Four big Massey Bridge contracts up for grabs.

Preparations to replace the aging George Massey Tunnel with a bridge are rapidly underway.

The Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure issued requests for proposals on Oct. 1 for four major, long-term contracts, just a week-and-a-half after Premier Christy Clark’s Sept. 20 announcement. 

Massey Tunnel (Highways B.C.) 

Clark revealed construction of the Richmond-to-Delta bridge would start in 2017, but she did not say in her Union of B.C. Municipalities convention speech what the budget would be or how it would be financed. Does government know all the answers and is it just too afraid to give us all sticker shock? 

Companies hoping to win contracts for community relations and consultation, technical advisory, environmental management and owner’s engineer services have until Oct. 24 to file their bids. A rather short three-week window for something so complex. (UPDATE - Oct. 22): On Oct. 21, just three days before the bid deadline, the government extended the closing date for submissions by a week to Oct. 31. 

Contract values were not disclosed in the tendering documents, but the terms run November 2013 to March 2022. The government has an option to extend each contract until 2024. 

The George Massey Tunnel, opened in 1959, carries 80,000 vehicles a day and is Metro Vancouver's third busiest crossing. 

“The existing four-lane tunnel is congested for 12 hours a day in both directions, with significant impacts for commuters, goods movers and tourists,” according to the RFP documents. “It is the only major Fraser River crossing in Metro Vancouver with a single lane of traffic in the off-peak direction during the daily commute.”

The owner’s engineer contract is the most complex, estimated to be 160,000 person hours for structural, traffic, geotechnical, seismic and electrical engineering. 

“The contractor shall have extensive engineering experience in the development and delivery of large transportation infrastructure projects, including major bridge structures, in an urban environment,” said the RFP.

A two-year seismic upgrade costing $19 million finished in 2006. 

Some people had millions of reasons to say "congrats Christy"

After winning the May 14 provincial election by surprise, Premier Christy Clark's email box runneth over. There were those unhappy with the result. And there were those who were ecstatic. Read the whole bunch here. 

Many of those wishing Clark well had millions of reasons to do so. They had either done business with the government or had benefitted from millions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies. 

Jain (left) and Clark at TOIFA

Jain's diction:

A May 17 letter from Vineet Jain, the managing director of the Times of India Group is an ideal example of the latter.

Jain sat beside Clark at B.C. Place Stadium during the Times of India Film Awards on April 6. He was smiling ear to ear for good reason. Clark gave his company a $9.5 million no-bid contract to produce the Bollywood awards extravaganza.

Jain wrote: "TOIFA was a rewarding, enriching and memorable experience for everyone involved -- celebrities, dignitaries, guests and the people of British Columbia and I commend your vision and conviction in making this possible." 

BC Liberals called it a trade promotion; the rest of us called it a re-election ploy. It would be nice to know where all our money went and who in Canada and India benefitted. Despite Freedom of Information requests, the Liberals aren't in a rush to show us. Maybe the auditor general or another agency will step in to try and extract the answers. 

Flag on the field: 

B.C. Lions president Dennis Skulsky's email starts: "Good morning Premier Clark, Wow it sounds good and feels good to say that." Then he deserves a 10-yard penalty for misspelling the Premier's first name ("Christie"). Skulsky, Lions' owner David Braley and others from the CFL club were donors to the Liberal campaign. The government earmarked $2.7 million through B.C. Pavilion Corporation for the Lions to buy the rights to the 2014 Grey Cup. 

Blacktop politics:

Repeat after me: Roads and bridges and tunnels. Promise them and build them. Even if your predecessor did the promising, make sure you show up and look good at the ribbon-cutting. B.C.'s tradition of blacktop politics to win voters' hearts with their own pocketbooks is a surefire formula and allows B.C. Road Builders and Heavy Construction Association president Jack Davidson to keep his members happy. On Sept. 20, Clark announced the Massey Tunnel would be replaced with a bridge... but she didn't tell us how much it would cost or how it would be financed. 

Ni hao:

China's Consul General Liu Fei offered greetings from the Chinese government, including Gov. Zhu Xiaodan of Guangdong Province. 

