Auditor General getting ex-Solicitor General's help

British Columbia Auditor General John Doyle's efforts to compile a report on government indemnity for government personnel involved in legal proceedings have been frustrated by resistance from the B.C. Liberal government.

John van Dongen, a former Liberal Solicitor General, applied May 7 for intervenor status in Doyle's lawsuit against the government.

Doyle is trying to get to the bottom of the $6 million payoff for Dave Basi and Bob Virk's legal bills in October 2010, which was connected to the abrupt end of a corruption trial. When the trial ended with surprise guilty pleas, various current and former B.C. Liberal politicians and party insiders breathed a sigh of relief. They wouldn't have to testify.

Van Dongen cited the legacy of the B.C. Rail privatization scandal as a central reason for his stunning March 26 resignation from the B.C. Liberal caucus.

The citizens of B.C. have still not been supplied with the promised explanation for how the B.C. Rail privatization was mishandled. Premier Christy Clark -- who was deputy premier when the Crown corporation was effectively sold -- has refused to call a public inquiry.

Through the efforts of Doyle, and now van Dongen, the truth may eventually be told.


2012 05 07 Notice of Application

Mischievous Bloy

When Harry Bloy resigned from cabinet on March 15, for leaking an email from a Province reporter to the company of a B.C. Liberal Party supporter, he tried his best to make it look like an honourable departure. He "felt it important" to take responsibility for his actions, according to his resignation letter.

It was either quit or be fired. He simply could not have continued as Minister of State for Multiculturalism.

I obtained, via Freedom of Information, Bloy's three-part oath of office. It includes an oath of confidentiality. The release of a reporter's email to an outsider breached his oath of office.

Interesting to note: the document signed by Bloy and Lt. Gov. Steven Point contains a key error: the first name of the lieutenant governor, the Queen's representative in B.C., is misspelled. The website for the Office of the Lieutenant Governor of B.C. indicates Mr. Point's first name is correctly spelled "Steven" -- NOT Stephen, as it appears on Bloy's oath of office.

Harry Bloy's oath of office

Women's World Cup is coming to Vancouver

Soccer, on the front lawn of Parliament Hill in Ottawa?

You bet. A girls youth friendly match is scheduled for 2:15 p.m. Eastern Time May 4. before Canadian Soccer Association president Dominic Maestracci and FIFA president Sepp Blatter unveil the list of cities to host matches for the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup.

One of the cities will be Vancouver. But you'll have to wait a bit longer to find out whether it hosts a semi-final, bronze medal match and/or the championship final.

"The schedule will be released in the second half of 2012," said CSA communications manager Michele Dion.

B.C. Place Stadium's only serious competition for the final is Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium. Olympic Stadium in Montreal is a darkhorse. Toronto will be hosting the 2015 Pan American Games, so BMO Field and Rogers Centre will be off limits. The British Columbia government committed $2 million of taxpayers funds to the CSA to bring matches to Vancouver. We do not know the full cost to taxpayers for the tournament. The federal government has promised at least $15 million.

B.C. Soccer Association executive director Bjorn Osieck will be there, as part of a delegation of seven from the west coast for the weekend's annual general meeting. Maestracci faces a leadership challenge, as Canada's four professional clubs are backing candidate Rob Newman in the May 5 election. The SBC Insurance CEO, formerly from Saskatchewan, has been a CSA vice-president since 2006 and chairs the governance committee.

The CSA will be patting itself on the back all weekend over so-called governance reforms. It's still an organization that has not met the challenge of transparency. If it really wants the public to believe in reform, the best, first step would be to release a financial report. Until then, it'll be up to us in the media to pay $5 to the government under the Access to Information Act to get a copy.

Dion said Blatter will stay for the Saturday AGM and banquet. Will it be his last visit to Canada? Blatter is serving his third and final term as FIFA president after his 2011 re-election. The world's soccer governing body is under fire for allegations of widespread corruption.

Face and voice of VANOC switches off Hydro

Very quietly, BC Hydro's senior vice-president of communications quit her post in mid-March.

Renee Smith-Valade went to the most-powerful (in more ways than one) Crown corporation in British Columbia after the May 2010 hiring of Dave Cobb as chief executive. Cobb was deputy CEO to John Furlong at the Vancouver Olympic organizing committee. Cobb was also vice-president Smith-Valade's boss at VANOC, where she ran the 2010 Winter Games' communications and media relations department. She brought staffers Chris Brumwell, Greg Alexis and Jennifer Young with her.

