Travel advice keeps others away from Calgary

There's a random article found in the Calgary Herald about the mayor's recommendations on things to do around Calgary. That's fine and all, but the Herald made it sound so partisan, anti-Bronco, and stupid, that the newspaper is really doing a disservice to the tourism industry in the city. It reads:

Follow Bronco's Lead


Our mayor is the ultimate insider.


November 20, 2009


The consummate political animal, three-term mayor Dave Bronconnier is constantly on the move. After all, the man has a clock in his office that counts down to the next civic election. (332 days, tick, tick, Dave.) All this makes His Worship the man when it comes to recommendations for where to take out-of-towners. "There are lots of great places in town," Bronconnier says, "but two new ones worth the trip are the recently renovated ENMAX CONSERVATORY at the CALGARY ZOO and the HISTORIC TOWN SQUARE and GASOLINE ALLEY at HERITAGE PARK."

I'm very surprised the mayor was open to doing that interview with such a terrible introduction. By the 5th word in, I didn't really care about where to go in Calgary. All that was running through my head was "this city sounds already tehhh lame even if the city thinks the mayor is teeehhh lame."

I think the Travel section needs to stick to travel and less on consummate political animals.

Maybe this is why a lot of people want a better daily newspaper instead of snippets like this. The Herald's subscription department should advertise this. Would be great!

Is protesting in an office the best way to get attention? Cowbell missing the beat

Seems like the biggest problem concerning climate protection isn't the government, it's us. We're probably the biggest threat the environment. A few extra garbage bags, and a few more styrofoam plates here and there.

The picture on the left may just be water vapour! You never know!

The recent invasion of Minister Jim Prentice's office seems to counterproductive more than anything else. I'm probably doing more damage to the environment than the government is. What if someone sat in my house and refused to leave? I too would probably call the cops and have them removed.

Maybe here's the time when we can agree to disagree that perhaps this new civil disobedience is not quite like what Gandhi's or Martin Luther King's.

I really haven't seen any sit ins over the homeless problem or sit ins regarding continued government invasion into our privacy.

Following the Calgary Cowbell has been interesting. I probably have more in common with David Wilson than a right wing person, but the message is being lost when it comes down to some of the material being written. There's only a target, but never a solution, and the latest demonstration seems to miss the whole point about climate change.

The whole tactic of getting attention seemed weird to me. We had to destroy the environment a little more by getting the news media to drive their SUVs to the office to interview them and waste more electricity and ink, in order to save the environment. Sounds weird doesn't it?

I wish these 7 individuals offered the public a solution rather than a sit in. It's great to call on the government to do more, but give the masses some solutions that are plausible. And why not go to the big businesses who you are targetting? No like Greenpeace, but see what they are doing to mitigate the effects of their business.

Big oil companies would love for you to give them solutions that can help them save money and reduce environmental damage. As much as you don't like hearing it, it really all comes down to money. Find a way to make tailing ponds history while reducing that clean up cost, and the big business will start listening. Invading their territory, or anyone else's, isn't going to solve the problem.

Note: This is coming from a chemical engineering student. And yes, chemmies do love the environment too. 

References

7 arrested for sit-in at environment minister's office
- CBC News

''Civil'' climate change protest at federal environment minister''s Calgary office - OilWeek

Some will go to the ends of the universe to save a speedway, but not transit

Do we have to use taxpayer dollars to bail out a speedway?

It's a question I honestly don't know the answer to, but I can tell you that our city council has some strange passions.

One of our main goals as a city is to manage transportation. By that definition, some would put speedways and transit in the same category. By some further retweaking of that definition, we would put speedways and transit on the same level with equal weighting.

We'll cut the budget so that transit hours are cut. We'll cut it in the way that the communities who benefit the most from transit will see their line cut due to under usage. The communities that have sprawled will continue to have no links to transit lines because our city managed our geographical layout very well.

At the same time we cut our transit hours and services, we see aldermen supporting Race City. No doubt this facility offers a wide range of services and unique opportunities for those who would like to experience high speeds or even school projects. However, is it a government's job to bail something out if it is not financially viable?

It was a close vote too. 8-7.

Now people will argue that somehow if Race City isn't viable, then why should the city be supporting the arts or organization X. If the city has to cut there, then it will. We've seen cuts to the arts before, so it's not a matter of this blogger favouring arts over Race City.

You know what it's all about right? It's the fact that aldermen aren't willing to sacrifice the excess instead of the essentials. I'm pretty sure transit is much more of an essential than Race City. As a politician, if you weigh an election potential heavier than a long-term needs potential, you're bound to make a terrible mistake in city planning.

