Tag Archives: politics

Musings on public input

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Mob rule When I hear a call for a public meeting, my first thought is to ask why we need it. Is the issue something that absolutely needs more public input above and beyond what is already widely available?

Public meetings require considerable planning, advertising and recording. Sometimes they require a large space, which has to be rented. Is the issue big enough to warrant such a process or cost? Is this meeting efficient, or will it delay a process or a decision unnecessarily?

And, of course, I ask: does it serve the community as a whole or just a special interest group?

Political theorist Hannah Pitkin wrote that political representation is a “social relationship, constituted in part by shared meanings.”*

Social relationships are two-way. They require interaction, dialogue and trust to function. But with so many people, so many interests, demands, needs, wishes, agendas, issues and goals in even a small town, the relationship between representative and electorate is naturally uneven. You cannot be all things to all people.

The result of that imbalance is the rise of “informal representation” where special interest or advocacy groups formed to focus attention on their particular goals or demands because they feel under-represented by the politicians or the media.

But while any elected representative can make some claim to be universal and inclusive, special interest groups are, by their nature, particular and exclusive. Council has to worry about infrastructure, the downtown, taxes, industry, recreation, jobs, zoning, the debt, communication, library, museum, bylaws, budgets, signs, staffing – a whole gamut of issues, services and facilities that most special interests ignore in pursuit of their specific goals.

Special interest groups act like acupuncture needles on hot spots of particular focus. They can galvanize their members to bring public attention to themselves and their cause, and to act as advocates and pressure points on council. That attention can be either good or bad – sometimes the attention is warranted and serves the greater good; other times it serves some more limited or even inimical purpose.

Often the informal and unelected representatives see themselves as entitled to the same decision making authority as their elected counterparts, as if on par with them. Trust between formal and informal representatives can then break down into an adversarial relationship when the elected representatives do not perform as the special interest groups expect or demand. But it is not a contest between two governments: only one is the elected authority.

To increase their power, these groups often lobby elected representatives to act as their advocates, or try to create factionalism among the body of representatives to prevent action that is counter to the group’s goals. We’ve seen both, locally. Dr. Mark Cooray wrote,

Pressure groups give rise to special problems. The public choice theorists argue that pressure groups have in fact increased arbitrary government. In the absence of limitations, factionalism leads to the pursuit of separate ends, with the government gaining power to satisfy particular demands.

To attempt to be as inclusive as possible, council always tries to involve the public as much as is both practical and effective.

Public input is ubiquitous in our system. Council meetings are open and public, and we advertise the subjects under discussion beforehand. The debates and votes are held in public view, covered by local media and available online. Public input is accepted by email, letter, or delegation, and every member of council has his or her contact information published to facilitate access. Almost every document or piece of correspondence is available for public reading. Plus there are mandated meetings where public input is actively solicited, such as zoning changes.

Councillor Hull’s recent motion demanding the town “hold further public dialogue to engage the citizens of the Town of Collingwood for their input and comments on the various opportunities identified by Council & Staff to ensure that the proceeds of this public sale are being used in the best interest of the taxpayers and residents of the Town of Collingwood,” strikes me as mere political opportunism. It is both inefficient and unnecessary (and a trifle wordy).

Why?

  • Because we already held a public session late last year, hearing delegations and taking written submissions from residents;
  • Because we have been receiving suggestions and comments from the public ever since we got the Collus money, as recently as an email sent to council Sunday. We received a request for a delegation about this just last week;
  • Because it has been reported in the media for months and as a result, the public has participated by providing comment during that time;
  • And because we have already given staff the task to collate all those suggestions and present them to council for discussion in the near future;
  • It also discredits the considerable amount of public input and engagement already received, as well as presupposes staff’s pending report will be inadequate;
  • Asking to do it again before we even have the opportunity to read the staff report is redundant and a waste of staff time and energy; it will direct staff away from other, more immediate tasks (like completing the 2013 budget);
  • Adding more ideas to the two dozen or more already collected will not make decision making easier, faster or more efficient – it will only confuse and delay the issue.**

The argument that some people didn’t comment initially because they thought the money was already allocated, and thus need a second chance, is a canard. The issue has been raised too often and for too long in the media, on social media and at council for anyone not to know about it. We have received comments and emails about it before and since the public meeting, indicating that the public has not felt shy about commenting. A second public meeting only delays the decision.

Further, you don’t keep doing and redoing a thing simply because you don’t like the answer the first time around.

Municipal politics isn’t a card game where you keep pulling cards from the deck to see if this one is the one, and if not, pulling out another until you get the answer you wanted. One point of our procedural bylaw is to keep issues from being dragged back to the table every time someone doesn’t agree with the vote.

We represent the entire community, not just a special interest. We have to consider all the possible uses for the funds; examine all the suggestions and their financial implications, and pick those that will ultimately benefit the entire community – not just serve the needs of the few.

A public meeting should be called only when it serves the greater good, not to foster personal or special interest agendas.