Last fall, Cobb quit his $550,000-a-year job at BC Hydro to join the Jim Pattison Group where he works as managing director of corporate development, with president and ex-Premier Glen Clark and billionaire chairman Pattison.

Brumwell, a former Canucks and VANOC communications manager, preceded Smith-Valade out the BC Hydro door to work for Vancouver yoga wear juggernaut Lululemon.

When I broke the news of Smith-Valade's departure via Twitter on May 2, Bill Tieleman was quick to re-Tweet and then add his speculation:

@BillTieleman
Twitter math: Premier Christy Clark's office - Rebecca Scott + BC Hydro spokesperson Renee Smith-Valade quits = new Clark staffer? #bcpoli

Scott's move out of Premier Christy Clark's office and into Government Communications and Public Engagement (read: propaganda office) became public earlier in the day. Scott's position became newsworthy in recent months because her husband is the CBC's talented Legislature reporter Stephen Smart. One of their wedding guests was Premier Christy Clark. The Smart/Scott relationship was the subject of an investigation by CBC's ombudsman Kirk LaPointe. LaPointe "found a violation of CBC Journalistic Standards and Practices."

Clark has had a revolving door of press secretaries. Chris Olsen, the consumer reporter who was "On Our Side," quit CTV to be on "her side." Now he's on the outside. In January, Clark figuratively kicked Olsen on the backside, with a $67,000 severance.

She filled the job with Sara MacIntyre, who was an effective spokesperson for the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation but went on to work in the Prime Minister's Office under Stephen Harper. MacIntyre is part of Clark's bid to be a Liberal in Conservative clothing. It hasn't worked so far and MacIntyre was notorious for the poorly handled photo and interview opportunity with Clark at the Globe 2012 trade show.

At Hydro, Smith-Valade's job included leading the marketing communications, website management, media and public affairs, community relations and customer care and conservation teams. On her LinkedIn page, Smith-Valade describes herself as a "creative consultant" with her own RSV Strategic Communications firm. Her list of qualifications ends with "government/public affairs support."

Here is the email to BC Hydro staff announcing her departure:

From: News, BCH Corporate 

Sent: 2012, March 14 12:21 PM

Subject: A Message from Charles Reid: The Departure of Renee Smith-Valade, Senior Vice-President, Customer Care, Conservation and Communications

Good Afternoon:

After a year and a half leading our Communications team and, more recently, also the Customer Care and Conservation teams, Renee Smith-Valade has resigned from her position as Senior Vice-President on the Executive Team to take some time off and then pursue other opportunities in communications.

Renee joined BC Hydro shortly after finishing up five years with VANOC and jumped in with both feet into leading the Communications team. Over the last 20 months, Renee has confidently led the Communications team through many challenges including supporting the rollout of the Safety Taskforce recommendations and the Smart Metering Program, the Fraser River Towers incident, rate increases, the communication of the Government Review and its outcomes, and the rollout of seasonal Power Smart marketing communications programs, to name just a few highlights. Through all of this, she maintained dedication and passion for her team and BC Hydro. Most recently, she relished the chance to start working with the Power Smart and Customer Care teams in August to help them to continue to deliver strong conservation programs and our highly regarded customer service.

Renee has often commented on how fortunate she is to work with such a strong team and how enjoyable it has been to work with the dedicated people at BC Hydro. I am taking some time to assess how we can best ensure the continued strong performance of the Communications, Customer Care and Conservation teams, and particularly how to maximize the strong leadership of these areas that Renee has told me she values enormously. I will let you know when those decisions are made. In the meantime, I am confident that Lisa Coltart (Power Smart and Customer Care), Steve Vanagas (Corporate Communications), Cynthia Dyson (Marketing Communications and Brand Strategy) and Thoren Hudyma (Community Engagement and Capital Projects Communications) will continue to do a great job as we meet the opportunities and challenges ahead.

On behalf of the Executive Team, I would like to thank Renee for her hard work and dedication through a very challenging year. I know all of you will join me in wishing Renee the very best as she takes some well-earned time off with family and explores other opportunities.