Cheers: 

Pacific Western Brewing owner Kazuko Komatsu sent her congratulations. Her company's products include Pacific Pilsner, Cariboo and Scandal Ale. The Prince George company is a well-known donor to the BC Liberals (and wrote some cheques to the NDP, too) and even got a huge tax break that ruffled big and small brewers. 

You can't be sure:

Shell Canada president Lorraine Mitchelmore's congratulations letter was gutted by government censors. "Not responsive," says most of the letter. 

Mr. Sincerity: 

Then there is this letter from B.C. Federation of Labour president Jim Sinclair. Close your eyes and imagine a grown man at a computer keyboard, with a tear running down his cheek, landing in his moustache. 

Sinclair and the BC Fed were with Adrian Dix and the NDP every step of the way and helped fill the party coffers. Then it all went wrong on May 14 and he had to write a face-saving, pride-swallowing letter on behalf of his members (who didn't all vote NDP). 

"On behalf of the B.C. Federation of Labour, I would like to congratulate you on your successful campaign to be elected to a second term as the Premier of British Columbia," wrote Sinclair. 

Well, it really is her first term. Clark was chosen by her party in February 2011 to serve the remainder of Gordon Campbell's 2009-won third term.

Christy's Congrats by BobMackin

Russian LNG behemoth coming to B.C. in 2015

Gazprom is coming to British Columbia. 

Not to buy liquefied natural gas -- Premier Christy Clark’s much-ballyhooed elixir for the future of the debt-laden province -- but instead to sponsor the biggest sport final in Canada since the 2010 Winter Olympics' men's hockey gold medal match.

On Sept. 14 in the Winter Olympic city of Sochi, as Russian president Vladimir Putin looked-on, the world’s biggest LNG company inked a deal to become the official oil, gas and fuel sponsor of FIFA, soccer’s world governing body. 

The agreement runs 2015 to 2018 and is connected to Russia’s hosting of the 2018 World Cup. 

The 2015 Women’s World Cup, FIFA’s second-biggest tournament, is coming to Canada June 6 to July 5, 2015. The championship final will be played at B.C. Place Stadium in Vancouver. 

That means Gazprom’s logo will be seen on the pitch-level advertising boards and executives of Russia’s largest corporation will have the opportunity to enjoy a level 3 hospitality suite. The 2015 Women’s World Cup will be the biggest yet, with 24 nations represented, and matches in six Canadian cities. 

Gazprom claims 18% of the world's natural gas reserves and to be the producer of 14% of the world’s LNG. Gazprom was once poised to export Russian LNG to the U.S., but the advent of fracking meant the U.S. didn’t need it. The Kremlin-backed company has staked its future on a pipeline to China. Gazprom signed an agreement to supply China National Petroleum Corporation on Sept. 5 at the G20 Summit in St. Petersburg. Witnesses included Putin and Chinese president Xi Jinping. Gazprom is also in talks to export Russian LNG to South Korea and Japan.

Clark will lead another trade junket to China, Japan and South Korea to flog B.C. LNG from Nov. 21-Dec. 3. (Academic research shows trade missions don't actually increase trade, but that's another story for another day.)

What happens to the investment of both private and public money in B.C. to develop an LNG industry if Gazprom meets China’s needs and if the Chinese find ample reserves of their own? What happens if Gazprom also finds buyers in South Korea and Japan? 

The word "shutout" comes to mind.

Health Minister's briefing book that the government didn't want you to see

Premier Christy Clark shuffled her cabinet on Sept. 5, 2012. Back then, some of us wags used the “shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic” line. Little did we know, the B.C. NDP, under captain Adrian Dix would run aground and the Liberals would keep sailing after the May 14 election.

On election night, Clark lost her seat in Vancouver-Point Grey to the NDP’s David Eby. She is hoping to win a by-election in Kelowna sometime this summer. Dr. Margaret MacDiarmid, who became Minister of Health on Sept. 5, 2012, also lost her seat, in Vancouver-Fairview, to the NDP’s George Heyman. I covered the Vancouver-Fairview riding for the Vancouver Courier. 

MacDiarmid

The day that MacDiarmid was announced as Health Minister, I sought the briefing book and transition information that staff provided her (she was not formally sworn-in until Sept. 26, 2012). I finally received that on June 4, 2013, after MacDiarmid had become the ex-Health Minister. 