Once we have read the staff report, and discussed the suggestions already in it, we can decide if we need to have another public meeting. But I will always keep in mind that we are elected to make decisions, not to find ways to duck them or delay them.
~~~~~
* The Concept of Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967.
** After this long, and with this many ideas already presented, does anyone actually believe some exceptional, new and unconsidered idea will be brought forward?

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Musings on representational democracy

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Representational democracy, says Wikipedia, is

“…founded on the principle of elected people representing a group of people, as opposed to direct democracy. All modern Western style democracies are various types of representative democracies…”

And so is Canada, and by extension so is the Town of Collingwood; small cog it may be in the great machinery of democratic government. We elect people to represent us, to make decisions for us, to debate the issues for us.

Some people mistake the point of this system. They believe we elect people to do what they’re told, to act as their delegates and represent solely their own interests rather than those of the whole electorate. We’ve seen that reaction locally.

Edmund Burke, that great critic of unrestrained democracy, was adamant that the duty of a representative was not simply to act as a rubber stamp for the wishes of the electorate, turning every demand or grumble into legislation or votes. Burke said, in a speech in 1774, that representatives owed the electorate the duty of both their conscience and their judgment – even if their views ran counter to those of the majority:

“…it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. But his unbiassed opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure; no, nor from the law and the constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”
Edmund Burke: Reflections on the Revolution in France

Burke believed representatives should be a trustee, not merely a delegate. He never advocated acting without consideration for the electorate, but he believed at the end of the day, you were elected to make decisions, and for everyone’s best interests.

While good in theory, Burke was also skeptical about how it worked in practice because democracy is fraught with challenges. As Wikipedia notes, he believed,

“…government required a degree of intelligence and breadth of knowledge of the sort that was very uncommon among the common people. Second he thought that common people had dangerous and angry passions that could be easily aroused by demagogues if they had the vote; he feared the authoritarian impulses that could be empowered by these passions would undermine cherished traditions and established religion, leading to violence and confiscation of property. Thirdly, Burke warned that democracy would tyrannize unpopular minorities who needed the protection of the upper classes.”

Things have not changed as much since Burke’s day as we might imagine. In fact, we need even more knowledge today than ever before to govern effectively. Thanks to the advent of social media, everyone is empowered to rise to the level of demagogue, and passionate – often authoritarian and intemperate – impulses rule internet forums, blogs and social media. We see some people using those tools to “tyrannize” and bully others by the sheer volume and anger of their attack.

Perhaps the difference is that today you can more easily tyrannize the majority with these methods, not simply the “unpopular minorities” Burke wrote about.

Some people … believe we elect people to do what they’re told, to act as their delegates and represent solely their own interests rather than those of the whole electorate. We’ve seen that reaction locally.

Representational democracy exists because the “direct” democracy of the Greek city states is impractical today. You simply cannot convene a meeting where every citizen has a say and a vote for every issue and you can’t have a referendum for every vote. If we did, we would still be debating the palette of colours for the heritage district, or the size of A-frame signs, and nothing would ever get done.

One hundred percent participation may be democracy by strict definition, but it would veer uncomfortably close to anarchy and mob rule. The loudest voices would top the rest. That’s why we choose representatives to manage our interests: it avoids the decline into mob rule. And that means the representatives have the responsibility of listening to all voices, not just the loudest.

To prevent representational democracy from becoming a dictatorship of the elected, various laws are in place to act as checks and balances on the process and on how power is wielded. This works relatively well here in Canada, especially in our non-party municipal politics; it works rather poorly in the USA where lobbyists easily buy votes and favourable legislation. No system is perfect.

~~~~~

* The Concept of Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967.

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Is Tar Baby the new N-Word?

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Wikipedia imageAs far back as I can recall, the term “tar baby” was a metaphor in common political parlance for a “sticky situation.” It has no racial meaning in that context, any more than saying “honey trap” or “sticky wicket.” Both have similar, but not synonymous meanings. But in the last decade, “tar-baby” has become the new N-word on the political stage.*

The tar-baby theme is common in mythology from many cultures (referenced, for example, in Joseph’s Campbell’s groundbreaking work, Hero With a Thousand Faces). It represents an apparently attractive situation that traps the beholder and, once you embrace it, the harder you struggle to break free, the more you become stuck in it. I’ve used the term in such a context in several blog posts. But recently, when I was accused on Facebook of using “racist” terms by mentioning a tar-baby situation, I was taken aback, and felt I had to disagree. And do some research.

In 2009, the use of this term in the House of Commons created a mini-cyclone of comment about allegedly racist terminology used in the House. As the blog Unambiguously Ambidextrous, notes:

A controversy erupted in the House of Commons today after Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre, the parliamentary secretary to the prime minister, used the term “tar baby” in response to Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff’s decision to back away from Stephane Dion’s unpopular carbon tax policy. I have to plead ignorance on the etymology of the noun, as I have always been more familiar with the pejorative.

“On that side of the House, they have the man who fathered the carbon tax, put it up for adoption to his predecessor and now wants a paternity test to prove the tar baby was never his in the first place,” said Poilievre.

This was followed by MP Ralph Goodale’s objections to the term and asked Mr. Poilievre to apologize for the usage:

“In addition to being a pejorative term, which might well prove to be unparliamentary, the parliamentary secretary might consider that there are many authorities both in this country and many others that consider the term racist,” said Goodale.

Stephen Taylor provided a list of references to similar non-parliamentary uses of the term in his blog, none of which seem to have have generated the same storm of controversy. Clara Rising, writing in 2002 about collective religious consciousness, called original sin, “a cultural Tar Baby implacable and immutable, as infinite and as unavoidable as eternity.”