Thank you,
Charles

Will she end up in government, helping Clark rescue her political career? Will she be reunited with Cobb at the Jim Pattison Group or Furlong with the Vancouver Whitecaps? Or somewhere else? For now, she's not talking.

Asked for an interview about leaving BC Hydro, her emailed response to me was:

"I appreciate the request and your interest however I'm going to decline for now. Can we revisit this again In a few weeks time?"

I'll wait to find out what she says and does.

Contest: Rename the B.C. Liberal Party

Fresh from two by-election losses on April 19 amid the continuing unpopularity of Premier Christy Clark, the B.C. Liberal Party is desperately searching for a way to prolong its grasp on power in British Columbia.

Meanwhile NDP leader Adrian Dix positions himself as Premier-in-waiting and Conservative leader John Cummins could become leader of the opposition.

Some Liberal strategists are trying to convince themselves that the problem is not their leader, but on their label. They're pondering a name change, which can be a risky proposition. There have been many failures in the high-stakes world of rebranding.

Should they co-opt the old Social Credit name to rejuvenate the free enterprise coalition? Should they call it the Pacific Dogwood Party, after the provincial flower? Or just simply call the whole thing "Gordon," for the first names of ex-leaders Gordon Gibson, Gordon Wilson and Gordon Campbell? (Maybe they could adopt the red, white and blue ball icon from the Barenaked Ladies' "Gordon" album as a symbol of the liberal/conservative coalition?)

What do you think? What should be the new name for the B.C. Liberal Party?

The best, most creative suggestion for a monicker makeover wins a personalized copy of my new e-book, Red Mittens & Red Ink: The Vancouver Olympics. Deadline is noon PDT on May 12.

The winner will be announced May 14, which is, coincidentally, the one-year countdown to the next scheduled provincial election.

Vote early, vote often. Comments accepted below or via email to 2010goldrush (at) gmail.com. Be tasteful and stay classy, please.

What's the Premier's office hiding about Atwal?

Remember the story about the Ghuman and the gunman?

The Ghuman was Tariq Ghuman, a B.C. Liberal Party director. The gunman was Jaspal Singh Atwal, the buddy Ghuman brought to the 2012 B.C. Budget speech on Feb. 21 in the Legislature.

Atwal, a Liberal supporter, was convicted in 1987 for his attempt to murder Indian cabinet minister Malkiat Singh Sidhu, who was visiting British Columbia in May 1986.

On Feb. 27, Kim Bolan of the Vancouver Sun reported the following:

Shane Mills, Premier Christy Clark's director of communications, said Monday that Atwal only made his way onto the guest list when another person invited by the premier's office asked for an extra ticket to attend.

"His name was on a list. It was put on the list at the request of an invited guest," Mills said. "If we had known his background, he would not have been invited."

Mills said Atwal's name was just given to government the day before the budget speech.

"And we don't normally vet those kind of things. So we were unaware of the person's background and we will be working to improve the vetting and working with the Speaker's office on that," he said.

Ghuman resigned, but popped up at party events shortly after.

The Jaspal Atwal controversy garnered Clark the revulsion of commentators on opposite sides of the political spectrum, from Bill Tieleman (who found Atwal's buddy Ghuman literally rubbing shoulders with Port Moody-Coquitlam by-election candidate Dennis Marsden and former Tory MP Stockwell Day) to Alex Tsakumis (who claims a source told him Clark unsuccessfully lobbied an Indian diplomat to grant Atwal a visa so he could travel with her on last fall's trade mission to India). When I asked Mills about this, he denied the Premier did so.

I was curious. Who were all the people on the guest list? What did the invitation look like? What was being said internally in the Office of the Premier about Atwal? Could there have been correspondence with the Indian consul about Atwal? Or correspondence with Atwal, himself?

So I filed a Freedom of Information request. Lo and behold, the Office of the Premier claimed it had no records. My laughter ensued.

See the two denial letters below. Then compare them with the records received when I asked for the guest list and invitation for the Clark-and-cabinet swearing-in ceremony of March 14, 2011. Remember how Clark claimed she was a champion of openness and transparency? Apparently not anymore.

Message to the Office of the Premier: I was born at night, but not last night. Kindly cough up the guest list for the B.C. Budget speech, show me the Atwal correspondence. I just hope the documents, didn't grow legs and jump into your paper shredder on their own.

