Publicity & Communications – Page 3

Airports and opportunities vs. The Block

Strategic Vision: To become a premier regional commercial airport that stimulates the socioeconomic development of Simcoe County and the City of Barrie by improving connectivity, enhancing the competitiveness of the region and improving the quality of life for its residents. Mission Statement: To drive the region’s economic prosperity, enhance business opportunities, increase the region’s competitive position and support the travel needs of the community through increased connectivity. So opens a report on the opportunities and challenges facing the Simcoe Regional Airport, presented to the county’s Committee of the Whole session, May 22. You can see it here, starting at page … click below for more ↓

Deception, The Block, and EPCOR

2018-05-09 2018-05-10 Collingwood / Deceit / deception & secrecy / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

The Ontario Energy Board (OEB) is currently conducting hearings about the proposed sale of our publicly-owned electrical utility, Collus, to the for-profit, out-of-province corporation, EPCOR. Several documents have already been entered into the record and you can read them here. Most of them are fairly technical and steeped in opaque legalese, but download and read this one: EPCOR_IRR_SEC_EPCOR Collingwood MAADs_20180503.pdf. There’s some interesting content here and I think it’s stuff that The Block, the town and maybe even EPCOR don’t want you – the public – to know about. After all, The Block and town administration conducted this whole process … click below for more ↓

The hypocrisy, it burns, it burns…

2018-05-01 2018-05-01 Collingwood / Council / deception & secrecy / Development & Growth / Planning & Policies / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

The Block on Collingwood Council can’t seem to go a week without diving into their deep, private lake of hypocrisy. Remember how they whined and snarled about the partnership last council formed with PowerStream to own and operate our electrical utility? How the Jeremiahs at the table lamented that a partnership deal was bad for the town. Now they want one for our airport. Ah, the hypocrisy. Yep. A story in the Connection last week noted, “…the two best options for the municipality would be a full sale of the property or a sale that includes a private and public … click below for more ↓

Council kills Collingwood construction

2018-04-20 2018-04-20 Collingwood / Council / deception & secrecy / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / Publicity & CommunicationsLeave a comment

Collingwood council – dominated by The Block – has voted to cripple the booming construction industry in town. A bylaw passed this week prohibits, “…operation of construction equipment to Monday to Friday from 7 a.m., to 7 p.m.” according to a story in the Connection.* This means The Block have really put a damper on construction, making it even more difficult for developers to get homes finished on time, hurting the workers who depend on those jobs, delaying new home buyers from moving in and creating yet another liability situation for the town. The article notes: This deals with major … click below for more ↓

The report The Block don’t want you to see

2018-01-03 2018-01-05 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / Publicity & CommunicationsOne Comment

Late last year, BMA Management Consulting produced a hefty 517-page report called Municipal Study 2017* that examines a wide variety of socio-economic indicators in more than 100 Ontario municipalities: taxes, user fees, population, average home value, water/sewer, economic development programs and more. As Owen Sound notes on its website: The study identifies both key quantifiable indicators and selective environmental factors that should be considered part of a comprehensive evaluation of a local municipality’s financial condition. Use of the study over a number of years provides trends to allow decision-makers to monitor selected indicators over time. Trend analysis helps to provide … click below for more ↓

Collingwood’s culture of secrecy

2017-12-27 2017-12-27 Collingwood / Council / deception & secrecy / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

For the past fifteen months, I have been trying to get a copy of the Request For Proposals (RFP) sent out to potential buyers for the purchase of our public utility. For the past fifteen months, the town has fought me, has refused to hand it over, has challenged my appeals to the Information and Privacy Commissioner (IPC). The public is not allowed to see it, even though it affects us and our once-public utility. Even though it is in the public’s interest to know what has been going on. Why not? After all, the RFP was released in August, … click below for more ↓

What became of Better Together Collingwood?

2017-12-23 2017-12-23 Collingwood / Council / Deceit / deception & secrecy / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Publicity & Communications2 Comments

Rather amusingly, the Better Together Collingwood website is still online. The latest event noted on the site is a rally for Monday March 25, 2013. Its Facebook page also remains intact, although the most recent post there is dated Jan. 15, 2015. But what are stale-dated entries about non-existent activities of a fake association among friends, eh? Well, it seems the only friends left for BTC are at the council table. It’s amusing because as a group it ceased to be a functional entity the moment the last municipal election was held and Brian Saunderson won his seat as deputy … click below for more ↓

Brian suddenly realizes there’s a budget process.

