• I am happy that the federal funding for the Komagata Maru memorial has been received, and that the Khalsa Diwan Society and the Vancouver Park Board are working together on selecting a location.  But with all due respect to Mr. Mohinder Gill, the federal government has never offered an official apology for the incident, and there are huge swaths of the Sikh community that continue to push for such an acknowledgment in the House of Commons.  This monument is a step in the right direction, but it is far from an apology.

• Guess who is announcing their intentions to run in the NDP leadership race this morning?  All I am going to say is that this individual doesn’t have a penchant for yellow scarves.

• It is absolutely hilarious how Daniel Fontaine, the former Chief of Staff to Sam Sullivan, tries to distance himself from the “the previous NPA administration” which “pulled back on major reforms that could have resulted in more meaningful citizen engagement.”  In fact, I had a conversation with a prominent local reporter the other day which stated how citizen engagement and City Hall’s bureaucracy were annoyances for him.  Daniel may try and blame the NPA for these actions, but he and his former boss must step up to the plate and take responsibility for a policy which allowed them to ram through policies like EcoDensity down the throats of communities.  Fontaine’s attack on Kerry Jang’s comments are also a stretch, as nowhere does the Councillor come close to diminishing the role of community engagement.  A nice attempt at deflection from the former orchestrator of Sullivan’s Mayor’s office, but one that falls completely flat.  Oh, and there are some classy comments on this post from the City Caucus blog squad that seem to give a pretty interesting window into the NPA’s views on race relations in this city and country.

• My early morning drive to Surrey yesterday was newsworthy, first as I was diverted blocks from my house as a result of Sunday morning’s terrible mass shooting, and then as I drove over the sink hole before it collapsed and was just a huge dip in the middle of the road – and at the time, I had no idea of that either was about to hit the news.  The gang violence is very, very scary and so callous – particularly in such a quiet neighbourhood such as this.  However, to try and and link Gregor Robertson to this incident is quite possibly the cheapest and lowest form of local politics I have witnessed in many, many years.  Absolutely disgusting, and once again to no one’s surprise, originating from City Caucus.

• I hear through the grapevine that the Vision Vancouver Park Board’s recent lobbying of City Council for additional funding is looking optimistic – I am aware that talks are ongoing.  It will be interesting to see if there is anything to report at tonight’s Park Board meeting.  But in the end do I think that public bathrooms are going to be shut down around the city?  I highly doubt it.

• A different tone?  Maybe for now.  But the fact of the matter is that cutbacks are still going to have to come due to the Province overloading School Boards with ridiculous costs, yet not adequately funding them.  Schools might not be closing yet, but programs and staff will have to be reduced.  When those final decisions are released, I would say that the war will continue.  And rest assured, even if no other Board in the province has the guts to face off against the provincial government, Vancouver Chair Patti Bacchus is not going to stay silent and let Education Minister Margaret MacDiarmid get a free pass with regards to her hard line approach to the relationship between school boards and her government.

• Here’s the latest scuttlebutt from the provincial leadership races.  Adrian Dix continues to mull over a run, although there are many voices that are trying to prevent that from happening because Dix would most likely be a polarizing figure for the public (I am still not entirely sure why, as I think the guy is very charming and publicly palatable…but then again, I am not a member of the party).  The Christy Clark and Kevin Falcon camps are really targeting each other in their messaging to potential membership sign-ups, and as a result, I am hearing more and more that George Abbott is going to be the second choice for both camps due to the bad blood that is developing between the former talk show host and the former health Minister.  And Mike Farnworth?  Slowly but surely becoming the consensus candidate within the NDP, particularly because he plays very well with the general public.

Alright folks, that’s all for now.  Stay safe.

Tim Louis has his facts wrong on the accomplishments made by the current City Council on social housing.

Yesterday, former COPE Councillor Tim Louis wrote an op-ed on City Caucus claiming that the Vision Vancouver led Council has been responsible for no new social housing.

But here are the real facts that Tim failed to mention:

Under the NPA, the city signed a 2007 Memorandum of Understanding with the Province to open 14 sites of social housing.

At the time it was hailed as a landmark agreement, and on paper, it absolutely was.  It was very positive.

Except for one thing…there was absolutely no money attached to the commitment.

Fast forward to 2008, and no construction had started.  Why?  Because as Mayor, Sam Sullivan was unable to secure anything but lip service, and as a result, no provincial money had been set aside.  The social housing sites sat empty.

It wasn’t until March of 2009 that Gregor and Vision got the BC Liberals committed to funding the first six social housing sites in Vancouver, and subsequently in April of 2010, they committed funding to the rest, for a total of $333 million in new money.