UPDATE (April 24, 2012): I have formally asked for the Information and Privacy Commissioner to intervene.

Another request denied

Another request denied

Premier Christy Clark's swearing-in guest list

Elimination is inevitable, commiserate responsibly

Vancouver Canucks: three-time Campbell Bowl winners. Two-time President’s Trophy winners.

Stanley Cups? Zero.

There is no doubt in my mind that fact will not change in 2012. The team is 0-3 and one loss away from the golf course. Regardless, if they steal a win at Staples Center, elimination remains inevitable. Stanley Park's Lord Stanley statue will not be getting a visit from a Cup-holding Canuck in 2012.

Just as it is hard to defend a Stanley Cup championship, it is equally difficult for a runner-up to return immediately for another challenge.

Losing in Game 7 on home ice, as the Canucks did in 2011, meant the players had the longest and shortest summers of their careers. It was a long summer of wondering why, how come and what could have been for the Canucks while members of the Boston Bruins enjoyed sharing the Cup with friends, families and communities.

Short, because (with the exception of the Bruins) the time to relax and recover before beginning the cycle anew at training camp was extremely limited. It was only 91 days since Game 7 and the players reporting for pre-training camp medical exams.

By virtue of geography and their playoff schedule, the Canucks are the most-played and most-traveled team in the NHL since September 2010. General manager Mike Gillis hired sleep consultants and other experts to mitigate the wear-and-tear, but that has only gone so far. The team exhibited weariness and unfocussed play since the so-called “Game 8” win over the Bruins in Boston. The team was 4-3 in tiebreakers before the Boston game, then went 11-6.

In March 2011, the Canucks went 13-2 (including 2 shutout wins and 1 overtime win) and outscored opponents 43-27. In March 2012, they went 9-6 (including 2-1 in overtime) and were 35-35 in the goals for/against columns. In 2011, the Canucks were hot, they were feared and they were dominant in regulation time down the stretch. In 2012, they were not. The final three regular season games in April were a preview of the 0-3 depression in the Kings’ series. The only regulation win, in which they clinched the President’s Trophy, was a game they struggled to win 3-0 over the lowly Edmonton Oilers.

Only twice since the NHL began expansion in 1968 has a runner-up rebounded. The Canucks will not be the third.

Why?

This is not a team like the 1984 Edmonton Oilers, who were led by young Wayne Gretzky, Jarri Kurri and Mark Messier. They lost in 1983 but stormed back the following year when Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier and Clark Gillies of the New York Islanders passed the torch.

This is not a team like the 2009 Pittsburgh Penguins, who lost in 2008, had a mediocre start to the next season and fired coach Michel Therrien with a 27-25-5 record. They replaced him with Dan Bylsma, who guided the team to a hot 18-3-4 record down the stretch. Centres Evgeni Malkin (113 points) and Sidney Crosby (103) continued their dominance in the playoffs with 30-plus-points each. Goalie Marc-Andre Fleury was solid, from wire-to-wire.

To get to the Stanley Cup, a team needs to be a healthy team, working as one. It requires the right decisions by management and coaches. It also requires luck. The 2011 Canucks had all that, including the first round-winning overtime goal by Alexandre Burrows over Chicago and Kevin Bieksa’s bizarre Western conference-clinching ricochet goal against San Jose.)

In 2012, they were not dominant and decisive down the stretch. Gillis traded up-and-coming star Cody Hodgson for underperforming Zack Kassian. Daniel Sedin was injured with a concussion. Ryan Kesler and Mason Raymond are not the same players they were before 2011 playoff injuries. Gillis failed to find a grizzled vet to play a Mark Recchi-type role. Gillis couldn’t coax Mike Modano from retiring and Owen Nolan was a training camp cut.

The runner-up jinx remains. May the Canucks have better luck in 2013.

PavCo loses another director

Will the last person left please turn out the floodlights?

Another director has left the board of B.C. Pavilion Corporation, the taxpayer-owned company that operates B.C. Place Stadium and the Vancouver Convention Centre.

Peter Brown's February departure wasn't confirmed until March. The Howe Street tycoon, Order of B.C. recipient and Liberal bagman (right) claimed he wants to slow down, but the real reason was his disgust over Premier Christy Clark turning down the $35 million to $40 million B.C. Place Stadium naming rights deal with Telus.

