So, this isn't so much a post as it is an experiment. Earlier today, someone posted a photo on facebook showing throngs of people descending on Wall Street for the Occupy Wall Street protest. The original poster claimed that the photo had been repeatedly removed from her wall. Many people reposted the photo, myself included.
Sure enough, later today, the photo was gone. It was gone from my account and the friends of mine that had reposted it. There was no indication that it ever existed. Hmmm.
Obviously this affected a number of people, and yet there's no mention of it when searching in google, which I find hard to believe.
In order to confirm our theory, I reposted a simple photo from my friend (of her porch couch) and she then deleted it from her account. Sure enough, the photo is still on my wall.
Therefore, here's my experiment. I'm writing this up. I'm saying that there is the very real possibility that facebook is censoring information without the consent of its users. There is also the (slightly paranoid) assertion that google is complicit in ensuring this information does not get out to a larger audience. Sounds crazy, right? I agree. That's the reason for this post. I wonder if this will show up in a google search? I wonder if this will be removed from my facebook when I post the link?
There's only one way to find out.
Friday, September 30, 2011
Sunday, April 5, 2009
In defence of my craft
It is cliché to say that we are in the middle of a sea change in the way that journalism functions and delivers its message. Papers are shutting down, new technologies are changing the media landscape and everywhere journalists are running scared. Everything is transforming and we have no idea what the end product will look like.
Amidst the doom and gloom, however, there is something interesting taking place, even if the average consumer of information, or writer, doesn’t realize it: There is a rebirth in the understanding that we, as journalists, matter.
Despite the fact that we (media writ large) are the keenest advertisers of our own demise, tucked within each woeful story is the argument that what we do can make a difference in the world — that we are important. Jaded old-timers are unknowingly joining bright-eyed recent graduates of journalism programs in the belief that we can actually change the world. This is something we are told disappears quickly after entering the maddening fray of journalism and realizing that what we write doesn’t do a goddamn thing and we might as well just be talking to each other.
Though difficult to notice, there is a new celebration of what it means to have a professional and dedicated throng of people examining what happens in our society — holding governments, people, art institutions and anyone else operating in the public eye accountable. We are the ones that speak truth to power. We are the ones that find out what is going on and report it back to the people we represent. The public — society — has always been, and will always be, our audience, our judges and our reason for existence.
I find myself now in a position where I cover the arts in Calgary. It is at once an odd fit and a perfect coming together of interests. It is not, however, the way I envisioned things. I am a political geek, always have been. My interest was piqued early by a family that actually discussed what was happening in the world. My worldview was shaped by my (sometimes) reluctant conservative father, as much as by Jello Biafra and his fellow political punk rockers, Noam Chomsky and four years at UVic in political science major.
I don’t see any difference now in the important role that I play as a public voice for culture in the city that I reluctantly love. Covering the arts here is as much a political statement as taking on the one-party rule of the Conservatives. I speak for the community and I critique it to make it better. It is simply a different view of the world, a different segment of my society — no more or less important than the direct politics that affect how it operates.
It has been a hard year for me, in addition to the trials affecting my fellow writers. Almost one year ago, the love of my life was murdered in the worst mass killing in Calgary history. A media frenzy naturally followed. Amber’s face was plastered on the front page of the paper each horrific morning when I woke. It was hard, it is hard, but it was a necessary story, including an examination of the way we treat those who are mentally unstable and the need for better care.
So, when I saw legendary spoken word poet John Giorno perform last night, his words took on a double meaning for me. At one point he kept repeating the lines “filling up what is empty, emptying what is full.” I was struck by the fact that this applies as much to the process of grief that I have been struggling with as it does to the alternate struggle of understanding what is happening to the print medium that I love. I am filling up what is empty, print is in the process of emptying what is full, and in the end everything will be topped up, but how, no one knows.
The only concrete conclusion is that we, as journalists, writers and critics are vital. There is a resurrection in the belief that we are important. We are celebrating our role by grieving over its assumed destruction. It is for this reason that we must continue to write, because the printed word isn’t going anywhere, it’s just restructuring the mechanisms for delivery. Adjust and continue to keep the powers in check, or roll over and see it all go to hell.
So while we mourn, we are reborn. There is a new enthusiasm for what we do, and why it matters. Here’s to a renewed sense of self that so many forgot. We are all wild-eyed newbies again.
Amidst the doom and gloom, however, there is something interesting taking place, even if the average consumer of information, or writer, doesn’t realize it: There is a rebirth in the understanding that we, as journalists, matter.
Despite the fact that we (media writ large) are the keenest advertisers of our own demise, tucked within each woeful story is the argument that what we do can make a difference in the world — that we are important. Jaded old-timers are unknowingly joining bright-eyed recent graduates of journalism programs in the belief that we can actually change the world. This is something we are told disappears quickly after entering the maddening fray of journalism and realizing that what we write doesn’t do a goddamn thing and we might as well just be talking to each other.
Though difficult to notice, there is a new celebration of what it means to have a professional and dedicated throng of people examining what happens in our society — holding governments, people, art institutions and anyone else operating in the public eye accountable. We are the ones that speak truth to power. We are the ones that find out what is going on and report it back to the people we represent. The public — society — has always been, and will always be, our audience, our judges and our reason for existence.
I find myself now in a position where I cover the arts in Calgary. It is at once an odd fit and a perfect coming together of interests. It is not, however, the way I envisioned things. I am a political geek, always have been. My interest was piqued early by a family that actually discussed what was happening in the world. My worldview was shaped by my (sometimes) reluctant conservative father, as much as by Jello Biafra and his fellow political punk rockers, Noam Chomsky and four years at UVic in political science major.
I don’t see any difference now in the important role that I play as a public voice for culture in the city that I reluctantly love. Covering the arts here is as much a political statement as taking on the one-party rule of the Conservatives. I speak for the community and I critique it to make it better. It is simply a different view of the world, a different segment of my society — no more or less important than the direct politics that affect how it operates.
It has been a hard year for me, in addition to the trials affecting my fellow writers. Almost one year ago, the love of my life was murdered in the worst mass killing in Calgary history. A media frenzy naturally followed. Amber’s face was plastered on the front page of the paper each horrific morning when I woke. It was hard, it is hard, but it was a necessary story, including an examination of the way we treat those who are mentally unstable and the need for better care.
So, when I saw legendary spoken word poet John Giorno perform last night, his words took on a double meaning for me. At one point he kept repeating the lines “filling up what is empty, emptying what is full.” I was struck by the fact that this applies as much to the process of grief that I have been struggling with as it does to the alternate struggle of understanding what is happening to the print medium that I love. I am filling up what is empty, print is in the process of emptying what is full, and in the end everything will be topped up, but how, no one knows.
The only concrete conclusion is that we, as journalists, writers and critics are vital. There is a resurrection in the belief that we are important. We are celebrating our role by grieving over its assumed destruction. It is for this reason that we must continue to write, because the printed word isn’t going anywhere, it’s just restructuring the mechanisms for delivery. Adjust and continue to keep the powers in check, or roll over and see it all go to hell.
So while we mourn, we are reborn. There is a new enthusiasm for what we do, and why it matters. Here’s to a renewed sense of self that so many forgot. We are all wild-eyed newbies again.
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Not so clearcut
Kananaskis logging ignites forestry methods debate
Originally published in FFWD January 31, 2008 by Drew Anderson in Environment
Generally a place for calm reflection and recreation, the woods also stir powerful emotions and conflicts between user groups with vastly different points of view. Locally and beyond, these emotions cloud debate about the proper use and place in our lives of these wooded lands.
In the hills and forests that mark the entrance to Kananaskis Country, the debate about clearcut logging is in full swing. As trees are removed in the southwest section of Kananaskis, in accordance with a long-standing lease with Spray Lake Sawmills, people who live in the forest and those who use it for recreation cry foul. Water, fire, esthetics, recreation and wildlife all factor into the debate. How should we treat our forests, and what is the best method, if any, of removing trees for the goods we all rely on? The frustrating answer according to those involved: it depends.
NATURAL DISTURBANCES
Dr. Edward Johnson, a biologist at the University of Calgary who specializes in natural disturbances on the landscape, says local geography and tree species must be taken into account before judging logging practices. “What you have to remember is when it comes to logging, you have to match the way you log to the life history strategies of the trees involved,” he says. “In the Boreal forest, and in conifer forests in general, in the mountains for example here, these trees are almost all adjusted to large holes.” The holes he refers to are the wide-open spaces provided by forest fires, as well as those left when trees are clear cut. The trees include pine, the most prolific tree species on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. Lodgepole pine requires direct sunlight and heat in order to germinate after a fire, or in the case of man-made disturbance, after logging. In wildfires, the cones disperse their seeds after breaking open in heat, and the exposed warm, nutrient-rich soil allows the seeds to germinate quickly.
“When foresters try to mimic this, they realized you have to clear cut everything,” says Johnson. “The other thing was you had to burn off the surface layer like fires would. That turned out to be quite an expensive and tricky issue to do. So they usually scarify with big chains or something, in an attempt to expose parts of mineral soil so you can get a regeneration.”
Growth of a different kind is what disturbs Nigel Douglas, a conservation specialist with the Alberta Wilderness Association (AWA). He says you could argue clear cutting is the best mimic of natural disturbance, but that fires don’t build hundreds of kilometres of roads through the forest, fragmenting the landscape and natural habitats.
DISPUTED HARVEST
Gord Lehn is the woodlands manager for Spray Lake Sawmills, the Cochrane-based company that holds the rights to log portions of Kananaskis, which the company has done for over 60 years. Rows of raw logs point the way along Griffin Road to the lumber yard, slowly giving way to neat stacks of timber, a fitting allegory to the business. The sign at the entrance to the lumberyard, carved out of wood of course, declares Jesus is Lord.
Lehn’s office — the Spray Lake Sawmills head office — is almost entirely wooden, something he claims unnerves some people, including former staff, but this fits the company’s belief in its product. The business almost always uses clearcut logging to extract its prized wood, he says, for the same reasons highlighted by Johnson.
“It’s a mixture. It’s mostly clear cutting. You have to ask the question: why? How do you choose the harvesting system that you do? In the eastern-slope foothills of Alberta, we’re about 70 per cent lodgepole pine. Lodgepole pine is a fire-origin species. That species was naturally adapted to come back after a fire,” he says.
Fire is used not only as a precedent for the use of clearcuts in our forests, but also as a reason. Many argue that our forests, due to successful fire suppression to save timber resources, homes and hikers, has resulted in forests that are over mature, that need removal in one form or another, either to help nature and its fickle cycles, or to prevent a major fire event.
Dave Ealey, a spokesperson with Sustainable Resource Development Alberta (SRD), the government department responsible for industrial activity in our forests, says that “we have ended up in a situation where we have a much older population of forests than we would have had before the fire suppression took hold in the ’40s.” He insists that government policy concerning logging and logging practices reflects the need for diverse-age forests and prevents forest fires from ravaging an area.
This over-mature forest argument doesn’t wash with some, including Ralph Cartar, a biologist at the University of Calgary, and president of the Bragg Creek Environmental Coalition. He says “SRD still uses this argument even though it’s false, that the effect of fire suppression on the landscape has caused an unnaturally old forest.” Cartar argues that it is only during the first 25 years of a tree’s life that the fire risk is reduced by its smaller stature — after that the threat of fire is identical over its lifespan. “So if they’re going to come through every 99 years to cut it, three quarters of the time that forest will provide a risk to the community, you’ve only removed the risk for a quarter of the time, so that can’t be the reason you’re logging.”
Something that Parker Hogan, spokesperson for the Alberta Forest Products Association grudgingly admits, may be true. “Well, I guess it would make sense if all you’re doing is running numbers and hypotheticals,” he says. “But if I’m in that community and there is a fire, I’d rather that it be half as big as it was before it hit that break, because maybe my house, my belongings might be saved.”
One of the most prominent, or often-cited, concerns associated with clearcut logging, and something that again draws parallels to the effects of fire, is water quality. This is particularly relevant for Calgarians when you realize our water supply slowly meanders through the logging areas of Kananaskis.
One of the men responsible for the quality of Calgary’s water is John Jagorinec, senior water quality and regulatory analyst for the city. He has concerns about logging in our watershed, but downplays doomsday scenarios. “Theoretically, when you cut down large areas of forest, you can have a quicker runoff, and you can have more erosion and more sediment entering streams,” he says. “So, from a water-quality perspective, you have to deal with the potential of increased sediment-loading, you might have to deal with increased nutrients and things that are dissolved in the water from a water treatment perspective as well.”
He also says that without adequate vegetation, water rushes into the rivers, meaning there is too much during the wet season, and less water during drier times.
At issue is the cleansing process that water goes through as it drips and trickles through forest growth, as well as the slow seeping of rainwater into the rivers, as opposed to its rushing down bare slopes. These processes no longer exist when areas of the forest are removed.
“So this big sponge is sort of cleaning and soaking up the water and then slowly releasing it in dry periods,” says Douglas. “So if you get a big area of clearcut forestry, that water, when it rains, it hits the ground and rushes straight off into the rivers. It’s not getting cleansed, it’s not getting filtered, it’s taking all sorts of silt and muck with it.”
For the health of the water supply, Jagorinec thinks there may be better methods of logging, but relies on the expertise of the SRD in these matters and is in close contact with the department to address any concerns. For the time being, he is satisfied that increased monitoring will prevent any irreversible harm to the water supply. Those on the industry side argue that a fire is far more destructive to aquatic environments, particularly because a fire doesn’t leave a buffer zone of vegetation around lakes, creeks and rivers, while industry does.
Johnson, however, says there has to be more research into the effects on watersheds, of fires and man-made disturbances alike. “In the mountains here, our biggest problem… is that we know very little,” he says. “We do know from other places that logging in general doesn’t have that much of an impact if it’s carried out in a normal way. The biggest problem is the logging roads.”
According to Johnson, it is the roads that cause the most runoff into streams, runoff that carries with it contaminants from vehicles as well as increased silt and gravel. In addition to threatening the water, roads also increase human access to wild places, and the resulting impact on the natural environment is central to arguments against logging.
“When it comes to grizzly bears, to woodland caribou, to a whole lot of things like that, it comes down to access,” says Douglas. “We’re fragmenting landscapes, and it’s been really conclusively proven, certainly with grizzly bears, that that’s the main factor in the mortality of grizzly bears, is access.”
Others think that clearcuts are actually beneficial to wildlife, though this remains a contentious point. The government position is that “wildlife can do very well, and in fact, rely on some of these very early stage forest habitats to provide food… it opens up the forest,” according to Ealey.
Some animals like the open spaces and the easy-access vegetation they provide. Moose, elk, deer and bear all come to the clearings to feed, particularly when food is scarce, but Douglas argues that, at least in the case of the grizzly, there are some serious setbacks to this. He says that although some, like Ealey, will argue wildlife can thrive in these open spaces, that doesn’t take into account the risks associated with them. Though a grizzly bear may more easily find food and space in a clearcut, it’s “completely outweighed by the fact that they’re likely to be killed there because of the access.”
Access is a funny component to the debate about logging. Proponents of intensive logging argue that without its tree harvesting, public access to the sights and sounds of the deep woods would be limited. Many trails are carved by logging companies, and many areas enjoyed by Calgarians were logged in the not-so-distant past. Kananaskis is rife with recreational opportunities created by past logging.
Opponents of logging operations also point to increased access as a reason to stop logging, either to stop removing forests valued for reasons apart from the price of timber, like recreation, or paradoxically, to keep humans and their bad habits from penetrating deeper into the wilderness.
‘CLEARCUTS AREN’T SEXY’
Separated by Highway 1, but ideologically miles apart, Doug Sephton, Alvise Majer of the group Save Kananaskis, and Cartar, represent the foil to Lehn and the wooden office and lumber trucks of the Spray Lake Sawmills. In the Bragg Creek community centre, the three men sit on borrowed chairs in the front entrance as a Christmas craft sale is in full swing. Calgarians swarm to the centre to buy carved wooden goods and other small-town specialties, part of the charm of this far-flung pseudo-suburb. These men represent the nucleus of opposition to logging in the area and symbolize where the true nature of pro versus con comes into play: emotions.
“I think a little emotion is really good, because if you’re not emotionally invested in something then you’re just having a debate. But at the same time, you need to have some kind of a rational viewpoint on it,” says Hogan. Unfortunately, that rational viewpoint has no centre when it comes down to differing values.
Sephton is an unlikely environmentalist — in fact, he really isn’t one. He is a businessman concerned about the effects of logging on the quality of life in his cherished hometown and surrounding forest. He argues those who come to the area for weekends and day trips will be robbed of the beauty his neighbourhood offers. “That experience is going to be taken away from them when they look out over the landscape and see a bunch of clearcut patches off into the horizon,” he says. “We’re forced by the government to discuss these kinds of complex technical issues…. The point is, they shouldn’t be there at all. It’s not about whether there’s contaminants in the creek, it’s that this is more valuable to people than it is to [Spray Lake Sawmills] and they just shouldn’t be there.”
According to Cartar, this is definitely a case of NIMBY, but a justified one. With a city of a million people just a half-hour away, this is the playground for those surrounded on a daily basis by concrete and cars.
The problem is that forestry is ugly. Even if industry were able to mimic natural disturbances, and ensure ecological integrity in all aspects, which it can’t, the use of logging would nag at those who prefer a pristine environment. “It has been given a bad name over time, predominantly by environmental groups because it frankly takes large swaths of forested lands and cuts them all down,” says Hogan. “A colleague of mine presented a paper at a conference recently, and it was entitled ‘Clear Cuts Aren’t Sexy,’ and they’re not. You can even talk to foresters, they’re not really pretty things to look at a year or two after the harvesting has been done.” Hogan still believes, regardless of poor optics, that intensive logging is an appropriate activity in Alberta’s forests, and will continue to improve.
Despite appearances, the logging industry in Alberta has come a long way in the last 40 years, adding buffer zones to protect water, reducing the size of clearcuts, replanting trees and attempting to mimic natural disturbances. However, that doesn’t mean the industry is perfect, even according to those who vehemently support it. “The thing about forestry is it’s as much an art as it is a science,” says Hogan. “The only way you really know if anything you try to do is right is by doing it to the best of your ability and then waiting to see the results.”
