not as I do”? How depressingly predicatble.

Reading the “pledge” that the CTF wants candidates to sign, there is little doubt of where they stand:

“I will not vote to raise property taxes beyond the provincial rate of inflation (unless I get approval from taxpayers in a referendum)—and will diligently try to get increases lower than that”

“I will support the introduction of a Taxpayer Protection Bylaw… that financially punishes any mayor and council for raising taxes above the rate of inflation with a one?year, 15% pay cut.”

A few years before asking future Councillors to make this pledge, here is what Councillor Bateman said during his 2008 campaign for re-election when asked if he would support tax increases :

“I am committed to keeping taxes as low as possible. But we also owe it to Langley’s children to build the infrastructure that will keep them safe and healthy and to improve public safety….we must balance both the present and future needs of the Township.”

To me, that sounds like a much more nuanced and realistic approach to municipal taxation, and one that is similar to Wayne Wright’s comments at the Queens Park Residents Association meeting: (I paraphrase):“It’s easy to cut taxes, just tell me what services you want cut!”

However, Councillor Bateman’s comments were in the heat of the campaign. Let’s judge him instead on his actual record as one of Langley’s most popular City Councillors:

2008: he voted for a 5.0% Property Tax increase (more than twice the annual inflation rate for BC of 2.1%).

2009: he voted for (and vociferously supported over some vocal opposition from the new Mayor) a 5% increase (significantly more than the BC inflation rate of 0.0% in that recession year).

2010: he supported a 4.95% increase, (more than twice the annual inflation rate of 1.3%).

2011: just before jumping ship to join the paid staff of the CTF, Bateman voted for another 3.95% tax increase.

(Data on inflation rates is available here)

No problem, he couldn’t keep within the CTF guidelines because of extenuating circumstances – 4 years of extenuating circumstances, apparently – so did he face the punishment of the taxpayers for not managing the City’s finances more responsibly, and volunteer a 15% pay cut as suggested by the CTF? You know the question is rhetorical. The sad reality is that he voted for a 55% increase in Council members’ pay in 2009.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not arguing that taxes are too high or too low, or that councillors get too much pay or not enough. I am just pointing out the hypocrisy of the Canadian Taxpayer’s Federation’s entire “pledge or hedge” program.

Elections and Taxes and Salaries – Correction?

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 2 Comments.

So, enjoying the election so far?

It has become slightly less comfortable for me since writing this post last week. I am fairly non-partisan, in that I vote for candidates, not parties. No sooner do you post a blog looking deeper at the facts being provided by some candidates, and the suggestion of bias comes out.

As an aside, this blog has a market saturation of about 0.01% of eligible voters in New West (my Mom lives in the Kootenays, otherwise it might be 0.011%), so I can’t imagine my criticism is something a candidate should be all that worried about. Secondly, I call myself non-partisan, I never said I wasn’t biased. I work for a city, when someone drags out the “Lazy Muni Employee” trope, I respond. I even declared my bias at the beginning of that post. Notably, I have provided financial and/or logistical help to three council candidates and one mayoral candidate so far this election, and as things stand, it looks like I will vote for about half of those 4. I even have biases within my own biases! Democracy is great.

Back to the topic in question: both of the Candidates I mentioned have taken me to task for the article I linked to above, as I took them to task for (to Quote Mr. Crosty’s campaign literature):

“…over 78% of out taxes are used to pay wages, benefits, and consulting fees”

(and, by implication, our City Staff is lazy, overpaid, and bankrupting the taxpayers of the City).

Demonstrating that, as I previously claimed, I am not a genius at financial statements, one of the Candidates provided me a link to this report prepared by the City which provides the info much more clearly (and, I assume, more accurately,) than my post on the subject. It was pointed out to me that I should look at I should look at Page 8 of the report, where one can find the line:

”…the City’s major cost is salaries and benefits, representing approximately 78% of the total general operating budget.”