Back in 2006, then-governor Mitt Romney was taken to task for using the term “tar-baby” in a reference to a piece of problematic infrastructure. As a Time Magazine writer commented about the subsequent uproar:

So, is use of the term today a case of insensitivity? Or is the controversy caused by political correctness gone amok?

The latter, I suggest. True, I might not be as sensitive to it as Americans. I don’t live in the same political-racial-social milieu as most Americans; while racism exists in Canada, it is not nearly as overt in our multicultural nation.

In the USA, “tar-baby” has been used as a pejorative (and sometimes as a term of affection). Racial politics are so highly charged among our southern neighbours that it is a treacherous undercurrent in American political dialogue. As the Colorado Springs Gazette noted in this editorial:

Racism in the political sphere today has become so insulting that it makes “tar-baby” seem benign.

Even if mild, a white person calling someone of African-American heritage a “tar-baby” is considered a racist slur, and I can appreciate the sensitivity of the use. But surely there’s a difference between labelling a person, race or group with a term and labelling an issue or situation.

Just as an example, calling a woman a “honey trap” is very different from labelling a common tactic in espionage a honey trap. If I call a woman a bitch, it is very different from calling a tricky shot in golf one. Clearly context matters.

Would there be an issue if we used the metaphor of the “tar-wolf” (from James Mooney’s Myths of the Cherokee)? Would anyone be accused of slinging racist slurs against aboriginal First Nations people by talking about a “tar-wolf” situation? The two stories are almost identical, aside from the difference between the character molded from the tar. Both the Cherokee and African-Americans shared at least one disreputable part of US history:

If these two stories sound remarkably similar, it is no coincidence.  Before the Cherokee were relocated to Oklahoma in 1838, many were plantation owners and owned slaves.

In the heated cauldron of American politics, or in the adversarial arena of the House of Commons, people are constantly looking for ways to attack opponents for any reason, regardless of the validity or strength of the attack. Unfortunately, this also creates a situation of apparent wrongdoing by making it a focus of media attention. The perception of  racism can create the reality in the public mind that it is there, regardless any logical argument that it is imaginary. Words themselves, no matter how innocently used, become their own tar-babies.

The Denver Post commented on this flap in the US:

The notion that referencing African folklore reveals inherent racism against those of African descent is bizarre.

True, the tar baby has been fundamentally misunderstood by various illiterate racists. In their ignorance of the folklore, such bigots think the term applies specifically to a black person. For example, the late comedic genius Bernie Mac wrote of being called a “tar baby” as a child. But surely we ought not let ignorant racists push us to obliterate cultural knowledge of important African folklore.

This raises the question: where does the reference come from? The Denver Post points out a bit of the history:

“Tar baby” comes from African folklore. Congressman Doug Lamborn used the term to refer to the debt-ceiling negotiations, not the president. And the nationwide smear campaign against Lamborn follows the left’s typical path of character assassination and guilt by association.
In his book, “Hero with a Thousand Faces,” Joseph Campbell writes of the “celebrated and well-nigh universal tar-baby story of popular folklore.” Campbell refers to scholar Aurelio Espinosa, who in the 1930s and ’40s gathered hundreds of examples of “the tar-baby story” from around the world, varying in detail but all about getting stuck in something.
In America, we know the story best from Joel Chandler Harris’ “Uncle Remus” stories of the 1800s. But Harris did not create these stories. Instead, he took (some say stole) them from slaves, who brought the stories with them from Africa and adapted them orally.

What’s ironic is that Chandler’s stories were not seen as racist until more than a century later. They were originally treated as they were meant: records of African-American folklore.** As Wikipedia notes:

The animal stories were conveyed in such a manner that they were not seen as racist by many among the audiences of the time. By the mid-20th century, however, the dialect and the “old Uncle” stereotype of the narrator, was considered politically incorrect and demeaning by many African-American people, on account of what they considered to be racist and patronizing attitudes toward African-Americans. Providing additional controversy is the story’s context in the Antebellum south on a slave owning plantation, a setting that is portrayed in a passive and even docile manner. Nevertheless, Harris’ work was, according to himself, an accurate account of the stories he heard from the slaves when he worked on a plantation as a young man. … Many of the stories that he recorded have direct equivalents in the African oral tradition, and it is thanks to Harris that their African-American form is preserved.

Wikipedia has a lengthier list of antecedents, including Cherokee and African folk tales, and mentions one researcher who identified 267 variants on the tale in world mythology.

The New Republic took up the debate, noting in 2011 when the term again raised its politically-charged head:

…the word around the blogosphere, most articulately phrased by David Sirota at Salon, is that Lamborn was using coded language: “[T]he comment reveals how various forms of racism are still being mainstreamed by the fringe right,” as Sirota has it. But before making that judgment, we must ascertain: Is tar baby actually a racial slur?

Certainly not the way the guys before Lamborn were using it. A notion that they were passing a quiet signal to racists is awkward, given the decidedly non-black topics they were discussing. Need we entertain the possibility that Romney was telegraphing a subtle signal to bigots in a discussion of a highway project? Was John McCain preaching a coded message to a racist base in a comment about divorce procedure?

