Kathy Moore, City Councillor

When Councillor Moore perceives irregularities over time in the City of Rossland's procurement/contracting/governance processes, she - almost single-handed - brings her concerns to City Council - nothing! - then the mayor - nothing! - then up/down/across City Hall - nothing! - and along the local and regional political food-chain - always nothing!

Resistance from all directions at once must often feel insurmountable - she persists!

Eventually - finally! - ending-up in the Auditor General for Local Governments Office which investigates and supports her observations to then publish a report for all to see. Court cases and tough recommendations are in the works - with those in charge of fair Rossland now shifting uncomfortably in their seats and attempting to do nice.

I admire Councillor Moore for her integrity - that taking precedence over political, economic, social smallish-town agendas - and getting on with her job. That's what it comes down to: 

Kathy Moore is doing the job she was elected to do.

  

How Simple!/How difficult! 

Images:
Andy Warhol
Pierre et Gilles 

Civic Arena Mural: Paint-By-Numbers

Number 1
Quite recently the Nelson Regional Sports Council (NRSC) decides to have a mural on the north- and Hall-sides of the Civic Arena - towards the Community Center. After having talked about possibilities of this over time - including possibly costing up to $100.000. Be still, poor heart! They present no plans to the public - just sports-in-general talk and the job to be awarded in some application/selection process. Neither do they have funding.

No ideas - no funding - no nothing!

Many large-scale graffito-style pieces today are considered murals. An essential difference being: murals traditionally show great art-technique training/expertise - which we don't find in Nelson, and graffiti often are impulsively bold statements from great imagination - which we also don't find in Nelson. Bring the templates! Out there the lines are blurred today. Here - seemingly without any idea what this mural-thingie is to be - they now surprisingly do know what it will cost.

30.000 dollars! Having come down drastically and this a tellling sign: they haven't a clue!

So what's really going on here?

Number 2
Seeing that the NRSC and RDCK are blood-relations - the latter currently in the process of collecting their master plan thoughts around revamping the Community Center on the same premises - it would seem reasonable to have the RDCK provide a portion of the funding - surely one plan built into the other you sly devils you wink-wink! Particularly as the RDCK lately rather throws wads of money around - so they've got it! It would also seem reasonable to have the NRSC initiate a fundraising-drive for the rest among soccer/hockey-moms - clearly art-buffs all.

But no need for any of that! Totally handled! I mean - they can go straight to City Hall via their very own direct line to the money. Which they do! This very direct line being the same one getting them the soccer/tram-road redo - directly detouring Council.

So what's really going on here?

Number 3
These 30 grand promptly putting the audacious NRSC at the very top of the City's yearly list of worthy projects, funded by the Columbia Basin Trust (CBT). And when a few days ago funds are handed out - Council allows them $10.000. Still an obscene amount - considering the NRSC has done absolutely nothing along artistic-creative lines in the past or present to show they are competent - thus deserving of funding.

Will you wait, it gets better! Then Mayor Dooley - co-founder of the NRSC - insists they get the full amount because: this project will create work for artists over several months (which artists, which work, which months - how does he know?), and it will be an integral part of the Hall-Street-redo (and how does he know what's suddenly integral there?). This with the NRSC thus far having absolutely nothing to show. Seeing that few walk down/fewer up, and drivers have to pay attention to the steep hill: a poor representation of - yawn! - yet another hockey-stick being swung hardly can be called integral.

The Hall miracle-mile - touted as the only direct lake-access but really going nowhere: weeell, to light-industrial and/or Dog-Turd Alley at the left; the mall at the right; straight ahead to the hotel with the pretentious name. But no direct access. Now if we had a stern-wheeler down there......but I am digressing!