I have to admit, this number is way better than the numbers I tried to parse out of the Annual Financial Statements, and it is stated so eloquently, so I guess I owe the Candidates an apology.

Sort of.

Problem is, 78% of the General Operating Budget is not the same thing as 78% of Taxes. Not even close.

The 78% for 2010 number comes from $60M in salaries paid out of the General Operating Fund of $77M. But the General Operating Fund is the money used for day-to-day operations of the City (See Appendix 1 of the Report). The fund from which they pay for office supplies, insurance, incidentals, and yes, salaries. It is not the fund used for Capital Works for the City (like building the Pier Park, or replacing a boiler or City Hall, or sidewalk repairs). Nor does it include any of the Utility operations or capital: the water pipes, sewers, and trash collection that is so much of what the City does.

Things also not included in the General Operating Fund budget: buying and maintaining the vehicle fleet, painting yellow lines on roads, Fire and Police equipment, the Master Transportation Plan, Christmas Lighting, Rail Crossing upgrades, paving projects, the Mercer Stadium Track replacement, street light or street sign upgrades, and the list goes on…

The budget for all of these “Capital costs” was about $65 Million in 2010. And much of that is paid with your taxes.

Then there are utility operations: Electrical, Sewer, Water, and Solid Waste. These are operated on a strict fee-for-service basis: so those who get the service are those who pay for it, and all the money paid for them goes right back into operating the utility. If memory serves me right, this is a strict requirement in the Local Government Act. Utilities cannot be used as cash cows to fund other programs. The only relationship this has to your taxes is that some money is transferred from the Utilities to the General Operating Fund in order to pay the salaries of the people who operate and maintain those utilities but are otherwise paid out of the General Operating Fund.

Interesting to consider that if we reduced salaries, we would need to reduce the General Operation Fund by the same amount of money. If we reduced salaries from $60M to $45M (a 25% cut, sure to cause chaos in any organization), then we would have to also reduce the General Operating Fund by $15M, so the statistic provided by the Candidates would then say “72% goes to taxes!”: not much of an improvement for decimating your City services.

Sorry guys, I stand by my original post as being a much more accurate picture of the relationship of taxes and salaries than “78% of our taxes go to salaries”.

On Elections, Taxes, and Wages

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 2 Comments.

Now I may be biased, seeing as how I work for a City, but I don’t work for New Westminster, so I am going to barge ahead with that potential bias exposed (sound like a declared conflict-of-interest?). There are currently at least two candidates in New Westminster who are talking taxes in a big way, and it seems they both think that City Workers get paid too much. Fair opinion, but are they arguing facts?

John Ashdown, sometimes referred to as the “Mayor of 12th Street”, is well known as both a community-builder and a fiscal conservative. His website includes the following quote:

”Do you know that 78% of your tax dollar ends up in to City Wages and Salaries?

Mayoral Candidate James Crosty was recently quoted by the Douglas College student paper making a very similar statement:

“80 per cent of every tax dollar that’s generated goes towards paying salaries in the city.”

His promotional newspaper is a little more conservative, downgrading that number to 78.08%. But the message is clear: the City pays so much of your taxes to the wages of City workers that they can hardly afford anything else form the 20% of the money that is left!

This first raised the question to me: is that high? I mean it sounds high, but I wonder if it really is compared to other cities, like Richmond, where I work. I asked these questions to Mr. Crosty at last night’s all-candidates mixer, and he suggested I make the comparison between New West and Richmond (presumably, a better-managed City in his opinion). However, before we compare the facts, let’s find out of they are facts.

Luckily, the City’s 2010 budget is available on-line for anyone to read. Now, I’m no financial expert. Tables of geochemical data generally make much more sense to me that tables with dollar signs on them, but we should be able to parse out the info here without too much trouble.

If we look at the amount of tax revenue generated in 2010, we get the nice, round number of $54,569,975 (page 10 of the .pdf, which is page 2 of the financial statements, first number, second column). So 80% of that is $43,655,980.