In those instances, a simpler analysis works. Language is all about metaphor, and it is useful to have one to refer to objects or topics that ensnare one upon contact. It’s why the Bre’r Rabbit story the expression traces to has had such legs—as well as why cultures worldwide, including African ones, have equivalent folklore characters. Thus a reasonable analysis is that people reach for this useful metaphor, within the rapid and subconscious activity that speaking entails, unaware that some consider it to have a second meaning as a slur.

As little as I respect the Republicans or Harper’s Conservatives, I doubt they would be deliberately and provocatively racist, and, like my use, meant the word as a powerful metaphor that still resounds in popular culture. John McWhorter, at the New Republic, added:

I submit, however, that to a large extent, those who feel that tar baby’s status as a slur is patently obvious are judging from the fact that it sounds like a racial slur, because tar is black and baby sounds dismissive. And here’s the crucial point: that, in itself, is a reality that cannot be denied.

Part of the human propensity for metaphor is that we make semantic associations, which drift and reassign over time. As such, it’s not the most graceful thing to refer to a black figure as a tar baby, and it was quite gracious for Lamborn to apologize. However, to assume Lamborn knew the word was a slur and was passing a grimy little signal to his base is unwarranted here. It is the kind of reflexive and recreational abuse we revile when it comes from the other direction (i.e. Obama as a “racist”).

Tar baby is one of those intermediate cases: The basic meaning is the folkloric one, while a derived meaning, known only to a segment of American English speakers (and to many among them, only vaguely) is a dismissive reference to black people.

There will be gaffes with expressions like these, upon which, in a sociologically enlightened society, apologies will be necessary. However, to insist upon the moral backwardness of the apologist is logically incoherent in reference to this particular term, and as such, less sociologically enlightened than it may seem.

Sounds like a racist slur? Should we not judge a thing by more depth than a bad first impression? There’s a conversation in Woody Allen’s movie, Annie Hall, in which Alvy Singer (played by Allen) is complaining about what he (mis)hears as an anti-Semitic remark by a TV executive:

“You know, I was having lunch with some guys from NBC, so I said, ‘Did you eat yet or what?’ And Tom Christie said, ‘No, JEW?’ Not ‘Did you?’…JEW eat? JEW? You get it? JEW eat?”

Which the audience recognizes as both comically over-sensitive on Alvy’s part, but also as a wry comment on how things get misconstrued so easily. Such is the situation with “tar-baby” today. Except not all of the audience seems to get the joke.

The Denver Post editorial concluded:

The irony is that “tar baby” has become its own tar baby, and we’re all getting stuck in it. Several media outlets reviewed my detailed blog posts on the matter, and all involved stole time away from addressing the nation’s pressing problems.

Yet there’s a reason the tar baby folktale has spread through so many cultures. It teaches us something important and universal about human nature. And that’s precisely why we ought not sacrifice the African tar baby story on the altar of political correctness.

I agree with that last line. Metaphors are powerful and memorable because they speak to something larger than just the words. Most come from storytelling and in a few words they encapsulate the entire tale – the characters, the events, the moral. The Colorado Springs Gazette suggests what I don’t believe is a reasonable solution:

Let us all stop saying “tar-baby,” for sure. For using this phrase, Lamborn will pay. He is mired in a controversy that will get worse as he fights against it. But let’s keep perspective. Relative to the racial hatred and insensitivity that permeates political rhetoric of the past and present, this should be far from a major-league scandal.

What next? Will we stop saying “slow but steady wins the race” because it comes from one of Aesop’s fables, and it might be seen as a slur against Greeks? Stop using “the boy who cried wolf” because it might be derogatory towards shepherds? Stop using the “good Samaritan” parable because it might be seen as a pejorative against Palestinians (today’s Samaritan ancestors)? Where will this nonsense end? Will we abandon all of our powerful language and chuck metaphors out the window out of fear someone won’t understand what we’re saying?