This large-scale experimentation with the forest is what angers opponents to logging, locally and globally. When there is an emotional attachment to the woods that surround us, trying to get it right and missing the mark from time to time is unacceptable to some. “We see that as inappropriate because the forest that they are removing is valuable for other reasons,” says Cartar. “So there is, in a sense, a clash of values.”
Originally published in FFWD January 31, 2008 by Drew Anderson in Environment
Generally a place for calm reflection and recreation, the woods also stir powerful emotions and conflicts between user groups with vastly different points of view. Locally and beyond, these emotions cloud debate about the proper use and place in our lives of these wooded lands.
In the hills and forests that mark the entrance to Kananaskis Country, the debate about clearcut logging is in full swing. As trees are removed in the southwest section of Kananaskis, in accordance with a long-standing lease with Spray Lake Sawmills, people who live in the forest and those who use it for recreation cry foul. Water, fire, esthetics, recreation and wildlife all factor into the debate. How should we treat our forests, and what is the best method, if any, of removing trees for the goods we all rely on? The frustrating answer according to those involved: it depends.
NATURAL DISTURBANCES
Dr. Edward Johnson, a biologist at the University of Calgary who specializes in natural disturbances on the landscape, says local geography and tree species must be taken into account before judging logging practices. “What you have to remember is when it comes to logging, you have to match the way you log to the life history strategies of the trees involved,” he says. “In the Boreal forest, and in conifer forests in general, in the mountains for example here, these trees are almost all adjusted to large holes.” The holes he refers to are the wide-open spaces provided by forest fires, as well as those left when trees are clear cut. The trees include pine, the most prolific tree species on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. Lodgepole pine requires direct sunlight and heat in order to germinate after a fire, or in the case of man-made disturbance, after logging. In wildfires, the cones disperse their seeds after breaking open in heat, and the exposed warm, nutrient-rich soil allows the seeds to germinate quickly.
“When foresters try to mimic this, they realized you have to clear cut everything,” says Johnson. “The other thing was you had to burn off the surface layer like fires would. That turned out to be quite an expensive and tricky issue to do. So they usually scarify with big chains or something, in an attempt to expose parts of mineral soil so you can get a regeneration.”
Growth of a different kind is what disturbs Nigel Douglas, a conservation specialist with the Alberta Wilderness Association (AWA). He says you could argue clear cutting is the best mimic of natural disturbance, but that fires don’t build hundreds of kilometres of roads through the forest, fragmenting the landscape and natural habitats.
DISPUTED HARVEST
Gord Lehn is the woodlands manager for Spray Lake Sawmills, the Cochrane-based company that holds the rights to log portions of Kananaskis, which the company has done for over 60 years. Rows of raw logs point the way along Griffin Road to the lumber yard, slowly giving way to neat stacks of timber, a fitting allegory to the business. The sign at the entrance to the lumberyard, carved out of wood of course, declares Jesus is Lord.
Lehn’s office — the Spray Lake Sawmills head office — is almost entirely wooden, something he claims unnerves some people, including former staff, but this fits the company’s belief in its product. The business almost always uses clearcut logging to extract its prized wood, he says, for the same reasons highlighted by Johnson.
“It’s a mixture. It’s mostly clear cutting. You have to ask the question: why? How do you choose the harvesting system that you do? In the eastern-slope foothills of Alberta, we’re about 70 per cent lodgepole pine. Lodgepole pine is a fire-origin species. That species was naturally adapted to come back after a fire,” he says.
Fire is used not only as a precedent for the use of clearcuts in our forests, but also as a reason. Many argue that our forests, due to successful fire suppression to save timber resources, homes and hikers, has resulted in forests that are over mature, that need removal in one form or another, either to help nature and its fickle cycles, or to prevent a major fire event.
Dave Ealey, a spokesperson with Sustainable Resource Development Alberta (SRD), the government department responsible for industrial activity in our forests, says that “we have ended up in a situation where we have a much older population of forests than we would have had before the fire suppression took hold in the ’40s.” He insists that government policy concerning logging and logging practices reflects the need for diverse-age forests and prevents forest fires from ravaging an area.
This over-mature forest argument doesn’t wash with some, including Ralph Cartar, a biologist at the University of Calgary, and president of the Bragg Creek Environmental Coalition. He says “SRD still uses this argument even though it’s false, that the effect of fire suppression on the landscape has caused an unnaturally old forest.” Cartar argues that it is only during the first 25 years of a tree’s life that the fire risk is reduced by its smaller stature — after that the threat of fire is identical over its lifespan. “So if they’re going to come through every 99 years to cut it, three quarters of the time that forest will provide a risk to the community, you’ve only removed the risk for a quarter of the time, so that can’t be the reason you’re logging.”
Something that Parker Hogan, spokesperson for the Alberta Forest Products Association grudgingly admits, may be true. “Well, I guess it would make sense if all you’re doing is running numbers and hypotheticals,” he says. “But if I’m in that community and there is a fire, I’d rather that it be half as big as it was before it hit that break, because maybe my house, my belongings might be saved.”
One of the most prominent, or often-cited, concerns associated with clearcut logging, and something that again draws parallels to the effects of fire, is water quality. This is particularly relevant for Calgarians when you realize our water supply slowly meanders through the logging areas of Kananaskis.
One of the men responsible for the quality of Calgary’s water is John Jagorinec, senior water quality and regulatory analyst for the city. He has concerns about logging in our watershed, but downplays doomsday scenarios. “Theoretically, when you cut down large areas of forest, you can have a quicker runoff, and you can have more erosion and more sediment entering streams,” he says. “So, from a water-quality perspective, you have to deal with the potential of increased sediment-loading, you might have to deal with increased nutrients and things that are dissolved in the water from a water treatment perspective as well.”
He also says that without adequate vegetation, water rushes into the rivers, meaning there is too much during the wet season, and less water during drier times.
At issue is the cleansing process that water goes through as it drips and trickles through forest growth, as well as the slow seeping of rainwater into the rivers, as opposed to its rushing down bare slopes. These processes no longer exist when areas of the forest are removed.
“So this big sponge is sort of cleaning and soaking up the water and then slowly releasing it in dry periods,” says Douglas. “So if you get a big area of clearcut forestry, that water, when it rains, it hits the ground and rushes straight off into the rivers. It’s not getting cleansed, it’s not getting filtered, it’s taking all sorts of silt and muck with it.”
For the health of the water supply, Jagorinec thinks there may be better methods of logging, but relies on the expertise of the SRD in these matters and is in close contact with the department to address any concerns. For the time being, he is satisfied that increased monitoring will prevent any irreversible harm to the water supply. Those on the industry side argue that a fire is far more destructive to aquatic environments, particularly because a fire doesn’t leave a buffer zone of vegetation around lakes, creeks and rivers, while industry does.
Johnson, however, says there has to be more research into the effects on watersheds, of fires and man-made disturbances alike. “In the mountains here, our biggest problem… is that we know very little,” he says. “We do know from other places that logging in general doesn’t have that much of an impact if it’s carried out in a normal way. The biggest problem is the logging roads.”
According to Johnson, it is the roads that cause the most runoff into streams, runoff that carries with it contaminants from vehicles as well as increased silt and gravel. In addition to threatening the water, roads also increase human access to wild places, and the resulting impact on the natural environment is central to arguments against logging.
“When it comes to grizzly bears, to woodland caribou, to a whole lot of things like that, it comes down to access,” says Douglas. “We’re fragmenting landscapes, and it’s been really conclusively proven, certainly with grizzly bears, that that’s the main factor in the mortality of grizzly bears, is access.”
Others think that clearcuts are actually beneficial to wildlife, though this remains a contentious point. The government position is that “wildlife can do very well, and in fact, rely on some of these very early stage forest habitats to provide food… it opens up the forest,” according to Ealey.
Some animals like the open spaces and the easy-access vegetation they provide. Moose, elk, deer and bear all come to the clearings to feed, particularly when food is scarce, but Douglas argues that, at least in the case of the grizzly, there are some serious setbacks to this. He says that although some, like Ealey, will argue wildlife can thrive in these open spaces, that doesn’t take into account the risks associated with them. Though a grizzly bear may more easily find food and space in a clearcut, it’s “completely outweighed by the fact that they’re likely to be killed there because of the access.”
Access is a funny component to the debate about logging. Proponents of intensive logging argue that without its tree harvesting, public access to the sights and sounds of the deep woods would be limited. Many trails are carved by logging companies, and many areas enjoyed by Calgarians were logged in the not-so-distant past. Kananaskis is rife with recreational opportunities created by past logging.
Opponents of logging operations also point to increased access as a reason to stop logging, either to stop removing forests valued for reasons apart from the price of timber, like recreation, or paradoxically, to keep humans and their bad habits from penetrating deeper into the wilderness.
‘CLEARCUTS AREN’T SEXY’
Separated by Highway 1, but ideologically miles apart, Doug Sephton, Alvise Majer of the group Save Kananaskis, and Cartar, represent the foil to Lehn and the wooden office and lumber trucks of the Spray Lake Sawmills. In the Bragg Creek community centre, the three men sit on borrowed chairs in the front entrance as a Christmas craft sale is in full swing. Calgarians swarm to the centre to buy carved wooden goods and other small-town specialties, part of the charm of this far-flung pseudo-suburb. These men represent the nucleus of opposition to logging in the area and symbolize where the true nature of pro versus con comes into play: emotions.
“I think a little emotion is really good, because if you’re not emotionally invested in something then you’re just having a debate. But at the same time, you need to have some kind of a rational viewpoint on it,” says Hogan. Unfortunately, that rational viewpoint has no centre when it comes down to differing values.
Sephton is an unlikely environmentalist — in fact, he really isn’t one. He is a businessman concerned about the effects of logging on the quality of life in his cherished hometown and surrounding forest. He argues those who come to the area for weekends and day trips will be robbed of the beauty his neighbourhood offers. “That experience is going to be taken away from them when they look out over the landscape and see a bunch of clearcut patches off into the horizon,” he says. “We’re forced by the government to discuss these kinds of complex technical issues…. The point is, they shouldn’t be there at all. It’s not about whether there’s contaminants in the creek, it’s that this is more valuable to people than it is to [Spray Lake Sawmills] and they just shouldn’t be there.”
According to Cartar, this is definitely a case of NIMBY, but a justified one. With a city of a million people just a half-hour away, this is the playground for those surrounded on a daily basis by concrete and cars.
The problem is that forestry is ugly. Even if industry were able to mimic natural disturbances, and ensure ecological integrity in all aspects, which it can’t, the use of logging would nag at those who prefer a pristine environment. “It has been given a bad name over time, predominantly by environmental groups because it frankly takes large swaths of forested lands and cuts them all down,” says Hogan. “A colleague of mine presented a paper at a conference recently, and it was entitled ‘Clear Cuts Aren’t Sexy,’ and they’re not. You can even talk to foresters, they’re not really pretty things to look at a year or two after the harvesting has been done.” Hogan still believes, regardless of poor optics, that intensive logging is an appropriate activity in Alberta’s forests, and will continue to improve.
Despite appearances, the logging industry in Alberta has come a long way in the last 40 years, adding buffer zones to protect water, reducing the size of clearcuts, replanting trees and attempting to mimic natural disturbances. However, that doesn’t mean the industry is perfect, even according to those who vehemently support it. “The thing about forestry is it’s as much an art as it is a science,” says Hogan. “The only way you really know if anything you try to do is right is by doing it to the best of your ability and then waiting to see the results.”
This large-scale experimentation with the forest is what angers opponents to logging, locally and globally. When there is an emotional attachment to the woods that surround us, trying to get it right and missing the mark from time to time is unacceptable to some. “We see that as inappropriate because the forest that they are removing is valuable for other reasons,” says Cartar. “So there is, in a sense, a clash of values.”
The wrong machine
Conservation groups alienated by provincial stakeholder consultation process
Originally published in FFWD February 28, 2008 by Drew Anderson in News
Public and stakeholder consultation in the province is largely failing to live up to the public interest, according to some stakeholders involved in environmental protection. This contention has recently been highlighted by the use of advisory councils in the provincial Water for Life strategy and the process that led to the creation of Alberta’s new Land-use Framework.
Many environmental groups chose not to participate in the discussions on the Land-use Framework, citing concerns with the ongoing consultation process; while those involved in the Water for Life strategy are concerned about the lack of authority for water councils.
“The most recent stakeholder process has been the Land-use Framework, which they’ve [the government] been working on drafting for roughly a couple of years now,” says Diane Pachal, Alberta wilderness director for the Sierra Club of Canada Prairie Chapter. “Prior to that, landholder groups and conservation groups and environmental groups all met and looked at the proposed process. Those of us with experience in previous processes said ‘Oh, this isn’t going to work.’”
The framework is intended to be a government policy that lays the foundation for managing natural resources in the province, on both public and private lands. The environmental groups drafted a set of suggestions for the government about how to make the process function in a way that could bring them on board, but the government largely ignored these suggestions. “If a process isn’t designed to work, what’s the point of putting your time into it? You can always do other things with that time,” says Pachal.
Essentially the groups were concerned about what they perceived as the process’s lack of accountability and murky goals.
Major concerns with the discussions raised by the discouraged environmental groups centreed on the design of the consultation process and the commitment of the government to support the framework and to be held accountable. They wanted clearer goals and direction from the government before proceeding. According to David Kahane, a professor at the Univesity of Alberta who specializes in participatory democratic theory and practice, the design of the process is the most important factor in determining whether a collaborative process will work, particularly in terms of who gets to participate. “For me, the big variable in making these democratically legitimate or illegitimate is how carefully you think about the principles that are governing who you bring in and how transparent you are about that,” says Kahane.
According to Deleen Schoff, a spokesperson for Sustainable Resource Development — the government ministry in charge of the land-use discussions — despite environmental group concerns, there was significant participation in the process. “Over 3,000 Albertans did complete the workbooks, 110 stakeholders chose to have a voice in the process and served on the working groups, and we’re thankful that that has happened,” she says.
However, the fact that many participate in a process does not ensure a balanced outcome, according to Pachal, something she says she has seen from the provincial government in the realm of habitat protection for threatened species. “Say 80 per cent of the public wants to see caribou habitat protected and caribou recover,” she explains, “but that’s not necessarily represented at the table because you’ve got all the industry sectors… and if the selection of the stakeholders isn’t careful, you’ll wind up with the balance at the table being organizations for which wildlife habitat or conservation is not the priority of their organization,” she says.
Another priority that is constantly raised these days is the issue of water use in the province. The Conservatives moved on this front and established the Water for Life strategy that includes the creation of advisory water councils consisting of concerned stakeholders. While the move towards a collaborative approach to finding solutions can be viewed as a positive step towards greater democratic participations, some see fatal flaws in the organization.
“We’ve been involved in this pretty intimately for a couple of years now, and our unfolding view is that we’ve got to get back to basics with respect to governance. At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility for protecting our watersheds should lie with government. Particularly the provincial government,” says Danielle Droitsch, director of Bow Riverkeeper and a participant on the Bow River Basin Council.
While she supports the concept of Watershed Planning and Advisory Councils (WPACS) like the Bow Basin Council, which look into issues for specific watersheds, she thinks that it can act as a distraction and a means to stall effective change, rather than a powerful policy tool.
“So for example, WPACS don’t have any authority, they have no legal authority whatsoever to actually change what happens on the landscape. Their only power — and even that power hasn’t been defined anywhere near clearly enough — is an advisory capacity,” she says. “There’s absolutely nothing written down that says the government must listen to the WPACs.”
Kahane holds out a great deal of hope for the future of democracy and puts most of that hope in collaborative methods that engage citizens in the decision-making process, but he doesn’t think that Alberta is there yet. In the case of exercises for which there is no legitimate authority, like advisory bodies without teeth, he is cautious.
“It’s not clear what the democratic usefulness of those sorts of exercises are, because it’s at least always vulnerable to the suspicion that this is just window dressing. That you bring people together, they say lots of different things and then the government goes, ‘Oh, what we discovered was they love our policy,’” he says.
He is quick to point out, however, that when discussing new forms of democracy, it is always important to contrast with the system that is already in place, rather than aiming for an ideal right away. “You want to assess the democratic effect of these sorts of stakeholder processes compared to the kind of democracy we already have. I don’t think we have some glowing model of representative democracy in Alberta,” he says.
There is also the concern of compromise in any process that involves divergent interests coming together at the same table, something particularly worrisome for environmental groups. “When you get a whole bunch of people in a room, I see people compromising away what they feel is their bottom line simply to get the acceptance of an industry player at the table who has no real reason for making commitments that will cost them money,” says Droitsch, reiterating that it should be up to the government to institute solid bottom lines to ensure appropriate conservation of our waterways.
For Pachal, it all comes down to how you grind it all out. “They make the analogy to sausages; if you don’t have a good sausage machine, and you’re not putting good things into it, you get crappy sausages at the other end, and that’s what’s happening,” she says. “We’ve been getting crappy sausages — crappy policies and programs — the machine’s the wrong machine, and the wrong things are going into it.”
Originally published in FFWD February 28, 2008 by Drew Anderson in News
Public and stakeholder consultation in the province is largely failing to live up to the public interest, according to some stakeholders involved in environmental protection. This contention has recently been highlighted by the use of advisory councils in the provincial Water for Life strategy and the process that led to the creation of Alberta’s new Land-use Framework.
Many environmental groups chose not to participate in the discussions on the Land-use Framework, citing concerns with the ongoing consultation process; while those involved in the Water for Life strategy are concerned about the lack of authority for water councils.
“The most recent stakeholder process has been the Land-use Framework, which they’ve [the government] been working on drafting for roughly a couple of years now,” says Diane Pachal, Alberta wilderness director for the Sierra Club of Canada Prairie Chapter. “Prior to that, landholder groups and conservation groups and environmental groups all met and looked at the proposed process. Those of us with experience in previous processes said ‘Oh, this isn’t going to work.’”
The framework is intended to be a government policy that lays the foundation for managing natural resources in the province, on both public and private lands. The environmental groups drafted a set of suggestions for the government about how to make the process function in a way that could bring them on board, but the government largely ignored these suggestions. “If a process isn’t designed to work, what’s the point of putting your time into it? You can always do other things with that time,” says Pachal.
Essentially the groups were concerned about what they perceived as the process’s lack of accountability and murky goals.