2017-12-21 2017-12-21 Collingwood / Council / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / TaxesLeave a comment

Over on BBFFWS (Brian’s BFF’s Web Site) is a sort-of-a story about Collingwood’s 2018 budget. It’s really just some comments about a document this council won’t even get a peek at until sometime in late January, and won’t get through the approval stage until late spring or even early summer. Even though all of our municipal neighbours, the county and indeed most of Ontario, have already approved their 2018 budgets, Collingwood continues to slog along, months behind the process curve. And nary a word of complaint from The Block. Well, to be fair, nary a word they even noticed was … click below for more ↓

EPCOR and The Block’s Big Lie

2017-11-27 2022-05-25 Collingwood / Council / Development & Growth / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Staff and administration / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

For all their evils and their wrongs, the Soviets did some things very well: propaganda and disinformation. As one writer commented in the Spectator, “Communist ideology dismissed the idea of truth as a bourgeois construct. What mattered was power; and you baptised as truth those doctrines which provided it.” Stalin defined truth as what he said it was. The Soviets were such masters at it from an early stage that George Orwell declared that history stopped in 1936; after that there was only propaganda. So good were they at it that their methods and techniques were copied by other states … click below for more ↓

Open vs secret at Collingwood Council part 2

2017-11-09 2017-11-09 Collingwood / Council / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

In the previous part of this story, I provided dates of meetings and events in the terms of the previous council (on which I sat) and the current council. I documented how last term, the sale of one half the share of our electrical utility (Collus) was sold to the municipally-owned PowerStream (now Alectra) through a very well-documented, open and transparent process. I compared it to the secretive, deceptive process used by The Block on Collingwood Council, and the administration. Last term, residents and stakeholders were engaged and informed. This term we have been ignored, avoided and lied to. Last … click below for more ↓

In camera, closed door meetings in Collingwood, 2015-17

2017-11-02 2017-11-02 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Hospital / Planning & Policies / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and water7 Comments

Using the agendas posted on the town’s website, I tallied up the number of Council’s in-camera meetings for three specific topics this term: Collus-PowerStream (including the share sale, shared services agreement, advice from Mark Rodger and board appointments); the hospital redevelopment, and the airport (including the request for a letter of intent and possible sale of the airport). There are several other items listed for in camera discussion that may be related to one or more of these, but since I could not pair them with motions or later news items, and the listed descriptions were inadequate, I did not … click below for more ↓

The secrecy and deception behind Collingwood’s utility sale

2017-10-26 2017-10-27 Collingwood / Council / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and water3 Comments

Meetings held behind closed doors late into the night. Personal vendettas. Kickbacks. Conspiracy theories. Scams and phony reports. Backroom deals. Unethical politicians conniving. Dubious legality. Shady characters pulling strings from the shadows. Scheming. Minions acting like thugs. Cowardice. Hidden contracts. Lies and deception. A deal they can’t refuse. A financial shell game. The betrayal of public trust. If that sounds like the ingredients for a crime novel, to me it reads like Collingwood Council’s secretive, unethical “process” to sell our public utilities. The public was betrayed by The Block. The process has a stench of corruption about it. And don’t … click below for more ↓

The secret costs of the EPCOR deal

2017-10-19 2017-10-23 Collingwood / Council / Disrespect and bad behaviour / Ethics and behaviour / Publicity & Communications / Staff and administration / Taxes / Utilities: electricity and water2 Comments

Whether or not The Block sell our share of our public electrical utility to the for-profit, Edmonton-based EPCOR, it will still cost taxpayers millions. And I don’t mean just the rising costs of sole-sourced lawyers and buddy consultants the administration has hired (well over $1 million already, and the bills keep coming in). I’m talking about the hidden costs The Block won’t divulge because they don’t want taxpayers to realize how really bad a deal they’ve made with this devil. And it all happens behind closed doors, Monday, Oct. 23, 2017. No public input allowed on the sale of our … click below for more ↓

Shoulda, coulda, woulda

2017-04-19 2017-04-19 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Planning & Policies / Publicity & CommunicationsLeave a comment

Two and a half years of calamitous mismanagement. Council motivated by wild conspiracy theories, maliciousness and personal vendettas. A rudderless, ruthless administration flailing and fumbling its way from one catastrophe to another. The town’s reputation ruined. Our municipal partners and neighbours alienated. Secret discussions determine the fate of our assets while the public is excluded from the process. Taxes and costs rising and sole-sourced contracts handed out like party favours. Ethics tossed out the window and the municipal air redolent with the stench of entitlement. And the term is barely half-way through. What a disaster. Any commentary or discussion on … click below for more ↓

The Blame Game

2017-03-11 2017-03-11 Collingwood / Council / Ethics and behaviour / Hospital / Planning & Policies / Publicity & Communications / Utilities: electricity and waterLeave a comment

Remember The Name Game – that song from the Sixties that had those crazy lyrics: Shirley! Shirley, Shirley/ Bo-ber-ley, bo-na-na fanna/ Fo-fer-ley. fee fi mo-mer-ley, Shirley! Not the most intellectual lyrics of the era, I admit, but not forgotten and clearly suitable for local tastes. In Collingwood town hall, for example, they even sing their own version, The Blame Game: Bloggers! Bloggers! Bloggers! Bo-ba-loggers, bo-na-na fanna Fo-fer-loggers fee fi mo-mer-loggers, Bloggers! And so on. It’s part of the “not my fault” mindset that infuses The Block and the administration this term: blame everyone else for the mess you made yourself. … click below for more ↓