The government invoked an extension from the original disclosure date of Oct. 19, 2012 to Dec. 3, 2012. On Nov. 28, 2012, it asked if I would consent to a delay until Jan. 17, 2013, so that the Office of the Premier could decide what information it wanted to withhold. I expressed my opposition. 

The Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner granted a 10-day extension to Dec. 17, 2012. 

It took 271 days (or eight months and 29 days) from filing the request to receipt of the documents. MacDiarmid did not last that long as Minister! 

I have complained to the OIPC. It is abundantly clear that the government preferred not to have the records about its most complex, costly and controversial ministry in the public domain until after the election. This is not an isolated case. Governing parties at all levels in Canada are increasingly exploiting the toothless federal, provincial and municipal access to information laws to delay publication of information until after elections, so as to avoid controversy. 

So, on the day we find out who will succeed MacDiarmid, I present to you her briefing book for the $17 billion ministry. The document was subject to what I believe is unreasonable censoring.

Yet more evidence of why Clark’s promises about open government were hollow. 

HTH-2012-00165 by BobMackin

Smart meter info kept secret until after the election

So-called smart meters were among the multitude of grievances British Columbians had with the ruling BC Liberals, who were surprisingly given another four years to govern on May 14 when not enough voters showed up at the polls to force a change.

While Health Canada claims there is no public health risk, the Electronic Privacy Information Center has a multitude of concerns about the new technology's proliferation around North America. There are also interesting connections between the Liberals and the smart meter industry and questions persist about why the program was exempted from full regulatory vetting by the B.C. Utilities Commission. Is this billion-dollar program really about energy efficiency?

Meanwhile, outgoing Auditor General John Doyle blew the whistle on BC Hydro's deferral of billions of dollars of costs. As Doyle put it, the Crown corporation has created "the appearance of profitability where none actually exists." As such, Rafe Mair boldly predicts that BC Hydro will be privatized.

So how did smart meters not become part of the election discourse? Premier Christy Clark and her Liberals set the agenda by pushing pipelines. The media became fascinated by polls. Adrian Dix and the NDP were too little, too late with criticism for the Liberals. Smart meters were part of the low-hanging fruit that the NDP ignored to their detriment. And BC Hydro exploited B.C.'s weak and poorly enforced Freedom of Information laws.

On Jan. 30, I made a request for information about the smart meter program's one-year completion delay. BC Hydro finally sent me the documents on May 15.

The day after voting day.

Here is my Business in Vancouver story. The documents are below.

BC Hydro smart meters update, disclosed after the election by BobMackin

Of Times of India and Taxpayers of British Columbia: The Sequel

The B.C. Liberal government did its best to keep Times of India Film Awards information away from you and me during its successful re-election campaign.

On Jan. 22, via Freedom of Information, I asked for records about the controversial April 6 B.C. Place Stadium Bollywood awards. I wanted the contract and the business case. Jan. 22 was the day Premier Christy Clark announced TOIFA and, coincidentally, when thousands of film industry workers gathered at North Shore Studios to promote the Save B.C. Film campaign.

After the government invoked a delay, I finally received some of the records from the Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training Ministry on May 13 -- the day before voting day. I reported on the documents on The World Today with Jon McComb on CKNW AM 980. I got some more documents from the Finance Ministry on May 17, three days after election day.

I have published those records below. I am disappointed to say that there are still more questions than answers. You will see that the government has withheld most of the information.

Below you will see a Financial Impact Assessment dated Oct. 9, 2012 and the Nov. 27, 2012 Treasury Board approval from Finance Minister Mike de Jong (who danced for the crowd of 35,000). Notice in de Jong's letter to Pat Bell that the funds came from contingencies. With four months remaining in the fiscal year, de Jong was already dipping into the rainy-day fund for non-essential spending. This is the same Finance Minister who claimed on Nov. 28 that he was controlling spending.

The contract with Times of India subsidiary BCCL International Events Private Ltd. was dated Dec. 12, 2012 and the government previously claimed it was worth $9.5 million, but there are no dollar values visible. Which begs the question: how much did this event really cost British Columbians?

