Sorry, Clark doesn’t ‘deserve’ to be handed a free seat

I’m not one of those who gets all sentimental about Christy Clark “deserving” a seat in the B.C. Legislature.

Clark announced Wednesday she will run in a by-election in Westside-Kelowna, and some people think the other parties should step aside and let her win by acclamation.

Such a grand gesture would save the taxpayers some money but, democratically speaking, it would be foolish.

According to Todd Stone, the decision of Liberal Ben Stewart to resign the seat he just handily won, in order to give Clark a safe shot at election, is the “honorable thing” to do.

Any of the Liberals elected May 14 would do the same thing, he said.

Well, not quite. Ralph Sultan, who won re-election in West Vancouver-Capilano by the biggest margin of any Liberal, was quoted by CBC shortly after election night that he would not voluntarily give up his seat for Clark. It will be interesting to see if Sultan’s name comes up on the list of cabinet ministers that will be announced Friday.

Westside-Kelowna is a strange choice for Clark. She’s from the Coast, after all.

According to Clark, though, Kelowna is her “natural political home.” Apparently, she’s had an epiphany after all these years. Clark, who lives in Vancouver-Fairview, lost in Vancouver-Point Grey. She is a Lower Mainlander through and through, but suddenly her political heart is in the Interior.

Oh, well, Adrian Dix has decided to put up a candidate and fight the good fight in the by-election, and the Liberals will, no doubt, complain about it. For Dix, though, it’s a no-brainer — he’ll get to fight the general election all over again, at least in miniature, and try to avoid the total screw-up he committed in May.

This being a democracy, the people should have a say, and she should have to earn her seat.

Clark will win, of course, because she’s the premier and because the Liberals won Westside-Kelowna by 28 points and nothing’s going to change that. Of course, that’s pretty much what the New Democrats thought about the general election they just blew.

Council newbies, please spare us sad stories about your hard work

Shed a tear for the poor City councillor. Apparently, it’s a tough job.

In a column in The Daily News, Coun. Ken Christian laments the hard life of the councillor, filled with meetings, reading, public events and travel.

Coun. Ken Christian

He and other councillors across the country returned home this week from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities convention in Vancouver. Coquitlam mayor Richard Stewart and some of his councillors were criticized by fellow councillor Lou Sekora for spending $225 a night — funded by taxpayers — at the Fairmont Waterfront Hotel instead of commuting by car as he did.

Stewart, naturally, used the old “networking” defence to justify the expenditures. Municipal politicians were slaving away on our behalf from 7 a.m. to midnight at the convention, he says.

Mayors and councillors always feel defensive about conventions like the FCM. I see in today’s Daily News a headline, “Councillors say FCM worth the expense.” The story quotes Kamloops delegates talking about all the informative sessions they attended and, of course, the networking.

Marg Spina met Justin Trudeau in a lineup, Arjun Singh talked to some guy while jogging, and the mayor of Sudbury told Peter Milobar what a great place her city is, mine and all.

Look, conventions can be valuable. They are also a lot of fun, with great meals, nice receptions, some fine entertainment, and interesting tours. Councillors doth protest way too much with their assurances of all the work they’re getting done.

Fact is, the FCM does have some informative sessions, but it’s not nearly as valuable as the annual UBCM conference, for example, and way more expensive because of travel costs. The venue is often on the other side of the country.

FCM attendance should be limited to three members of council each year — that way, each councillor will have a chance to attend one FCM conference during his or her three-year term. Even the TNRD puts limits on attendance.

Back to Ken Christian for a minute. It seems like rookie councillors come to the conclusion after a year in office that they didn’t realize how much work it was going to be.

Christian’s column comes on the heels of a charge led by Nancy Bepple and Nelly Dever to review the pay rates for Kamloops City council. In the column, he talks about having to spend two to six hours reading the agenda before each weekly meeting, and about public hearings that can last up to five hours.

Well, studying the homework will typically take two hours. More than that is unusual. Public hearings can take up to five hours — once in a blue moon.

As for public events, councillors attend what they can, so some attend more than others. It’s not always a lot of fun, but sometimes it is.

Nobody said it was easy but the point is, being on council is not drudgery. It’s fun, it’s exciting, it’s an experience like no other. So please, newbies, spare us the sad stories about how much work you do.

Fired Ford chief of staff a former Kamloopsian with impressive background

Mark Towhey (left) and Mayor Rob Ford. (canada.com)

The Kamloops connection to the controversy surrounding Toronto Mayor Rob Ford has a sense of humour, a distinguished background in the Canadian Armed Forces and a long career in crisis management.

Mark Towhey was fired as Ford’s chief of staff Thursday after nine months on the job, telling media as he left city hall, “I am no longer the chief of staff. I did not resign.”

The reasons for the firing haven’t been made public, though some media are reporting that he was terminated after a disagreement with Ford arising out of the controversies the mayor has found himself in during the past week.

In the two days since his firing, Towhey has been getting praise from newspaper readers. He has not commented on the reasons for his firing, but he certainly has an impressive resume.

KamHigh lists Towhey as being a student there from 1980 to 1982, and he has referred to Kamloops as his “home town.”

A friend says that following high school, Towhey attended the University of Victoria, where he was elected to the alma mater society, then joined the Canadian Scottish as an infantry reserve officer and then the regular forces, serving in Germany, Africa and Golan as a UN peacekeeper, as well as several postings in Canada.

He left the forces and got an MBA at Western University’s Richard Ivey School of Business, then established a crisis management company, serving as consultant in Canada, the U.S., and internationally.

In 2010, he helped get Ford elected as mayor, and was appointed chief of staff last August. In a feature about Ford’s key staff in April 2011, when Towhey’s position was director of policy and strategic planning, the Globe and Mail described him as a “strategist” and wrote:

“An ever-present broker during council votes and debates, Mr. Towhey was a consultant specializing in crisis management for the likes of McCain Foods, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and the federal Department of Defence prior to joining the Ford campaign.

“He worked on two failed federal campaigns for Conservative Jon Capobianco in Etobicoke-Lakeshore, the riding currently held by Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff, and once blogged in favour of selling the TTC to the private sector. In the mayor’s office, Mr. Towhey is the architect of incorporating the election platform of Rob Ford, the candidate, into the agenda of Rob Ford, the mayor.”

Friday, the Toronto Star wrote: “Appointed as Toronto Mayor Rob Ford’s chief of staff last August and fired on Thursday, Towhey was arguably the most important — and some would say the smartest — person on the mayor’s team.

“Towhey was assigned to steer Ford in the right direction, find the right venues for Ford to appear at, identify media who could be sympathetic to him and plot strategy for the press secretary.”

Towhey’s sense of humour shows up in his tweeting from time to time. After a horde of television cameras and newspaper photographers recorded his departure from City Hall on Thursday afternoon as he got into his car and drove off, he tweeted, “Very happy now that I remembered to wash my car yesterday.”

Friday, in an apparent reference to a controversy over Ford sticking “Rob Ford Mayor” fridge magnets on cars in a parking lot of a church, and in the context of the past week’s uproar, Towhey tweeted, “This week in review: all in all gotta be pretty happy with the way we buried the magnet story.”

Today, he tweeted, “From my upcoming LearningAnnex wrksp ‘How 2 get 1,000 Twitter Followers in 1 day’ Step 1 Help elect a big city mayor Step 2 buy fridge magnets…”

One of those new followers is yours truly.