Better instead to get our head out of the politically correct sand learn to recognize the context of a metaphor. Stop treating it like a convenient one-size-fits-all racist slur that fits your preconceived political notions, and start thinking critically instead.

~~~~~

* Yes, I know “tar baby” is really two words, but calling it the new N-phrase has no cachet. N-word has a life of its own, larger than mere counting or vocabulary.

** Uncle Remus stories were still popular when I was growing up in the 1950s, and I saw Disney’s 1946 cartoon version (Song of the South) on TV that decade. Even as a child I was able to see the racial stereotypes and exaggerations. Uncle Remus tales were still available in school libraries, too, sometimes alone, other times in compilations of folktales.

Read the tale here. I wonder why the briar patch metaphor from the second half of the tale does not evoke similar revulsion among the politically correct guardians.

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Tax the Rich – a video

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You really should watch this video. It explains in clear, simple terms the argument of the billionaires and the rest of us. I like it because – while it’s simplistic – it is succinct and presents its argument in a powerful story. It also clearly underscores the very polarized US arguments about both taxation and wealth.

This was commented on the Daily Kos as well. Amusingly, it was immediately pounced upon by the rightists as “socialist” propaganda. Sean Hannity, talking head for the uber-right Fox News, was apparently “outraged.” It was titled ”Villifying $uccess.”

That they would associate success with money (the $ sign) identifies the basic flaw in their argument. Money, in their simple minds, is merely a measure of itself. Unless that money has contributed beyond mere accumulation – created jobs, built economies, served a greater good such as education – it’s merely a measure of greed. So the video vilifies greed, not success. A person can be successful without accumulating millions or even billions of dollars.

That’s a typical conservative canard – the idea that any challenge to unrestrained (laissez faire) capitalism or suggestion of taxing the wealthy is a socialist plot to enslave America. The real villain here is not money per se, but how a series of US governments has failed in its responsibilities to oversee and manage capitalism. They have allowed the money to shift from productivity, manufacturing, creativity and jobs to the gambling system called Wall Street. They have allowed shareholder profits and executive salaries and benefits to become more important than jobs, local economies, businesses and overall wellbeing. It’s a sad condition when the CEO of Wal-Mart, Mike Duke, makes more in one hour ($16,827) than his typical employee makes in a whole year (average annual wage in the US for a Wal-Mart employee: $13,650).

For the ultra-conservatives, any attempt to rein in the excesses of capitalism is to raise the spectre of that political Cthulhu - socialism, a truly misunderstood word for most Americans. There is an irony here, since the US oligarchs are mostly living in states of entitlement not unlike that of Stalin’s and Khrushchev’s and Brezhnev’s politburos under Communism. Communism may have fallen as an economic system, but its class system still thrives in modern America.*

These conservatives believe the market – that is, the economy – will best regulate itself, much the same way your cat will choose the best vet for its care, or your children will choose the healthy, steamed and unsalted broccoli over the sugar-saturated, heavily advertised junk food for dinner. But if you associate success with mere wealth (as, it seems, many conservatives do), then the greedier the person, the greater his or her success. And thus you get the mess the US economy is in, with jobs going overseas in order for CEOs to be able to afford another yacht, with home foreclosures for the the recently-unemployed middle class while billionaires thrive after having gutted the factories and sold off the assets (Mitt Romney for president, anyone?).

Okay, that’s another simplification, but one only needs to look at the economic figures to see how crazy this has become. Capitalism is a wondrous system for growth, but it needs the government’s hands on its rudder to keep it off the shoals of madness. And it’s been without a captain for many decades now, at least in the USA. In most other Western nations, at least a modicum of control has been provided (Canada, for example, avoided the worst of the recession not by being smarter than Americans, but because we have more stringent controls on our banking and financial sectors).

So government intervention helps capitalism, helps strengthen it, helps build economies, by preventing the excesses it is capable of, from happening.

The Young Turks throw in this comment about the difference between cutting services and social support versus taxing the rich, with some counterpoint:

And James Galbraith, of the LBJ School of Public Affairs, makes some cogent points about the US economy in this video:

~~~~~

* The other irony is that many of these conservatives claim – rather loudly – to be Christian, yet they act in a very un-Christian, even anti-Christian manner, towards their fellow Americans – again like the politburo.

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The Known Unknowns

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Known Unknowns“There are known knowns; there are things we know that we know,” said United States Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld in a now-famous statement. “There are known unknowns; that is to say there are things that, we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns – there are things we do not know we don’t know.”

Monday night, Council was treated to a “known unknown” when we were asked to approve a motion* that condemned a report that at least seven of us had never seen, let alone read.
 
The report in question was written to justify erecting wind turbines near the Collingwood Airport. The motion expressed concerns about the location of some of these proposed turbines – they may lie too close to the flight paths for landing and takeoff. I have no problem with that – I share their concerns. I have no issues with wind turbines in general, and am supportive of alternate energy projects, where they do not present potential safety issues. My concern would be for the placement of specific turbines, not turbines in general.

There were several ways to present this. The airport board could have provided a copy of the reports mentioned in the motion for council to read. A single copy, placed in the council room a week before the meeting, would have sufficed. The board could have done a presentation that showed slides of the proposed turbine locations and the sections of the report considered contentious, and explained to council and the public why these locations were worrisome. The board could have written the motion to refer to the turbines without making reference to specific sections of the report, but dealing in general with concerns about safety and the turbine locations.

None of these were done. Council did not even get a written staff report explaining the issues. We never even saw a map identifying the proposed turbines. Instead, we were asked to condemn some very specific sections of a report that we never saw.

All we got were the terse minutes from an Airport Services Board that included the original recommendation and a comment that the chair of the board expressed concerns about  the turbines and had written a motion to challenge the report:

“…expressed his concerns to the recommendations provided in the Project Description Report as they do not address or acknowledge the concerns of the airport with respect to the safety of the aircraft when coming to and leaving the airport.”

There is no indication in the minutes that any of the other board members expressed similar concerns, and neither of Collingwood’s two council representatives on the board (Deputy Mayor Lloyd and Councillor Edwards) spoke about the reports when the motion was presented to council. I assume they have read them – but neither said they had done so when the motion was presented.

The Enterprise-Bulletin story notes,

Councillor Mike Edwards noted the board would not have presented a recommendation “if it had not been factual.” Councillor Keith Hull pointed out council recently approved the demolition of the Mountainview Hotel based on a staff recommendation: “We didn’t need to read the documents on how to take down the building.”

“Time is of the essence to get this to the province,” added Deputy-mayor Rick Lloyd. “This is not anti-wind turbine; this is a safety issue for the airport.”