Organizers failed to sign any mainstream, Canadian national advertiser as a corporate sponsor. There simply was not enough time. BCCL eventually found a title sponsor. Lux Cozi is a Kolkata-based underwear company that you might say has some dirty laundry. Chairman Ashok Todi was charged by Indian authorities in connection to the 2007 death of his son-in-law. Todi, who has not been proven guilty, and daughter Priyanka were on-stage in B.C. Place Stadium. The awards are scheduled to air on Sony Entertainment Television in India on June 16.

In the contract, the government required BCCL to create an "online virtual data room" -- a glorified website -- containing records about its services. But the very next line in the contract says that any records held by BCCL are beyond the reach of the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. This is a new trick that I hope Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham will deem illegal.

The government has the power to show you and me as much or as little as it wants. In this case, it chose secrecy. It conveniently chose to cloak this very expensive event behind the closed doors of cabinet because it knew this was not for the benefit of all. How can we believe the information contained in the government's propaganda?

It is obvious that the Clark Liberals wanted to avoid questions about TOIFA spending after Ontario media outlets got the line-by-line list of costs for the 2011 International Indian Film Academy Awards via FOI. Despite that, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty parlayed IIFA into his re-election. McGuinty's chief of staff was Don Guy, who was part of Clark's 2013 campaign backroom.

Remember: there was no involvement by the Canadian Tourism Commission nor the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. This was not about building bridges between the vibrant South Asian community and the rest of B.C. This was not about multiculturalism. This was about the Multicultural Outreach strategy -- the expenditure of public funds to benefit the ruling party's bid to perpetuate its hold on power.

For $9.5 million, how many more cops could have been investigating unsolved murders and rapes in B.C.? How many homeless people could have been housed? How many cancer patients could have been treated? How many more scientists could have been in labs, trying to solve diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's? 

Times of India Film Awards contract by BobMackin

TOIFA-FIN-2013-00029

Not Done Properly: Dix's Dips failed British Columbians

Media and scholars will study for years to come how the BC Liberals defied the odds (and the polls) and won British Columbia's 40th provincial election on May 14. 

Liberal sources told me they were truly surprised at what happened. They would've been overjoyed with a minority government for Christy Clark, but were already resigned to hearing the words "Premier-designate, Adrian Dix." 

Dix departs on day 1: flawed from the start.

I haven't found any members of the so-called 801 Club, but I found sympathizers who vowed to stay home on election day. They would never vote NDP, but they said they couldn't vote to keep Clark as premier. 

Ultimately, it was the triumph of a fear-based advertising campaign. Fear and greed are the two most basic motivators of humans. The Liberals painted Dix as weak and voters were told time and again they should fear what he might do if given power. It was built on the premise that repetition can sometimes be perceived as reality, even if the message is false. The same spin doctors portrayed Clark as strong. It was laughable for her to claim fiscal responsibility, but more people bought it than bought the NDP narrative. 

The Weathervane ad, showing Dix's head swivelling in the wind under black clouds in a thunderstorm, was the last big salvo fired in the ad war that began with the infomercial that starred various Liberal insiders (who were portrayed as average British Columbians). The Liberals audaciously employed a weather metaphor when they had a dismal record in that category. The NDP had nothing to counter it. 

On the ground, the Liberals spent the last weekend promoting Green Party candidates in some swing ridings, hoping to split the NDP vote. On election day, Liberal candidates, such as Peter Fassbender, Suzanne Anton and Richard Lee, used social media to bash the NDP and/or get the vote out, despite the Elections Act's ban on transmitting or publishing advertising messages on election day. They finally stopped and deleted their messages. Those weren't the signs of a party confident of victory. 

As much as Dix was delivering a bright, positive Barack Obama-inspired message of hope and change, his campaign was too little, too late in expressing criticism of the Liberal record. When the NDP became critical, the Liberals framed it as being negative. The NDP could have prevented this. 

Re-using the Jack Layton playbook from the 2011 federal election was ill-conceived. Layton was not running to be Prime Minister, he was running to be the Opposition leader. Dix's fatal error was not highlighting the 12-year Liberal record of incompetence and corruption on a daily basis. Showing how the Liberals wasted resources and grew government would have been simple. Simple, just-the-facts storytelling (with a dash of humour) would have done the job and reminded British Columbians that it was time for a change in government. 

One practical step at a time? Dix should instead have been urging British Columbians to take a giant leap away from the Liberals. 

