Posts Tagged ‘Olympic Village’

A reality check for “Ambassador” Sullivan

Posted by Jonathan Ross

Paralympic Ambassador Sam Sullivan has a very short memory about his own record in office.

Today’s Vancouver Courier arrived on my doorstep with the following front page headline:

Athletes Village balconies aren’t wheelchair accessible: Former mayor and Paralympic Games ambassador calls situation a ’scandal‘”

In consideration of the efforts of Sullivan to make Vancouver the most accessible jurisdiction in the world in advance of the Olympic and Paralympic Games, this is most definitely a scandal.

The problem for the current Paralympic Ambassador and former Mayor, however, is that responsibility for the scandal rests solely on his shoulders.

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The politicization of City Hall bureaucracy? It’s about time

Posted by Jonathan Ross

CivicScene's makes a return to the Vancouver Sun this morning.

CivicScene is back with the first oped in a new series beginning in today’s Vancouver Sun.

Critics of the current administration at City Hall tend to frame their grievances on the accusation that the civil service has been politicized.  In fact, when I spoke to lone NPA City Councillor Suzanne Anton over the Olympic Games and asked what her biggest objection to Vision Vancouver was, this was her first response.

But let’s for a moment consider the alternative.

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Ladner, Sullivan and Owen’s management of Property Endowment Fund suspect

Posted by Jonathan Ross

Some former NPA affiliated staffers are running extremely low in the memory department.

So, a Freedom of Information request filed by City Caucus’ Daniel Fontaine has discovered that the Property Endowment Fund (PEF) board did not meet during the calendar year of 2009.

Without the time nor the inclination to find out the frequency of meetings in previous council years, however, the magic of the Internet has turned up some interesting facts about the reign over the PEF by former NPA Mayors/mayoral candidates.

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A Saturday morning full of civic affairs

Posted by Jonathan Ross

Civic affairs were front and centre in an interesting and engaging forum hosted this past Saturday.

Civic affairs were front and centre in an interesting and engaging forum hosted this past Saturday.

I really wasn’t sure what to expect when I walked into the “Year In Review” forum hosted by previous NPA candidate Michael Geller, largely because I suspected an overwhelmingly NPA supportive crowd would be the only ones to show up.

And, for the most part, I was correct – former and current NPA board members, elected officials and supporters roamed the room, with few Vision or COPE supporters in tow.  In fact, one of those former NPA elected officials tried to tell me that the morning remained civil and well-behaved because “the right-of-centre” had been behind the organizing, suggesting that had the “left” been at the helm, chaos and hostility would have ruled the day.

This is exactly the type of comment that I have come to expect from your typical NPA, Quadra-type of supporter.  When confronted with the question, I told the individual that having grown up in Marpole/Kerrisdale, I knew first hand that civility was by no means exclusive to her end of the political spectrum.

That bit of nonsense aside, I found the morning to be a fantastic endeavour that could prove to be a model for civic engagement for all parties – assuming, of course, that the pool of interest is widened with future sessions.

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Thu Mar 11, 2010

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FACT OF THE DAY

An article titled Vancouver Politics by Paul Tennant in The Vancouver Book (1976), describes the entry of TEAM onto the civic political scene in 1968. TEAM, wrote Tennant, “sought to be a moderate reform group appealing to persons of all political ideologies.”

On their left was COPE (the Committee of Progressive Electors), also formed in 1968, and on their right was the NPA (the Non-Partisan Association), which had been a power in city politics for nearly four decades, and which “held that the affairs of the city should be run by those with the necessary knowledge and experience, i.e., those with a professional-managerial background, in order to run the city in a business-like way.”

The reformers, on the other hand, “felt that civic decision-making should be open to the public, with leadership coming from a cross-section of the population, and rule going to the working class majority. This group was concerned about land use, they advocated city control, and preferred to structure politics around the neighborhood concept.”

Quote OF THE DAY

“It was very diverse, and we got together by word of mouth. There were professors, business people, labor, lawyers and from all across the city. It was a coalescing of people around the idea we should do something.” – former City Councillor Setty Pendakur on the formation Vancouver’s reform movement and its political manifestation – TEAM – came into being in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.

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