Now, if you scroll way, down to page 41 of the .pdf, you get a list of all salaries paid in 2010, notably excluding police: $40,430,379. That is about 74%. Close enough for politics.

Hopefully looking at these same financial statements, you see all the problems with this rough estimate. The $54 Million number only represents about a third of City revenue. The City’s annual revenue is actually more than $165 Million, when you include transfers from other governments, utility charges, and other revenue sources. If you want to be simplistic and call all of these “taxes”, then the $40 Million salary figure above only represents 24% of the money the City takes in.

In fact, a better count for the wages paid out is available on page 27 of the .pdf: including Police services, the City paid $64,034,085 in wages and salaries, or 117% of the tax revenue they take in!

Another way to look at it is to flip to page 48 of the .pdf. At the end of a long list of all the businesses to whom the City paid money for goods or services in 2010 is a grand total of $102,540,586.

Perhaps one of the candidates making the statements above can explain to me how a City that is took in $165 Million in revenue can spend 62% of that revenue on payments to suppliers of goods and services, and still spend 80% on staff salaries? Because I’m clearly not a financial genius, and I may have a bias here.

Finally, let’s compare New Westminster with Richmond.

New West collected $54M in property taxes in 2010, which represents 32% of their $165M in revenues. They pay $64M wages (including cops), and another $7M in contracted services, for a total of $71M. That total represents 43% of their revenue. So 43 cents of every tax dollar goes to wages and consultant fees.

Compare this to Richmond’s annual financial report. Note that Richmond collected $156M in Property Taxes, which is 41% of their $379M in revenue. In the same year, they paid wages to $116M and $49M in contracted services for a total of $165M. That represents 43% of their total revenue. Exactly the same as New West.

Mayor Nantel?

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

UPDATE: He’s on Twitter! And apparently following Bill Gates and Bill Vander Zalm. oh boy.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I’ve been asking it around town for a week and a half, and no-one can answer: Who the hell is Francois Nantel?

This municipal election we have no less than four people running for Mayor. Besides the Incumbent, we have Vance McFayden, a long-time resident and community builder, and we have Citizen Advocate James Crosty, and you all know who he is. The mystery to me is Francois Nantel.

Notably, last time Francois was on a ballot in New Westminster was the federal election of 2000, I was living in Illinois (the only Federal Election I have missed since the one a couple of weeks after my 19th birthday when I was living in the crappy apartment on Royal Ave…), but he ran for the federal Green Party! I’m not trying to suggest I am all things “green” in New West, but if I don’t know who this guy is, he has a serious name-recognition problem.

I spent several years serving on the local Green Party EDA (but am not a member of the party any longer… another post, another time), and I have helped the campaigns of Carrie McLaren, Marshall Smith, and Rebecca Helps, but I don’t remember him being at any of those meetings. A couple of friends I have are attached to the Provincial Party, and they have no idea who he is. He isn’t “friends” on Facebook with any of the Green Party Candidates in New West over the last 10 years. So, I guess his ties with the Green Party are pretty severed.

What about community groups? The New Westminster Environmental Partners have been at the forefront of numerous environmental issues in the City over the last few years, from the UBE to solid waste to community gardens, but I don’t remember Francois ever taking part. Neither do the members who started the group before I got active.

There are several citizen committees in New West, but I don’t see his name listed on any of the committees in 2010 or 2011. As a resident of the West End, he is a member of the West End Residents Association, one of the most active in the City, who post their minutes on-line. Mr. Nantel’s name is conspicuously absent .

I asked one of the longer-serving City Councillors on Friday night, and he said “I think he popped up about 10 years ago, angry about Wal Mart, but I don’t know where he has been since…”

I searched the minutes of every Council Meeting in 2011, and I did not find one reference to Mr. Nantel: no delegations, no correspondence. I assume he watched a few of them on TV! If he has any opinions about what he saw, he sure didn’t share them, as searches for “Nantel” of both the News Leader and the Record come up with only a few hits, all of them from the last two weeks, and all little more than mentions that he is running for mayor.