Anyway - there's the requisite bit of toing-and-froing with some councilors who think 30 grand are a bit much - taking away from other worthy causes. So true - this amount represents almost a quarter of the total funds made available by the CBT! But - with his capacity for overwhelming others - the mayor insists, and Council - with their congenital lack of backbone - promptly cave: in a backroom-deal it is agreed to have Staff find the 20 grand wanting somewhere in the general budget and/or elsewhere. Which is exactly the same as just handing over the total 30 grand to the NRSC: at City Hall more money can always be found somewhere - depending on who's looking and knowing where to look. This way just looking better.
But why would Staff - on our time! - do this for a rather regional project, what with the RDCK shuddering at even just the physical proximity of City Hall! So why don't they do all this - their own stuff - on their own? Why? Because free money doesn't smell! That's why!

So what's really going on here?

Number 4
Obviously there are more players involved in all this than just the suddenly art-craving NRSC - with a scenario worked out earlier, still worked as they go along. But none of that the great unwashed need to know. Clearly, the money will materialize - but then who decides on across-the-board criteria and logistics for making the project happen? Clearly not the NRSC!

The public must be consulted; after all - we pay for it, and we will have to be able to live with this! Keeping in mind that the RDCK's master plan invites the public's input.

While the CDC(?) and Arts Council(?) decide what/who is the best - this at best still only means the best of what's on offer. In their opinion - and that's a whole other story. Not necessarily meaning a truly exceptional, mind-blowing artist and his/her work on any out-there terms. 

So what's really going on here?

 
Number 5
Our recent mural/graffiti-experience is dodgy. The Credit Union mural literally is paint-by-numbers - flat and awkward; Reo's gets ever more wastelandish as time passes: its heart an empty dark-dirty place; the one-off gang doing the decoratively pleasant and predictable fish-and-fowl mural under the bridge - during their (unsupervised) process - add stuff to their originally approved design as they move along. Without approval - so how responsible/mature are they?

We have no exceptional painters working in Nelson, and even if we had: would they be able to work on that size-does-matter scale? Would they even want to - hockey-shlockey generic and all - other than as a means to pay the rent. 30.000 taxpayered bucks spent on spec and predictably mediocre artistic merit/result, with a totally guaranteed very limited lifespan - unevenly sun-faded, rain-soaked, peeled-off - is nothing much to look forward to and at.

 That's what's really going on here!





Murals/Graffiti:
H Fleury, M-C Lachance, P Laforest + Cite Creation
Linda Schrader
HOW and NOSM
RCL
Sainer 

Condomania!

I am counting about 380 properties offered in Nelson-and-area by 4 realtors on Baker Street. Subtracting a generous 50 - presumably sold or undeveloped - about 330 residentials are on offer with various anything - at various prices.
Of interest here ought to be: how many foreclosures are hidden within these numbers, and what is the median time-span of properties listed.

Meanwhile - back at City Hall and despite the above - 3 generic condo-developments with about 90 units have stepped lightly over the very low hurdle of variances and rezoning. Low - what with developers clarifying little because Council is asking little. Kutenai Landing Part 2, 3 and 4: practically giving the shop away, coming from big-city density/mixed-use and tax-revenue. Only.

An additional 11 in advanced planning for the Nelson Daily News building - no parking allowed for and major modifications and permanent maintenance of Herridge Lane needed - will bring condos on offer in Nelson to about 100. And the total of anticipated and available residential properties in and around Nelson to - let's say - an even 400.
Though not to forget the not long ago talked about condos in the Royal.

1.
Density is not an issue in Nelson - we are not Coal Harbour in Vancouver. This non-issue punctuated by Nelson Commons having a hard - if not impossible - time selling its downtown-lifestyle.
2.
Mixed-use may be news and good in new and large big-city complexes. Nelson has been living mixed-use since Day 1: in the downtown core - as traditional anywhere - a store downstairs and apartments/offices above.
3.
Tax-revenue will only increase to significance if these developments actually become fully occupied reality and houses again turn into homes. It is astonishing that the developed brains are intent on oversupplying a low-demand market - but they just keep on coming! While it is not astonishing that Council's narrow focus sees taxes as the only way to move towards Nelson's "sustainable" growth.