Major concerns with the discussions raised by the discouraged environmental groups centreed on the design of the consultation process and the commitment of the government to support the framework and to be held accountable. They wanted clearer goals and direction from the government before proceeding. According to David Kahane, a professor at the Univesity of Alberta who specializes in participatory democratic theory and practice, the design of the process is the most important factor in determining whether a collaborative process will work, particularly in terms of who gets to participate. “For me, the big variable in making these democratically legitimate or illegitimate is how carefully you think about the principles that are governing who you bring in and how transparent you are about that,” says Kahane.
According to Deleen Schoff, a spokesperson for Sustainable Resource Development — the government ministry in charge of the land-use discussions — despite environmental group concerns, there was significant participation in the process. “Over 3,000 Albertans did complete the workbooks, 110 stakeholders chose to have a voice in the process and served on the working groups, and we’re thankful that that has happened,” she says.
However, the fact that many participate in a process does not ensure a balanced outcome, according to Pachal, something she says she has seen from the provincial government in the realm of habitat protection for threatened species. “Say 80 per cent of the public wants to see caribou habitat protected and caribou recover,” she explains, “but that’s not necessarily represented at the table because you’ve got all the industry sectors… and if the selection of the stakeholders isn’t careful, you’ll wind up with the balance at the table being organizations for which wildlife habitat or conservation is not the priority of their organization,” she says.
Another priority that is constantly raised these days is the issue of water use in the province. The Conservatives moved on this front and established the Water for Life strategy that includes the creation of advisory water councils consisting of concerned stakeholders. While the move towards a collaborative approach to finding solutions can be viewed as a positive step towards greater democratic participations, some see fatal flaws in the organization.
“We’ve been involved in this pretty intimately for a couple of years now, and our unfolding view is that we’ve got to get back to basics with respect to governance. At the end of the day, the ultimate responsibility for protecting our watersheds should lie with government. Particularly the provincial government,” says Danielle Droitsch, director of Bow Riverkeeper and a participant on the Bow River Basin Council.
While she supports the concept of Watershed Planning and Advisory Councils (WPACS) like the Bow Basin Council, which look into issues for specific watersheds, she thinks that it can act as a distraction and a means to stall effective change, rather than a powerful policy tool.
“So for example, WPACS don’t have any authority, they have no legal authority whatsoever to actually change what happens on the landscape. Their only power — and even that power hasn’t been defined anywhere near clearly enough — is an advisory capacity,” she says. “There’s absolutely nothing written down that says the government must listen to the WPACs.”
Kahane holds out a great deal of hope for the future of democracy and puts most of that hope in collaborative methods that engage citizens in the decision-making process, but he doesn’t think that Alberta is there yet. In the case of exercises for which there is no legitimate authority, like advisory bodies without teeth, he is cautious.
“It’s not clear what the democratic usefulness of those sorts of exercises are, because it’s at least always vulnerable to the suspicion that this is just window dressing. That you bring people together, they say lots of different things and then the government goes, ‘Oh, what we discovered was they love our policy,’” he says.
He is quick to point out, however, that when discussing new forms of democracy, it is always important to contrast with the system that is already in place, rather than aiming for an ideal right away. “You want to assess the democratic effect of these sorts of stakeholder processes compared to the kind of democracy we already have. I don’t think we have some glowing model of representative democracy in Alberta,” he says.
There is also the concern of compromise in any process that involves divergent interests coming together at the same table, something particularly worrisome for environmental groups. “When you get a whole bunch of people in a room, I see people compromising away what they feel is their bottom line simply to get the acceptance of an industry player at the table who has no real reason for making commitments that will cost them money,” says Droitsch, reiterating that it should be up to the government to institute solid bottom lines to ensure appropriate conservation of our waterways.
For Pachal, it all comes down to how you grind it all out. “They make the analogy to sausages; if you don’t have a good sausage machine, and you’re not putting good things into it, you get crappy sausages at the other end, and that’s what’s happening,” she says. “We’ve been getting crappy sausages — crappy policies and programs — the machine’s the wrong machine, and the wrong things are going into it.”
Don’t eat the grass — yet
Fight to ban the cosmetic use of pesticides has been a lesson in patience and politics for Robin McLeod
Originally published in FFWD March 13, 2008 by Drew Anderson in Activist Guide
If you walk through some city parks at certain times in spring and summer, you will see yellow signs dotting the ground, warning you of the chemicals sprayed on the grass, a nice colour contrast to the perfectly green lawns and an ironic backdrop to the geese unknowingly consuming the tainted grass. Though not in it as much for the geese as the people warned off by the signs, Robin McLeod, with the Coalition for a Healthy Calgary, has been fighting for a ban on cosmetic use of pesticides for a little over two years.
“The focus is that we feel these chemicals to make people’s lawns lovely and weedless and green are really unnecessary, and the potential for medical problems is significant in terms of endocrine disruption, neurological disorders, behavioural disorders, certain types of cancers,” says McLeod.
“It’s very similar to second-hand smoke — we as citizens have no control over that, except it affects us. You’re next-door neighbour is a weed fanatic, and so he’s out there doing a pesticide spray. I get that drift in my yard, my kids might be over there playing, what control do I have? I have none.”
McLeod is working to wrest some control back through her work in the coalition. This work has paid off, at least in terms of the slow-moving machinery of city hall. On February 25, a motion was presented to council asking it to consider a bylaw phasing out use of cosmetic pesticides. If all goes according to plan, the issue could be before a committee by June.
It has been a solid lesson in patience and city politics for McLeod, who has concerns about the report being written by those that support selective use of pesticides. She also worries about the shifting attitudes of aldermen.
“It’s very interesting, because prior to the election we surveyed all the candidates running for alderman and mayor — 11 of the 14 candidates that were elected as aldermen said they would support a bylaw phasing out cosmetic use of pesticides. It was a yes or no question,” she says, adding that if there had been a vote on the question on February 25, the ban would likely have been voted down. “What does that say about the aldermen?”
Originally from north of Toronto, McLeod had grandparents in Calgary, and found her way to the mountains of Lake Louise in 1978, before moving on to the city in 1981. Highly involved in activist issues for the last 20 years, she calls herself “half-legitimate” as a Calgarian, but has been working hard to prove her full status by watching out for the city she calls home.
As the director of civic affairs for the South Calgary Community Association, McLeod is also busy fighting for the character of her community and the diversity that makes it possible; something under threat in many established neighbourhoods.
“We are the busiest community in terms of development permits in the entire city of Calgary, so we have a chance to shape our city, shape our community and not be overrun by developers. They want to make a profit, but we’ve got to consider the community and keeping its character and keeping it a welcome place for all income levels, for all ages,” says McLeod.
She has also worked on issues to protect water quality in the lower Elbow River and prevent the degradation of Sandy Beach, River Park and the Britannia escarpment that line the Elbow valley in the city’s southwest, just under the reservoir.
Asked if it is as exhausting as it all sounds, she doesn’t flinch. “Somehow if you feel strongly about your opportunities and trying to make a great city, you find the energy.”
With that energy, McLeod and the Coalition will continue fighting for a healthier Calgary even if their pesticide ban is successful, likely focusing on other issues that affect the health of Calgarians
In the meantime, it is simply an issue of doing what activists do best: getting the message out to the public and the politicos.
“We’re not calling for a total ban of pesticides when it comes to threats to public health, we’re not touching the farming community, so it is really just toxins used to make your green grass look lovely. We need to let people know there are other ways of getting there. They may be a little more time-intensive, but in the long run it’s worth it,” she says.
Originally published in FFWD March 13, 2008 by Drew Anderson in Activist Guide
If you walk through some city parks at certain times in spring and summer, you will see yellow signs dotting the ground, warning you of the chemicals sprayed on the grass, a nice colour contrast to the perfectly green lawns and an ironic backdrop to the geese unknowingly consuming the tainted grass. Though not in it as much for the geese as the people warned off by the signs, Robin McLeod, with the Coalition for a Healthy Calgary, has been fighting for a ban on cosmetic use of pesticides for a little over two years.
“The focus is that we feel these chemicals to make people’s lawns lovely and weedless and green are really unnecessary, and the potential for medical problems is significant in terms of endocrine disruption, neurological disorders, behavioural disorders, certain types of cancers,” says McLeod.
“It’s very similar to second-hand smoke — we as citizens have no control over that, except it affects us. You’re next-door neighbour is a weed fanatic, and so he’s out there doing a pesticide spray. I get that drift in my yard, my kids might be over there playing, what control do I have? I have none.”
McLeod is working to wrest some control back through her work in the coalition. This work has paid off, at least in terms of the slow-moving machinery of city hall. On February 25, a motion was presented to council asking it to consider a bylaw phasing out use of cosmetic pesticides. If all goes according to plan, the issue could be before a committee by June.
It has been a solid lesson in patience and city politics for McLeod, who has concerns about the report being written by those that support selective use of pesticides. She also worries about the shifting attitudes of aldermen.
“It’s very interesting, because prior to the election we surveyed all the candidates running for alderman and mayor — 11 of the 14 candidates that were elected as aldermen said they would support a bylaw phasing out cosmetic use of pesticides. It was a yes or no question,” she says, adding that if there had been a vote on the question on February 25, the ban would likely have been voted down. “What does that say about the aldermen?”
Originally from north of Toronto, McLeod had grandparents in Calgary, and found her way to the mountains of Lake Louise in 1978, before moving on to the city in 1981. Highly involved in activist issues for the last 20 years, she calls herself “half-legitimate” as a Calgarian, but has been working hard to prove her full status by watching out for the city she calls home.
As the director of civic affairs for the South Calgary Community Association, McLeod is also busy fighting for the character of her community and the diversity that makes it possible; something under threat in many established neighbourhoods.
“We are the busiest community in terms of development permits in the entire city of Calgary, so we have a chance to shape our city, shape our community and not be overrun by developers. They want to make a profit, but we’ve got to consider the community and keeping its character and keeping it a welcome place for all income levels, for all ages,” says McLeod.
She has also worked on issues to protect water quality in the lower Elbow River and prevent the degradation of Sandy Beach, River Park and the Britannia escarpment that line the Elbow valley in the city’s southwest, just under the reservoir.
Asked if it is as exhausting as it all sounds, she doesn’t flinch. “Somehow if you feel strongly about your opportunities and trying to make a great city, you find the energy.”
With that energy, McLeod and the Coalition will continue fighting for a healthier Calgary even if their pesticide ban is successful, likely focusing on other issues that affect the health of Calgarians
In the meantime, it is simply an issue of doing what activists do best: getting the message out to the public and the politicos.
“We’re not calling for a total ban of pesticides when it comes to threats to public health, we’re not touching the farming community, so it is really just toxins used to make your green grass look lovely. We need to let people know there are other ways of getting there. They may be a little more time-intensive, but in the long run it’s worth it,” she says.
Calgary's National Portrait Gallery Gets Mixed Support
Originally published in FFWD April 17, 2008 by Drew Anderson in City
Some in the visual arts community are cautiously optimistic about the possibility of bringing the Portrait Gallery of Canada to Calgary, but City Council was tight-lipped about the matter heading into a behind-the-scenes meeting on April 14. The federal government had just provided answers to some outstanding city questions and extended the gallery competition deadline for the second time.
Nine cities across Canada were invited to bid on housing the collection, which features photographs, paintings and video art representing the faces of Canada — famous and unknown. The issue for Calgary’s politicians and artists alike is sustainability of funding and the appropriate use of scarce cultural resources.
“It’s an interesting idea, but I think that if the city is going to be looking at providing land for arts organizations, they should be looking at the roots, you know, what’s growing here,” says Melody Jacobson, operations co-ordinator for the Calgary Society of Independent Filmmakers. “It doesn’t have to be either-or — if it happens in a way that benefits the arts organizations that are in our community here, then I don’t see anything wrong with that.”
Having earlier denied another extension to the competition, the federal government announced on April 7, that the process will remain open until May 16. Public Works and Government Services Canada, the federal department responsible for the bid, also answered outstanding questions the city wanted addressed before proceeding.
Prior to the April 14 meeting, Robert Graham, co-ordinator of strategic projects with the city’s planning department, said there were concerns about the competition. “Which left us in a difficult situation, because we weren’t fully satisfied that we had a full understanding of the documents. Interestingly enough they did, in fact, in some cases amend their documents based on our questions, so obviously our questions were fairly serious.”
Graham was unwilling, however, to disclose which city questions were addressed, noting that some were not made public by the federal government. He did acknowledge there were still some question marks. “They chose not to answer a number of them — a number that the city considered very important.”
The meeting was held behind closed doors, and it is unclear what exactly was up for debate. Ald. Druh Farrell, who represents the downtown ward most likely to house a new gallery, couldn’t elaborate on the nature of the discussions outside of council chambers prior to the meeting.
The arts community is concerned about the inclusion of local flavour, and the assurance that community arts organizations and talent are not overlooked for funding. “Most visual arts organizations in Calgary are stretched for resources and are constantly fighting an uphill battle in terms of being able to financially support their institutions,” says Valerie Cooper, president and CEO of the Art Gallery of Calgary. “So I guess that’s where my caution would come…. If we had the infrastructure and the resources to support it appropriately, then it would be a good move.”
Farrell shares the views of the city’s creative class. “My concern, initially, was that if this was going to be our one grand gesture toward visual arts, that the portrait gallery is not where I would be putting my attention,” she says. “If it was part of a cultural facility, building cultural density, then I would be supportive, and that seems to be the direction that we’re going.”
Although it is not clear whether the question came from Calgary, the amended bid document from the federal government publicly answered a question on mixed-use buildings, stating that: “Stand-alone or mixed-use proposals, including those that contain other cultural users, will be considered.”
On the lips of many city artists and their supporters these days is the need for a contemporary art gallery, a glaring cultural omission in any metropolitan centre. “It will be important to Calgary in the near future to have a collecting modern, contemporary gallery in our city. That is more important, at this time, than the national portrait gallery coming to Calgary,” says Cooper. She is quick to point out, however, that the two are not mutually exclusive. “That’s why I think it would be important that a plan that includes perhaps both… would be a real solid one, because you could build upon those agendas quite nicely,” she concludes.
Some in the visual arts community are cautiously optimistic about the possibility of bringing the Portrait Gallery of Canada to Calgary, but City Council was tight-lipped about the matter heading into a behind-the-scenes meeting on April 14. The federal government had just provided answers to some outstanding city questions and extended the gallery competition deadline for the second time.
Nine cities across Canada were invited to bid on housing the collection, which features photographs, paintings and video art representing the faces of Canada — famous and unknown. The issue for Calgary’s politicians and artists alike is sustainability of funding and the appropriate use of scarce cultural resources.
“It’s an interesting idea, but I think that if the city is going to be looking at providing land for arts organizations, they should be looking at the roots, you know, what’s growing here,” says Melody Jacobson, operations co-ordinator for the Calgary Society of Independent Filmmakers. “It doesn’t have to be either-or — if it happens in a way that benefits the arts organizations that are in our community here, then I don’t see anything wrong with that.”
Having earlier denied another extension to the competition, the federal government announced on April 7, that the process will remain open until May 16. Public Works and Government Services Canada, the federal department responsible for the bid, also answered outstanding questions the city wanted addressed before proceeding.
Prior to the April 14 meeting, Robert Graham, co-ordinator of strategic projects with the city’s planning department, said there were concerns about the competition. “Which left us in a difficult situation, because we weren’t fully satisfied that we had a full understanding of the documents. Interestingly enough they did, in fact, in some cases amend their documents based on our questions, so obviously our questions were fairly serious.”
Graham was unwilling, however, to disclose which city questions were addressed, noting that some were not made public by the federal government. He did acknowledge there were still some question marks. “They chose not to answer a number of them — a number that the city considered very important.”
The meeting was held behind closed doors, and it is unclear what exactly was up for debate. Ald. Druh Farrell, who represents the downtown ward most likely to house a new gallery, couldn’t elaborate on the nature of the discussions outside of council chambers prior to the meeting.
The arts community is concerned about the inclusion of local flavour, and the assurance that community arts organizations and talent are not overlooked for funding. “Most visual arts organizations in Calgary are stretched for resources and are constantly fighting an uphill battle in terms of being able to financially support their institutions,” says Valerie Cooper, president and CEO of the Art Gallery of Calgary. “So I guess that’s where my caution would come…. If we had the infrastructure and the resources to support it appropriately, then it would be a good move.”
Farrell shares the views of the city’s creative class. “My concern, initially, was that if this was going to be our one grand gesture toward visual arts, that the portrait gallery is not where I would be putting my attention,” she says. “If it was part of a cultural facility, building cultural density, then I would be supportive, and that seems to be the direction that we’re going.”
Although it is not clear whether the question came from Calgary, the amended bid document from the federal government publicly answered a question on mixed-use buildings, stating that: “Stand-alone or mixed-use proposals, including those that contain other cultural users, will be considered.”
On the lips of many city artists and their supporters these days is the need for a contemporary art gallery, a glaring cultural omission in any metropolitan centre. “It will be important to Calgary in the near future to have a collecting modern, contemporary gallery in our city. That is more important, at this time, than the national portrait gallery coming to Calgary,” says Cooper. She is quick to point out, however, that the two are not mutually exclusive. “That’s why I think it would be important that a plan that includes perhaps both… would be a real solid one, because you could build upon those agendas quite nicely,” she concludes.
Sunday, January 6, 2008
White supremacists
Originally published in FFWD December 27, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
Recent census numbers report that one in five Canadians is foreign born, the first time this number has been so high since 1931. At the same time, the Canadian economy, and particularly that of Alberta, is flourishing despite the potential recession looming over the heads of Americans. Locally, according to the Conference Board of Canada, Calgary is the most economically dynamic and attractive city to live in.
Distressingly, however, we are seeing increasing tension within our prosperous and cosmopolitan society. In Quebec there has been a strange resurgence in the ugly side of French nationalism, manifesting itself in the “reasonable accommodation” hearings that are intended to focus on acceptable means of integrating immigrants, but have highlighted disturbing tensions. Here in Calgary, a group of racist skinheads slithered out of their basements, proclaimed white supremacy and even slipped some propaganda into a few copies of Fast Forward.
The rise of an intolerant group in Calgary isn’t necessarily surprising, but the fact its members are willing to be so vocal is disturbing. Despite their bluster, their message is intentionally veiled in an attempt to conceal their true intentions, even if that message remains obvious. They are waging a racist campaign couched in the language of tolerance.
The group demonstrates a troubling split personality on its website. While the site proclaims a commitment to non-violence, it also features pictures of members holding guns and bats, not to mention a freaky devotion to Hitler. I’m pretty sure Gandhi didn’t look to Stalin for inspiration.