Factual or not, I feel it dishonest to approve a motion that refers to a document that I have never seen or read. By this logic, council should be merely a rubber stamp for committees, and doing our due diligence is unnecessary. When I worked for magazines and newspapers, I would never have written a review of a film I’d never seen or a book I’d never read.

As for the Mountainview Hotel, that’s a canard: council was asked to approve the demolition, not the contract for doing so. In the same manner, we approved the construction of two fabric structures for our rec facilities – we were not asked to approve the contracts with the builder. Had we been asked to approve either contract, would it have been ethical to approve them without seeing them first?

This motion was about specific documents and specific sections within those documents, not just concerns about airport safety. It could have been written in a way to deal with the general considerations of airport safety, but it was written differently to bring forward the reports themselves.

When we were asked to approve the Official Plan or Sustainability Plan or the Active Transportation Plan, council was provided with both a copy of the documents, and received a presentation to highlight key sections in each. Why was this motion done differently?

The board chair, Charlie Tatham is quoted in the Collingwood Connection as saying on Monday night,

“We believe that this is a dangerous proposition. Here’s our chance to rub their noses in it and make sure it doesn’t go by unchallenged,”

I don’t disagree that turbines in close proximity to an airport is dangerous. However, I don’t believe it is the role of a municipal council to rub anyone’s noses in anything. The originally proposed motion (see below) was inflammatory in its language, but was toned down by staff before the meeting.