None of these condo-developers have defined a market-demographic, while the location of their projects could appeal to different groups - provided developers aren't choosy. Which they really can't afford to be - with children, pet-pythons, smoking, garage bands - because that might scare-off potential buyers. After all - they need to consider: these 100 or so condos on top of 300 or so houses may dilute this low-demand market to - next to no market at all!

  

With Nelson's taxpayers paying and paying for Council's low hurdles and lack of a daring vision.




Images: Rene Magritte

Nelson: Developers Dream (On!)

Nelson now has 3 major condo-developments in the works - about 90 units total - in various stages of support by City Council. Seemingly the developers see something we underdeveloped don't: a market for them.
But first:

Kutenai Landing
Slogan: New Future. This slogan/name alone should be a warning - it isn't. Careless determination of the developer's financial ability by an inept thus promptly stubborn Council/Staff moves the project along for an exasperating while - fortunately said ability crashes even for Council to hear and makes the project fall off the map.
And a good thing too - with its height ever higher, a large section of the lake just given away and Council spitefully digging-in: there is a substantial outcry against it all - including Council - by the public.
Its current status - rezoning, variances and all that - is unknown to us. And even though this misadventure should have alerted City Hall to finally locking-in definitive long-longed-for rules for the waterfront: this still hasn't happened - the Sustainable Downtown and Waterfront Master Plan is that in name only.

Have they learned from the experience as a whole? It seems not - see below.

Nelson Commons
No matter what the spin: this project - ostensibly coming from currently much bandied-about density/mixed-use wonderfulness of real cities - actually is generated by sudden panic over having to make as much money as possible as quickly as possible to pay off the way-too-large property the Kootenay Co-op buys in the delirious swoon of an ego-centric few at the top. And condos above the store seem the quick fix. While hardly co-oppy! A Dr. Faustus bargain.

The City - shades of Kutenai Landing, eager to give the shop away again - is so ready for this one: City Planning prepares the ground literally for a far-ranging parking-variance even before it is applied for. Planned with considerable time and focus: not according to a Nelson need but to save Nelson Commons money - at the expense of the Nelson taxpayer. And then approved unquestioned in one of Council's predigested rituals.

In an attempt to put a face on a bad situation Villa Kelowna is born: remarkable only for its unimaginatively conservative - but soothing to many - appearance in what should be the vibrant heart of Nelson. Marketed as a place for those who want to down-size: including on children, not mentioned in sales pitches.

Much has been written about the project - bottom-line now: with lack of enough firm commitment from buyers, an actual physical go-ahead has been moved back and back. Bleeding major member-money in the process. With you there because you're already there there not a certainty any longer.
So there!

Nelson Landing
Storm Mountain Development is advertising 8 townhouses within a $400.000 range, between 1.324 and 1.389 square-feet.
Vague images of front/back have an insubstantial southern vacation-rental feel - so how can you be sure of getting on with the neighbors and their children in your face/ears and what if you can't then what! For that price.

Commencement of construction is subject to preselling 6 townhouses and is expected to start in June 2014, with completion in six to eight months.
                                                           Nelson Star, 24 Jan, 2014

The pattern is the same as that of Nelson Commons: they need firm commitments - money changing hands! - before the banks will step in. And that this very minute - as they want to start construction in a month or so! Their confidence knowing no bounds: with demand they are willing/ready to start constructing even more units now. 
The dizzying speed with which this developer expects the project to move forward demonstrates the slow learning-curve of his market-perception.
Sold!

The Crossing at Granite Pointe
West Creek Developments are planning 24 to 30 (a substantial difference) condos in 3 buildings on 1.3 acres. Density in a city is one thing - density of a large group of strangers in woodsy-quiet isolation is another. Plus - at least in amateurish and ugly renderings - the project as a whole is an eyesore. In terms of aesthetics and livability - the least desirable of the 3 developments.
After an area-resident expresses worries about children possibly not safe any longer running around freely in added Crossing traffic - Councillor Batycki makes an unfortunate quip about keeping them yarded. Not amusing anyone. And there will be no yards at The Crossings either! While the development accepts the possibility of families.