How could he have done so? By revealing the incidents of Liberal mistakes and misconducts one-by-one throughout the campaign, in a daily advent calendar-style opening, complete with historical newspaper quotes and broadcast clips. The only problem would have been choosing which 28 issues and incidents to highlight and in which order. Quick Wins, Wood Innovation and Design Centre, Liquor Distribution Branch, BC Hydro smart meters... those are just the tip of the iceberg. The list is so long, as per Laila Yuile's 100+ Reasons the Liberals Must Go.

While the Liberals spent a year-and-a-half reminding voters of Dix's 1999 backdated memo, Dix and the NDP should have reminded voters of the boxes and boxes and boxes of documents hauled out of the Legislature on Dec. 28, 2003 by police officers investigating the corrupt procurement process around the sale of BC Rail. There were more than 25,000 pages entered as evidence in Dave Basi and Bob Virk's bribery trial. 

Van Dongen's BC Rail cookie. (Facebook)

Dix's tour bus should have included trips to the former BC Rail terminus in Prince George and the recently demolished station in North Vancouver. It was not good enough to simply promise a two-year, $10 million judicial inquiry in the platform. The $6 million legal indemnity deal resonates with citizens but the NDP did little when the documents the government didn't want you to see were finally revealed during the campaign by Global BC's Jas Johal. In fact, independent John van Dongen did more to highlight the issue than the NDP did by publishing a photo of a themed cookie by an Abbotsford baker on Facebook and Twitter. 

The May 2 poll release from Angus Reid Public Opinion said the $6 million legal indemnity deal mattered a lot or somewhat to 67% of respondents -- 1% more than the way the Harmonized Sales Tax was introduced in 2009 by the Liberals.

People are mad as hell and not tolerating corruption anymore. Since the global economic crisis of 2008, corruption has been top-of-mind around the world. Consider the troubles in India listed in this BBC report. Or how new Chinese president Li Xinping is battling corruption (and how there is a BC Liberal connection, according to the Globe and Mail!). Closer to home, B.C. taxpayers need to keep an eye on embattled Montreal engineering firm SNC-Lavalin; the Evergreen Line contractor was blacklisted by the World Bank and is facing corruption investigations on four continents.

It was also not good enough for the NDP platform to focus solely on a BC Rail inquiry. A top-to-bottom overhaul of government is necessary. The Office of the Auditor-General proposed whistleblower protection. The Information and Privacy Commissioner has offered ideas on increasing transparency and accountability, including a duty to document law. The NDP didn't offer a new vision for openness and accountability. It was simply not confident in its ability to set and adhere to higher standards and deliver the good government that British Columbians truly desire.

The NDP needed a focussed plan to restore public trust. It didn't. It failed British Columbians.

Breaking: Liberal campaign manager's plea to the party

Its time running out for the BC Liberals?

Central campaign manager Mike McDonald sent out the memo below just after 5 p.m. to party faithful, claiming voter turnout is low. 

But I am told McDonald is tossing a Hail Mary and hoping someone, anyone, will be in the red zone to catch it. A source tells me that the part of the email claiming the election is close is not accurate. Liberal internal polling indicates the party could have as few as 17 MLAs by the end of the night.

The Liberals are not getting out the vote like they wanted, which is one reason why several high-profile candidates, including Mike de Jong, Suzanne Anton, Darryl Plecas, Peter Fassbender and Richard Lee, were Tweeting earlier today and contravening Elections BC's ban on election day advertising. They eventually stopped and deleted their Tweets. But not before dozens of Twitter users notified Elections BC. 

Subject:	There's still time: let's win this!
Date:	14 May 2013 17:05:43 -0700
From:	Mike McDonald <campaign.director@bcliberals.com>

Dear BC Liberal members, I'm sending this as we head into the final three hours of voting for the most important provincial election in a generation. Premier Christy Clark and our outstanding team of candidates need your active support tonight. Overall voter turnout is still pretty low as of 5pm so we will gain the edge by continuing to turn out our vote. Let's pull out all the stops! 1. If you haven't already, please VOTE as soon as possible. Click here for voting locations. 2. Phone, knock on doors, email, Facebook, Tweet... let everyone know they must vote by 8pm PT. 3. Think about people you know around the province. We need to pull votes in the North, the Cariboo, the Thompson-Okanagan, the Kootenays, Metro Vancouver, the Fraser Valley, and Vancouver Island. Do what you can to make sure your network is voting wherever they live. Few expected this election would be this close ... let alone the Opposition. Now, it's our chance to keep BC's economy on the right track. Please make that extra effort tonight. Collectively, it will make the difference. Let's take charge of our future and make this happen. Thank you for your support, Mike McDonald Campaign Director

The government doesn't want you to know

British Columbians go to the polls for the 40th time in the province’s history on May 14. They will get to do what billions of people around the world cannot: Say yes to change and no to corruption. Democratically and peacefully.

