Yellow Journalism
Here’s an interesting approach to developing good relations with your print media advertisers: take their money, publish their full-colour advertisement, then challenge their content, their integrity and their claims in…
ethics
The 50% Solution
Imagine you want to go out for dinner with a friend. Get some wings and beer. You like mild dry rub wings, and a nice, crisp lager. Your friend likes…
The Leadership Crisis
In his latest book, The Leadership Crisis, Gord Hume defines seven characteristics – the Seven Cs – of great political leadership*. See how many you can recognize as attributes within…
The CAO’s expenses
Earlier this year, I filed a Freedom of Information (FOI) Act request to see the expense records of Collingwood’s Interim CAO for 2015 and 2016 to the end of March.…
Two conferences and a show
I had the honour and the enjoyment of attending two municipal conferences last week. While no longer directly involved in politics, I am able to keep my finger in some…
The stench of entitlement
You’d think politicians would learn from the recent investigations into Senate spending and the Mike Duffy trial, that Canadians have no tolerance for the gimme, gimme, gimme of politicians. Canadians…
Killing gnats with grenades
Collingwood Council has taken the equivalent approach of a grenade attack to swat at a little gnat. It has launched a full-frontal assault on people feeding wildlife in order to…
Amateur layout and bad ads. Again.
I see the Town of Collingwood is still letting the EB layout its full page of ads in the paper. Tragic. Embarrassing. Cringe-worthy. The latest back page mashup has as…
Annoyed Ontario Liberals and Wynne’s Autism Echo Chamber:
This blog will be dedicated moving forward to following the conversations and policy discussions about Ontario’s new autism policy. The discussions going on right now are a national ethical and…
Why? A few questions for councillors
Why? Councillor Madigan said he had written that on every page of the report about Collus, presented to council last week by lawyer Mark Rodger. After reading the report, I…
The latest FOI emails examined
One hundred and seventy pages of email correspondence between the town’s interim CAO, John Brown, and the Collus/Powerstream CEO, Ed Houghton, from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, , 2015, were…
Collingwood’s broken committee system, part 2
Back in early 2015, I wrote that the experimental standing committee structure adopted by council was broken. Well, wouldn’t you know it, a year later, council finally agreed. And they…
Kathleen Wynne’s Spouse Could Be Benefiting From Recent Changes to Autism Services In Ontario
(Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Spouse Jane Rounthwaite Worked as a Consultant in Autism Services While Parents Fought Government in Court in 2006) As the world celebrates Autism Awareness Day, parents…
Fixing the shared services agreement
First, some history: for 15 years, Collus – now Collus/Powerstream – had a beneficial, mutually-agreed-on and successful agreement with the town to provide services back to the town at reasonable…
Dots that may connect – UPDATED
When first published on March 26, my article referred to "maintenance costing five times what refitting the same ships cost in BC ten years ago." That was based on press…
Dots that may connect – UPDATED
When first published on March 26, my article referred to “maintenance costing five times what refitting the same ships cost in BC ten years ago.” That was based on press…
Guest post: Paying for Information and Influence
I invited Chris Alemany, a councillor for the City of Port Alberni, to write of his effort to gain information about a subject of broad public interest. It is unfortunate…
Guest post: Paying for Information and Influence
I invited Chris Alemany, a councillor for the City of Port Alberni, to write of his effort to gain information about a subject of broad public interest. It is unfortunate…
Guest post: Paying for Information and Influence
I invited Chris Alemany, a councillor for the City of Port Alberni, to write of his effort to gain information about a subject of broad public interest. It is unfortunate…