Saving Race City sounds really good, but we're cutting the budget right? Gotta look at all avenues, including the ones that will get you votes.

There might be many who don't like what I say, but what can you do? You either raise the tax (which you don't want) or you cut other services (transit in this case, which to me is much more important because I use that everyday to get to school). I can hold back my temptations to speed 150000000 miles per hour.

So what's the right thing to do? Politicians always talk about "the right thing." Some people say there is no definitive answer because everyone has different opinions on these matters. I think I do.

The right thing, in my opinion, is whatever an election promise says it is.

Oh no! One less coffee a month! Is a hike of 4.8% that bad?

I find it most interesting that Rick Bell from the Calgary Sun told us that the recession wasn't that bad. I agree with him on that. Except he didn't take that notion when he talks about tax hikes.

Let me tell you one thing: this blog started because of the tax hike last year. The huge 20% over 3 years thing didn't sound great.

And then you try to figure out how much that amounts to per month with the new tax increase that council decided on a while ago. According to CHQR, it's about $54 increase for the year. That's an average of $4.50 a month.

So here's to not being angry at council all the time.

However, when it comes to let's say cell phones for example, we won't get angry. Canada is worse than Rwanda when it comes to mobile data access, and we as citizens care about how our Twitter feed is going to get RT'ed more than anything else.

I remember reading the Herald and their readers said that they were willing to fork over more money to get better services. Yes, that was during the boom, but is it that bad?

Is it bad as watching farmland turn into a wasteland like the 1930s? Was it so bad that it caused us terrible spasms and shock and grief when we found out we couldn't' take a vacation to the Bahamas, again. Oh, I guess that's one less coffee a month.

Why don't we just use our GST cheques to cover that increase? This $54 is not going to hold you back from getting that HDTV you've always wanted.

I know many of you hate Bronconnier, but he's being honest. He's the only guy tough enough to say "hey guys, you want more except you guys want to pay less at the same time, that's not happening."

While many of us will read Ian's column on how great our fiscal hawks will be, and how cutting 10% of the workforce will be great, it's really morbid if you think about it.

We pride ourselves in cutting other people's jobs so that we'll save a few dollars. We pretend that if we elect Alderman A, who promised tax increases to a minimum or even lower them, that it'll be the best solution.

We got that in the 1990s, and now we're playing catch up. Crumbling infrastructure that we had to fix. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about.

I'm ok with paying my taxes. Most people are, and according to our election results, most people don't really care if they go up or down.

What do you take from this story? You'll probably blog about it, Twitter it, and put the #crapImadeup hashtag on it.

Note: Sorry, I don't have a family and mortgage yet. I guess you can discount me from having an opinion.

Good luck, Ms. Anderson!

Yet another promising journalist is leaving town for a gig with the Vancouver Sun. Katy Anderson from the Gauntlet will be leaving for Vancouver after the last issue of the the Gauntlet this semester. She was my news editor when I first started writing for the newspaper.

She's also the host of the half hour Gauntlet news show called "Off the Page" that airs Tuesday at 10am. 

Why are all the better journalists leaving? Maybe this city isn't all that great for media for them to stay behind.

You can visit all her work for the Gauntlet here and be sure to check our her personal website for other things she wrote. Here's her twitter that she never checks anymore.

Wasn't that guy who offended the Premier the same guy that ran that millionaire's mayoral campaign?

Yesterday, the Premier of Alberta got mad at Stephen Carter, who is an advisor to Danielle Smith, for making inappropriate comments that supposedly targeted the Premier's Ukrainian heritage.

The twitter post was,

"Just saw da premier making a speech. Dat was quite a speech. Dem media better report it right," - Carter_bbold

Stephen Carter also ran Alnoor Kassam's unsuccessful bid for mayor of Calgary in 2007.

Is there a correlation? Probably not.

I think this whole thing is a non issue. What is Mr. Cater was a Ukranian himself? Would that have caused such a stir?

What if Danielle Smith was Ukranian too? Then he'd be fired immediately... maybe.

What if the Premier wasn't Ukranian and he put that? Would the media have jumped on that?

What if Mr. Carter made fun of a regular Ukranian? Would the media have done anything there?

What about that thing when NDP leader Brian Mason called or referenced (I'm not too sure so don't quote me on it) the premier of being a Stalinist? The media didn't really cover that.

But this... this WAP Vs. PC fight is really big over a twitter post. By a non-politician.

I guess the Willrose Alliance is more credible than the NDP.

*Update: Is Daneille Smith actually Ukranian? That changes the story, doesn't it? Can anyone confirm this for me besides Wikipedia.