This has been a nasty election, marked by attack advertising from the ruling party and a lack of discourse around important issues like healthcare, education, crime and the declining trust in public institutions. 

Christy Clark and the BC Liberals hyped their natural gas pipe dreams and the NDP under Adrian Dix opposed pipelines and tankers. The Liberals spoke deceptively about deficit and debt. The NDP admitted it would speed-up spending, perhaps sell a stadium and order a judicial inquiry into the 2003 sale of BC Rail.

When the Liberals came to power in the 2001 provincial election, they swept aside a worn-out and corrupt NDP. The Liberals had a bold, "New Era" plan for a prosperous B.C. that included the pledge to be Canada's most open and accountable government.

But did they achieve that goal under Gordon Campbell during his decade at the helm? Or under Clark for the last two years? No and no.

Consider these 10 stories.

The Liberal government was obsessed with selling the warehousing and distribution operations of the Liquor Distribution Branch in 2012 after being lobbied by Exel Logistics, a division of the giant Deutsche Post DHL. Proceeds from the sale were supposed to help balance the budget. One of the drivers of this plan was none other than Patrick Kinsella. Then, suddenly, tendering was cancelled and the B.C. Government and Service Employees’ Union’s new contract was the convenient excuse. 

What was the real reason? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

The Private Career Training Institutions Agency of B.C. is a Crown corporation that regulates private post-secondary education. Last fall, it moved to shut down two schools: Royal Canadian Institute of Technology and Prana Yoga Teacher College. PCTIA registrar and CEO Karin Kirkpatrick admitted that RCIT had no financial problems or student complaints. 

Kirkpatrick approved the hiring of the law firm Lawson Lundell to represent PCTIA in these actions. 
There was no formal tendering process. 

One of Lawson Lundell's partners is Kirkpatrick's husband Murray Campbell.

Why was this potential conflict of interest allowed?

The government doesn't want you to know. 

The Province of B.C. was the guarantor for VANOC, the organizer of the 2010 Winter Olympics.  Yet, the City of Vancouver (which derives its power from the province) was given authority to cut a deal with the Canadian Olympic Committee and VANOC to seal the financial records, board minutes and legal correspondence away from the eyes of the public until the year 2025. 

Why keep the people who paid for the Games in the dark for so long? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

B.C. Place Stadium was renovated for $514 million to the benefit of the Vancouver Whitecaps and B.C. Lions. Do the Whitecaps and Lions pay fair market value for rent?  Why did the Whitecaps get a taxpayer subsidy for a training centre in Premier Clark’s riding, when the team’s managing director has a personal hockey rink at his mansion in Whistler? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

B.C. Pavilion Corporation called me frivolous and vexatious and tried to have me blacklisted from making Freedom of Information requests about the operations of money-losing B.C. Place. Then it withdrew the complaint at the 11th hour. The net result? PavCo succeeded in delaying my FOI requests until after the election. Whose idea was this? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

The SNC-Lavalin engineering firm is one of Canada’s biggest companies. It is under investigation for corruption on four continents, yet the B.C. government felt it was worthy of receiving the contract to design and build the $1.4 billion Evergreen Line Rapid Transit Project in the Tri-Cities. The company was also blacklisted for bribery by the World Bank from receiving construction financing for development projects. 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

BC Liberal appointees to the Premier’s Office were found to have broken rules of their employment when they did party work on government time, using the public’s dime. Only one person lost her job. Deputy chief of staff Kim Haakstad quit, and therefore was ineligible for severance. She showed up at Clark’s riding campaign office during the election as a volunteer. Pamela Martin, Brian Bonney and Barinder Bhullar also remained party insiders, despite dishonouring their commitments. 