The group also claims on the site to “reject the simple psychology of reactionary politics as a recruitment tool,” which ought to make it difficult to recruit, considering its entire philosophy is based on reactionary politics. As supporters of National Socialism (Hitler’s political bent), its entire structure is reactionary, relying on scapegoats as an excuse for drastic attitudes and actions; rallying around race and a constructed heritage in the face of a perceived threat
White supremacists, who often hide behind other titles like white nationalism or white pride, proclaim they are fighting for the survival of the white race, for the protection of their families and their children. Many follow the “Fourteen Words,” based on a passage from Hitler’s Mein Kampf and coined by terrorist David Lane: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White [sic] children.”
The Calgary group follows this principle. While the group states that its members “acknowledge the right of all people, religions, races and cultures to live free from fear, oppression, exploitation and foreign domination,” it is clear that this does not include having those religions and cultures in their city. The question is why?
The paradox is that, rather than springing up during times of economic duress and a reduction in national stature — as is normally the case for racist groups — this is occurring during a time of plenty. All our growth and wealth is producing strains on our society, and this is a reaction to those strains (reactionary again). The fact that society is succeeding leaves those who are not doing so feeling increasingly inadequate. This new framework of discontent is unlike that of 1930s Germany in which society was failing everyone.
There is nothing wrong with having pride in your culture and heritage; in fact, celebrating all the cultures that exist in Canada is a main tenet in our multicultural society. Of course, that is where the problem lies for white supremacists. To celebrate “white” culture (as though there was some overarching one) is seen as a fundamental right, while celebrating other cultures is seen as a burden worthy of fighting. What is troubling is celebrating your culture at the expense of another, and of condemning people based on their race while proclaiming pride in your own. It’s illogical.
A recent post on Stormfront’s Calgary thread sounded an alarm to those Calgarians who have rationalized their way out of the primordial soup: “We are planning on stepping it up a bit more this next year and getting out and hitting the streets even more than we have been. with [sic] all the new people we have been meeting I am very happy with the way things have gone this year and can only hope to do just as well next year!”
With more people being left behind by Alberta’s strong economy, or that of Canada, and with increasing numbers of immigrants helping to make that success a reality, there could be a true threat here. Let’s hope that it’s just more brainless bluster, and that this unwanted group of paranoid white people, and their ideological equivalents across Canada hit their high water mark in 2007.
Recent census numbers report that one in five Canadians is foreign born, the first time this number has been so high since 1931. At the same time, the Canadian economy, and particularly that of Alberta, is flourishing despite the potential recession looming over the heads of Americans. Locally, according to the Conference Board of Canada, Calgary is the most economically dynamic and attractive city to live in.
Distressingly, however, we are seeing increasing tension within our prosperous and cosmopolitan society. In Quebec there has been a strange resurgence in the ugly side of French nationalism, manifesting itself in the “reasonable accommodation” hearings that are intended to focus on acceptable means of integrating immigrants, but have highlighted disturbing tensions. Here in Calgary, a group of racist skinheads slithered out of their basements, proclaimed white supremacy and even slipped some propaganda into a few copies of Fast Forward.
The rise of an intolerant group in Calgary isn’t necessarily surprising, but the fact its members are willing to be so vocal is disturbing. Despite their bluster, their message is intentionally veiled in an attempt to conceal their true intentions, even if that message remains obvious. They are waging a racist campaign couched in the language of tolerance.
The group demonstrates a troubling split personality on its website. While the site proclaims a commitment to non-violence, it also features pictures of members holding guns and bats, not to mention a freaky devotion to Hitler. I’m pretty sure Gandhi didn’t look to Stalin for inspiration.
The group also claims on the site to “reject the simple psychology of reactionary politics as a recruitment tool,” which ought to make it difficult to recruit, considering its entire philosophy is based on reactionary politics. As supporters of National Socialism (Hitler’s political bent), its entire structure is reactionary, relying on scapegoats as an excuse for drastic attitudes and actions; rallying around race and a constructed heritage in the face of a perceived threat
White supremacists, who often hide behind other titles like white nationalism or white pride, proclaim they are fighting for the survival of the white race, for the protection of their families and their children. Many follow the “Fourteen Words,” based on a passage from Hitler’s Mein Kampf and coined by terrorist David Lane: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for White [sic] children.”
The Calgary group follows this principle. While the group states that its members “acknowledge the right of all people, religions, races and cultures to live free from fear, oppression, exploitation and foreign domination,” it is clear that this does not include having those religions and cultures in their city. The question is why?
The paradox is that, rather than springing up during times of economic duress and a reduction in national stature — as is normally the case for racist groups — this is occurring during a time of plenty. All our growth and wealth is producing strains on our society, and this is a reaction to those strains (reactionary again). The fact that society is succeeding leaves those who are not doing so feeling increasingly inadequate. This new framework of discontent is unlike that of 1930s Germany in which society was failing everyone.
There is nothing wrong with having pride in your culture and heritage; in fact, celebrating all the cultures that exist in Canada is a main tenet in our multicultural society. Of course, that is where the problem lies for white supremacists. To celebrate “white” culture (as though there was some overarching one) is seen as a fundamental right, while celebrating other cultures is seen as a burden worthy of fighting. What is troubling is celebrating your culture at the expense of another, and of condemning people based on their race while proclaiming pride in your own. It’s illogical.
A recent post on Stormfront’s Calgary thread sounded an alarm to those Calgarians who have rationalized their way out of the primordial soup: “We are planning on stepping it up a bit more this next year and getting out and hitting the streets even more than we have been. with [sic] all the new people we have been meeting I am very happy with the way things have gone this year and can only hope to do just as well next year!”
With more people being left behind by Alberta’s strong economy, or that of Canada, and with increasing numbers of immigrants helping to make that success a reality, there could be a true threat here. Let’s hope that it’s just more brainless bluster, and that this unwanted group of paranoid white people, and their ideological equivalents across Canada hit their high water mark in 2007.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Smart programs curb crime
Tough-on-crime rhetoric misses the mark
Originally published in FFWD, November 29, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
If you were to listen to the politicians at all three levels of government affecting Calgary, you would reasonably assume that we are under attack by a swarm of bloodthirsty criminals. This comes at a time when the crime rate has dropped significantly in Alberta and across the country, and a recent report from Statistics Canada says our incarceration rate has risen for the first time in more than a decade.
The federal Conservatives recently announced new tough-on-crime measures for identity theft, drugs and youth crime. The provincial government wants more police, to clamp down on repeat offenders and address addiction, while in the city, council approved funding for more bylaw and police officers and increased funding for a drug court.
There is no doubt that crime is an important issue, but it is used far too often as an easy political weapon rather than a well-reasoned policy tool. The federal Conservatives are simply using the issue to appease their party’s right wing and bully the opposition. There is no logic behind introducing mandatory drug sentences of increased length at a time when, according to Statistics Canada, our prisons are at or beyond capacity. It also seems an odd time for a crackdown, given that the national crime rate has fallen consistently and is at its lowest level in 25 years.
Harper and his party also want to start dealing more aggressively with youth crime, trying more young offenders as adults and denying them bail more regularly. It’s not clear why this crowd doesn’t accept that longer prison sentences for young offenders don’t produce model youth, nor the fact that overcrowding in remand centres is directly linked to bail being granted less often.
The provincial government responded to yet another panel report earlier this month entitled Keeping Communities Safe. Unlike many of the other reports that have crossed Premier Ed Stelmach’s desk, he didn’t dare mess around too much with this one. The government accepted 29 of the 31 recommendations laid out by the panel.
There are some good recommendations, including more focus on crime prevention through education and support. Most importantly, there is a call for more treatment beds for substance abusers and the mentally ill, with particular emphasis on youth and young adults.
What is the Alberta government actually going to do? In the next budget it will fund a whopping total of 40 new addiction treatment beds in the province, and 41 beds at hospitals and group homes to deal with mental illness. The 50 detox beds dedicated to youth will have to wait until 2010. The government has yet to announce a timetable or funding structure for a desired increase in policing.
There are good things in all of this. New funding from the city is focused on the rehabilitation of offenders and their connecting with the community. The Calgary drug court, though still small, will allow for treatment in lieu of jail time or a stint in the disastrously overcrowded remand centre. Despite the creation of a pilot project drug court in Edmonton funded by the province, Calgary’s drug court is a city initiative, championed by Mayor Dave Bronconnier.
New funding for bylaw officers will see a return of the popular Community Support Officer (CSO) program for the downtown and Beltline. This program was cancelled a few years ago after provincial funding dried up. Institution of the CSO program means more bylaw officers will deal with minor complaints and interact more closely with the community, freeing up time for police. It is an example of a program that shows smart thinking rather than brute force can help keep crime at lower levels and reduce it further.
Now is the time to focus on treatment and on rehabilitation, on poverty and homelessness — issues that lead to incarceration and repeat offences — rather than on punishment. At a time when the crime rate in Alberta has dropped by six per cent, one of the largest drops in the country, we should be taking the initiative to focus on rehabilitation in our prisons and beyond, not on longer sentences that create overcrowded conditions.
The familiar complaints about Calgary’s economy and those left behind due to housing and increased cost of living all come into play in the debate about crime and punishment, or at least they should. Whenever politicians start to talk about crime, it’s time to dig around and see what’s really going on. Affordable housing and counselling cost a lot less than a new prison, and well-reasoned debate should always trump scare tactic rhetoric.
Originally published in FFWD, November 29, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
If you were to listen to the politicians at all three levels of government affecting Calgary, you would reasonably assume that we are under attack by a swarm of bloodthirsty criminals. This comes at a time when the crime rate has dropped significantly in Alberta and across the country, and a recent report from Statistics Canada says our incarceration rate has risen for the first time in more than a decade.
The federal Conservatives recently announced new tough-on-crime measures for identity theft, drugs and youth crime. The provincial government wants more police, to clamp down on repeat offenders and address addiction, while in the city, council approved funding for more bylaw and police officers and increased funding for a drug court.
There is no doubt that crime is an important issue, but it is used far too often as an easy political weapon rather than a well-reasoned policy tool. The federal Conservatives are simply using the issue to appease their party’s right wing and bully the opposition. There is no logic behind introducing mandatory drug sentences of increased length at a time when, according to Statistics Canada, our prisons are at or beyond capacity. It also seems an odd time for a crackdown, given that the national crime rate has fallen consistently and is at its lowest level in 25 years.
Harper and his party also want to start dealing more aggressively with youth crime, trying more young offenders as adults and denying them bail more regularly. It’s not clear why this crowd doesn’t accept that longer prison sentences for young offenders don’t produce model youth, nor the fact that overcrowding in remand centres is directly linked to bail being granted less often.
The provincial government responded to yet another panel report earlier this month entitled Keeping Communities Safe. Unlike many of the other reports that have crossed Premier Ed Stelmach’s desk, he didn’t dare mess around too much with this one. The government accepted 29 of the 31 recommendations laid out by the panel.
There are some good recommendations, including more focus on crime prevention through education and support. Most importantly, there is a call for more treatment beds for substance abusers and the mentally ill, with particular emphasis on youth and young adults.
What is the Alberta government actually going to do? In the next budget it will fund a whopping total of 40 new addiction treatment beds in the province, and 41 beds at hospitals and group homes to deal with mental illness. The 50 detox beds dedicated to youth will have to wait until 2010. The government has yet to announce a timetable or funding structure for a desired increase in policing.
There are good things in all of this. New funding from the city is focused on the rehabilitation of offenders and their connecting with the community. The Calgary drug court, though still small, will allow for treatment in lieu of jail time or a stint in the disastrously overcrowded remand centre. Despite the creation of a pilot project drug court in Edmonton funded by the province, Calgary’s drug court is a city initiative, championed by Mayor Dave Bronconnier.
New funding for bylaw officers will see a return of the popular Community Support Officer (CSO) program for the downtown and Beltline. This program was cancelled a few years ago after provincial funding dried up. Institution of the CSO program means more bylaw officers will deal with minor complaints and interact more closely with the community, freeing up time for police. It is an example of a program that shows smart thinking rather than brute force can help keep crime at lower levels and reduce it further.
Now is the time to focus on treatment and on rehabilitation, on poverty and homelessness — issues that lead to incarceration and repeat offences — rather than on punishment. At a time when the crime rate in Alberta has dropped by six per cent, one of the largest drops in the country, we should be taking the initiative to focus on rehabilitation in our prisons and beyond, not on longer sentences that create overcrowded conditions.
The familiar complaints about Calgary’s economy and those left behind due to housing and increased cost of living all come into play in the debate about crime and punishment, or at least they should. Whenever politicians start to talk about crime, it’s time to dig around and see what’s really going on. Affordable housing and counselling cost a lot less than a new prison, and well-reasoned debate should always trump scare tactic rhetoric.
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Time Bombs
Canada’s atomic veterans fight for recognition
Originally published in FFWD, November 8, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Television
The federal government has ignored the plight of Canadian veterans dying from exposure to radiation caused by nuclear tests in Nevada in 1957, according to Time Bombs, a new documentary to be aired on Global television November 10.
According to Eric Ruelle, who directed and produced the documentary with Guylaine Maroist, the initial seed for the film was a small article written by two journalists in Montreal in 1957. That article, small on details, spoke of a top-secret mission in the States. It took the duo 10 years to track down the necessary sources and find a television network interested in the project.
That mission was named Operation Plumbbob, the largest nuclear testing project ever undertaken, involving thousands of American soldiers and a handful of unknowing Canadian volunteers. The soldiers were exposed to six nuclear blasts and then ordered to participate in war games amongst the fallout, to test their reactions to orders after the explosion.
Jim Huntley lived through those blasts and helped organize the Canadian Atomic Veterans Association in 1995 to help fight for recognition of the veterans. “We were sent there and they knew we were guinea pigs,” says Huntley, who bristles with anger at the treatment the veterans have received from the government. “We flew in helicopters through that cloud.”
Huntley is leading the charge in the association’s fight against the government, a task bestowed on him thanks in part to his good health. Of 40 soldiers sent to Nevada in the summer of 1957, 22 or more are dead, and the survivors are riddled with cancer and arthritis. Jim is the healthiest surviving member of the unit.
The task has proven difficult. The group has been denied, ignored and shuffled through the storied Canadian bureaucracy, stymied at every turn and lied to by political officials. After years of trying to get information and compensation, the association was finally promised a package by former defence minister Gordon O’Connor, according to Huntley, but the deadline for that package has come and gone without a word.
“There’s no going back. They lied to us. The minister of defence lied to us. He came here in July and told us we were getting a package on the 15th of September. We have nothing, not even a phone call,” says Huntley after a screening of the documentary in Calgary. He says the government is now trying to send the group back to square one. “They told us they’ve never heard of us. I said to the secretary, ‘We’ve talked to you for a year and a half. You don’t know who we are?’” says Huntley.
Anger is pervasive amongst those still alive. The flashes of light, the shockwaves and the dust from the explosions remain seared in their memories. “I get angry and I get more angry… I’m ashamed,” says Bob Henderson, a veteran of the tests, clutching an oxygen tank that resembles a violin case. Most of the participants that he was acquainted with, he says, served in the military long-term. “They served their country with pride, with dignity and most of all with honour. What the hell has the government done for us? Nothing. They’ve tried to sweep us away.”
Henderson echoes a disturbing conclusion shared amongst the survivors: that the government is waiting for all of them to succumb to the radiation they ingested 50 years ago. “They’re holding back because they know we’re falling,” he says wearily.
In 1992, the American government finally admitted its culpability for exposing soldiers to nuclear blasts and awarded compensation. “They finally admitted that it was a human experiment, it’s written in black-and-white — a human experiment. They really wanted to see how they would react in a nuclear war. So they would say to the soldiers, ‘don’t worry about radiation, it’s OK, Mother Nature will take care of you,’” says Ruelle. “I’m now very ashamed of my government, I’m now very ashamed of my country.”
Ruelle and Maroist are not letting go of the story, or the veterans they have befriended while filming Time Bombs, and have pledged to continue fighting for them after the release of the film. “We’ve made a commitment to ourselves… we have a moral commitment to ourselves and to the guys, we cannot let them go,” says Ruelle. “We need to take this to the end, because if we don’t, we don’t succeed. Success is not having everybody clap at the show and everybody say ‘hey, great show.’ No, the success is having the government acknowledge and compensate those guys.”
Originally published in FFWD, November 8, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Television
The federal government has ignored the plight of Canadian veterans dying from exposure to radiation caused by nuclear tests in Nevada in 1957, according to Time Bombs, a new documentary to be aired on Global television November 10.
According to Eric Ruelle, who directed and produced the documentary with Guylaine Maroist, the initial seed for the film was a small article written by two journalists in Montreal in 1957. That article, small on details, spoke of a top-secret mission in the States. It took the duo 10 years to track down the necessary sources and find a television network interested in the project.
That mission was named Operation Plumbbob, the largest nuclear testing project ever undertaken, involving thousands of American soldiers and a handful of unknowing Canadian volunteers. The soldiers were exposed to six nuclear blasts and then ordered to participate in war games amongst the fallout, to test their reactions to orders after the explosion.
Jim Huntley lived through those blasts and helped organize the Canadian Atomic Veterans Association in 1995 to help fight for recognition of the veterans. “We were sent there and they knew we were guinea pigs,” says Huntley, who bristles with anger at the treatment the veterans have received from the government. “We flew in helicopters through that cloud.”
Huntley is leading the charge in the association’s fight against the government, a task bestowed on him thanks in part to his good health. Of 40 soldiers sent to Nevada in the summer of 1957, 22 or more are dead, and the survivors are riddled with cancer and arthritis. Jim is the healthiest surviving member of the unit.
The task has proven difficult. The group has been denied, ignored and shuffled through the storied Canadian bureaucracy, stymied at every turn and lied to by political officials. After years of trying to get information and compensation, the association was finally promised a package by former defence minister Gordon O’Connor, according to Huntley, but the deadline for that package has come and gone without a word.
“There’s no going back. They lied to us. The minister of defence lied to us. He came here in July and told us we were getting a package on the 15th of September. We have nothing, not even a phone call,” says Huntley after a screening of the documentary in Calgary. He says the government is now trying to send the group back to square one. “They told us they’ve never heard of us. I said to the secretary, ‘We’ve talked to you for a year and a half. You don’t know who we are?’” says Huntley.