The record article is most concerning. Apparently, this run for Mayor is just a “stepping stone” to bigger, better things in Federal Politics. Yikes. Not a good sign for local leadership.

You know, I have been asking candidates two things this election: don’t go negative, and show me your vision. So I am going to avoid being negative, and accentuate the positive here. I am happy Francois Nantel has shown us what his vision for New Westminster is: a stepping stone in his rear-view mirror as he flies off to Ottawa. Bonne chance, mon frère.

New West Doc Fest – Day 1

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 3 Comments.

Tonight was the first night of the First Annual New West Doc Fest.

The turn out was pretty good, including the Mayor and Councillors Cote, Williams, and Harper. After a bit of mingling with the sultry tones of the Redrick Sultan Jazz Trio, the main event began.

There were three short films before the feature documentary of the night.

The first was “Meathead”, a strangely funny 3-minute short made by students at Pull Focus Film School. It was strangely funny, because you could see most of the jokes coming, but the actor managed to sell the punchlines with a turn of expression that made you laugh. Quick, irreverent, with a message, student film-making at it’s best.

Two documentary shorts were on the subject of the proposed Enbridge oil pipeline to Kitimat. The animated talk-piece “Cetaceans of the Great Bear” told of the threat to cetaceans represented by increased tanker traffic. Although the animation and graphic treatments were at times quite compelling, the message came across a little too strident and wrapped in over-the-top rhetoric to be effective as a message to anyone but the true believer. Let’s just say Dave Brett might not approve. The second, “Oil in Eden” is a little richer in actual content, and tells a much more complete story about the reasons for the oil pipeline, the potential risks, and the groups (especially first nations) who are against the idea.

The main feature was “Burning Water”, a story about a couple of farmers in the outskirts of Calgary with the little problem of flammable drinking water. Although the trailer makes it look like this is about a pissed-off farmer who won’t take it any more, the reality of the story is much more nuanced. This is because of the approach the owners of Valhalla Farm, Fiona and John Lauridsen, take to the issue.

Their problems started when energy giant Encana created a few “coal bed methane” gas wells on their property using “hydraulic fracturing”. Fiona takes a rational approach of asking Encana to do something about it, until Encana determined it wasn’t their fault. She ten takes the rational approach of going to the Government, who do something worse than doing nothing: they are actively indifferent to her plight. John takes the non-confrontational approach of just dealing with it and trying to move on, much to Fiona’s frustration, until he finally decides to strike back at Encana in a rather humorous way.

What makes this more than a simple David-vs-Goliath story is the fact the town in which the Lauridsens live relies on grant money from Encana for their community theatre (a major economic driver), their library, their parks. The Lauridsens even rely on EnCana for non-farm income: from the land-use settlement for the wells and Fiona for her part-time job in the community theatre. They are acutely aware that Encana is an important part of their economy; they just want to be able to continue living on their farm, seemingly made unliveable by Encana’s activity. In the end, all they want is Encana to respect their issue, and Encana, for their own reasons, cannot.

Unfortunately, the story arc is left unfinished, we don’t really know what the solution is, nor are we left with a hint of what the solution will be. But you are not left with the feeling that Fiona’s simple dream of living on her Prairie Valhalla is a sustainable one.

The Doc was followed by a brief but informative Q&A session with the Pembina Institute’s Matt Horne. It seemed the only positive way forward was to assure that we compel our government to develop and enforce a regulatory regime that protects the environment, to counter the forces behind run-away exploration and development of oil and gas, especially in BC’s north-east. However, between BC’s inability to modernize it’s Water Act, the weakness of our groundwater regulation, the fact the Oil and Gas Commission can overrule any BC law, and our current government’s commitment to “reduce red tape” for resource extraction, I am not left filled with confidence.

But hey, tomorrow’s four documentary films have a chance to lift my spirits!

Thinking Forward

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

Here are a couple of pictures I took this summer, a day apart. See if you can figure what they have in common.

click to Art-decotize

Both of these are pictures of public toilets at busy tourist areas.