I asked for a deferral until the next meeting to give council the opportunity to review the documents were were being asked to condemn. To me, that was simply doing the due diligence I believe is my responsibility as a councillor. No one seconded my motion. Council passed the motion 8-1, approving the unknowns.

~~~~~

* Here is the motion in its entirety as revised and read at the table. The sections that concerned me are in red:
Whereas it is noted in the technical guidelines for a Renewable Energy Approval that if the proponent believes that a negative environmental impact has no potential to occur, the draft project description report should include an explanation of how this determination was made;
AND WHEREAS the Project Description Report and Appendix C in particular (Stantec, May, 2012) contains virtually no reference to Collingwood Regional Airport;
AND WHEREAS the Collingwood Regional Airport Services Board and Collingwood Council express significant concerns with Section 5.65 of the Design and Operations Report (Stantec, May, 2012) with respect to the potential impact of turbines 1, 3, 4, and 8 on aircraft operations arriving and departing Collingwood Regional Airport, and the attendant negative impacts to airport operations, all as described in the Charlie Cormier report dated August 23, 2012;
BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED THAT the Council of the Corporation of the Town of Collingwood inform the Ministry of the Environment that the documents submitted in support of the application by WPD for project approval under the Renewable Energy Act does not adequately report on the negative impacts of the proposed wind farm, and it is not in compliance with the Environmental Protection Act, the Green Energy Act, and Ontario Regulation 359/09, because the proponent has failed to carry out the assessment required by O.Reg. 359/09 of any negative environmental effects that may result from the development of a wind farm in the close proximity of the Collingwood Regional Airport, and in turn has failed to identify modifications to the proposal to reduce or remove the negative impacts.

The original motion, as proposed in the agenda and in the airport board mintures, was more confrontational, and I had also expressed concerns about the wording (noted in red, below) before the council meeting:
THAT Council of the Town of Collingwood, Township of Clearview and Town of Wasaga Beach consider the following motion:
WHEREAS it is noted in the technical guidelines for a Renewable Energy Approval that if
the proponent believes that a negative environmental impact has no potential to occur, the
draft project description report should include an explanation of how this determination was made;
AND WHEREAS the Project Description Report and Appendix C in particular (Stantec, May, 2012) contains virtually no reference to Collingwood Regional Airport;
AND WHEREAS Section 5.65 of the Design and Operations Report (Stantec, May, 2012) is fundamentally flawed, inadequate, and misleading with respect to the potential impact of
turbines 1, 3, 4, and 8 on aircraft operations arriving and departing Collingwood Regional
Airport, and the attendant negative impacts to airport operations, all as described in the
Charlie Cormier report dated August 23, 2012;
BE IT THEREFORE RESOLVED THAT the Ministry of the Environment be informed that
the Council of the Corporation of the Town of Collingwood believes that the documents
submitted in support of the application by wpd for project approval under the Renewable
Energy Act are inadequate and incomplete, and not in compliance with the Environmental
Protection Act, the Green Energy Act, and Ontario Regulation 359/09, because the
proponent has failed to carry out the assessment required by O.Reg. 359/09 of any negative environmental effects that may result from the engaging in the project upon Collingwood Regional Airport and on the social/economic wellbeing of the Georgian Triangle area, and in turn has failed to identify modifications to the proposal to reduce or remove the negative impacts.

 

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Mayors Under Siege: Why Laws Must Change

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Toronto Mayor Rob Ford is planning to appeal the recent judicial decision that ousted him from office for failing to obey one of the basic rules of municipal governance. In fact, during the hearing, he admitted never having read the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act, one of the key pieces of legislation that govern municipal politicians, even once during his decade on council.

Superior Court Justice Charles Hackland wrote a 24-page decision that called Ford’s  “wilful blindness” inexcusable, and said:

“It is difficult to accept an error-in-judgment defence based essentially on a stubborn sense of entitlement (concerning his football foundation) and a dismissive and confrontational attitude to the integrity commissioner and the ‘code of conduct’.”

Ford, of course, blames the “lefties” for his own failings. Coming out of court, Ford said:

“This comes down to left-wing politics. The left wing wants me out of here, and they’ll do anything in their power to (do that).”

Ford’s charge is merely a tawdry attempt to dissociate himself from his own responsibilities (and failings), and to attack his political opponents on the basis of party platforms. Partisan politics easily obscure truth and reality through such tactics. Party followers are more willing to believe the platform than the facts (as in the recent US presidential election where the Democrat candidate was labelled a “socialist” by the Republicans).

Ford’s churlish comment also became a much-repeated joke in the Twitter-verse, but on CBC radio, I also heard people interviewed on the street repeating the same inanity, as if the judicial system was hostage to left-wing politics because they found Ford guilty.

Ford timeline

Ford also commented,

“I’m going to fight for the taxpayers of this city like I always have. The calls are coming in fast and furious, telling me to fight it, telling me to run. I’ll never give up fighting for the taxpayers.”

No: Ford is fighting for his reputation and his political career. That is not a fight for the taxpayers (ask yourself which taxes are at risk by Ford’s absence). It is disingenuous to try to associate a personal battle with something for the greater good. The electorate is not fooled by it.

London Mayor Joe Fontana has been charged by the RCMP with fraud, breach of trust by a public officer, and uttering forged documents. He has refused to step down while the charges are investigated, despite attempts by London council to ask him to do so. A non-confidence vote – more symbolic than effectual – was passed by a committee and comes to the council table soon.

Fontana is innocent until proven guilty, of course. Unlike Ford, he didn’t try to blame others for his problems, and declared his innocence. And we should not automatically assume any guilt while the investigation continues. He did, however, refuse to step down until the legal process is completed:

“I’ve been given a mandate by the people of London. People call me every day saying they like the work I’m doing as mayor.”

The mandate given by an electorate is to serve the people, not serve personal or even party agendas. Every mayor has to live up to a higher standard than the electorate, and treat the office with respect and honour. The job comes with some serious responsibilities to act in a manner that reflects those expectations and upholds those standards. The mandate is not simply about taxes or promises: it is about leadership.

When the public feels that the mayor sullies the office, the mayor is seen as rejecting that mandate. Ford and Fontana are treating it like it is their right to stay on and continue, not a privilege granted by the electorate. They are separating themselves from those they are expected to lead and guide.

Ford was removed from the mayor’s chair by a judge because there is no mechanism in the Municipal Act for either a council, integrity commissioner, or the public to remove an elected politician from office outside the courts. Fontana cannot be removed, regardless of council’s vote (and council is only asking him to step aside (with pay) during the investigation, not resign) and the motion is simply symbolic. Fontana can legally ignore it.

These tales of mayoral woe pale in comparison with the ongoing revelations of kickbacks and corruption in Quebec that caused  Montreal Mayor Gerald Tremblay and Laval Mayor Gilles Vaillancourt to resign in the face of public outrage and police investigation. And today I heard that Winnipeg’s mayor, Sam Katz, faces his own conflict of interest challenge. Mayors are always in the spotlight and cannot hid from the media’s attention.