Anger is pervasive amongst those still alive. The flashes of light, the shockwaves and the dust from the explosions remain seared in their memories. “I get angry and I get more angry… I’m ashamed,” says Bob Henderson, a veteran of the tests, clutching an oxygen tank that resembles a violin case. Most of the participants that he was acquainted with, he says, served in the military long-term. “They served their country with pride, with dignity and most of all with honour. What the hell has the government done for us? Nothing. They’ve tried to sweep us away.”
Henderson echoes a disturbing conclusion shared amongst the survivors: that the government is waiting for all of them to succumb to the radiation they ingested 50 years ago. “They’re holding back because they know we’re falling,” he says wearily.
In 1992, the American government finally admitted its culpability for exposing soldiers to nuclear blasts and awarded compensation. “They finally admitted that it was a human experiment, it’s written in black-and-white — a human experiment. They really wanted to see how they would react in a nuclear war. So they would say to the soldiers, ‘don’t worry about radiation, it’s OK, Mother Nature will take care of you,’” says Ruelle. “I’m now very ashamed of my government, I’m now very ashamed of my country.”
Ruelle and Maroist are not letting go of the story, or the veterans they have befriended while filming Time Bombs, and have pledged to continue fighting for them after the release of the film. “We’ve made a commitment to ourselves… we have a moral commitment to ourselves and to the guys, we cannot let them go,” says Ruelle. “We need to take this to the end, because if we don’t, we don’t succeed. Success is not having everybody clap at the show and everybody say ‘hey, great show.’ No, the success is having the government acknowledge and compensate those guys.”
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Hoping for healthy debate
Alberta’s upcoming legislative session will be lively
Originally published in FFWD November 1, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
The new provincial political season is definitely under way with the recent announcement of the government position on oil and gas royalties. At the opening of the new session of the legislature at the beginning of November, the royalty debate will be the primary source of conflict in what will likely be a lively, if not short, legislature sitting.
The opposition parties surely smell blood and will be doing everything in their power to draw more of it as the still-fresh premier attempts to gain control over his image and garner support from unusually cranky Albertans. So far, his performance has been lukewarm, and his polling numbers remain low. With the Liberals still far behind and the New Democrats further away, each will try to convince the electorate of their worth during this legislative session.
Premier Ed Stelmach, who is decidedly more open to discussion than the tyrant who formerly inhabited the premier’s chair, marks a slight shift to the centre for the Conservatives in Alberta. He could be more willing to compromise on legislation, which might be seen as caving in to the opposition, or as a genuine attempt at conciliation. It will all be an attempt to distance himself from Ralph Klein, despite the fact that Stelmach and all of his MLAs were in government by Klein’s side.
The ongoing rhetoric around government accountability, introduced as a major plank in Stelmach’s policy platform, will be intricately tied to the royalty debate and the move towards a more inclusive legislature. This is especially important after the long, dark rule by Klein, who preferred to govern by decree and without much in the way of public consultation. Actually, even the fact that there will be meaningful debate in the legislature is a hopeful, if not limited, return to democracy in this province.
One fundamental difference in governing style is the adoption of all-party committees, announced in April of this year. As shocking as it seems, government policy was debated mostly behind closed doors and only amongst Conservatives under the Klein regime. Now we have some semblance of a functioning democratic institution that will hopefully strengthen in the upcoming sitting, as opposition members acclimatize to their new roles as participants in the government process.
Klein preferred to make announcements on the go, sometimes catching everyone off guard — even, it appeared, his cabinet ministers. This reckless style rarely included any meaningful debate, and was mostly done outside of the legislature, bypassing the opposition completely. A classic example of his disregard for dialogue was when he threw a Liberal-drafted health policy at a 17-year-old page in the legislature after telling the Liberals if they had any ideas on health care to send them over. The page was delivering the material to Klein.
One thing sure to be debated hotly in the legislature is the government’s response to the royalty review, which discarded a large swath of the panel’s recommendations. One panel member reacted by accusing the premier of “blatant deceit” in an interview with the Edmonton Journal.
Stelmach has said repeatedly that the discussion is over and that he will stay the course on his proposal, which doesn’t inspire much faith in his new accountable approach, or in his respect for expert opinion.
Another sign that government may just be doing a window dressing job on accountability is the contentious Bill 46, which would prevent public input into proposed utilities projects. A government that purports to champion accountability, but stifles public input into projects that could directly affect citizens, reeks of a continuation of old, paternalistic Alberta conservatism.
The fact there is the potential for healthy debate in the upcoming sitting of the legislature is cause for celebration, but also concern that it takes so little to make us happy in this one-party province. It is unclear whether this shift reflects an acknowledgement of new strength in the opposition parties, particularly the Liberals who recently won a by-election in Klein’s old Calgary riding, or whether it is just Stelmach trying to be the consummate nice guy and at least pretending to value everyone’s input. He certainly does like his expert panels, though he often ignores their findings.
The true political debate in this province will happen when the premier finally goes to the people of Alberta to seek a mandate to govern. There are pre-Christmas election rumours swirling on the airwaves and in the papers, but with Stelmach trying to inch his poll numbers up and wanting to push through some more pet policies, we might just have to settle for increased debate in the legislature for a little while longer.
Originally published in FFWD November 1, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
The new provincial political season is definitely under way with the recent announcement of the government position on oil and gas royalties. At the opening of the new session of the legislature at the beginning of November, the royalty debate will be the primary source of conflict in what will likely be a lively, if not short, legislature sitting.
The opposition parties surely smell blood and will be doing everything in their power to draw more of it as the still-fresh premier attempts to gain control over his image and garner support from unusually cranky Albertans. So far, his performance has been lukewarm, and his polling numbers remain low. With the Liberals still far behind and the New Democrats further away, each will try to convince the electorate of their worth during this legislative session.
Premier Ed Stelmach, who is decidedly more open to discussion than the tyrant who formerly inhabited the premier’s chair, marks a slight shift to the centre for the Conservatives in Alberta. He could be more willing to compromise on legislation, which might be seen as caving in to the opposition, or as a genuine attempt at conciliation. It will all be an attempt to distance himself from Ralph Klein, despite the fact that Stelmach and all of his MLAs were in government by Klein’s side.
The ongoing rhetoric around government accountability, introduced as a major plank in Stelmach’s policy platform, will be intricately tied to the royalty debate and the move towards a more inclusive legislature. This is especially important after the long, dark rule by Klein, who preferred to govern by decree and without much in the way of public consultation. Actually, even the fact that there will be meaningful debate in the legislature is a hopeful, if not limited, return to democracy in this province.
One fundamental difference in governing style is the adoption of all-party committees, announced in April of this year. As shocking as it seems, government policy was debated mostly behind closed doors and only amongst Conservatives under the Klein regime. Now we have some semblance of a functioning democratic institution that will hopefully strengthen in the upcoming sitting, as opposition members acclimatize to their new roles as participants in the government process.
Klein preferred to make announcements on the go, sometimes catching everyone off guard — even, it appeared, his cabinet ministers. This reckless style rarely included any meaningful debate, and was mostly done outside of the legislature, bypassing the opposition completely. A classic example of his disregard for dialogue was when he threw a Liberal-drafted health policy at a 17-year-old page in the legislature after telling the Liberals if they had any ideas on health care to send them over. The page was delivering the material to Klein.
One thing sure to be debated hotly in the legislature is the government’s response to the royalty review, which discarded a large swath of the panel’s recommendations. One panel member reacted by accusing the premier of “blatant deceit” in an interview with the Edmonton Journal.
Stelmach has said repeatedly that the discussion is over and that he will stay the course on his proposal, which doesn’t inspire much faith in his new accountable approach, or in his respect for expert opinion.
Another sign that government may just be doing a window dressing job on accountability is the contentious Bill 46, which would prevent public input into proposed utilities projects. A government that purports to champion accountability, but stifles public input into projects that could directly affect citizens, reeks of a continuation of old, paternalistic Alberta conservatism.
The fact there is the potential for healthy debate in the upcoming sitting of the legislature is cause for celebration, but also concern that it takes so little to make us happy in this one-party province. It is unclear whether this shift reflects an acknowledgement of new strength in the opposition parties, particularly the Liberals who recently won a by-election in Klein’s old Calgary riding, or whether it is just Stelmach trying to be the consummate nice guy and at least pretending to value everyone’s input. He certainly does like his expert panels, though he often ignores their findings.
The true political debate in this province will happen when the premier finally goes to the people of Alberta to seek a mandate to govern. There are pre-Christmas election rumours swirling on the airwaves and in the papers, but with Stelmach trying to inch his poll numbers up and wanting to push through some more pet policies, we might just have to settle for increased debate in the legislature for a little while longer.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Examining women’s boom burden
Originally published in FFWD October 25, 2007 by Drew Anderson in City
The Women’s Centre of Calgary will play host to a conference celebrating its 10 years of independent service to women, at a time when issues of poverty, politics and commerce are increasingly important. Our booming economy can be an unforgiving beast for women, and the recent municipal election saw two incumbent female aldermen lose their seats.
Lisa Hari, an education and outreach worker at the centre, and one of the organizers of the conference, says the point is to have women tell their own stories. “We actually went out and said, ‘Hey, we’re planning a conference and what would you like to talk about?” Participants were further asked to look at the media and consider misrepresentations, misinformation and unaddressed issues pertaining to women.
The conference, titled Connections, will feature individual sessions covering everything from connecting with corporate Calgary to sex and gender diversity issues. Each presenter will have a personal connection to the material and a story to tell.
“I think what’s unique about this conference is that it’s women living the issues,” says Hari. “We have a woman that’s a vice-president of a bank coming to talk about women in corporate Calgary. So it’s women that are telling their stories, and I think that’s what is so great about this conference.”
In light of the recent ejection of two women from city council, the session on women and politics is particularly timely. Susan Stratton, co-chair of Equal Voice (Southern Alberta chapter), president of the Alberta Green Party and a Raging Granny, will speak about how women can participate in politics and increase representation. “There are statistics, both federally and provincially, and now at least in Calgary in the civic arena, about the poor representation of women. So we’ll be mentioning those stats certainly, that we may have come a long way, but not in politics,” she says.
Stratton believes that having more women involved in the political process will help soften the often-harsh world of Canadian politics and foster a greater spirit of co-operation. “I just think that the culture of politics as it’s usually practised is an issue. The tendency to attack and pull each other down rather than looking to co-operate and get something done is very obvious in Canadian politics,” she says. “You get more women in, you change the culture and the expectation, so it is kind of a chicken and egg thing.”
According to Stratton, it is not simply a matter of being elected to office, either. Women can participate in politics on a number of levels, she says, citing the rise of Elizabeth May to leader of the federal Green Party through the Sierra Club.
This loss of representation at all levels of government is troubling when so many women are suffering through the boom times in Calgary. According to Hari, there are a lot of women coming to the centre with housing issues. She says there is “definitely an increase because of rental hikes. So that might mean people need more food, or more personal care items, or they can’t afford to do things for themselves.”
Livia Quequezana, a presenter on women and poverty at the conference, knows the dangers of Calgary’s high cost of living from personal experience. After moving here with her family one and a half years ago, Quequezana struggled and was forced to live on welfare before her husband found a job.
“Almost all of the welfare I received went to pay the rent, which is huge here in Calgary,” she says. There was the additional burden of a sick child and the difficulty of establishing themselves in a new city, but she says they were lucky to receive generous help from city agencies including the Women’s Centre.
“That’s why I keep in touch with the Women’s Centre. I am always grateful to them because they provided us with food, clothing, tickets for recreational activities, any kind of information about schooling and supplies, they are a very good support for women in need.”
Quequezana is presenting at the conference in order to encourage other women to speak up. “The only way to have support is to talk about it,” she says. “I would encourage women to talk about their own issues to get the support that they need, because here in Calgary, they will find many kinds of agencies and many good people that will help in many ways.”
Hari hopes that the conference will live up to its name and foster communication between a diverse group of women with unique stories to tell. “That’s why we’re calling it Connections. Not only are people talking about what is their perspective, what’s their current issue, but having the opportunity to listen to other women and building those connections, building some understanding.”
The Women’s Centre of Calgary will play host to a conference celebrating its 10 years of independent service to women, at a time when issues of poverty, politics and commerce are increasingly important. Our booming economy can be an unforgiving beast for women, and the recent municipal election saw two incumbent female aldermen lose their seats.
Lisa Hari, an education and outreach worker at the centre, and one of the organizers of the conference, says the point is to have women tell their own stories. “We actually went out and said, ‘Hey, we’re planning a conference and what would you like to talk about?” Participants were further asked to look at the media and consider misrepresentations, misinformation and unaddressed issues pertaining to women.
The conference, titled Connections, will feature individual sessions covering everything from connecting with corporate Calgary to sex and gender diversity issues. Each presenter will have a personal connection to the material and a story to tell.
“I think what’s unique about this conference is that it’s women living the issues,” says Hari. “We have a woman that’s a vice-president of a bank coming to talk about women in corporate Calgary. So it’s women that are telling their stories, and I think that’s what is so great about this conference.”
In light of the recent ejection of two women from city council, the session on women and politics is particularly timely. Susan Stratton, co-chair of Equal Voice (Southern Alberta chapter), president of the Alberta Green Party and a Raging Granny, will speak about how women can participate in politics and increase representation. “There are statistics, both federally and provincially, and now at least in Calgary in the civic arena, about the poor representation of women. So we’ll be mentioning those stats certainly, that we may have come a long way, but not in politics,” she says.
Stratton believes that having more women involved in the political process will help soften the often-harsh world of Canadian politics and foster a greater spirit of co-operation. “I just think that the culture of politics as it’s usually practised is an issue. The tendency to attack and pull each other down rather than looking to co-operate and get something done is very obvious in Canadian politics,” she says. “You get more women in, you change the culture and the expectation, so it is kind of a chicken and egg thing.”
According to Stratton, it is not simply a matter of being elected to office, either. Women can participate in politics on a number of levels, she says, citing the rise of Elizabeth May to leader of the federal Green Party through the Sierra Club.
This loss of representation at all levels of government is troubling when so many women are suffering through the boom times in Calgary. According to Hari, there are a lot of women coming to the centre with housing issues. She says there is “definitely an increase because of rental hikes. So that might mean people need more food, or more personal care items, or they can’t afford to do things for themselves.”
Livia Quequezana, a presenter on women and poverty at the conference, knows the dangers of Calgary’s high cost of living from personal experience. After moving here with her family one and a half years ago, Quequezana struggled and was forced to live on welfare before her husband found a job.
“Almost all of the welfare I received went to pay the rent, which is huge here in Calgary,” she says. There was the additional burden of a sick child and the difficulty of establishing themselves in a new city, but she says they were lucky to receive generous help from city agencies including the Women’s Centre.
“That’s why I keep in touch with the Women’s Centre. I am always grateful to them because they provided us with food, clothing, tickets for recreational activities, any kind of information about schooling and supplies, they are a very good support for women in need.”
Quequezana is presenting at the conference in order to encourage other women to speak up. “The only way to have support is to talk about it,” she says. “I would encourage women to talk about their own issues to get the support that they need, because here in Calgary, they will find many kinds of agencies and many good people that will help in many ways.”
Hari hopes that the conference will live up to its name and foster communication between a diverse group of women with unique stories to tell. “That’s why we’re calling it Connections. Not only are people talking about what is their perspective, what’s their current issue, but having the opportunity to listen to other women and building those connections, building some understanding.”
Goodbye to the Western Standard
The free market eats one of its own
Originally published in FFWD October 25, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
Woe is the state of conservatism in the world, when those that preach fiscal responsibility seem to have the hardest time keeping their operations in the black, governments and a magazine among them.
Western Standard, the ranting right-wing rag that purported to represent the opinions of our corner of the world, was unable to attract enough attention in its worldview to keep it afloat. According to publisher Ezra Levant, speaking recently to the Globe and Mail, it will likely carry on in some form on the Internet, but we are thankfully without its continued presence at our newsstands. Why is it that conservatives, who constantly lecture on fiduciary responsibility, whether it be from the podium or in print, have such a hard time keeping their own finances in order?
The Conservative provincial government is the highest spender per capita in the country. To give it credit, it is debt-free, but that is largely due to excessive spending cuts in the ’90s, and the sea of oil we happen to live upon. The increased infrastructure, health and social spending we see today is an attempt to make up for those very same cuts, made by the same party, though with a different face. The Conservative provincial government, as indicated by the recent royalty review, has also done a poor job of ensuring Albertan’s financial interests were protected in the extraction of our natural resources. It hasn’t even kept proper records on finances in the tar sands.
Each year, the Conservative provincial government announces larger-than-expected budget surpluses, something now imitated by its federal counterpart and ideological brothers in arms. These surprise surpluses are never really a surprise, and are just a political ploy to curry favour with the electorate by unveiling extra funds, while hiding the fact those funds were available in the first place for social spending. Regardless, it doesn’t instill confidence in their ability to mind the books.
It’s almost too obvious to point out the situation south of us, where a conservative president has turned a large surplus into a terrifying deficit and helped speed his country towards a recession.
In the same Globe interview, Levant says that his magazine’s end is not an indication of a downturn in conservative support in Alberta and across Canada. This point is open for debate, especially in light of the inadequacies of our own government becoming more and more clear. What isn’t open for debate is the fact that Levant’s magazine, for whatever reason, couldn’t pay the bills.
The Western Standard operated for only three years as a print publication, taking up the reins of the also defunct Alberta Report magazine. Alberta Report was started by Ted Byfield, a well-known right-wing curmudgeon who also helped found the Reform Party. That magazine, after passing into the younger right-wing hands of Link Byfield, was also unable to sustain the finances necessary to continue, despite once boasting an impressive distribution.
Perhaps Levant should have followed Byfield’s strange lead and started the Standard as a quasi-religious endeavour, paying its commune-living writers $1 a day. Surely that would have bought some much-needed time and helped build up revenue.
Maybe Levant should have instituted his own spending cuts, like the conservative governments he lauds Levant could have reconsidered his driving practises and pumped some of the money he pours into his Hummer back into the magazine. That car isn’t fiscally responsible no matter how you look at it. But cuts aren’t for conservative leaders or pundits, they are for the rest of us.
Levant, a former National Post columnist and communications director for Stockwell Day’s disastrous stint as Canadian Alliance leader, banked on his showmanship and ability to antagonize in order to keep his marginal magazine afloat.
