The Black Rod

What a week!   There were so many stories breaking last week that we could hardly sit down to write about one when another came whizzing up.    We were so exhausted trying to keep up that we had to take the weekend off in Costa Rica to catch our breaths.    We were working 90 percent of the time, honest. Without further ado, let's try to catch up...starting with Forensic Files: Winnipeg Style. Can you believe it?    The former Mayor of Winnipeg and his best friend, once the most powerful civil servant in the city, have lawyered up and are waiting to be charged by the RCMP with taking kickbacks.    The pool on the day of the perp walk starts now. We've got March 31. Details of the building case against ex-mayor Sam Katz and his pal Phil Sheegl are contained in applications for RCMP search warrants, which have been widely reported.    Robert Tapper, Katz's and Sheegl's mouthpiece, has added additional incriminating info...

The looting of Winnipeg started almost as soon as Phil Sheegl got on the city payroll. And it lasted almost until the day he quit. That's the cold truth you're left with after reading the latest audit presented to city hall, an audit of five years of real estate deals conducted by the city under Sheegl's watch. Phil Sheegl, the best friend of Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz, was hired in April, 2008, as the director of the city's department of planning, property and development. In  November, 2008, he was appointed deputy Chief Administrative Officer, and in 2011 he replaced Glen Laubenstein as CAO. Three months after Sheegl got the planning job, the city announced it was looking for real estate advisors and brokers to "assist the city with real estate transactions".  They eventually qualified five. "In the transactions where an external advisor was retained, there was no documentation explaining the rationale why an external adv...

Like the guilty fugitive trying to outrun the law, Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz can almost feel the hot breath of the bloodhounds on his neck. With each passing day the pressure grows for a police investigation of the looting of the city under Katz's terms of office. The public is seething with anger. Whether in private conversations, Internet comments, or twitter, the message is the same -- where are the cops?  Won't anybody stop this corruption? Katz was feeling the heat in spades at Wednesday's special council meeting to chew on the EY (Ernst and Young) audit of five years of city real estate deals. His Sweet-Sam-smile was replaced with a face fixed in pure hate, teeth drawn back in a psychopathic grin that fooled no one. Mayor Sam launched a condescending attack on the EY auditors who highlighted his pal Phil Sheegl's involvement in one shady deal after another.  He attacked city auditor Brian Whiteside, who, you'll remember, refused to join Sheeg...

Sam Katz didn't decide not to run for another term as mayor because he wanted to spend more time with his family.  Puh-lease . Wasn't there another cliche he could use? And he didn't decide because of some off-the-cuff comment four years ago, that nobody remembered,  to serve only two terms. Hey, this was the guy who lied outright to get elected in 2010 by painting himself as  the defender of elderly and poor homeowners, only to stab them in the back as soon as he got re-elected by raising their property taxes and promising annual increases from here until forever.  Breaking his word was like breathing air. Effortless. And he didn't decide not to run because he was afraid he might lose to a North End baba whose entire work life has been spent as an NDP hack. He trounced her once before and in an election over who was hated more by taxpayers, him or the NDP, he still held a slight edge over the NDP's candidate. And he didn't walk awa...

When it comes to electing a mayor, nothing says a city is dynamic, bold, and thriving like a stara baba collecting an old-age pension. This week Judy Wasylycia-Leis, 63 in August,  announced her second run at the mayor's job. She still has zero experience at City Hall, still marches to the orders of the NDP, collects two retirement pensions and would be getting a third, her old age security cheque, if Mayor. Do you feel the excitement, yet? Despite getting trounced by Sam Katz in the mayoral election four years ago, JWL thinks her campaign the second time around needs only minor tinkering.  Most specifically, she doesn't have to pretend to be apologetic for promising higher taxes. Katz handily defeated JWL by at least paying lip service to protecting seniors and low-income homeowners from her promised tax hikes. Of course, it turns out he was either lying or ..., well, lying, because the first thing he did after re-election was sta...

Every year the Mayor delivers a State of the City address to the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce.  And every year a transcript is published on the Internet. So, of course, given that, as usual, our invitation to the event was lost in the mail,  we went looking for the Mayor's address on the Web. Imagine our shock. This was the State of the City address? It was a measley five paragraphs long.  It read as if it was cribbed from a city travel brochure. It looked like the Mayor dashed it off at the last minute on a sheet of toilet paper while sitting on the crapper. Winnipeg is great, it's got a zoo, and some American stores, and (a white elephant, aka) a human rights museum, said Mayor Sam Katz. And there's some theatres, and restaurants, and a convention centre and "optimistic spirit." Okay? Gotta run ... According to reporters, Katz padded his delivery with extemporaneous comments about frozen water pipes, a pledge by Kins...