Now joining Brown on the outside-looking-in is Derek Brindle. Brindle (below) is a lawyer with the Vancouver firm Singleton Urquhart, has a Queen's Counsel designation, and his bio states he "acts as an arbitrator and in mediations involving construction and insurance disputes. Derek advises Crown institutions and industry on risk mitigation strategies in major procurement."

UPDATE: 8:33 p.m. April 12

PavCo chairman David Podmore has emailed me this statement:

"Derek left the board in February 2012.

"He joined the Board at my invitation in 2007 to be available to provide construction legal expertise as PavCo proceeded through completion of the VCC West expansion and the BC Place Refurbishment.

"With completion of both major construction efforts PavCo is moving to a focus on business development to ensure that the business potential of these assets (VCC West, VCC East, and BC Place) are maximized, consequentially the business focus will gradually shift away from construction and more emphasis will be placed in sales and marketing as well as operations.

"Derek's advice and expertise has been most helpful through the past years where the focus has been on completion of the new facilities and the BC Place upgrade.

"Derek has been exceptionally helpful through these stages, and has resigned to allow PavCo to move to the next stage where the focus must be on business development to maximize utilization of these exceptional assets which he helped deliver, and recruit the Directors that will have the appropriate expertise to provide the guidance and advice to maximize the utilization of the exceptional facilities created during Derek' s participation on the PavCo Board."

UPDATE: 10 a.m. April 13

Brindle responded to my phone message via email:

"I resigned in February after nearly 5 years on the Board.

"I initially joined at the Chair's invitation as someone with experience and interest in construction. My preferred area of practice was, and is, in construction law. It was not my intention to overstay the construction projects to be undertaken.

"After the completion of the final construction project near the end of 2011, it was timely to move off the Board to allow for an orderly transition and focus on marketing and operations.

"Any further questions can be directed to Pavco."

UPDATE: 12:41 p.m. April 13

Here is the response when I asked if Brindle might have a few minutes to answer questions about whether his departure from the board was affected by the government-nixed Telus naming rights deal and the lawsuit by two roof contractors:

"Thank you, however, I have nothing further to add to my earlier e-mail response to your questions."

Questions persist, I say. Why no public announcement of Brown and Brindle's departures? Can one call it an "orderly transition" when there is no immediate replacement for directors who leave before the May 27 end-of-term? Why do taxpayers have to wait until a reporter gets a tip?

PavCo, coincidentally, is one of the parties named in a $6.5 million lawsuit filed by steel cable installer Freyssinet. Steel contractor Canam Group filed a $26.15 million countersuit against Freyssinet. The messy dispute, which may ultimately tell the story of this difficult renovation, could be settled in a marathon court trial to begin in October 2013.

We still have no update on the cost of the B.C. Place renovations, which were budgeted at $563 million. The government is not likely to tell us the truth while it's contesting by-elections in Port Moody and Chilliwack, for fear of losing two seats in the Legislature.

Furlong: white toques to Whitecaps

It seems Vancouver Whitecaps chief executive Paul Barber's chair was barely cold when the ownership group began thinking of re-filling it.

The media had been told that president Bob Lenarduzzi and chief operating officer Rachel Lewis would run the Major League Soccer franchise as a duo since the former Tottenham Hotspur executive announced his shock resignation on Dec. 9, 2011. Barber worked his last day on Feb. 29. (Sources told me Barber was frustrated that his decision-making authority fell victim to principal owner Greg Kerfoot's micromanaging.)

On April 12, part-owner Jeff Mallett surprised the gathered media at the Hyatt Regency Hotel by introducing John Furlong, the chief executive of the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics organizing committee, as the club's new executive chairman. Lenarduzzi and Lewis will report to Furlong. Furlong, who served VANOC at the pleasure of Premier Gordon Campbell, will report weekly to Kerfoot, the mysterious, media-shy West Vancouver tech tycoon.

Furlong told the media the idea was hatched at a dinner with Kerfoot about six weeks earlier. The job is a full-time gig, without an equity stake in the company, that includes a desk on the same floor in Gastown's Landing where he led the Vancouver 2010 Bid Corporation and its successor, VANOC, after the International Olympic Committee chose Vancouver in 2003 to host the 21st Olympic Winter Games.