Decisions like printing the Prophet Muhammad cartoons that sparked such outrage around the world were nothing but irresponsible attention-seeking, couched in free-speech rhetoric. It turns out that being a jerk on a national level doesn’t help sell magazines, it just makes you look like a jerk.
In the Globe and Mail article, Levant says the publication was never purely an economic enterprise, but a moral one as well. It’s a good thing, too, because it never did turn a profit. Many would also argue his claim about the moral returns he insists it engendered.
This is what he had to say to Fast Forward in August 2006, while defending some of the blogs that were supported on his magazine’s website: "Sometimes people are rude and bigoted and sometimes people are anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic and that entire spectrum is allowed on our website, because unlike in Fast Forward, I believe that in the marketplace of ideas the good ideas will beat out the bad ideas." Turns out that in the marketplace of ideas, or just in the plain old-fashioned marketplace of which Levant is such a fan, being a jerk is just being a jerk, and being conservative does not mean you’re good with your money.
Originally published in FFWD October 25, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
Woe is the state of conservatism in the world, when those that preach fiscal responsibility seem to have the hardest time keeping their operations in the black, governments and a magazine among them.
Western Standard, the ranting right-wing rag that purported to represent the opinions of our corner of the world, was unable to attract enough attention in its worldview to keep it afloat. According to publisher Ezra Levant, speaking recently to the Globe and Mail, it will likely carry on in some form on the Internet, but we are thankfully without its continued presence at our newsstands. Why is it that conservatives, who constantly lecture on fiduciary responsibility, whether it be from the podium or in print, have such a hard time keeping their own finances in order?
The Conservative provincial government is the highest spender per capita in the country. To give it credit, it is debt-free, but that is largely due to excessive spending cuts in the ’90s, and the sea of oil we happen to live upon. The increased infrastructure, health and social spending we see today is an attempt to make up for those very same cuts, made by the same party, though with a different face. The Conservative provincial government, as indicated by the recent royalty review, has also done a poor job of ensuring Albertan’s financial interests were protected in the extraction of our natural resources. It hasn’t even kept proper records on finances in the tar sands.
Each year, the Conservative provincial government announces larger-than-expected budget surpluses, something now imitated by its federal counterpart and ideological brothers in arms. These surprise surpluses are never really a surprise, and are just a political ploy to curry favour with the electorate by unveiling extra funds, while hiding the fact those funds were available in the first place for social spending. Regardless, it doesn’t instill confidence in their ability to mind the books.
It’s almost too obvious to point out the situation south of us, where a conservative president has turned a large surplus into a terrifying deficit and helped speed his country towards a recession.
In the same Globe interview, Levant says that his magazine’s end is not an indication of a downturn in conservative support in Alberta and across Canada. This point is open for debate, especially in light of the inadequacies of our own government becoming more and more clear. What isn’t open for debate is the fact that Levant’s magazine, for whatever reason, couldn’t pay the bills.
The Western Standard operated for only three years as a print publication, taking up the reins of the also defunct Alberta Report magazine. Alberta Report was started by Ted Byfield, a well-known right-wing curmudgeon who also helped found the Reform Party. That magazine, after passing into the younger right-wing hands of Link Byfield, was also unable to sustain the finances necessary to continue, despite once boasting an impressive distribution.
Perhaps Levant should have followed Byfield’s strange lead and started the Standard as a quasi-religious endeavour, paying its commune-living writers $1 a day. Surely that would have bought some much-needed time and helped build up revenue.
Maybe Levant should have instituted his own spending cuts, like the conservative governments he lauds Levant could have reconsidered his driving practises and pumped some of the money he pours into his Hummer back into the magazine. That car isn’t fiscally responsible no matter how you look at it. But cuts aren’t for conservative leaders or pundits, they are for the rest of us.
Levant, a former National Post columnist and communications director for Stockwell Day’s disastrous stint as Canadian Alliance leader, banked on his showmanship and ability to antagonize in order to keep his marginal magazine afloat.
Decisions like printing the Prophet Muhammad cartoons that sparked such outrage around the world were nothing but irresponsible attention-seeking, couched in free-speech rhetoric. It turns out that being a jerk on a national level doesn’t help sell magazines, it just makes you look like a jerk.
In the Globe and Mail article, Levant says the publication was never purely an economic enterprise, but a moral one as well. It’s a good thing, too, because it never did turn a profit. Many would also argue his claim about the moral returns he insists it engendered.
This is what he had to say to Fast Forward in August 2006, while defending some of the blogs that were supported on his magazine’s website: "Sometimes people are rude and bigoted and sometimes people are anti-Muslim and anti-Semitic and that entire spectrum is allowed on our website, because unlike in Fast Forward, I believe that in the marketplace of ideas the good ideas will beat out the bad ideas." Turns out that in the marketplace of ideas, or just in the plain old-fashioned marketplace of which Levant is such a fan, being a jerk is just being a jerk, and being conservative does not mean you’re good with your money.
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Contradictory Calgarians
By: Drew Anderson
Originally publihsed in FFWD, October 4th, in City.
According to two recent reports looking into the state of affairs in our city, Calgarians are a contradictory people. We are concerned about the environment, but do little to reduce our impact, we are concerned over traffic, but continue to drive. We are concerned about crime but feel safe in our neighbourhoods. We are considered conservative but have priorities and concerns more in line with a socialist.
The Calgary Foundation released Vital Signs, which asked participants to grade the city in various areas of concern, including the environment, while the Canada West Foundation, in its report Looking West 2007, examined citizens views on their city, with research in all major western cities and Toronto. Both studies asked respondents to rate priorities and asked for their perception of the city.
The results can be confounding. Despite ranking crime as the fifth priority out of 13 in Looking West, 81 per cent of us feel very or somewhat safe in our neighbourhoods after dark, the highest rating in the country.
Traffic and roads were rated priorities number one and two respectively, and in Vital Signs, our livable/walkable city grade was C-. However, individual citizens continue to drive. 78 per cent of us drive our own vehicle to work instead of taking transit according to Vital Signs.
Loleen Berdahl, the lead researcher on Looking West, says Calgarians want change, they just don’t necessarily want to pay for it. Although transportation was rated a top priority, later in the study respondents shunned almost all methods of funding the necessary improvements.
“I think that’s human nature. I’d love everything for free too, but it’s a big problem. I think the electorate needs to realize that if they want the city that they claim to want, they’re going to need to make some choices with that and there’s going to be some costs to be paid. Not only in terms of actual tax dollars or user fees, but also costs to be paid in terms of…some policy options that restrict types of growth or that provide incentives for certain types of growth or things like that,” she says.
Others see the need for the municipal government to step in and do a better job of addressing Calgarian’s concerns.
“People have aspirations of how they want our city to be, but a lot of it hinges on our government taking action,” said Noel Keough, a senior researcher with Sustainable Calgary who helped research indicators for Vital Signs. “It’s got to do with how we build the city, it’s not an individual’s choice really.”
With a municipal election scheduled for October 15th, the timing of the two reports is fortuitous; revealing the priorities, concerns and perceptions of ordinary Calgarians. It is hoped that the reports will spur discussion on the issues.
“It’s a citizens engagement exercise - the report, and the issues that citizens identified - the election will be over October 15th, but these issues will all be with us for much longer,” says Eva Friessen, President and CEO of The Calgary Foundation.
The reports, however, both highlight another significant issue with the contradictory nature of the municipal citizen, our political apathy despite the realization that the civic government affects our lives deeply.
According to Looking West, 48.7 per cent of us think that of the three levels of government, the municipal variety has the greatest impact on our lives. Yet in the last election only 19 per cent of us voted; one of the lowest turnouts in the country and earning us an overall grade of C in the leadership and belonging section of Vital Signs.
“Who knows how to interpret it,” said Keough, “but you might interpret it as people have not seen a local government that is effective in dealing with these issues, so why vote. That’s a bed set of decisions to make, but perhaps that’s what people are seeing.”
Dr. Keith Brownsey, a political scientist at Mount Royal College isn’t surprised by the apathy and doesn’t see these reports changing anything soon.
“We have very little interest, although people understand that civic politics affects their lives every day,” he says.
“They (citizens) couldn’t care less, the water comes. They only get upset when taxes go up, I mean gosh there’s a tax revolt if your property tax goes up by three dollars a year…I mean that’s where people get animated.”
Yet despite this, Calgarians appear more socially progressive than normally portrayed, and rated property taxes 11th out of the 13 priorities in Looking West, far behind affordable housing and homelessness.
“Every time we do priorities (in a study), lowering taxes ends up in the middle, never the top,” said Berdahl.
“I wasn’t surprised to see Calgary sitting very similar to the other cities, I actually think that despite its national reputation, Calgary is, in many ways, very progressive on a lot of issues.”
Originally publihsed in FFWD, October 4th, in City.
According to two recent reports looking into the state of affairs in our city, Calgarians are a contradictory people. We are concerned about the environment, but do little to reduce our impact, we are concerned over traffic, but continue to drive. We are concerned about crime but feel safe in our neighbourhoods. We are considered conservative but have priorities and concerns more in line with a socialist.
The Calgary Foundation released Vital Signs, which asked participants to grade the city in various areas of concern, including the environment, while the Canada West Foundation, in its report Looking West 2007, examined citizens views on their city, with research in all major western cities and Toronto. Both studies asked respondents to rate priorities and asked for their perception of the city.
The results can be confounding. Despite ranking crime as the fifth priority out of 13 in Looking West, 81 per cent of us feel very or somewhat safe in our neighbourhoods after dark, the highest rating in the country.
Traffic and roads were rated priorities number one and two respectively, and in Vital Signs, our livable/walkable city grade was C-. However, individual citizens continue to drive. 78 per cent of us drive our own vehicle to work instead of taking transit according to Vital Signs.
Loleen Berdahl, the lead researcher on Looking West, says Calgarians want change, they just don’t necessarily want to pay for it. Although transportation was rated a top priority, later in the study respondents shunned almost all methods of funding the necessary improvements.
“I think that’s human nature. I’d love everything for free too, but it’s a big problem. I think the electorate needs to realize that if they want the city that they claim to want, they’re going to need to make some choices with that and there’s going to be some costs to be paid. Not only in terms of actual tax dollars or user fees, but also costs to be paid in terms of…some policy options that restrict types of growth or that provide incentives for certain types of growth or things like that,” she says.
Others see the need for the municipal government to step in and do a better job of addressing Calgarian’s concerns.
“People have aspirations of how they want our city to be, but a lot of it hinges on our government taking action,” said Noel Keough, a senior researcher with Sustainable Calgary who helped research indicators for Vital Signs. “It’s got to do with how we build the city, it’s not an individual’s choice really.”
With a municipal election scheduled for October 15th, the timing of the two reports is fortuitous; revealing the priorities, concerns and perceptions of ordinary Calgarians. It is hoped that the reports will spur discussion on the issues.
“It’s a citizens engagement exercise - the report, and the issues that citizens identified - the election will be over October 15th, but these issues will all be with us for much longer,” says Eva Friessen, President and CEO of The Calgary Foundation.
The reports, however, both highlight another significant issue with the contradictory nature of the municipal citizen, our political apathy despite the realization that the civic government affects our lives deeply.
According to Looking West, 48.7 per cent of us think that of the three levels of government, the municipal variety has the greatest impact on our lives. Yet in the last election only 19 per cent of us voted; one of the lowest turnouts in the country and earning us an overall grade of C in the leadership and belonging section of Vital Signs.
“Who knows how to interpret it,” said Keough, “but you might interpret it as people have not seen a local government that is effective in dealing with these issues, so why vote. That’s a bed set of decisions to make, but perhaps that’s what people are seeing.”
Dr. Keith Brownsey, a political scientist at Mount Royal College isn’t surprised by the apathy and doesn’t see these reports changing anything soon.
“We have very little interest, although people understand that civic politics affects their lives every day,” he says.
“They (citizens) couldn’t care less, the water comes. They only get upset when taxes go up, I mean gosh there’s a tax revolt if your property tax goes up by three dollars a year…I mean that’s where people get animated.”
Yet despite this, Calgarians appear more socially progressive than normally portrayed, and rated property taxes 11th out of the 13 priorities in Looking West, far behind affordable housing and homelessness.
“Every time we do priorities (in a study), lowering taxes ends up in the middle, never the top,” said Berdahl.
“I wasn’t surprised to see Calgary sitting very similar to the other cities, I actually think that despite its national reputation, Calgary is, in many ways, very progressive on a lot of issues.”
Voter apathy is where the heart is
Calgarians ignore government that affects us most
Originally published in FFWD October 11, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
A civic election is upon us, and candidates for alderman and mayor are laying out the issues in a city overwhelmed. Transportation, development, the environment, crime and housing are all on the lips of potential municipal decision-makers, but does anyone even care? Based on the 19 per cent turnout rate in the previous election, the answer is no.
It is boring now to point out that we are in the midst of unparalleled growth, with our city facing enormous pressures due to an overheated economy and a population surge. It’s boring, but it’s true. This makes our choice of civic leaders all the more important. These people will be guiding development in our communities, closing streets in our downtown and coming to grips with our excessive environmental impact. They will manage our growth, open up green space and build our recreation centres. When the neighbours are pissing you off, it is their bylaws you turn to.
Last election we had one of the lowest voter turnouts in Canada. The one government that is the most accessible to us, that affects our lives more intimately than the provincial or federal versions, is the one that commands the least attention.
So far many of the campaigns for alderman and for mayor have focused on a select set of issues: transportation, housing, development, crime and the environment. There are other issues being raised, and some candidates who just rant incoherently (you know who you are), but almost every campaign lists these as priorities.
Our current city council has tackled all of these issues through the course of their present term, though with a checkered success rate. Homelessness and affordable housing are clearly growing out of control. Piecemeal solutions to shelter in the winter months have angered residents with not-in-my-backyard attitudes, and have provided only temporary relief to a situation that continues unabated. There has to be a commitment to solutions that last longer than a couple of months — like the recent conversion of the old Brick building on 16th Ave.
We need committed leadership in the realm of affordable housing. Mayor Bronconnier is promising incentives to private developers and rent supplements to those struggling with housing costs. This is not the recipe for a permanent solution to the housing crisis. There has to be pressure on the provincial government from all our civic leaders to impose rent controls and protect those on the edge from unreasonable rent increases. We need a council and mayor that realize we can’t simply build more affordable housing without addressing the issues that make the rest of our housing unaffordable.
Both the homelessness and housing issues would benefit from scrapping the ward system and instead electing councillors that answer to the city as a whole, and not communities focused on their own self-interest.
The environmental footprint of Calgary is an embarrassment that needs immediate remedy. Our sprawling suburbs and car-centric planning has gobbled up as much land as New York City, despite the fact we have over seven million less residents. Our infrastructure is taxed from servicing such a large area, while our emissions and energy consumption continue to rise in excess of our population growth. We need to focus on building up rather than continuously out. According to a recent report by the Calgary Foundation, 78 per cent of Calgarians use their car to get to work — not surprising considering the city’s layout.
Transportation is an important issue for this city. Roads are clogged with excess cars, construction can’t keep up, thousands move here every year and transit seems unable to match demand with drivers and routes. It is heartening that candidates, specifically in the mayoral race, are promising movement on the west leg of the LRT and beyond. What is disappointing is the lack of infrastructure around alternative forms of travel in our communities and downtown; walking and cycling in this city can be challenging.
There is concern about a perceived crime increase, when all statistics show a continuing drop in crime rates. The current council approved a new bylaw and additional police officers in one of their last moves before the election campaign, but it still remains to be seen if the money for those officers or the bodies to fill those positions will be found.
As reported in Fast Forward last week, a major issue that needs addressing is accountability. Campaign financing regulations are largely non-existent, and the potential for corruption is enormous. Mayoral candidate Alnoor Kassam is the one contender making the biggest noise around accountability and ethics at city hall. There are questions, however, surrounding his escape from Kenya amidst fraud charges and his economic eviction of tenants with a rent increase of almost $2,000. Kassam says he was vindicated on the fraud charges at his immigration board hearing and that he offered free rent to his tenants for three months before the new rates took effect.
And through it all there is one lone voice in the electoral soup that is focusing on apathy, mayoral candidate Jeremy Zhao. So while all the bluster carries on about cars and roads and crime and infrastructure, it is fitting that nobody can hear Zhao through the din. Probably for the best; if we took an interest in our municipal affairs, what would we bitch about over the next round of drinks at a smoke-free bar?
Originally published in FFWD October 11, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
A civic election is upon us, and candidates for alderman and mayor are laying out the issues in a city overwhelmed. Transportation, development, the environment, crime and housing are all on the lips of potential municipal decision-makers, but does anyone even care? Based on the 19 per cent turnout rate in the previous election, the answer is no.
It is boring now to point out that we are in the midst of unparalleled growth, with our city facing enormous pressures due to an overheated economy and a population surge. It’s boring, but it’s true. This makes our choice of civic leaders all the more important. These people will be guiding development in our communities, closing streets in our downtown and coming to grips with our excessive environmental impact. They will manage our growth, open up green space and build our recreation centres. When the neighbours are pissing you off, it is their bylaws you turn to.
Last election we had one of the lowest voter turnouts in Canada. The one government that is the most accessible to us, that affects our lives more intimately than the provincial or federal versions, is the one that commands the least attention.
So far many of the campaigns for alderman and for mayor have focused on a select set of issues: transportation, housing, development, crime and the environment. There are other issues being raised, and some candidates who just rant incoherently (you know who you are), but almost every campaign lists these as priorities.
Our current city council has tackled all of these issues through the course of their present term, though with a checkered success rate. Homelessness and affordable housing are clearly growing out of control. Piecemeal solutions to shelter in the winter months have angered residents with not-in-my-backyard attitudes, and have provided only temporary relief to a situation that continues unabated. There has to be a commitment to solutions that last longer than a couple of months — like the recent conversion of the old Brick building on 16th Ave.
We need committed leadership in the realm of affordable housing. Mayor Bronconnier is promising incentives to private developers and rent supplements to those struggling with housing costs. This is not the recipe for a permanent solution to the housing crisis. There has to be pressure on the provincial government from all our civic leaders to impose rent controls and protect those on the edge from unreasonable rent increases. We need a council and mayor that realize we can’t simply build more affordable housing without addressing the issues that make the rest of our housing unaffordable.