MOU’s are great.  They signal inter-governmental cooperation – well, on paper at least.  Just take a look at the Evergreen Line MOU, which sat idle for many years without any commitments for tangible money, and you will see that the road to hell is always paved with the best of intentions.

It takes political will, negotiating, and a strong working relationship to make things actually take shape – something that Sam and his Chief of Staff Daniel Fontaine never seemed to grasp.  Truth be told, there are many within the Vision caucus that were open to a Rich Coleman leadership run because of all the progress he has been able to make with the City of Vancouver on social housing during this Vision Vancouver term.

So Tim Louis’ spin on no new social housing under Gregor Robertson is a sly trick and some great politics, but it really doesn’t reflect the reality of what has actually happened over the past two years in contrast to the previous three to Vision coming to power.

I would like to offer some general reactions to the just released Justason Market Intelligence poll.

First of all, you have got to be kidding me with this:

If Frances Bula is correct and the NPA is indeed “looking to prove, desperately these days,” that “potential NPA candidates,…have a fighting chance to beat Vision Vancouver,” then I think that by all means they should continue to use these results, and this question in particular, as their enticement.

Never mind the general public – there is a significant number of NPA supporters and members that don’t consider Suzanne Anton a viable candidate.

Furthermore, I just made a call to a few members of the Vision executive who have assured me that the internal polling that they are seeing tells a far different story.

I am no pollster, so I am in position to decipher whether the Justason poll is more accurate than any other.

But I do know this – Vision brass and decision makers are salivating at the chance to run Gregor Robertson head to head against Suzanne Anton.

If this “statistical tie” that is described by Justason and breathlessly promoted by City Caucus is the star that the NPA landscape is pinning their hopes on, then the next election will be a fun one for those working to secure another Vision Vancouver victory.

With regards to some of the other Justason findings, there are few points that need to be made for context.

The poll states that “disapproval now stands at 57% for the municipal government’s handling of Olympic Village (up 14 points from 43% since August).  More than one-in three (37%) now “strongly” disapprove.”

But this poll was taken between November 12-18, which does not fully take into account the fact that the OV has now been put into receivership through Ernst & Young – a move that was roundly seen as positive across the city.

Couple this new sense of control and stability with a new strategy from master real  estate marketer Bob Rennie, and things are looking up.

Furthermore, if the NPA thinks that fighting the election the Olympic Village is a good strategy, once again, then I fully support them going down that path.

The origins of the Olympic Village fiasco goes back to how the developer was selected and how the parameters for completion were structured – two factors that are directly attributable to the NPA reign of error under former Mayor Sam Sullivan and former City Manager Judy Rogers.

The Olympic Village is a tough issue, but I would be interested in seeing what the chattering classes are saying come next summer, where the landscape of real estate purchasing and the ability for the City to recover all of its money could have improved exponentially.

Once again, Suzanne Anton as a Mayoral candidate, criticizing the Vision Council for decisions she and her colleagues made when her party was in power, is a dream scenario for Gregor Robertson and his team.

I think that polls like this one, or the one released over the weekend by Christy Clark supporters, need to be taken for what they are – a political tool designed to achieve a particular outcome.  In the case of Christy, showing that she is the only person who can win an election for the BC Liberals, and in the case of Justason, showing that the NPA is really in the game when it comes to political viability.

This isn’t to say that the poll is without merit.  It is only to suggest that different polls done by different pollsters are telling a very different story with very similar questions.

Maybe someone can explain exactly how that works within the realm of “random” samples.

So as I try and get a lesson about the ins and outs of proper polling, I am not going to pay too much attention to a poll that has produced results that seem to have come straight out of the wish list of Vision Vancouver’s top strategic minds.

Neither will they as they try to contain their expressions of glee, I suspect.

• News of Millennium’s Evelyn Development going also going into receivership continues to compound the evidence that the City of Vancouver made a foolhardy decision with regards to the Olympic Village.  The KPMG report released last year clearly shows how staff reworked the criteria matrix so that the third place Millennium came out on top in the end.  Like I have said before, I want to know from City staff, the former City Manager Judy Rogers, and people like former Mayor Sam Sullivan and his former Chief of Staff Daniel Fontaine, how a third place bid suddenly became the winning bid and also how Millennium’s financial position and payment capabilities were examined before the deal was signed.  Any notion that the bureaucracy at City Hall all of a sudden became “politicized” after Vision Vancouver took power should understand how ludicrous that assertion is after looking at the manner in which the Olympic Village developer was selected.