The first is at Hoover Dam. This was the largest engineering project in the world at the time, and one that was built with public money during the largest economic depression of the post-industrial revolution (the kind of “stimulus spending” that actually puts people to work, well, those it didn’t kill, anyway…). This might be the finest-looking monument to urination ever built: art deco, bas relief sculpture, brass doors, and beautiful tile mosaics inside.

The second is a crappy industrial toilet built at a major trailhead at the Grand Canyon. Nothing wrong with it: four walls and a roof and a composting toilet. Wheelchair accessible, probably built in the late 90s, functional, a little squat, just dull enough to be almost completely unregarded. A Park Service General-Function Shithouse Type #4. Probably tossed together in an afternoon from pre-fab bits imported from China. It is only sad when compared to the architectural grandeur of the Hoover Dam crapper.

This, if you will follow along a bit, says a lot about where we are in North America in the dawn of the 21st century.

You see, there was a time when America (and Canada, as America’s fluffy toque) built things that they were proud of. They dared to dream. If people asked FDR why they were building the largest arch-gravity dam on earth at the height of the Great Depression, he would have said something along the lines of “because we can build a better future today!” But no-one would have asked such a silly question: they knew already. America was the place where people had big dreams and did big things.

This is why the 20th Century belonged to America. Put a man on the moon? No freaking problem: banged the most complicated engineering feat in history together in less than 9 years. From the Chrysler building in 1930 to the Sears Tower in 1998, the United States was home to a series of the world’s tallest skyscrapers. The USof A won the most medals at the Olympics, had the best schools, lead in all fields of science, from FermiLab to the Mayo Clinic to M.I.T. USA! USA! USA!

It is pretty clear to anyone not currently running for President that those times are gone. The US cannot put a human being in space without relying on the very ballistic missile technology developed to destroy the USA. The Middle and Far East are competing to build the greatest Cities in the world. China wins more gold medals, builds more high-speed rail every year than the entire stock of high-speed rail in the United States, and now builds almost twice as many automobiles as the country that made the building of lots of automobiles their entire business plan. There are many countries in the world looking forward and building great things. The USA just isn’t one of them anymore. And now that Steve Jobs is gone…

I’m thinking the toilets above are emblematic of the problem. Where we used to dream and build great things, now we seem to think “what’s the point?” Especially if we can build something less great for less money. When the biggest building in any town USA is the WalMart (and the biggest building in New Westminster is a Lowe’s), why build it fancy? The race is on for cheaper, faster, more of less. There is a cultural malaise where all they can do is look inward, protect what they have. This is a place where people are afraid of the future.

It’s not just me saying this, it is an ongoing theme I am noticing from people much, much smarter than me, and with diverse back grounds, like Umair Haque and Neil DeGrasse Tyson .

I suspect a large part of the problem is the one thing in which the USA still leads to the world: Negative politics.

The problem with negative politics is that it creates an environment where things like Vision and Hope are set up for ridicule. Why come up with a new idea when you can make cheap political points outlining all the potential problems with your opponent’s ideas? Criticism is much easier that creativity. As a result, no politician in the 21st century is going to say “were going to put a man on the moon and return him safety to Earth by the end of the decade”. No-one is brave enough to suggest the US should invest in high-speed rail, or a sustainable energy future (other than “Drill, baby Drill!” – a non-solution that nonetheless is easy for the noisemakers the chant), or in renewing their public education system. Suggesting that maybe people should have health insurance is enough to cost significant political capital.

In today’s political climate, the dreams are too easy to crush:

But that’s the States. What does it have to do with us?

New Westminster is a City that is proud of it’s past, and for good reason. But this Municipal election, I’m going to be thinking about it’s future, not it’s past. This City, like it or not, is going to grow to 100,000 people by the middle of the century. We need to start thinking now about how that future works. How are people going to live in New Westminster in 2050? How are they going to move about New Westminster? Where are they going to work in New Westminster? How will we maintain our livability, our economic stability, our infrastructure?