Both the homelessness and housing issues would benefit from scrapping the ward system and instead electing councillors that answer to the city as a whole, and not communities focused on their own self-interest.
The environmental footprint of Calgary is an embarrassment that needs immediate remedy. Our sprawling suburbs and car-centric planning has gobbled up as much land as New York City, despite the fact we have over seven million less residents. Our infrastructure is taxed from servicing such a large area, while our emissions and energy consumption continue to rise in excess of our population growth. We need to focus on building up rather than continuously out. According to a recent report by the Calgary Foundation, 78 per cent of Calgarians use their car to get to work — not surprising considering the city’s layout.
Transportation is an important issue for this city. Roads are clogged with excess cars, construction can’t keep up, thousands move here every year and transit seems unable to match demand with drivers and routes. It is heartening that candidates, specifically in the mayoral race, are promising movement on the west leg of the LRT and beyond. What is disappointing is the lack of infrastructure around alternative forms of travel in our communities and downtown; walking and cycling in this city can be challenging.
There is concern about a perceived crime increase, when all statistics show a continuing drop in crime rates. The current council approved a new bylaw and additional police officers in one of their last moves before the election campaign, but it still remains to be seen if the money for those officers or the bodies to fill those positions will be found.
As reported in Fast Forward last week, a major issue that needs addressing is accountability. Campaign financing regulations are largely non-existent, and the potential for corruption is enormous. Mayoral candidate Alnoor Kassam is the one contender making the biggest noise around accountability and ethics at city hall. There are questions, however, surrounding his escape from Kenya amidst fraud charges and his economic eviction of tenants with a rent increase of almost $2,000. Kassam says he was vindicated on the fraud charges at his immigration board hearing and that he offered free rent to his tenants for three months before the new rates took effect.
And through it all there is one lone voice in the electoral soup that is focusing on apathy, mayoral candidate Jeremy Zhao. So while all the bluster carries on about cars and roads and crime and infrastructure, it is fitting that nobody can hear Zhao through the din. Probably for the best; if we took an interest in our municipal affairs, what would we bitch about over the next round of drinks at a smoke-free bar?
Oil change
Albertans hungry for a fair slice of our petrochemical pie
Originally published in FFWD October 4, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
There has been a great deal of debate, gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair since the provincial government-appointed panel on oil royalties released its report: Our Fair Share. Oil companies are dusting off their doomsday arguments, left over from past royalty reviews, while regular Albertans wait patiently for the government to answer the report sometime in October.
Premier Ed Stelmach, in an attempt to demonstrate his Conservative government’s commitment to transparency and democracy, convened the panel to avoid the government confronting the oil sector on its own; a clear step away from the shoot-from-the-hip, thoughtless and perpetually destructive style of the former leader. Now we see the kinder, gentler, wimpier leader, always looking for an excuse to act.
That excuse came out with a bang on Tuesday September 18, with the proposal (gasp) to increase the royalties paid out by multibillion dollar corporations to us lowly Albertans; or as the report succinctly defines us: owners. There would also be some royalty reductions for low-producing conventional oil and gas wells, but increases would be seen across the board. In all, if approved, the higher rates should mean an extra $1.9 billion for the province’s coffers annually.
It turns out we’ve been getting a bum deal for quite some time, though exactly how badly we’ve been ripped off can’t really be answered, because the government, apparently, isn’t doing such a good job of keeping track of things like that. What we do know for sure is that we are below Texas, Alaska, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Norway, the U.K.; well, just about everybody. With the increases, we would still be near the bottom of this list.
It surely doesn’t come as a surprise to anybody that the government in Alberta is cozy with the oil interests that dominate our economy, but surely there was the assumption that it was keeping track of it all; adding up the figures. It wasn’t, particularly in the tar sands. This also leads to a situation where the royalties that were supposed to be collected may not have been.
According to the report: “In clear language, it seems that achievement of expected, intended royalty collections falls short of the actual amounts collected.” In other words, the report’s authors think we lost out on even more money, but they don’t have accurate enough numbers to know for sure.
In a testament to the lack of transparency and the sense of entitlement endemic to the Alberta Conservative dynasty, the panel isn’t even sure, given the lack of pertinent data, how decisions are being made in the tar sands.
“How the administration or public leaders make informed decisions in this vital arena is open to question,” says the report. That’s a polite, government panel way of saying things are insanely messed up with relation to one of the largest and most environmentally destructive industrial developments in the world. This is unacceptable.
The panel also took issue with the fact the same government department (Alberta Energy) is responsible for “maximizing activity in the energy sector and also ensuring that Albertan’s receive their ‘fair share’ from energy development….” This is seen as a fundamental conflict of interest.
To hear the oil companies tell it, these increases would spell the end of the “patch.” Billions of investment dollars would pull out and head for other territories. It seems too obvious to point out that the cost of production in these other oil and gas producing jurisdictions is greater than it is here. As well, almost all, including Angola, Nigeria, even Mexico, lack Alberta’s political stability and quality publicly funded infrastructure.
There is one concern that may prove accurate, and one the panel itself acknowledges: development in the tar sands may slow down as a result of the increase in royalty payouts. The panel wasn’t sure why this was such a bad thing, and I’m sure most Albertans will agree.
It’s only natural that an industry accustomed to reaping enormous profit would decry losing some of that income, but it’s not credible. It will continue to profit handsomely. Even if costs continue to rise, these will be considered a business expense. The oil and gas industry in Alberta has the advantage of operating in an environment that is not only stable, but in the case of the tar sands provides no exploration risk. As stated in the report: “In Alberta, we already know where the deposits are.”
In terms of cost, the panel called for both the government and the industry to improve their reporting and accountability of what constitutes a true business expense. As it stands, the regulations governing appropriate costs are ineffective.
“…Albertans need and deserve much more information on how costs are accounted for, and verified, in this system,” according to the report. These costs, after all, remove money from royalty payments. This applies as much to expansion of operations as it does to the gold watch given to the foreman on his last day. I hardly think Albertans want to pay for that. Though if this government refuses to implement the recommendations laid out in the report, we could spring for a few more after the next election.
Originally published in FFWD October 4, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
There has been a great deal of debate, gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair since the provincial government-appointed panel on oil royalties released its report: Our Fair Share. Oil companies are dusting off their doomsday arguments, left over from past royalty reviews, while regular Albertans wait patiently for the government to answer the report sometime in October.
Premier Ed Stelmach, in an attempt to demonstrate his Conservative government’s commitment to transparency and democracy, convened the panel to avoid the government confronting the oil sector on its own; a clear step away from the shoot-from-the-hip, thoughtless and perpetually destructive style of the former leader. Now we see the kinder, gentler, wimpier leader, always looking for an excuse to act.
That excuse came out with a bang on Tuesday September 18, with the proposal (gasp) to increase the royalties paid out by multibillion dollar corporations to us lowly Albertans; or as the report succinctly defines us: owners. There would also be some royalty reductions for low-producing conventional oil and gas wells, but increases would be seen across the board. In all, if approved, the higher rates should mean an extra $1.9 billion for the province’s coffers annually.
It turns out we’ve been getting a bum deal for quite some time, though exactly how badly we’ve been ripped off can’t really be answered, because the government, apparently, isn’t doing such a good job of keeping track of things like that. What we do know for sure is that we are below Texas, Alaska, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Norway, the U.K.; well, just about everybody. With the increases, we would still be near the bottom of this list.
It surely doesn’t come as a surprise to anybody that the government in Alberta is cozy with the oil interests that dominate our economy, but surely there was the assumption that it was keeping track of it all; adding up the figures. It wasn’t, particularly in the tar sands. This also leads to a situation where the royalties that were supposed to be collected may not have been.
According to the report: “In clear language, it seems that achievement of expected, intended royalty collections falls short of the actual amounts collected.” In other words, the report’s authors think we lost out on even more money, but they don’t have accurate enough numbers to know for sure.
In a testament to the lack of transparency and the sense of entitlement endemic to the Alberta Conservative dynasty, the panel isn’t even sure, given the lack of pertinent data, how decisions are being made in the tar sands.
“How the administration or public leaders make informed decisions in this vital arena is open to question,” says the report. That’s a polite, government panel way of saying things are insanely messed up with relation to one of the largest and most environmentally destructive industrial developments in the world. This is unacceptable.
The panel also took issue with the fact the same government department (Alberta Energy) is responsible for “maximizing activity in the energy sector and also ensuring that Albertan’s receive their ‘fair share’ from energy development….” This is seen as a fundamental conflict of interest.
To hear the oil companies tell it, these increases would spell the end of the “patch.” Billions of investment dollars would pull out and head for other territories. It seems too obvious to point out that the cost of production in these other oil and gas producing jurisdictions is greater than it is here. As well, almost all, including Angola, Nigeria, even Mexico, lack Alberta’s political stability and quality publicly funded infrastructure.
There is one concern that may prove accurate, and one the panel itself acknowledges: development in the tar sands may slow down as a result of the increase in royalty payouts. The panel wasn’t sure why this was such a bad thing, and I’m sure most Albertans will agree.
It’s only natural that an industry accustomed to reaping enormous profit would decry losing some of that income, but it’s not credible. It will continue to profit handsomely. Even if costs continue to rise, these will be considered a business expense. The oil and gas industry in Alberta has the advantage of operating in an environment that is not only stable, but in the case of the tar sands provides no exploration risk. As stated in the report: “In Alberta, we already know where the deposits are.”
In terms of cost, the panel called for both the government and the industry to improve their reporting and accountability of what constitutes a true business expense. As it stands, the regulations governing appropriate costs are ineffective.
“…Albertans need and deserve much more information on how costs are accounted for, and verified, in this system,” according to the report. These costs, after all, remove money from royalty payments. This applies as much to expansion of operations as it does to the gold watch given to the foreman on his last day. I hardly think Albertans want to pay for that. Though if this government refuses to implement the recommendations laid out in the report, we could spring for a few more after the next election.
Drabinsky's Triple Sensation
Garth Drabinsky lets young hopefuls compete for cash and glory in Triple Sensation
Originally published in FFWD October 4, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Television
Garth Drabinsky is a story unto himself. He’s wanted by the law in the United States on fraud charges, and faces similar charges here in Canada. He is the creative force behind the Broadway musical Ragtime, the producer of The Changeling and has been cited as one of the reasons for the resurgence in Canadian theatre.
His latest challenge is to convince us that his new CBC reality show, Triple Sensation, is worth watching and not just a copy of the uninspired dribble that too often graces our small screens.
Sitting in Catch, and speaking in a deep New York accent, Drabinsky proves three things over lunch: he’s charming, he’s passionate about his latest project and he’s not just mimicking “other shows.”
“They’ve bastardized the whole idea of what this sort of television could be,” he says, never once referring to other reality shows by name.
Triple Sensation follows a familiar premise: travel Canada holding auditions to look for talent that will compete for a prize. It is different on a few levels, however. The title refers to the fact that participants must be able to sing, act and dance and do it all extremely well. There is also a strong focus on training and growth of the performers, without the unnecessary cruelty seen on other reality shows.
Drabinsky was determined from the outset to present Canadian talent and not make a show that is intended to denigrate its participants or to promise them a fleeting moment in the spotlight. “It’s not that the panel pulls any punches. We’re rigorously honest in our assessment of the kids’ talent, but not mean in the process. Constructive criticism you learn from, constructive criticism is enlightening. Constructive criticism, in fact, can be very entertaining,” he says. “It’s not about making some profoundly inflammatory comment, baseless often, just for the sake of thinking that’s good television I don’t think that’s good television.”
The prize for the winner of the show is also something that sets it apart. Rather than promising fame, the winner gets a scholarship worth $150,000 for the institution of their choice — in other words, more training. “The only way to have longevity and be able to sustain a career creatively and economically is hard work, nothing short of hard work,” he says. “The scholarship is also part of the nobility of the show. I don’t dangle a walk-on part on Broadway. I say, ‘Here, I’m going to help you become greater. I’m going to let you study anywhere in the world that you want to study, but I want you to come back to Canada, and I want Canadian audiences, and ultimately world audiences, to stand and cheer for just who you are.’”
Drabinsky has managed to coax some big names onto his jury, and the cream of the performing arts crop to be trainers of the chosen few selected from thousands of initial hopefuls. The jury (or marquee panel as it’s called) consists of Marvin Hamlisch, Cynthia Dale, Adrian Noble, Sergio Trujillo and, of course, Drabinksy.
Once the field is narrowed to 12 competitors, they will be housed in the National Ballet building and trained by elite coaches from institutions like Julliard, the Metropolitan Opera and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Even the acting coach for Brad Pitt and Hillary Swank has a turn with the competitors. “This (the training) represents the only way you can be great in the performing arts, not an ephemeral moment of instant stardom, whatever it is the other shows try to give. One moment you’re something and the next moment you’re serving coffee at Starbucks,” he says.
Our waitress engages in a few playful exchanges with the producer, still unsure, but opening up about her piano playing, singing and tap dancing. She has stage fright, though. It seems too perfect, but Drabinsky insists she’s not a plant. You just know a performer when you see one, he says.
There is no doubt that Drabinsky, though usually behind the stage or the camera, is a performer himself, travelling across Canada convincing skeptical journalists of his show’s merit. He does a pretty good job.
One thing is clear — this show represents a truly Canadian attitude towards how we should showcase and cultivate young performers and not, as Drabinsky puts it, “make a mockery of the talent.”
Originally published in FFWD October 4, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Television
Garth Drabinsky is a story unto himself. He’s wanted by the law in the United States on fraud charges, and faces similar charges here in Canada. He is the creative force behind the Broadway musical Ragtime, the producer of The Changeling and has been cited as one of the reasons for the resurgence in Canadian theatre.
His latest challenge is to convince us that his new CBC reality show, Triple Sensation, is worth watching and not just a copy of the uninspired dribble that too often graces our small screens.
Sitting in Catch, and speaking in a deep New York accent, Drabinsky proves three things over lunch: he’s charming, he’s passionate about his latest project and he’s not just mimicking “other shows.”
“They’ve bastardized the whole idea of what this sort of television could be,” he says, never once referring to other reality shows by name.
Triple Sensation follows a familiar premise: travel Canada holding auditions to look for talent that will compete for a prize. It is different on a few levels, however. The title refers to the fact that participants must be able to sing, act and dance and do it all extremely well. There is also a strong focus on training and growth of the performers, without the unnecessary cruelty seen on other reality shows.
Drabinsky was determined from the outset to present Canadian talent and not make a show that is intended to denigrate its participants or to promise them a fleeting moment in the spotlight. “It’s not that the panel pulls any punches. We’re rigorously honest in our assessment of the kids’ talent, but not mean in the process. Constructive criticism you learn from, constructive criticism is enlightening. Constructive criticism, in fact, can be very entertaining,” he says. “It’s not about making some profoundly inflammatory comment, baseless often, just for the sake of thinking that’s good television I don’t think that’s good television.”
The prize for the winner of the show is also something that sets it apart. Rather than promising fame, the winner gets a scholarship worth $150,000 for the institution of their choice — in other words, more training. “The only way to have longevity and be able to sustain a career creatively and economically is hard work, nothing short of hard work,” he says. “The scholarship is also part of the nobility of the show. I don’t dangle a walk-on part on Broadway. I say, ‘Here, I’m going to help you become greater. I’m going to let you study anywhere in the world that you want to study, but I want you to come back to Canada, and I want Canadian audiences, and ultimately world audiences, to stand and cheer for just who you are.’”
Drabinsky has managed to coax some big names onto his jury, and the cream of the performing arts crop to be trainers of the chosen few selected from thousands of initial hopefuls. The jury (or marquee panel as it’s called) consists of Marvin Hamlisch, Cynthia Dale, Adrian Noble, Sergio Trujillo and, of course, Drabinksy.
Once the field is narrowed to 12 competitors, they will be housed in the National Ballet building and trained by elite coaches from institutions like Julliard, the Metropolitan Opera and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Even the acting coach for Brad Pitt and Hillary Swank has a turn with the competitors. “This (the training) represents the only way you can be great in the performing arts, not an ephemeral moment of instant stardom, whatever it is the other shows try to give. One moment you’re something and the next moment you’re serving coffee at Starbucks,” he says.
Our waitress engages in a few playful exchanges with the producer, still unsure, but opening up about her piano playing, singing and tap dancing. She has stage fright, though. It seems too perfect, but Drabinsky insists she’s not a plant. You just know a performer when you see one, he says.
There is no doubt that Drabinsky, though usually behind the stage or the camera, is a performer himself, travelling across Canada convincing skeptical journalists of his show’s merit. He does a pretty good job.
One thing is clear — this show represents a truly Canadian attitude towards how we should showcase and cultivate young performers and not, as Drabinsky puts it, “make a mockery of the talent.”
Cyber-store
Community Cloth gives indie designers their own online boutique
Initially published in FFWD October 11, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Fashion
At 25, David Robert is young, but certainly not lazy. A web designer by trade, Robert has spent a good 480 hours of his own time over the last year or so designing a website intended for, well, designers — the clothing variety.
Community Cloth is a new Calgary-based website that, once complete, will host pages for independent fashion designers in the United States and Canada. It is intended as a place where those interested in obscure designers can find unique pieces and buy them in a stylish cyber-atmosphere, and where those same independent designers can find clients and boutiques.
The idea was hatched when Robert was helping his mother on a project for the children’s clothing store she used to operate in Kensington. “I was working on a few things for her and noticed all of the designers that were supplying her store didn’t have very good sites,” he says. But it’s not just the kid’s designers that are lacking an online style.
“Some designers have MySpace pages or Facebook pages and if they want to sell their clothes, they sell them on ebay. It’s the worst process and it’s ugly.”
Since coming to the realization that there was an opening in the market, it took two years before Robert began to put his ideas into motion. “I woke up one day and had an idea for the branding of the site and for me that just starts everything, a visual motivator.”
Designers will have the opportunity to set up their own page on the site, complete with pictures and logos, links and customer ratings. There will be a store that sells all wares featured on the site that will have a unique advantage over other online shopping venues. Robert and his two compatriots are working on something called a fitting tool which, once complete, will allow shoppers to profile their body on the site and go shopping for items by fit — one innovation designed to bypass the obvious issues associated with shopping on a screen rather than in person.
