Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Nicole Mortillaro notes that the reduction in pollution due to COVID-19-related shutdowns isn’t keeping 2020 from being either the hottest or second-hottest…
taxes
A Platform for Tax Fairness
“Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.” This quote by Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. is the motto of Canadians for Tax Fairness, an organization that “advocates for…
The towering heights of the SVJI
Four hundred and twenty seven thousand, two hundred and sixty five. That’s how many documents have been submitted to the Saunderson Vindictive Judicial Inquiry (SVJI) to date, according to a…
Small town rules
In their book, Small Town Rules (Pearson Education Inc., USA, 2012), authors Barry Moltz and Becky McCray explain seven rules for businesses that use the model of a small town…
Ten points on affordable housing
I was invited, along with the other candidates for this municipal election, to address residents at Rupert’s Landing this week. Each candidate was provided a list of ten questions and…
My answers to residents: 5
This is a somewhat edited response to a resident who asked about a splash pad. The resident also commented that, “As nice as Collingwood is, we feel that this town…
My answers to SOS
The following questions were sent to all candidates by the local citizen’s group, Save Our Shoreline (SOS). These are my answers, below. I have formatted my response for better online…
More costs pile onto the SVJI
It seems Saunderson’s Vindictive Judicial Inquiry (SVJI) is eating up taxpayer money rapidly, with a little help from other town departments. It was originally estimated to cost taxpayers between $2…
Doherty’s Magic Money Fairy
At 3:55:20 in the video of Monday’s Collingwood Council meeting, Councillor Deb Doherty utters the self-congratulatory claim that she is “glad” the costs of the upcoming judicial inquiry to pursue…
Bullshit and hypocrisy again
You have to hand it to our Deputy Mayor: for all his many, many faults, he does do two things remarkably well: hypocrisy and bullshit. Neither does he do in…
The report The Block don’t want you to see
Late last year, BMA Management Consulting produced a hefty 517-page report called a subsequent one for 2017* that examines a wide variety of socio-economic indicators in more than 100 Ontario…
Brian suddenly realizes there’s a budget process.
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…
Alectra says no: The Block screwed us again
The headline on the media release reads, “Alectra selling its shares in Collus PowerStream to Collingwood.” What it should add is that Collingwood residents and taxpayers were betrayed by members…
The secret costs of the EPCOR deal
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…
The Block are privatizing our public assets
So Brian and his Block minions want to sell our airport. Our publicly-owned asset. And they’re doing it without even the pretence of the courtesy to tell us why. No…
Why the Con’s Phony Tax Revolt Is Doomed to Fail
If you believe our Con media you might think that the entire country was rising up to fight the Liberal government's plan to make our tax system fairer.If you believe…
Montaigne and The Block
I do love reading Michel de Montaigne. And writing about him. In 2014 alone, I wrote ten separate posts about him and his famous book, Essays. But since then, my…
Andrew Scheer’s Shameful Flim-Flam Act
We know that Andrew Scheer is a sinister religious fanatic. We know that he is a crass misogynist, and an anti-gay and anti-Muslim bigot.We know that he is a creepy…
Betrayal by the Block, again
Monday night, The Block will engage in their favourite political activity: betraying the public trust. In fact, it’s the only political activity they’ve engaged in this term, in which the…
Taking credit for the work of others
A short while ago, I received an unsolicited email from the interim (and soon to be departing) CAO, John Brown, with the subject, “Ideas. Observations. Musings . Opinions . Facts ?”…