Now is the time to dream, now is the time to have a vision. I think there are glimmers of a bright future offered by the current Council. I don’t think many will argue that Sapperton and Downtown are more vibrant places, more “complete” neighbourhoods than they were a decade ago. Progress is being made. To continue this trend, we are going to need some bigger ideas. We need to be brave enough to build things we are proud of, so our future is as bright as our past.

There are several members of the Council that I support strongly, but I think there is room for some fresh vision at that table as well. I wish good luck to all the Candidates, and hope to hear some great discussion about the City’s future. Let’s keep it above the belt, and be ready to wow us with your ideas. However, if all you bring to the table is the problems with every one else’s ideas, then may I humbly suggest you get out of the way and let someone else lead.

The Trains of October -UPDATE

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

I guess once James Crosty stepped up to run for Mayor, it was inevitable that a distraction like train noise would become a central talking point in this election.

Vital transportation link or loaded shotgun? Actually, both.

Based on recent comments in the local media, trains are either the worst thing that ever happened to New Westminster, or they are completely benign and only bother a couple of Nimby whiners. Like most things, the reality is somewhere in between the two. And like most political hot-button topics, there are numerous interacting issues here, none of them being addressed by the overtly-partisan letter-writers to the local papers. Yes, I’m talking to you, Ted Eddy.

First off, and pointed out by Matt Laird in a letter that garnered no feedback a few weeks ago, the issue that the Quayside Board and the esteemed Mr. Crosty was fighting is a completely different issue than train whistles and the City’s new plan to address whistle cessation. Matt should know: he is named in the court case, Mr. Crosty is not. The City doesn’t really have a horse in the first fight, but has significant input on the second. I’m not sure if conflating the two issues is particularly helpful, as any success we will make in whistle cessation is going to require participation with the railways in question and collaboration, not court fights.

Scott Larsen’s very long letter to both papers last week was a treatise on the “who gives a shit?” side of the argument. The thesis, that being “trains are here, love them or leave” is kind of unsatisfying.

I don’t see trains as different than any other business or resident in the City. They have a right to use their land and to do business, and to not be unnecessarily fettered by unreasonable neighbours. Like any other part of the community, they also have some (ethical, if not legal) responsibility towards their neighbours, and need to consider what reasonable accommodation they can afford their neighbours. Since Rail companies are not beholden to City Bylaws and do not pay property tax, there is little that Cities can do but respectfully request these accommodations, and work with the Rail Companies in a partnership to manage them. For this to happen, both sides need to be honest brokers, and the Rail Company needs to be concerned about the needs of their neighbours.

I have worked with railways on “emissions” issues in the past (emissions being the catch-all term for air pollutants, vibrations, and noise), and from my limited personal experience: the small guys are great to deal with, the two big Canadian railways are harder to deal with, and BNSF are a bunch of jerks. My suspicion is that this reflects their corporate structures, as the larger and more pan-national the organizations, the less accountability the guy across the table has to the community and the more he has to the “shareholders”, wherever they are.

In the case of the Quayside, it seems that efforts to be honest brokering fell apart years ago, although none of us really know what happened, as the agreement was kept confidential, and no-one is talking about it. However, continued engagement is the best bet the Quayside has, and Mr. Crosty and company should get kudos for doing so much to keep the issue moving along. I’m not sure conflict through the courts is the best approach, but I am on the outside, am not party to the confidential agreement, nor to their strategy discussions with their legal counsel. Here is the point: neither are most of the people commenting so vociferously about this issue! Therefore, you are criticising Mr. Crosty and the Quayside about something you don’t know anything about!

The most idiotic and useless part of this public discourse is the “they were here first” trope. Residential development pre-dates rails in New Westminster by at least 20 years. Of course, the rails were here before James Crosty moved to the Quayside, but James Crosty and many of the Quayside condos were there before SRY Railway (the current keeper of the bridge through the Quayside) was created, and down the rabbit hole we go. All of this built the idea that whoever is here first can do whatever they want, and anyone who comes later has to lump it. That is anti-community, anti-democracy, anti-development, anti-progress, and a silly argument for an adult to make.