“We haven’t made a working concept, it’s just calculations and mock-ups, but essentially you would be able to create, without a tape measure, your body’s profile. Then what you can do, if you’re searching for a pair of jeans, because jeans are impossible to fit, you would be able to search for jeans that fit you instead of searching for jeans that are low-rise, 32, boot-cut,” he says.
A second concept that will be used to ensure a good shopping experience is sample material with stitching and button samples provided by each designer as a mark of their craftsmanship.
The first phase of the site will be up and running before the end of the month and will feature street fashion photos uploaded by guests on the site. There will be space for commentary on the styles either of individuals or designers clothing with the intent to create interest in the site and independent fashion. “What we’re launching this fall is basically editorial and user-contributed articles and user-contributed street fashion photos,” says Robert.
Currently the site has a stable of 30 interested designers, nine of which are from Calgary. The target, however, is 500 by the time the site is fully functional, something Robert thinks is doable. “Every time we get in touch with a designer, they’re excited about it because there’s nothing out there right now,” he says.
The site has already hosted one street fashion show on an underpass walkway downtown, and may be hosting a Plus-15 show in February if all goes according to plan. With a site dedicated to independent designers, the hope is that Calgary’s fashion scene will continue to expand. “Personally, I’m really concentrating on Calgary and trying to work with what’s around right now,” says Robert. “Calgary’s fashion scene is growing really fast.”
Initially published in FFWD October 11, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Fashion
At 25, David Robert is young, but certainly not lazy. A web designer by trade, Robert has spent a good 480 hours of his own time over the last year or so designing a website intended for, well, designers — the clothing variety.
Community Cloth is a new Calgary-based website that, once complete, will host pages for independent fashion designers in the United States and Canada. It is intended as a place where those interested in obscure designers can find unique pieces and buy them in a stylish cyber-atmosphere, and where those same independent designers can find clients and boutiques.
The idea was hatched when Robert was helping his mother on a project for the children’s clothing store she used to operate in Kensington. “I was working on a few things for her and noticed all of the designers that were supplying her store didn’t have very good sites,” he says. But it’s not just the kid’s designers that are lacking an online style.
“Some designers have MySpace pages or Facebook pages and if they want to sell their clothes, they sell them on ebay. It’s the worst process and it’s ugly.”
Since coming to the realization that there was an opening in the market, it took two years before Robert began to put his ideas into motion. “I woke up one day and had an idea for the branding of the site and for me that just starts everything, a visual motivator.”
Designers will have the opportunity to set up their own page on the site, complete with pictures and logos, links and customer ratings. There will be a store that sells all wares featured on the site that will have a unique advantage over other online shopping venues. Robert and his two compatriots are working on something called a fitting tool which, once complete, will allow shoppers to profile their body on the site and go shopping for items by fit — one innovation designed to bypass the obvious issues associated with shopping on a screen rather than in person.
“We haven’t made a working concept, it’s just calculations and mock-ups, but essentially you would be able to create, without a tape measure, your body’s profile. Then what you can do, if you’re searching for a pair of jeans, because jeans are impossible to fit, you would be able to search for jeans that fit you instead of searching for jeans that are low-rise, 32, boot-cut,” he says.
A second concept that will be used to ensure a good shopping experience is sample material with stitching and button samples provided by each designer as a mark of their craftsmanship.
The first phase of the site will be up and running before the end of the month and will feature street fashion photos uploaded by guests on the site. There will be space for commentary on the styles either of individuals or designers clothing with the intent to create interest in the site and independent fashion. “What we’re launching this fall is basically editorial and user-contributed articles and user-contributed street fashion photos,” says Robert.
Currently the site has a stable of 30 interested designers, nine of which are from Calgary. The target, however, is 500 by the time the site is fully functional, something Robert thinks is doable. “Every time we get in touch with a designer, they’re excited about it because there’s nothing out there right now,” he says.
The site has already hosted one street fashion show on an underpass walkway downtown, and may be hosting a Plus-15 show in February if all goes according to plan. With a site dedicated to independent designers, the hope is that Calgary’s fashion scene will continue to expand. “Personally, I’m really concentrating on Calgary and trying to work with what’s around right now,” says Robert. “Calgary’s fashion scene is growing really fast.”
Friday, September 28, 2007
Nuclear debate on wrong track
‘Clean’ energy source doing ‘dirty’ work
Originally published in FFWD September 13, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
On the same day the Calgary Herald ran a front-page story on Energy Alberta Corp. applying for a licence to build Western Canada’s first nuclear reactor, it also ran a short story, tucked into the back of the front section, detailing lingering fallout issues in Finland stemming from the Chernobyl disaster more than 20 years ago.
Over the course of the next couple of days, there was debate around the positive and negative implications of going nuclear, but the debate was on the wrong track right from the beginning. It is premature to discuss the issues of clean power and environmental sensitivities in relation to the plant. Rather, it is the issue of where that energy is going, and for what purpose, that ought to be the initial focus of dialogue.
Energy Alberta is seeking a permit from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to build two twin Candu ACR-1000 reactors on Lake Cardinal, just west of Peace River. The cost of the project is estimated to be $6.2 billion, though nuclear development is notorious for cost overruns. According to Energy Alberta president and co-chairman Wayne Henuset, 70 per cent of the energy (2,200 megawatts from the first reactor alone) produced by the facility will go to an unspecified corporate customer, most likely a tar sands operator.
Debate so far has focused on the costs and benefits of nuclear power, specifically as it relates to the environment. Some claim nuclear energy is the cleanest solution to meet our energy needs, while others say it is a lesser-of-two-evils solution and leaves a toxic legacy in its wake. There are valid arguments on both sides. While nuclear energy does not produce carbon emissions through its production of energy, it still generates harmful waste that lingers for millennia, and the reactor drinks enormous amounts of water. The true debate, however, is how far we want tar sand development to progress and at what cost.
Development is now leading debate in this province rather than the more rational direction of debate leading development. It is often difficult to see the long-term repercussions of the decisions that we make, but this is not one of those times. There are already immense problems in the northern communities that border the tar sands: insufficient infrastructure, lack of housing, health problems and environmental degradation on par with the worst the rest of the world has to offer. According to the government of Alberta, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
While the tar sands cover an area twice the size of New Brunswick, only around 10 per cent of the resource has been exploited to date. While in 2005 the tar sands produced 966,000 barrels of oil per day, the provincial government forecasts three million barrels per day by 2020 and five million by 2030.
What are we going to do with the majority of that supposedly clean power spewing out of the nuclear reactors? We are going to dig up more earth and inject steam deep into crevices to produce more oil to feed the North American petroleum diet.
Albertans are being asked to risk nuclear power — the potential costs, the toxic waste and the jitters that accompany a power plant that could kill a great number of us if not managed properly — all for the benefit of another tar sands operator reaping billions in profits. Regular Albertans will only get 30 per cent of the energy, but will have to bear all of the social costs that accompany it.
Once we decide whether we want to expand tar sands development to the point where pit mines and tailing ponds cover the full extent of Alberta’s deposits — 140,200 square kilometres underlying boreal forest — then finally, the debate can turn to whether we want nuclear energy to power it.
Originally published in FFWD September 13, 2007 by Drew Anderson in Viewpoint
On the same day the Calgary Herald ran a front-page story on Energy Alberta Corp. applying for a licence to build Western Canada’s first nuclear reactor, it also ran a short story, tucked into the back of the front section, detailing lingering fallout issues in Finland stemming from the Chernobyl disaster more than 20 years ago.
Over the course of the next couple of days, there was debate around the positive and negative implications of going nuclear, but the debate was on the wrong track right from the beginning. It is premature to discuss the issues of clean power and environmental sensitivities in relation to the plant. Rather, it is the issue of where that energy is going, and for what purpose, that ought to be the initial focus of dialogue.
Energy Alberta is seeking a permit from the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission to build two twin Candu ACR-1000 reactors on Lake Cardinal, just west of Peace River. The cost of the project is estimated to be $6.2 billion, though nuclear development is notorious for cost overruns. According to Energy Alberta president and co-chairman Wayne Henuset, 70 per cent of the energy (2,200 megawatts from the first reactor alone) produced by the facility will go to an unspecified corporate customer, most likely a tar sands operator.
Debate so far has focused on the costs and benefits of nuclear power, specifically as it relates to the environment. Some claim nuclear energy is the cleanest solution to meet our energy needs, while others say it is a lesser-of-two-evils solution and leaves a toxic legacy in its wake. There are valid arguments on both sides. While nuclear energy does not produce carbon emissions through its production of energy, it still generates harmful waste that lingers for millennia, and the reactor drinks enormous amounts of water. The true debate, however, is how far we want tar sand development to progress and at what cost.
Development is now leading debate in this province rather than the more rational direction of debate leading development. It is often difficult to see the long-term repercussions of the decisions that we make, but this is not one of those times. There are already immense problems in the northern communities that border the tar sands: insufficient infrastructure, lack of housing, health problems and environmental degradation on par with the worst the rest of the world has to offer. According to the government of Alberta, this is only the tip of the iceberg.
While the tar sands cover an area twice the size of New Brunswick, only around 10 per cent of the resource has been exploited to date. While in 2005 the tar sands produced 966,000 barrels of oil per day, the provincial government forecasts three million barrels per day by 2020 and five million by 2030.
What are we going to do with the majority of that supposedly clean power spewing out of the nuclear reactors? We are going to dig up more earth and inject steam deep into crevices to produce more oil to feed the North American petroleum diet.
Albertans are being asked to risk nuclear power — the potential costs, the toxic waste and the jitters that accompany a power plant that could kill a great number of us if not managed properly — all for the benefit of another tar sands operator reaping billions in profits. Regular Albertans will only get 30 per cent of the energy, but will have to bear all of the social costs that accompany it.
Once we decide whether we want to expand tar sands development to the point where pit mines and tailing ponds cover the full extent of Alberta’s deposits — 140,200 square kilometres underlying boreal forest — then finally, the debate can turn to whether we want nuclear energy to power it.
Cops at the core
Seeing Calgary’s downtown through police eyes
Originally published September 20, 2007 in FFWD by Drew Anderson in City
On September 10, Calgary city council unanimously approved a motion by Mayor Dave Bronconnier that called for an increased police presence in the downtown core and Beltline. His plan, which still must go through budget negotiations, would see 25 new bylaw officers, 10 new police officers and possibly closed-circuit cameras on the downtown beat — known as District One to the police that call this area their workplace.
Riding through the darkened streets of the district with Constables Gord Denison and Roland Stewart is like looking at your city through a television camera. The streets you ride on, walk past or drive by seem a little more menacing through the perceptive eyes of the police.
Police maintain a fine balance, acting as punishers and guardians, disciplinarians and social workers, a balance played out in every individual encounter and at the discretion of the officers. Sometimes that discretion is good, and sometimes it’s bad.
Before the van even leaves the alley behind police headquarters on Sixth Ave. and First St. S.E., a call comes over the radio about an assault — something about pepper spray. In less than 10 minutes the van pulls into an alley behind the bottle depot on Ninth Ave. S.E. in Inglewood and finds a distraught man, with a sore face, angrily moving shopping carts around. In a turf dispute, he has trespassed from his alley home into a nearby yard and gotten dosed for it.
Crime rates have been dropping across Canada for a few years now and Calgary is no different. According to Statistics Canada, the national crime rate hit a 25-year low in 2006, largely due to a drop in non-violent crime. Alberta witnessed one of the largest drops in the country at five per cent from 2005. Total drug crimes across the country increased by two per cent.
Steward and Denison have a keen eye and a deep understanding of what happens — who knows who and what looks out of the ordinary — on streets where everything appears to fit that description.
A suspicious car passes the paddy wagon on a seedy stretch of 14th Ave. Just east of Fourth St., Steward notices a passenger not wearing a shirt, unusual given the low-teen temperature on this late-summer night. After a quick U-turn, the van is speeding down the narrow street to find the vehicle, now pulled over and with its occupants hunching below the head rests. Soon, the trunk of the police car is littered with the tools of the trade: a homemade crack pipe, butane, bent spoons, needles, a car antennae (perfect as a whipping weapon) and an empty Tylenol container — a typical haul for the area according to the officers.
There are no actual drugs, and after issuing some tickets to the occupants, they are let allowed to drive away, only to be stopped a few blocks later when the car is reported stolen. Apparently the driver’s sister is not as generous as the man led officers to believe.
“It’s frustrating,” says Denison at the end of the night. “The courts don’t take the drugs seriously.” Both partners agree that the revolving door they see operate between the street and the courts is the least enjoyable part of their job.
At the Calgary Remand Centre, issues of overcrowding are putting a strain on the justice system. Recently, a man convicted of sexual assault of a minor was released upon sentencing after his time served in remand was measured as three times the length it would be in a regular prison. The credit was based on the overcrowded conditions of the centre, where three men are often crammed into rooms designed for two. Based on this calculation, the man had already surpassed his sentence.
This isn’t the only place in the city with a space crunch. At 11:30 p.m., the Calgary Drop-In Centre is at capacity, with men sleeping shoulder to shoulder on makeshift mattresses on the floor. The officers are there to wake up a man missing from the Rockyview General Hospital psychiatric ward; they say to stay close. There are people out front, waiting for a bed, sleeping on the ground. A man shivers on the concrete, but it’s impossible to tell if it’s because of the air temperature.
Halfway to the hospital, the officers are told the psychiatric patient has actually been discharged and it’s back to the Drop-In Centre, where his bed is, luckily, still available.
After a spate of violence in August, and with a civic election campaign right around the corner, crime has become a major issue in the city and, therefore, local politics. A new police chief, Rick Hanson, was named on September 10, coinciding with the approval of the new bylaw and police officers.
Spending four hours with Constables Steward and Denison, there are no arrests, no handcuffs, no fights, no serious crimes; their job almost seems like a dangerous, beefed-up, gun-toting hall patrol. Both men say their primary job is driving around and looking for stuff, keeping an eye out in case something does happen or a suspicious car drives by.
“Where are we supposed to put these guys?” asks Denison after calming the early evening turf war in the Inglewood alley, reflecting a general frustration with the city’s homelessness problem and an inability to stamp out crime. Whether it is in the downtown, the Beltline, Ramsay or Inglewood, the officers agree they are just pushing the problem from one area to another and back again.
Originally published September 20, 2007 in FFWD by Drew Anderson in City
On September 10, Calgary city council unanimously approved a motion by Mayor Dave Bronconnier that called for an increased police presence in the downtown core and Beltline. His plan, which still must go through budget negotiations, would see 25 new bylaw officers, 10 new police officers and possibly closed-circuit cameras on the downtown beat — known as District One to the police that call this area their workplace.
Riding through the darkened streets of the district with Constables Gord Denison and Roland Stewart is like looking at your city through a television camera. The streets you ride on, walk past or drive by seem a little more menacing through the perceptive eyes of the police.
Police maintain a fine balance, acting as punishers and guardians, disciplinarians and social workers, a balance played out in every individual encounter and at the discretion of the officers. Sometimes that discretion is good, and sometimes it’s bad.
Before the van even leaves the alley behind police headquarters on Sixth Ave. and First St. S.E., a call comes over the radio about an assault — something about pepper spray. In less than 10 minutes the van pulls into an alley behind the bottle depot on Ninth Ave. S.E. in Inglewood and finds a distraught man, with a sore face, angrily moving shopping carts around. In a turf dispute, he has trespassed from his alley home into a nearby yard and gotten dosed for it.
Crime rates have been dropping across Canada for a few years now and Calgary is no different. According to Statistics Canada, the national crime rate hit a 25-year low in 2006, largely due to a drop in non-violent crime. Alberta witnessed one of the largest drops in the country at five per cent from 2005. Total drug crimes across the country increased by two per cent.
Steward and Denison have a keen eye and a deep understanding of what happens — who knows who and what looks out of the ordinary — on streets where everything appears to fit that description.
A suspicious car passes the paddy wagon on a seedy stretch of 14th Ave. Just east of Fourth St., Steward notices a passenger not wearing a shirt, unusual given the low-teen temperature on this late-summer night. After a quick U-turn, the van is speeding down the narrow street to find the vehicle, now pulled over and with its occupants hunching below the head rests. Soon, the trunk of the police car is littered with the tools of the trade: a homemade crack pipe, butane, bent spoons, needles, a car antennae (perfect as a whipping weapon) and an empty Tylenol container — a typical haul for the area according to the officers.
There are no actual drugs, and after issuing some tickets to the occupants, they are let allowed to drive away, only to be stopped a few blocks later when the car is reported stolen. Apparently the driver’s sister is not as generous as the man led officers to believe.
“It’s frustrating,” says Denison at the end of the night. “The courts don’t take the drugs seriously.” Both partners agree that the revolving door they see operate between the street and the courts is the least enjoyable part of their job.
At the Calgary Remand Centre, issues of overcrowding are putting a strain on the justice system. Recently, a man convicted of sexual assault of a minor was released upon sentencing after his time served in remand was measured as three times the length it would be in a regular prison. The credit was based on the overcrowded conditions of the centre, where three men are often crammed into rooms designed for two. Based on this calculation, the man had already surpassed his sentence.
This isn’t the only place in the city with a space crunch. At 11:30 p.m., the Calgary Drop-In Centre is at capacity, with men sleeping shoulder to shoulder on makeshift mattresses on the floor. The officers are there to wake up a man missing from the Rockyview General Hospital psychiatric ward; they say to stay close. There are people out front, waiting for a bed, sleeping on the ground. A man shivers on the concrete, but it’s impossible to tell if it’s because of the air temperature.
Halfway to the hospital, the officers are told the psychiatric patient has actually been discharged and it’s back to the Drop-In Centre, where his bed is, luckily, still available.
After a spate of violence in August, and with a civic election campaign right around the corner, crime has become a major issue in the city and, therefore, local politics. A new police chief, Rick Hanson, was named on September 10, coinciding with the approval of the new bylaw and police officers.
Spending four hours with Constables Steward and Denison, there are no arrests, no handcuffs, no fights, no serious crimes; their job almost seems like a dangerous, beefed-up, gun-toting hall patrol. Both men say their primary job is driving around and looking for stuff, keeping an eye out in case something does happen or a suspicious car drives by.
“Where are we supposed to put these guys?” asks Denison after calming the early evening turf war in the Inglewood alley, reflecting a general frustration with the city’s homelessness problem and an inability to stamp out crime. Whether it is in the downtown, the Beltline, Ramsay or Inglewood, the officers agree they are just pushing the problem from one area to another and back again.
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