Sizes of condos range from 800 over 1.500 to 1.600 square-feet - all to be under $300.000. Like where exactly? Extras? 16 hundred square-feet make a condo here larger than a whole townhouse at Nelson Landing - that going for about 400-or-so grand.
How many units need to be sold before the big money has not been made public.

"This particular builder has found a niche that he seems to be able to work in quite well," Mayor Dooley said, noting the dwellings would be priced less than $300.000. "All their units are well positions (sic) to be sold and get people into the entry level market."
                                           Sam Van Schie, Nelson Star, 12 Mar, 2014

The sales-pitch here seems to be entry-level/starter-homes, yet usually those are fixer-uppers to eventually be flipped for a next bigger/better one - not unattractive live-in condos with not much value-appreciation in sight.
Then there's the starter-home/golfing dichotomy.

The golf course would benefit from the development because residents living so close to the green would likely buy memberships.
                                            Sam Van Schie, Nelson Star, 8 Jan, 2014

Would those in a "starter-attitude" condo buy memberships - at what price/fees?- like are they golfers with all the time in the world and the very expensive gear?
While - at the same time - anyone who lived here (sic) would probably want to golf more, according to Peter Muirhead, liaison between club and developer. But then he continues with The golf industry has changed - the younger generation aren't really joiners - we need to find different ways to maintain our membership numbers.

Golf more? Clearly - he is after an older, more affluent, possibly more demanding crowd. Will their demands be met in these condos?
Whatever - who's the target-buyer here?

These 3 developments run concurrently must severely limit chances of any one of them actually ever happening: look at Nelson Commons even while still having the market to itself.

All not only lack market-awareness but also a reality-based vision of themselves. Making them flawed - possibly fatally so.




Images:
1. Kootenay Country Store Co-operative - Nelson Commons
2, 3 Nelson Star/Storm Mountain Development - Nelson Landing
4, 5 Nelson Star/West Creek Development - The Crossing at Granite Pointe                                                       

Shut-up/Put-up!

Regular Council Meeting, 7 Apr. 2014

Council's look at a rezoning-application to allow for construction of condo clusters at 2000 Choquette Ave - the golf course - follows very passionate presentations by area-residents against the development.
Their issues include roads/traffic; additional cars/parking; lack of sidewalks; safety of children at this time able to play in a basically open setting; loss of quality of life-as-is-now for which most came to live here.

Patrick Davis - developer - presents his project, with support from the golf-club guy and a realtor: both smelling money-money-money! You build it - they'll come! Simple!

At some point Mayor Dooley announces needing to bring this meeting to an end shortly: he will do so by 3 times banging his gavel. He does a bit later, and that should be that - but THEN the developer says he wants to present some clarifications based on the residents' issues. Not having asked for this before or when the mayor announces the imminent end of the meeting.

Receiving permission from the mayor without hesitation, Davis aims for advantage in a last-ditch effort to soothe - not lessening the apprehension of those possibly affected within his plans.

And when they want to respond: they are peremptorily choked-off by the mayor with the meeting has been officially closed. For them - not the developer. How Harper! And they become incensed again, now over this preferential treatment afforded the developer, what with the mayor's blatant judgement-call denying them democratic process.

They leave - you can't fight city hall! - and councillors get down to voicing their deeply-explored opinions on the development's merits.

Councillor Cherbo raises a crucial issue: The traffic-impact study run for/by the developer in December at Council's request. Not the December part. Which to him - as former and experienced highway man - is a totally inappropriate time for such a study. The rest of Council - no highway men they - see no problem with the report - period. And agree with its predictable gist of no significant negative impact expected from the development. Of course they wouldn't - having varianced and rezoned enthusiastically from Kutenai Landing condos over Nelson Commons condos to Nelson Landing condos for days.
I can see what may be Cherbo's point - while not even a driver. In that usually very densely green area - but in December with far less vegetation on the ground and no leaves on underbrush and many trees: clearly even awkward stretches of roads and intersections then are visually far easier to maneuver.