All of these are examples of poor judgment, arrogance, ignorance and often a misplaced sense of entitlement, these mayors act as if they were both above the law and above public expectations. What they fail to acknowledge by denying wrongdoing and blustering their own defence is that, although mayors only have one vote at the council table, they fill a role that is far more important than a simple councillor.

Mayors have symbolic power as the figurehead at the head of the table; they speak for the municipality. It’s not simply a ceremonial role; they are perceived in the public eye as being both the spokesperson and the role model for the entire community. And a mayor who loses the respect of the community can also polarize the community against the entire political and bureaucratic structure (as we discovered here, last term). The electorate loses confidence in the very process of governance when it loses confidence in its mayor.

What the Municipal Act lacks is any mechanism to either unseat or recall a municipal politician. Not even an integrity commissioner can do that – as in Ford’s case. Nor is there any method for a council to express non-confidence in a mayor or hold a mayor accountable for his or her acts. Voters cannot recall a municipal politician and only have the election to make a statement of displeasure. That’s a problem that can only be resolved by the provincial government putting some enforceable accountability into the act.

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Ten Lessons Learned From the Petraeus Affair

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Sex scandal cartoonAfter watching the recent, exaggerated – and sordid – upheaval over the story about an extramarital affair that the (now former) head of the CIA had with his biographer, I have come to several conclusions about America, sex, American media and publicity:

1. Americans, who bought millions of copies of “Fifty Shades of Grey“, a poorly-written, highly derivative, pornographic book, and then turned it into a national industry that includes home parties where BDSM equipment is sold to housewives, and dozens of spin-off blogs based on the book, are easily offended by “racy” emails between consenting adults.

2. Americans, who consume a vast quantity of online pornography, and who turned the porn industry from a back-alley business into a multi-billion-dollar business, are offended when real, consenting adults outside of the sex trade, have ordinary sex. And, of course, get caught.

3. Americans, who elevate mediocre and untalented stars, starlets (like Pam Anderson) and wannabes (“socialites” like Paris Hilton) to exalted popular status when they make an explicit video recording of themselves having sex and then ensure it gets broadcast all over the Internet for millions to view, are offended when consenting adults have sex and don’t make a sex tape for the public to watch.

4. Americans, who revel in graphic sex scenes and nudity in their TV shows (i.e. True Blood) and  have made entire TV series based on sex and adultery (i.e. Sex in the City), condemn extramarital sex between consenting adults as a “scandal” in their TV news and in other media. (When exactly is a news story a scandal? See here.)

5. A sexual liaison between consenting adults can become headline news for weeks, even though it has no proven effect on national security, has no proven effect on the business of the state, is not a criminal matter – but is simply a private matter between the parties involved. Meanwhile, Americans avoid real news stories and have no idea what’s happening in the world. Few American media outlets seem either willing or able to rise above the tabloid-style headline. As Saskboy writes:

The American media is very primitive, which is why it avoids complex and important issues, and instead resorts to tabloid topics like sex scandals. While their country is embroiled in an unprovoked war in Iraq, occupies Afghanistan (along with Canada), and itches to bomb Iran for oil, they’re worried more about where the wiener Petraeus has been.

6. Sex is still a potent weapon for partisan battles in politics. Republicans will try to use anything they can to hurt the Democrats and especially president Obama, by blaming them for the scandal or worse – trying to impeach him.

Republicans have quickly shifted from licking their election defeat wounds to trying to tie the David Petraeus’ affair to Benghazi in order to impeach President Obama…

After losing elections, paranoid conspiracy theories are Republican comfort food used to soothe the fractured psyche of those who got a taste of what ‘Real America’ actually thinks of them. If anyone thought the GOP rank and file would learn any lessons from their latest defeat, think again.

7. Americans love sex scandal, and revel in making it into public entertainment. They will glorify the ‘scandal’ by turning a rather mediocre affair into a glitzy Hollywood drama to elevate the titillation level.

The hormone-charged hijinks have now spread to include military groupie and Tampa socialite, Jill Kelley, who blew the whistle on the marriage-breaking manoeuvres and the current warlord of the Afghan campaign, Gen. John Allen.

But who to cast in the leading roles? Here are our picks: Denzel Washington as President Barack Obama; William H. Macy as Petraeus; Demi Moore as Broadwell; Teri Hatcher as Kelley; Jack Nicholson as Gen. Allen; Vin Diesel as FBI Agent Frederick Humphries, and the Sopranos Steve Schirripa as Kelley’s cuckolded hubby, Scott Kelley.

8. The American government and media have screamed loudly about the exposure of their government documents to public scrutiny on Wikileaks, and demanded that the site’s owner, Julian Assange, be tried for treason. Yet the same media and government officials revel in exposing the sexual peccadilloes and personal lives of consenting adults caught in an affair.

9. Americans have always loved sexual scandal. As the Constitution Daily reports, this sort of event have captivated American audiences ever since the nation was first formed:

The current sex scandal involving the C.I.A., the F.B.I., the military, and possibly several private citizens isn’t the first in Washington, but it has some things in common with the huge scandal that hit Alexander Hamilton more than 200 years ago. The Maria Reynolds affair was the David Petraeus-Paula Broadwell-John Allen triangle of its day in the 1790s, with its admission of adultery, scandalous mail exchanges, and a high-profile resignation.

Political cartoon10. Nothing is ever secret online, no matter how you try to hide it. A nation that voluntarily and eagerly gives up its privacy online, and will post revealing details and even photos about its private life and body parts, is apparently shocked when private details of an affair between consenting adults are made public. Obviously had Petraeus posted the details and videos online, he would have become a media star.

It’s amusing that in late 2010, one political site was wondering aloud if sex scandal was dead as a political weapon or would hold media attention:

Perhaps in America the road to forgiveness is simply becoming shorter. Maybe, people are seeing what many in other countries have seen for years –the political sex scandal may change the conversation, but doesn’t by any means change the game.

However, as The Onion wrote satirically, this silliness may have opened some Americans’ eyes to some of the real news they’ve been avoiding while googling the salacious news about Petraeus:

WASHINGTON—As they scoured the Internet for more juicy details about former CIA director David Petraeus’ affair with biographer Paula Broadwell, Americans were reportedly horrified today upon learning that a protracted, bloody war involving U.S. forces is currently raging in the nation of Afghanistan. “Oh my God, this is terrible,” Allie Lipscomb, 29, said after accidentally stumbling on an article about the war while she tried to ascertain details about what specific sexual acts Petraeus and Broadwell might have engaged in. “According to this, 2,000 American troops have died, 18,000 have been wounded, and more than 20,000 civilians have been killed. Jesus Christ. And it’s been happening for, like, 11 years.” Sources confirmed that after reading a few paragraphs about the brutal war, the nation quickly became distracted by a headline about Elmo puppeteer Kevin Clash’s alleged sexual abuse of a 16-year-old boy.

The long run? America’s attention span for real news – Gaza, Syria, the Fiscal Cliff, pollution, GMO foods, the environment, Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, the Congo, and on and on -.is that of a gnat’s. But a sex scandal appeals to American’s mixed-message attitudes about sex – part smut, part puritan, all agog – and will capture American audiences for weeks and weeks, at least until another scandal takes over the headlines.

PS. Here’s a fun infographic on adultery from the National Post.

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