Hallelujah, Judy Rogers out

Best news in a while yet.

Vancouver city manager Judy Rogers fired

Dr. Penny Ballem to take over position

By BOB MACKIN, 24 HOURS


Just five days after taking the oath of office, Mayor Gregor Robertson has rocked city hall with the firing of city manager Judy Rogers.

A news release issued at 10:19 a.m. Friday announced Dr. Penny Ballem would immediately take over the job held by Rogers since 1999.

"Judy Rogers has made an enormous contribution to the City of Vancouver over the course of her 20-year career here. She built a talented and dedicated professional team over the years and she has worked hard to help make Vancouver the great city it is today," Robertson said in the news release. "I wish her the best as she moves forward in her career."

Newcomer Ballem comes to city hall from her position as corporate director for Bentall Capital and senior advisor to RPO Management Consultants. The clinical hematologist was the B.C. government's Deputy Minister of Health from 2001 to 2006.

Opponents criticized Rogers for her handling of the lengthy 2007 civic workers' strike. Rogers sat on the board of directors for Vancouver's Olympic organizing committee, which met behind closed doors on Tuesday. Robertson was a special guest.

Robertson's Vision Vancouver dominated city council meets today behind closed-doors to discuss the previous NPA-majority council's controversial $100 million loan to Olympic Village developer Millennium. Leaked information about the bailout was the central issue of the civic election campaign. Rogers pledged to reveal the deal to citizens within 30 days of his inauguration.

More than a month has passed and no information from City Hall

More than a month has passed since the lame news release by City Hall on
November 6th telling taxpayers that "The City will continue to make information publicly available when appropriate in order to continue to act in the taxpayers’ best interest."

So, when is appropriate? Next month, next year? How are they in a position to decide on "taxpayers best interest" when they kept this information from the taxpayers in the first place, and they have not been forthcoming in what happened with Estelle Lo, and how that action seems to be in conflict with the Vancouver Charter.

They certainly seem to be very decisive and eager to hire Richard Peck at an undetermined sum to investigate the source of the leak to cover themselves.

Vancouver City Council did not follow the Vancouver Charter

The section below of the Vancouver Charter illustrates that it is City Council that appoints someone to the position of Director of Finance. So, how is it that Estelle Lo resigned but none of the City Council supposedly knew about it till November 17th?

As well, it states that "213. No money shall be disbursed by the city except on the warrant of the Director of Finance" so how was that $100 Million Loan approved?

Director of Finance
210. There shall be a Director of Finance appointed by the Council who shall have such duties and powers in addition to those provided by this Act as the Council may from time to time prescribe.
1953-55-210; 1965-68-29.
Duty to advise Council
211. The Director of Finance may, whenever he thinks fit, and shall, whenever required by the Council so to do, advise the Council on the financial position of the city or any phase thereof and make recommendations with respect to the administration, co-ordination, and efficiency of the city's affairs and the systems under which they are carried on.

213. No money shall be disbursed by the city except on the warrant of the Director of Finance, to be drawn upon the Treasurer, specifying the fund out of which payment is to be made. Such warrant need not be signed by the Director of Finance if it is initialled by him, or by some person authorized by him for the purpose.

Richard Peck, don't worry about the costs!

A sentence every lawyer would love to hear! After all, its only taxpayer money. If the City Council can agree in secret to spend $100 Million and then get miffed that taxpayers find out about it, then whats a few hundred thousand dollars more. Times are tough, lawyers need to make money too, and it would be unseemly of City Council to place a budget limit on this fine lawyer doing this job for all of us. Look its well planned out with two, count 'em two phases!

Phase one. Review the processes for keeping secrets from taxpayers to make sure City Hall and Council can keep doing it. Make sure to write lengthy reports with lots of copies, gotta make those billable hours.

Phase two. Walk behind the policeman who are also investigating (who by the way work for the City) to discover that nefarious individual who leaked the notes from the secret "give our money away" meeting.

There is actually a Phase three though it has not been discussed. That is, based on your findings in Phase 2, go back and re-write the report for Phase one. What a bonanza.

The best part is that all this activity will help obscure why they kept this deal secret in the first place. Oh, I forgot, as Peter Ladner and Judy Rogers said, it was for our own good!

Update: This is the news release by the City of Vancouver on the hiring of Richard Peck. Notice that they refer to sections of the Vancouver Charter to justify this hiring but ignore the fact that the charter seems to have been violated in their dealings with Estelle Lo


December 3, 2008
City appoints barrister to investigate information leak
The City of Vancouver today appointed Richard Peck, Q.C. to conduct an independent investigation regarding the leak of confidential information relating to the Olympic Village in Southeast False Creek.

Council passed a motion calling for the appointment of a barrister pursuant to sections 176 and 177 of the Vancouver Charter at its final council meeting November 25, 2008.

In accepting the appointment, Mr. Peck has indicated he will complete his inquiry in two phases. Phase one will focus on: the adequacy of City policies and procedures relating to in- camera meetings; the treatment of sensitive documents, and the use of the confidential information. The second phase of the inquiry will, if necessary, be a fact-finding process to determine to a reasonable degree of certainty how and by whom confidential information was disclosed. The necessity of the second phase will be decided pending the outcome of the current Vancouver Police Department investigation.

Mr. Peck is scheduled to present written findings relating to the first phase of his inquiry to Council by mid-February 2009. At that time, a decision on whether to proceed with phase two will be made.

Vancouver Police investigate themselves, guess the outcome?

Today I got the Police report on the complaint I filed with the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner on June 1, 2008. As expected, its a whitewash. 

Any normal person reading the case can see that the police not only erred in their actions on the morning of October 20, 2007 when they broke into my suite, but what is also galling is that they did not record key information. 

To sum up, the security guard in the building filed a report on the incident where he describes talking to an agitated female resident of the building 3 floors down from my unit. She told him she fought with her boyfriend. He escorted her up to her suite and saw damage to the door.

The police had talked to this resident, but despite the fact that they were responding to a call from a resident one floor above this lady and 2 floors down from me about a domestic dispute, they left her and did not record any of this in their reports. I only found out about it from the Security Guards report. They instead went to my unit where no one was in and waited for an hour before breaking it down. They spoke to the Security Guard but never bothered to ask him about any problems in the building, which is the first thing an officer should have done.

Police also initially claimed that they got my number from the Assistant Manager but there was no response. When I proved via my phone bills that no call came in from them, they now state in the report that the number they were given was not the right one. They also did not record this number. More so, the Assistant Manager did not show up till after the breach of my unit, so who was this person that gave them this supposed telephone number?

So, the fight goes on. It proves that in the City of Vancouver, the police can do whatever they want as their employer, the City of Vancouver will cover for them. 

Judy Rogers loves the Coalition debacle

I am sure that Judy Rogers loves the current National Coalition Debacle taking place in Ottawa. It takes the fiasco at Vancouver City Hall of the front page, not that she would answer any questions the media or public might have.

Its very sad that here in Vancouver, you still see a few comments here and there about the $100 Million Loan and Estelle Lo fiasco, but for the most part, they got away with it. I guess we get the government we deserve. Haven't heard a peep on this matter lately from Mayor Elect Gregor Robertson, or the new City Council. (other than slimy requests to deny Estelle Lo her severance)