We will have to wait until the week of June 10 before we can see some of the 10,000 documents gathered in the Quick Wins, in-house investigation by John Dyble. 

We should have been able to see the records before election day. 

But the government doesn’t want you to know. 

Did complaints from Bell, Rogers and Shaw over the direct awarding to Telus of a $1 billion 10-year government-wide service contract lead to the cancellation of the $40 million, 20-year Telus Park naming rights for B.C. Place? 

Evidence I have gathered suggests there is a link. 

But the government doesn’t want you to know. 

Life is simply awful for some of the most vulnerable children and youths in British Columbia. Some of those who struggle with addictions, abuse and mental illnesses are housed in the Maples Adolescent Treatment Centre in Burnaby, where staff complain they work in a climate of fear. 

WorkSafeBC found that incidents were covered up. 

Why? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

The Times of India Film Awards business plan and contract (below) was finally released to me the day before the election, even though I asked for it on Jan. 22. All the dollar figures were censored and only 18 pages of the 168-page file were released. There is even a clause that protects financial information about the controversial April 6 awards show from public scrutiny -- as long the records are held by the Times of India. 

Why did the government spend $9.5 million (out of contingencies, no less!) on a Bollywood Awards show and omit the Hollywood North film industry from the B.C. Jobs Plan? Why did the government do this deal, while claiming that it was controlling spending? 

The government doesn’t want you to know. 

Times of India Film Awards contract by BobMackin

More perspectives on the 12 years of Liberal rule include:
Five Reasons to Turf Christy Clark's Liberal Crew, by Rafe Mair from The Tyee;
Why not to vote for the BC Liberals, by James Plett;
100+ Reasons the BC Liberals Must Go, by Laila Yuile;
and, finally, Richard Giroday's Tangled Web of BC Liberal rule infographic. It is a must-see. 

Blizzard of documents says Port Mann #IceBombs were preventable

There are eight ridings up for grabs in Surrey in the May 14 provincial election. At dissolution, they were split between the ruling Liberals and opposition NDP.

Surrey is the province's second-biggest city and British Columbia is well-known for its blacktop politics. Build a bridge. Rebuild a highway. Remind voters which party spent their hard-earned tax dollars to give the project the green light.

That is the modus operandi of the ruling BC Liberals, who took it to another level when Premier Christy Clark gave the go-ahead to slash the toll on the new Port Mann Bridge tolls from $3 to $1.50 per crossing.

Clark opened the bridge, the highlight of the $3.3 billion Highway 1 project, on Dec. 1, 2012 with a photo and video opportunity. Just 18 days later, on Dec. 19, 2012, the infamous "ice bombs" incident happened. Some 350 vehicles vehicles were damaged by falling ice and snow that had been allowed to gather on the bridge cables and towers.

This had been a problem on other cable-stayed bridges in North America and Europe and the documents below show that engineers knew it was a risk at the Port Mann. Some seem to have believed it would be a manageable risk, while others were concerned about safety. Transportation Investment Corporation, the Crown corporation set-up for the project, did not have a fulsome plan before the bridge's grand opening.

There was another issue.

The bridge opening was hurried along for the Premier's photo op. The bridge was opened during B.C.'s notorious stormy season, yet it did not have its own weather station. In fact, the closest Transportation Ministry weather stations were in Abbotsford and West Vancouver. One was finally bought for $100,000 and installed in February.

With better understanding of the conditions about to happen and as they were developing, the people that operate and maintain the Port Mann could have halted traffic earlier and avoided damage, injury and embarrassment.

Below are documents I obtained via Freedom of Information that include reports and correspondence from the files of Transportation Investment Corporation and contractor Kiewit-Flatiron.

The documents were part of a 500-page-plus release that included the lengthy U.S. Army Corps of Engineers technical report on superstructure ice protection by Charles Ryerson from April 2009. 

If ice accretion is up your alley, you can download the Ryerson report here. 

FOI 12012 - PMH1-Icebombs

The $70,000 Question: Answered

On March 14, Premier Christy Clark tabled the in-house Dyble Report investigation into the Multicultural Outreach Strategy scandal. The report was not independent, but conducted by John Dyble, the Deputy Minister who serves at the pleasure of Clark.