That said, Mr. Crosty’s argument that the First Nations were really here first is kind of bizarre: I don’t think the First Nations experience is a good image to evoke about how newcomers should treat long-time residents…

His long response to Mr. Larsen’s letter the New Leader makes it clear that Mr. Crosty wants this issue to stay in front of the election. Which is too bad, because I think that there are other issues in the City that need more attention this election than the Quayside’s ongoing battle with the Railways. Clearly that is one issue that will not be solved in this election or during the next council term. The role of the City in finding that solution is also hard to define, and in the end, Mr. Crosty and Mayor Wright are on the same side of this fight: they want the rails and the people of the Quayside to peacefully coexist.

Finally, does anyone else think it is a bizarre that there was a lot of news, much generated by Mr. Crosty himself when the Court of Appeal hearing was held,  now that the decision has been returned, and the Quayside appears to have lost, there has been no mention of this setback in the local news or on Mr. Crosty’s website?

UPDATE: Mr. Crosty sent me a message, and addressed some of the issues above. here is his note:

What you state is a loss may not be. We are waiting for the CTA to determine the outcome. The Judgement’s first page states the following:

“The appeal is allowed, the decision of the Agency is set aside and the matter is returned for re-determination in accordance with the reasons of the Court with one set of costs payable by the Canadian Transportation Agency to the Appellants.”

In other words the second complaint was rejected and the original complaint has yet to be dealt with. The CTA ruled on the second complaint this was rejected by the court hence the CTA is required to pay costs on this successful appeal by the rail companies.
As per usual court decisions are complicated matters we will not know what happens until the CTA convenes with it’s legal council. Sorry you have to wait but this is not a simple court case. We prefer to wait for the CTA to render it’s findings. The QCB has been patient, these things move slowly thru the system when it is the first time – after all we been waiting 5 years whats another week, month, or year 🙂 I trust you understand.

Like I said, I’m not a lawyer, and I am not in the middle of this case, so I am obviously missing a lot of the subtlety. Mr. Crosty’s trust is misplaced, as I really don’t understand. But the QCB has a strategy, so let’s wait to see where it goes before we pass any judgement.

One year on.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 4 Comments.

Things are so busy these days, I forgot to notice I have been doing this for a year. It’s been a year since I first posted with what has become my regular schtick: Half complaining about the City, while also giving them kudos.

1 year

139 posts (~one every 2.5 days)

13,000 all-time hits (including, I suspect, 6,500 by my Mom)

1,500 average monthly hits for last few months.

All-time most-read post: “on being visionary”.

O.K., when it comes to bandwidth and net presence, this is clearly not CNN, or even DrunkCyclist, but 40-50 hits a day is more than I should probably expect, as my target market is pretty tiny, I tend to blather on about the same crap, day-in and day-out, my marketing is non-existent, and anyone on the web in New West really should be spending their time over at 10ttF, where much more useful discussions ensue, and there is less profanity and fewer unending run-on sentences like this one.

However, going in, the purpose of this blog was to give me some practice writing, which I clearly need. I still start too many sentences with conjunctions, and end too many with prepositions. This has also forced me to bring my ideas and thoughts out in to open, which hopefully causes me to reason them through a little more, and hopefully learn from your criticism. This goes for my political ideas about the City, and my ideas about what it means to be an “environmental scientist”, when so much of the rhetoric around environmentalism (for and against) lacks scientific rigor. It also helps keep my spleen vented, and all the money I raise through it will go directly to my political campaign.

Clearly, I still need these things, so onward to Year 2. And thanks, Mom, for coming by.

Finally, for those who have come this far, I thought I would provide a rare glimpse into the process. Here is a brief behind-the-scenes view in the Green New West Headquarters, with me at my creative best…