Councillor Kozak raises another point, also finding no traction: With prices of the development's condos supposedly in the 200 thousands (they're all uniform and no-frills and teeny-weeny one-size-fits-all?) there's the realtor-come-on: young-family/starter-home talk. Kozak wonders how many people have even that kind of money. I wonder which young family - potentially/eventually growing - would put down that kind of money on a place they'll outgrow by tomorrow.

Rezoning is approved.

With Nelson Commons' go-ahead dodgier by the day; Nelson Landing at whatever presell-to-whom? stage and now this: where do/will all the buyers come from suddenly and all at once? The basically weak market is becoming more and more diluted - Council trilling every time won't this be great for Nelson we need the tax-revenue!

What tax-revenue? And what is the status of the so sloppily handled Kutenai Landing anyway? What did Council learn from that? And what will happen with all the rezoning and variancing if/when these projects don't get off the ground as planned and inevitably are diddled with?

Back to Start for the City and do not collect 200 - in fact - the not-in-on-this taxpayer paying and paying again and again for City Hall's efforts in these processes?

Rhetorical questions.





Images: Patrick Caulfield

Mungall MLAise

This follows
Michelle Mungall's Travel-Bug, 28 Mar, 2014,
immediately below this post.

Of course - Victoria's Accompanying Person Travel Expenses cover all significant others/aides of all BC MLAs - not just Michelle Mungall's: but she ostensibly is my go-to in Victoria.
I say ostensibly because over time I did go-to repeatedly: without so much as an acknowledgement from her - not even her office. Not once!
Now we learn she occupies the top spot on the 85 MLAs' travel-companion-expense list! A second-issue/what's-next disconnect for me. And while not responsible for Victoria-culture - she very clearly is very comfy with it.
While I am not: so here I focus on her.
Learning Mungall!

Victoria
As Speaker Reid's published list does not offer a break-down into who and how much for what - superficially dealing with "flights" only - questions in connection with before/after flights and while in Victoria present themselves.
Considering that Castlegar-Victoria-Castlegar flights take 3-4 hours, an aide would probably spend at least 2 nights in Victoria - 2 days pretty much gone with flights, etc. This to have 1 whole day for training. Hmmm!
Mungall's $7.806 total divided by 8 brings one trip to a median of about $975 - cutting it rather close for an aide but providing amply for a husband.

Expenses - Aides/Husband
1.
Who - during their stay - pays for transportation between places of concern in Victoria? (Taxis?)
2.
Where do out-of-town aides stay in Victoria? (Hotels?) Assuming that the husband stays and eats with Mungall.
3.
Who pays for these aides' several meals per day? (Restaurants?)
4.
How many fly-worthy aides does Mungall have in her Nelson-Creston district?
The ones trained in Victoria last year.
5.
Does the allowance for aides apply to the husband equally?

Expensive Expenses
All this flitting-about according to a there commonly accepted institutionalized insiders'-racket - refined over time: it needs to be questioned pronto! Disinclination to be transparent from the top down raises integrity- thus believability-issues around all those supposed to have our - not their! - best interests at heart. This even within whatever party of our choice - the only good guys!
Of course - much of the above is hypothetical because we don't know whether aides actually did fly during last year's 9 months and if how many times. I am just following the trail of crumbs: Mungall saying on the CBC that her aides were flown to Victoria for training. While - surely a P.R. move but not a wise one! - not how many times and not mentioning her husband at all. As for the aides' need to go - what with Skype, webinars, inter-governmental web-possibilities: why go at all?

Direct MLA Expenses - Mungall
While rattling the piggy-bank - just curious:
1.
Assuming Mungall lives by herself in a taxpayer-funded apartment: how much does it cost?
2.
How much are her personal away-from-home-, schmooze-, and whatever-allowances for Victoria altogether? This aside from her salary which - by the way - is how much?
3.
What is the total of Mungall's directly work-related allowances for Victoria - including all: from paperclips to staff?
4.
What is the total of Mungall's electoral-district related allowances - including all: from office-space over paperclips to staff?

