Wrigley chews into VANOC

The maker of Hubba Bubba, Big League Chew, Altoids and Lifesavers will become the newest VANOC sponsor on July 24 at a Toronto news conference. Wrigley will become an official supplier in the $3 million to $15 million range. Last year, VANOC had advertised for confectionery licensees. 

Wrigley's worldwide headquarters are Chicago, which is bidding to host the 2016 Summer Games.

VANOC to reveal more secrets?

The most exclusive club in the province -- the VANOC board of directors -- meets July 16 behind closed doors at so-called Fortress 2010 in East Vancouver. A noon-hour news conference could yield new information on the site of Vancouver 2010's anti-doping laboratory and a potential solution to the controversial proposal to use Britannia Ice Rink near politically charged Commercial Drive for hockey training. Click here for the agenda.

VANOC does not publish minutes, though it does issue a news release summary. It also won't disclose which directors, executives, staffers and guests attend meetings.

Cheque in the mail

Canada Post is the newest VANOC sponsor, pledging $3 million on July 3 to be an official supplier for the 2010 Games.
A week earlier, Canadians learned the federal Crown corporation wanted to increase the price of stamps from 52 cents to 54 cents in 2009 and then by 2 more cents in 2010 and 2011.
Canada Post began preparing for 2010 in July 2003 when it hyped a special edition stamp commemorating Vancouver's bid win. The underwhelming 48-cent domestic envelope-sticker showed Canada Post's Ottawa headquarters with Vancouver 2010 printed below.
In February, Postal Inspector in Charge Jag Sumra prepared a "Confidential Doucment (sic) Executive Briefing Note on 2010 Integrated Security Planning. Before it was made available via Access to Information, the 25-page document was heavily censored.
If it wasn't riddled with blacked-out paragraphs or entire pages blanked, then we might know more about hints from the table of contents, like: general vulnerability/security assessment, internal and external threats, safety and security of the mail, Canada Post facilities and equipment, VIP protection for Canada Post executives, communications and information sharing, airport security, business continuity planning, security and investigation services, and action plan.
A two-page list of 20 Olympic venue sites remains intact. The sites, expected to be behind security fences, will get special delivery arrangements. The Westin Bayshore, the IOC's hotel, is on the list, along with all competition and training venues. VANOC's Graveley Street offices, however, are not.

Surrey's 2010 contract revealed

Does Surrey need to spend $10.5 million on a new 21,000 square foot community centre in the Whalley ghetto for the VANOC Games Preparation Centre? 

That's a question Surrey residents ought to ask Mayor Dianne Watts. 

The May 26 venue city agreement between Surrey and VANOC -- obtained via Freedom of Information -- says VANOC needs just 5,500 square feet, which is slightly less than the floorspace in the Tom Binnie recreation centre that Watts and co. want to replace. The new facility is proposed to be built from scratch on a vacant lot next door. If it's not ready by Feb. 1, 2009, then VANOC can seek "judicial relief" via clause 13 in which Surrey waived the right to a defense. 

Other highlights:

• Surrey's $2 million payment to VANOC was due June 30.
  
• Surrey can buy tickets at face value and in priority to retail, including 50 for each of the opening and closing ceremonies, an average of 10 per day to prime events like hockey playoffs, figure skating, speedskating and gold medal curling and an average of 50 per day to all other sports. Tickets are for internal use only and resale at face value is only allowed via VANOC's ticket exchange program.
• Surrey may nominate up to five torchbearers (subject to VANOC approval) to carry the flame "within or in close proximity to the venue city."
• Use of the VANOC photo bank and image archive, street banners and signage, advertising space on billboards near competition venues and space in publications will cost extra.
• And, despite sponsors of all stripes being called "partners," clause 11 is titled Agreement Not a Partnership.

Vancouver's hopes extinguished

The June 24 announcement of the cancelation of the international Paralympic torch relay was especially disappointing for Vancouver.
Unlike the other stops in Sochi, Russia and London, Vancouver was needing the global spotlight on Aug. 28 and Whistler on Aug. 29. The event would have allowed Vancouver to welcome the world to the next Olympics in 2010; when the Beijing Games end Aug. 24, most will only know that London is the 2012 host. It would also have afforded Vancouver a chance at a dress rehearsal for the 2010 torch relay that will begin in November 2009.