Irish-born, 61-year-old Furlong chairs the Own the Podium advisory board, is a director of Whistler Blackcomb Holdings and was recently promoted to chairman of the Rocky Mountaineer Railtours' board (more about that below). The Whitecaps' gig gets precedence for Furlong, who did not receive

any IOC or Canadian Olympic Committee appointment after the 2010 Games.

Furlong, who grew up playing centreback, professes a lifelong love for the beautiful game. He recounted how he thrilled he was to watch England's 1966 World Cup win live on TV. He may owe a small debt of gratitude to the world's most powerful soccer executive for helping Vancouver get the Games.

In the following excerpt from his 2011-published memoir, Patriot Hearts: Inside the Olympics that Changed a Country (Douglas & McIntyre), Furlong revealed details about the 2002 night he spent with FIFA president Sepp Blatter at VANOC founding chairman Jack Poole's ranch. (Many have called for Blatter to resign amid longstanding allegations of bribery and FIFA's reluctance to immediately implement recommendations from well-respected transparency expert Mark Pieth's Independent Governance Committee.)

The bid process could hardly be described as logical. Sometimes we sought out Hail Mary opportunities on the off-chance something might work out. Delegates were scattered all over the world, so face time with them as often hard to arrange. When we had an opportunity, we pounced it immediately. One such occasion occurred that August. Canada was hosting the women's U19 World Cup of soccer. Sepp Blatter, the iconic head of the International Federation of Association Football, or FIFA as it is commonly known, was in the country and, we were told, was going to be passing through Vancouver on his way to Edmonton, where the tournament was being held. Working with our friends at the Canadian Soccer Association, we arranged to squirrel him away for an evening to talk Olympics. Sepp was an IOC member and an influential one at that. We wanted to make an indelible impression on him. We decided this would be a night for Jack Poole and his wife, Darlene, to put on the ritz at their sprawling estate in Mission, a rural community 90 minutes east of Vancouver. The plan was to send a helicopter for Sepp and fly him to Jack's place, while showing off a little of the local geography at the same time.

We met Sepp when he touched down on the estate's landing pad. Yes, Jack had his own landing pad. The Pooles poured on the charm. The steak was brilliant and so was the apple pie. We had a great evening talking to one of the most influential sports kings in the world, who waxed eloquently about sport politics, including those that surrounded the IOC.

Sepp was in his element -- at the centre of attention with no pressure. I asked him at one point what his vision was for the game of soccer. "I will not be satisfied until every child on the planet owns a soccer ball," he said. And he meant it. Sepp was a formidable man, short and stocky and with an imposing face, who seemed to dominate his surroundings the way someone much bigger might. By the end of the night we were friends. As always, we didn't ask for Sepp's vote but we were all smiles when he told us we could count on him.

(Media scrum video courtesy SendtoNews/Whitecaps).

John Furlong named executive chair of Whitecaps FC
John Furlong interview

For the record: Vancouver hosted the North American Soccer League's last single-game Soccer Bowl in 1983 at B.C. Place Stadium between the Tulsa Roughnecks and Toronto Blizzard. The NASL championship was contested one more time in 1984 in a best-of-three format between the Chicago Sting and Toronto. The Sting swept the Blizzard in two games, winning the trophy in Toronto.

Meanwhile, Furlong opted not to comment on the ongoing labour dispute between Rocky Mountaineer and its unionized on-board attendants from Teamsters local 31. This, despite being the chairman of the upscale tourist train company's board.

"You need to talk to Randy (Powell, president) about that, that's how we've chosen to do it," Furlong said. "I think this is an ongoing dispute and it wouldn't be appropriate for me to talk."

Workers were locked out last June and the company intends to continue using replacements. The company also chopped limbs off trees on adjacent public land, but claims it was a mistake.

Spreading the word

Red Mittens & Red Ink: The Vancouver Olympics by Bob Mackin has scored wider distribution.

The e-book about how the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics came and went is now available from the Sony Reader Store, Kobo, Diesel and Barnes & Noble.

Or you can go direct to Smashwords via the official website, RedMittensAndRedInk.com.

Wherever you buy it, the price is still just $8.99.