How much in total does it cost us per year to just keep 85 BC MLAs on their feet and shouting - never mind producing for us. And how much specifically does it cost us per year to further Michelle Mungall's political career in Victoria?

Nelson
So I go to the office - at 402 Baker, as advertised on Mungall's official local-contact website, with a map how to get there yet - to find it's been moved. Right!
At the new office - a very substantial whole building of quality and space - I introduce myself to 2 staff-members - He and She: they don't introduce themselves in return - asking for answers to a few questions. Like did you fly to Victoria last year for training?
Says She: I don't want to tell you that because you write a blog (which I had not told them I guess she knew (of) me and why would that be a reason for not telling me if you've got nothing to hide unless you were told not to or you're worried about your job) - but I can give you the name of someone who can give you more information.
Say I: You can't tell me whether you flew to Victoria last year? I am a constituent!

Shades of the Harper playing it ever so close to the chest. And it went downhill with her from there. Definitely not in vote-wooing mode. Off-point explanations about Mungall's top-position: in terms of money only and there was fog and actually fewer flights than others and we were allowed 12.

To keep this short: there are 3 staff-members - 2 in Nelson/1 in Creston - and all 3 flew to Victoria last year. Says she. Leaving 5 flights unaccounted for - with no mention of 5 husband-flights or anyone else's. Within 9 months - not 1 year.

  
I am no longer ready to vote for a particular party just to help defeat another particular party. Too many here have been doing that for too long - turning the local NDP's political currency into fool's gold.

  

Michelle Mungall's Travel-Bug

Recently the BC legislature made public a list of how much we got to spend for MLAs flying people hither-and-yon under Accompanying Person Travel Expenses.

This practice goes back to practically day one - when modes of transportation and long-distance communication were still limited - and those running BC needed someone from home to warm their feet in Victoria. Singles may have been left out in the cold with this one but who knows. So they allowed themselves 12 trips per year - at taxpayers' expense - and seeing that they didn't (and don't!) sit 12 months: this may have meant warm feet just about all the time.

Somewhere along the line this toing-and-froing began to allow for aides as well, whose presence MLAs just couldn't do without at all like. 
And today this page still is a most important one in Victoria's very silverlined playbook: MLAs are allowed to fly an accompanying person 12 times a year.
And that is the list now made public. No choice - otherwise it wouldn't have happened.

Covering BC's 85 MLAs - between 1 Apr, 2013 and 31 Dec, 2013 - $125.310 were spent on 233 trips. Not part of this are $55.922 Speaker Linda Reid approved separately, without breaking them down on the list. Because she didn't have to. And we don't know how the big money breaks down between spouses' warm feet and aides' warm hands. Because we don't need to know.
14 MLAs - for unexplained reasons - didn't partake in the feeding at the public trough.

Michelle & Zak Mungall








Topping the list of 71 MLAs - in terms of money spent on flights - is:
Michelle Mungall, NDP (Nelson - Creston)
with 8 trips - within 9 months - at $7.806.
Her explanation - on CBC Radio, 28 Mar, 2014: sometimes an aide accompanies her to Victoria for training. She didn't refer to the hubby.

Seeing that Mungall has been in this job for quite some time now - one wonders how much more training her local minions still need there. In person - what with the Internet and surely everything Victoria and leg.bc.ca on it.
Mind you - my letter left at Mungall's headquarters during her last election-campaign was never acknowledged; neither were two e-mails I sent to her official Victoria address later.
So there may be a training-deficit, indeed. Unless it's just carelessness or not caring.
Enough already I said to myself: cancelling my subscription to her newsletter. No enquiry why from her end. And a message sent separately - briefly explaining my reasons - didn't prompt a reply either.

 

Something to drink? Peanuts?

Michelle & Zak Mungall - selkirk.ca