Vancouver City Councillor

France’s Bula’s review of the troubled Streetohome Foundation in the latest Vancouver magazine spells out how a city homelessness initiative, launched under the Sam Sullivan council, may generate a windfall for the province.

In effect, more than a year and a half after it was launched to raise money from the wealthy to fund investments to end homelessness, Streetohome was proposing to turn its cash over to the Province of BC.

Architects of the Streetohome scheme: Ken Dobell, former city manager and former deputy to the Premier, and his partner in consulting, Don Fairbairn.

If it happens, it won’t be the first time the city has been the loser in a partnership with BC. [Read more →]

The 2010 city budget, adopted in December, required the layoff of up to 126 city employees. City manager Penny Ballem advised staff yesterday that number has been reduced to 14 through transfers, retirements and other measures.

Still to come: staff reassignments and changes related to the Vancouver Service Review, which is merging and rationalizing various aspects of city business.

Here’s the text of Ballem’s message: [Read more →]

The Georgia Straight has now charged, tried and convicted me for failing to put pressure on Concord Pacific to build the long-awaited Creekside Park extension on the north side of False Creek across from the Olympic Village.

This verdict has been set next to the campaign contributions made by Concord to Vision Vancouver so readers can draw the obvious conclusion: I am bought and paid for. (I reject that suggestion as well.)

But, as is often the case in the Straight, the prosecution was so anxious to get to the verdict that most of the defence was ruled inadmissable, including the facts that:

• Concord is not required to deliver the park until it decides it is ready, for its own market reasons, to develop the area;
• when Concord makes that decision, the province must then approve and pay for soil remediation; and
• the city must approve a rezoning for Concord that takes these factors into account, including final design of the park.

Until those pieces fall into place, there will be no park. [Read more →]

In the latest issue of Business in Vancouver, my take on a missed Olympic legacy: an improved labour relations climate.