The British came, the British came

London 2012 minister Tessa Jowell visited the land of 2010 from June 16-19. 

Like all politicians clutching the Olympics portfolio, she echoed the familiar "on-budget, on-time" refrain -- despite unrest back home where new London mayor Boris Johnson called for more transparency and frugality. 

Unlike Vancouver, which is doing little to resurrect the Downtown Eastside ghetto, the new Olympic Park in East London will be a legacy. 
“It will be an extraordinarily proud legacy for the Olympics to say we created jobs, homes, the largest urban park in Europe for 150 years in what has been an area of dereliction,” Jowell said.
B.C. and U.K. forged an Olympic economic development pact earlier this year. The two jurisdictions are no stranger to each other. Britain colonized Canada’s west coast in 1858. British Columbia became Canada’s sixth province in 1871. Vancouver hosted the 1954 British Empire Games. Victoria, the provincial capital, did the same 40 years later when it was called the Commonwealth Games.

Joining Jowell on the trade mission were: Andrew Bacchus, head of the construction, sports and leisure infrastructure sector for UK Trade and Investment; Andrew Eborn, CEO of Octopus TV; Anita Patel, director of Tania Taipei; Alphus Hinds, senior director of Olympics and major events for Smith's Detection International; Dave Crump and Curt Petty, business development directors of Avesco, and Ian Druce of Steer Davies Gleave.

London Calling

The British are coming! The British are coming!

Well, at least the United Kingdom minister responsible for London 2012 Tessa Jowell and several businesspeople from Blighty.

Jowell arrives June 15 and stays until June 19 to tour 2010 venues in Vancouver and Whistler and meet with VANOC executives and politicians.

Public meetings on Britannia and life in 2010

June 11 at Britannia Centre. 6 p.m. The Britannia board meets again to discuss the controversial proposal to let VANOC use Britannia Arena for Olympic hockey practice in 2010. A vote is unlikely before a proposal from VANOC and the City of Vancouver is received and questions about costs and security are answered.

June 18 at Richmond city hall (6:30 p.m.), June 19 at Hastings Park community centre (6:30 p.m.) and June 24 at Riley Park community centre (6:30 p.m.) are stops on VANOC's Game Plan 2008 tour, which is supposed to be a preview of how the Games will impact citizens' lives in February 2010. 

All are open to the public. 

Come with questions. Demand to leave with answers. Or stay quiet now and complain to yourself in 2010. 

NDP takes aim at Kinsella, Jiles

B.C. NDP attorney general critic Leonard Krog and federal NDP Olympics critic Peter Julian have blown the whistle on two of Premier Gordon Campbell's closest allies. 

"When Washington State went looking for a piece of the Olympic pie, it hired none other than Gordon Campbell insiders, Patrick Kinsella and Mark Jiles, to lobby the federal minister (David Emerson)," Burnaby-New Westminster MP Peter Julian said in Question Period on June 9. "There is only one problem -- they are not registered to lobby, which means it is illegal for them to lobby." 

Kinsella masterminded B.C. Liberal election victories in 2001 and 2005. Jiles managed Campbell's successful Vancouver-Point Grey campaign in 2005. In 2006, their Progressive Group scored a gig with the State of Washington to lobby key Olympic decision-makers, including cabinet ministers and VANOC executives, and find Olympic-related contracts for Washington companies.

Jiles boasted in one document that Progressive had "an office in the heart of Vancouver, a hand in British Columbia's provincial capital of Victoria and a foot into the 2010 Organizing Committee." 

Julian asked federal lobbyists' registrar Michael Nelson to investigate. Krog did the same provincially with B.C.'s information and privacy commissioner David Loukidelis. Jiles told 24 hours Vancouver that Progressive's work was simply "sports marketing."

Read more about this, including the scandalous Washington State documents, on Victoria journalist Sean Holman's Public Eye blog.

 

VANOC associate on trial

The Crown's case against VANOC Four Host First Nations executive director Tewanee Joseph and his lacrosse buddy Bobby Bell began to unravel on June 6 when defence lawyer Greg McDade cross-examined key witness/complainant Susan Soloman. Proceedings in the mischief and
threats matter are supposed to conclude on June 12. Read all about it here.