The Black Rod

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...

Justin Trudeau has delivered the kiss of death to the Manitoba Liberal Party. With a new leader and a successful annual general meeting under their belts, the Party had surged up the polls to heights unheard of since 1995. At 23 percent of popular support in the March poll by Probe Research, the Liberals were barking at the ankles of the ruling NDP (28 percent), a far cry from their 7.5 percent showing in the last provincial election (2011). Then Trudeau announced in May that the federal Liberals were henceforth the official pro-abortion party of Canada and anyone opposing abortion was an enemy of the state. Poof.   Support for the Manitoba Liberals dropped seven percentage points by the June polling. (And even that was bolstered by the anomaly of 28 percent support in Southwest Winnipeg.) The bright horizon predicted for Liberals under Leader Rana Bokhari suddenly became a pipe dream, with another trip to the sub-basement of political hell more...

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...

There's something fishy going on with the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, and we can't put our finger on what it is. Let's start with the bogus "news" story in the Winnipeg Free Press, the propaganda arm of the CMHR, that Canadian realtors "have come up with a $2 million donation." There's no byline so we don't know who wrote the story, but whoever it was,  he or she had to struggle mightily with the facts to devise a story that implies something false without lying outright. Someone with only a cursory interest in the CMHR would read the story and come away thinking the Canadian Real Estate Association had raised $2 million and donated it to the still-unopened museum.  That's what the Free Press wants you to think. But reading a little closer you see that the realtors' fundraising campaign started in 2008. In truth, then, it took them six years to raise $2 million. And their donation is not new money . I...

The Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra headed for a concert at New York's Carnegie Hall with all the hype and hoopla of the Titanic leaving port on its maiden voyage. Bon voyage! The WSO was one of six North American orchestras invited to perform at this year's  Spring For Music festival.  Here's how the event pitches itself: Spring For Music provides an idealized laboratory, free of the normal marketing and financial constraints, for an orchestra to be truly creative with programs that are interesting, provocative and stimulating, and that reflect its beliefs, its standards, and vision. Spring For Music believes that an orchestra’s fundamental obligation is to lead and not follow taste. Okay. Whatever. We're in. On Saturday, the Winnipeg Free Press devoted a full page and a bit to recap the WSO's May 8 appearance in The Big Apple.  As we peeled away layer after layer of hometown hooey, we thought can it get any sadder than this? Reporter ...

Brian Bowman is a true son of his generation. Without a lick of experience at City Hall, this Gen X-er believes he should start at the top, as Mayor. To compensate for knowing nothing about the job he wants, he says he will provide the city with "leadership."   Now, ordinarily this would be greeted with oohs and ahhs from an electorate that's seen the city reel from one scandal to another under Mayor Sam Katz and those councillors who blindly support him on executive policy committee. But seeing as how all the mayoral candidates will likely play the leadership card, how does Bowman stand out? Tuesday morning, before filing his papers to run for mayor, 42-year-old Bowman, a lawyer, showed up on Charles Adler's morning talk show where he expanded on his idea of leadership.  One word. Vision. Yep, Bowman is running on the vision thing.   'Vision' is the code word among the Ivory Tower elite for the rich man's burde...

We're baaaaaaack. Where were we?    We went where no reporters have gone before -- back in time. And we returned with the scoop -- the truth behind the real causes of climate change and the cause of the climactic havoc that's engulfed the world. "Freak storms, massive droughts, killer hurricanes..." "What's causing this crazy weather?" we asked, and so did Maclean's magazine.    In its New Year's '66  issue.    The one with the cover story Naming the Outstanding Canadians of 1965. Sixty-five had been bad. Real bad. Ten inches of snow on Sydney, Nova Scotia (when they still had inches). Rainmakers called in to help the parched Ottawa Valley. New York City banning the "unnecessary" flushing of toilets to preserve water. But so much rain on Quebec that housewives, (when they still had housewives) formed societies against artificial rainmaking. Ontario set all-time low temperatures in August. C...

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...