The NDP revealed on Feb. 27 -- Pink Shirt Anti-Bullying Day -- that Clark's staff was doing party work on government time, spending the public dime, in a bid to win votes from ethnic groups in the 2013 election. That was against government rules.

Clark announced that the B.C. Liberal Party had paid $70,000 to the public purse, representing some of Quick Wins co-conspirator Brian Bonney's salary. Media outlets took the Premier for her word and published the $70,000 repayment as fact.

I wanted proof. So I filed a Freedom of Information request on March 22. The government told me that the deadline for disclosure would be May 2.

On May 2, I got a response from six ministries with a few pages of email that appears to be from citizens. But there is one important document missing.

I complained to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner and senior staff at Information Access Operations -- the government's FOI clearinghouse. I even left phone and email messages on May 8 for Liberal president Sharon White, encouraging her to release a copy of the cheque.

Finally, a copy of the $70,000 cheque arrived on May 9. Albeit a calendar week late.

Two questions:

Why was it not provided to me on time?

Why didn't Premier Christy Clark -- who claims she champions open information and data -- just order her staff to publish a copy of the cheque when it was written on March 14?

See the request and the documents below.

QuickWins Repayment FOI

Exclusive: Flip this house, by order of the court

Clark and Wilson: debt free? (Facebook)

Gordon Wilson was the man who drove the BC Liberals from zero to 17 seats in the 1991 election, lost the 1993 leadership vote to Gordon Campbell (in the wake of his affair with Liberal house leader/future wife Judi Tyabji), formed the Progressive Democratic Alliance with Tyabji in 1995, sailed into a 1999 cabinet post with the NDP and took over the Fast Ferries file.

Yes, there's more! He ran for the NDP leadership in 2000, but Ujjal Dosanjh was the eventual winner who led the NDP to oblivion in the following year's election against Campbell and the Liberals.

Now, a dozen years later, Wilson is back in the BC Liberals' fold. This time supporting Premier Christy Clark and her "vote for me and we'll be debt-free in 15 years" campaign leading to the May 14 election. Clark's "Debt-Free B.C." slogan has been attacked by the NDP as the "fact-free" campaign, for errantly claiming that bond rating agencies called the Liberal budget balanced. The 2013-2014 pre-election budget proposes increasing the debt by $6 billion and forecasts a $69 billion debt in three years. That doesn't include the list of $96 billion-plus in long-term, contractual obligations.

What is Wilson's true motivation for urging disaffected Liberals to "come home"?

Wilson is known by the nickname "Flip" for all his party changes. But he's not wilfully flipping his house on the aptly named Random Road in Powell River. That is also the address listed for his Duddles' Lair waterfront sheep farm.

The property is offered for $842,900, according to the Realtor.ca listing below. A B.C. Supreme Court judge in Powell River ordered the immediate sale on Jan. 7. A summary of the case and the court's foreclosure order are both below.

On his blog, Wilson lists himself as the chairman of the board of Tugboat Enterprises Ltd., which owns Selkie Software data recovery and migration software. But the link from Wilson's blog to Tugboat Ventures goes to a website that is "down for maintenance." A toll-free phone number is listed, but the operator was unable to connect me to Wilson. A phone number on the Tugboat website registration is not in service.

Tyabji and Tugboat are listed as defendants in the long-running defamation lawsuit by former West Vancouver Liberal Member of Parliament Blair Wilson, who is unrelated. Another defendant is Mark Marissen, the ex-husband of Clark who remains a BC Liberal campaign strategist. Blair Wilson sued in fall 2008, after he switched to the Green Party. I have other documents that indicate this legal battle has not been kind to the wallets of Tyabji and Tugboat.

I reached out to Tyabji and Gordon Wilson late Monday afternoon via email and on Twitter, appealing for them to contact me. I have not had a response. I must assume that they can offer me a reasonable explanation about the legal and financial challenges they have faced. A home foreclosure cannot be a pleasant experience. I sincerely want to hear their side of the story and hope they will contact me as soon as possible.

UPDATE: The Wilsons' legal and financial woes are connected to a lawsuit involving Premier Christy Clark's ex-husband Mark Marissen (who remains a Liberal strategist) and an apparent failed attempt to sell Tugboat. Read the details here in Business in Vancouver.

REALTOR.ca -Property Details 10167

Wilson Foreclosure

Wilson Foreclosure Order