Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz says there's no need for an audit of the latest city mega-million-dollar boondoggle---the project to convert the downtown post office into a new police headquarters. Everything you need to know about the reason for the huge cost overruns was explained in a report to his executive policy committee in December, he says. Russ Wyatt, chairman of city council's finance committee, says there's no need for an audit of the latest city mega-million-dollar boondoggle. It's too expensive, he says, and for what ? It will only say exactly what the audit of the project to build four new firehalls said---that the city's chief administrative officer (since departed) was incompetent. Councillor Brian Mayes, a member of EPC, says there's no need for an audit of the latest city mega-million-dollar boondoggle because it's much ado about nothing. "What we're really looking at here is 12 or 13 percent overrun ... most of it ...
The origin of the Usher of the Black Rod goes back to early fourteenth century England . Today, with no royal duties to perform, the Usher knocks on the doors of the House of Commons with the Black Rod at the start of Parliament to summon the members. The rod is a symbol for the authority of debate in the upper house. We of The Black Rod adopted the symbol to knock some sense and the right questions into the heads of Legislators, pundits, and other opinion makers.