• Christy Clark will not only have Mike McDonald as a campaign manager as I reported over the weekend, but also Ken Boessenkool, a well-respected Stephen Harper organizer and strategist.  Christy’s campaign should really focus on trying to be the second choice of every other camp.  I feel as though she might be at a disadvantage in terms of numbers of sign-ups, meaning that she needs to sign up at least enough to make it past the first ballot and not fall off.  Then, if Christy can position herself as the only chance that the BC Liberals have of winning the next election (something that I, any other political observer with a half a brain can deduct), then maybe she can gather momentum and become the consensus choice for a membership wanting desperately to extend their reign in office.  It will be interesting to see how other camps respond to her impending announcement.

• Are Chief Jim Chu and Mayor Gregor Robertson being political and attributing responsibility for the RayCam community centre incident last week by calls like this and this?  Absolutely…and rightfully so.  Minister Kevin Falcon is correct when he says there is no system that can possibly account for the actions of everyone in society afflicted with a mental illness.  Yet it is very hard to argue with the 2008 VPD report on how the gaps in that very system are having a huge impact on police resources and effectiveness.  The study found that a staggering 31 per cent of all police calls involved at least one mentally ill person.  Now this isn’t about a hot potato of shifting blame.  Rather, this is about acknowledging that this provincial government has: 1) Eliminated the Mental Health Advocate’s office for BC  2) Eliminated the Minister of State for Mental Health 3) Slashed funding for mental health and addiction services (it isn’t all about housing, ladies and gents) and 4) Never followed through with their promise to provide municipalities with incentives to build new facilities to help people with mental illnesses and addictions.  I remember how Sam Sullivan’s alleged close relationships with the governments in Victoria and Ottawa were going to assist Vancouver is securing funding and support for initiatives.  We also saw how Sullivan was often completely ignored by his senior counterparts.  It is the job for the Mayor and the Chief of Police to advocate for cooperation and support with regards to mental illness, an issue which in some way touches all of us.

• I really wonder how Park Board Commissioner Stuart MacKinnon’s Green party feels about his ongoing alliance with the NPA’s Ian Robertson.  I say ongoing because this isn’t the first time that they have coalesced, and particularly going into an election year where attacking Vision will become an almost full-time affair, it is unlikely to be the last.  MacKinnon is a man that has a wealth of knowledge and passion about issues – particularly environmental and conservation – that put him ahead of a typical politician when it comes to interest and belief.  But he is also prone to making everything into a political drama, largely because he seems starved for attention and is likely worried about his re-election chances.  Political expediency and a little bit of coattail admiration is what makes me think that the Robertson flirtations might not be as respected or supported by his party faithful.

• Really, can you blame him?  The NDP is a fractured caucus with a bunch of ideologues and backstabbers that cannot put the fate of the party ahead of their own personal beefs or interests.  As I talked about last week, one of Vision Vancouver’s strongest assets is its party solidarity, particularly in contrast with the imploding of the NDP taking place at the moment.  First of all, he would be walking into a hornet’s nest full of many angry bees who have never forgiven Robertson for fleeing the provincial scene.  Second, he is poised for reelection in a municipal political landscape that is devoid of any significant opposition.  Robertson is a young man, and time is on his side…he is going nowhere until at least 2014-15, depending on whether the next go around is a 3 or 4-year term.

• David Lam was an amazing man, and the few times that I did come in contact with him during his days as Lieutenant Governor made a huge impact on me.  I distinctly remember a speech given at my high school where he spoke about diversity and multiculturalism, and how the word “tolerance” bothered him so much.  He said that merely “tolerating” someone in no way conotated respect or deference – it was almost a cop-out…a grin and bare it approach to accepting other people.  That is a speech I will never forget, and I remember how enthusiastically his words resonated in my head after he was done.  Lam was a generous and wise soul who made this province a better place.  He will be dearly missed by many.

• Speaking of remembering Canadian icons, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention my heartache for yesterday’s passing of Leslie Nielsen, who was one of my all-time favourites since I laughed my ass off as a 10-year old kid watching the Naked Gun in the theatre.  The best straight man in the history of cinema will also be sorely missed.  Here’s a montage to enjoy.

• Here’s a note to someone who might or might not know that this is directed to them: before you start levying anger at a group of people who are doing their jobs and playing effective politics, maybe you should examine your own state of affairs and realize that there is a lot of work to do from a public point of view, based on what was discovered over the weekend.  Ambushes aren’t exactly appreciated.

That’s all for now folks.  Have a great day.