Del.icio.us Politics: Municipal union targets boy scout for volunteering for the city

Here's an interesting story. The city of Allentown's largest union is targeting a boy scout after he had cleared a path in a local park. This took more than 200 hours to do. Below are two of the stories.

Union Bullies Boy Scout for Dastardly Good Deed

By Teresa Masterson for NBC Philadelphia

A 17-year-old Boy Scout worked more than 200 hours to clear a path in his local park so that people could enjoy walking and biking along the river.

Bad move Boy Scout. Now grown men who didn’t get around to doing it for a paycheck are after you.

Kevin Anderson, a junior at Southern Lehigh High School, a varsity soccer player and a Boy Scout hoping to get his Eagle Scout badge, spent 250 hours over several weeks creating a path on the partially complete 165-mile Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor that runs through Kimmets Lock Park in Allentown, reports The Morning Call.

"I decided to do my part in completing this part of the trail. In that way, others could enjoy walking along the river, without having to walk on the busy road," Anderson said in an e-mail, says The Morning Call.

But once the city’s municipal union caught wind of this do-gooder breath of fresh air, it put up a stink at Tuesday’s city council meeting. Nick Balzano, president of the local Service Employees International Unions said its considering filing a grievance against the city for allowing such good, free-of-charge, work to happen.

"We'll be looking into the Cub Scout or Boy Scout who did the trails," Balzano told the council, reports The Morning Call.

Anderson’s act of carving out a 1,000-foot path is not seen as good community service by the union because it was the only group to suffer layoffs in the city’s current financial downturn.

"We would hope that the well-intentioned efforts of an Eagle Scout candidate would not be challenged by the union," said Mayor Ed Pawlowski in an e-mail Friday. "This young man is performing a great service to the community. His efforts should be recognized as such."

Union troubled by Eagle Scout project in Allentown

By Jarrett Renshaw for the Morning Call

In pursuit of an Eagle Scout badge, Kevin Anderson, 17, has toiled for more than 200 hours hours over several weeks to clear a walking path in an east Allentown park.

Little did the do-gooder know that his altruistic act would put him in the cross hairs of the city's largest municipal union.

Nick Balzano, president of the local Service Employees International Union, told Allentown City Council Tuesday that the union is considering filing a grievance against the city for allowing Anderson to clear a 1,000-foot walking and biking path at Kimmets Lock Park.

"We'll be looking into the Cub Scout or Boy Scout who did the trails," Balzano told the council.

Balzano said Saturday he isn't targeting Boy Scouts. But given the city's decision in July to lay off 39 SEIU members, Balzano said "there's to be no volunteers." No one except union members may pick up a hoe or shovel, plant a flower or clear a walking path.

"We would hope that the well-intentioned efforts of an Eagle Scout candidate would not be challenged by the union," said Mayor Ed Pawlowski in an e-mail Friday. "This young man is performing a great service to the community. His efforts should be recognized as such."

Balzano said Saturday the union is still looking into the matter and might cut the city a break.

"We are probably going to let this one go," Balzano said .

The possible entanglement of a local Boy Scout in a union dispute underscores the frustration and anger SEIU members feel after being the lone city union to suffer layoffs in the ongoing financial crisis. It may also serve as a preview of future labor battles as the city tries to outsource some necessary jobs as a result of the layoffs.

Anderson, a junior and varsity soccer player at Southern Lehigh High School, is a member of Boy Scout Troop 301 of Center Valley.

He got the idea for the trail while taking hikes along the partially complete, 165-mile Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor. He noticed there were a few missing connections to the trail in Kimmets Lock Park, which is on the Lehigh River near Dauphin Street. He already has logged 250 hours trying to carve out a walking and biking trail along the river.

"I decided to do my part in completing this part of the trail. In that way, others could enjoy walking along the river, without having to walk on the busy road," Anderson said in an e-mail Friday.

During last week's budget hearings, where City Council reviewed the Public Works and Park and Recreation departments' funding requests, it was made clear that the layoffs and early retirements -- all of which have led to the lowest city staffing levels in two decades -- are bound to create union disputes in the weeks and months ahead.

For example, the city currently does not have an electrician available because of the layoffs and an employee on an extended sick leave. As a result, the city has been forced to hire an outside union electrician to oversee the installation for the popular Lights on the Parkway holiday display.

"In the spirit of the holiday, we decided to let that go," Balzano said.

Greg Weitzel, head of the Parks and Recreation Department, which lost 17 full-time employees as a result of the layoffs and retirements, said the low staffing levels will require more outsourcing of labor and a greater reliance on volunteers.

"There are some things that we can do in-house and other things we will have to bid out," Weitzel said Tuesday. "We originally had plans to do more with our labor force, but now we have to bid out that work."