Counting the pros and cons of the lowly penny

I paid for a sandwich at a drive-through this week. It was $5.99.

I handed three toonies through the window.

At this point, there is always an awkward moment. Does one wait for a penny’s change? Does one say, “Keep the change” and risk a “Gee, thanks, big spender” from the teenager at the till?

Or do you hit the gas before it becomes an issue?

Mostly, I’m able to avoid the problem by keeping a $10 bill handy for just such occasions. There’s no shame in waiting for two toonies and a penny in change. It all goes into the ash tray — the toonies add up and you use them the next time.

Unfortunately, the pennies add up, too. That sigh you just heard was the fast-food till tender after she’s been handed a fist full of pennies.

Counting pennies does not come naturally to someone who has been educated with a built-in i-pad calculator and trained on a pre-programmed cash register.

Meanwhile, I feel the eyes of the customer in the car behind me burning into the back of my head like a laser, for it is a capital offence to slow the lineup.

Everywhere, there are pennies. Each day I return home with pockets full of metal coinage, some of which goes on the kitchen counter, some in the change bowl, some in various drawers, and the rest simply disappears into thin air (although I caught Syd poking around in my change bowl Friday morning, ignoring anything smaller than a toonie — this might be a clue).

Every once in awhile we do a complete sweep of the place and dump all the change into a bucket. Eventually, the quarters get used up on parking meters, the bigger coins on staples. The problem then becomes what to do with a bucket full of pennies.

It’s estimated that it costs 1.6 cents to make a penny. I’ve never seen a study on the labour cost involved in taking a bucket of pennies and putting them all into those little paper rollers, but I do know it’s not worth it.

The announcement Thursday that the Canadian penny is on the way out has, of course, provided an opportunity to employ every trite penny saying known to man or woman.

People are lamenting the fact they’ll no longer be able to offer “a penny for your thoughts,” or be secure in the knowledge that “a penny saved is a penny earned.”

When we refer to someone as a “bad penny” he or she won’t know it’s an insult. There will be no more “pretty pennies,” and we can no longer chastise the government for pinching pennies or being “penny-wise and pound-foolish.”

No more penny ante schemes. When the penny finally drops, what will it matter?

None of us, not a single one, will have a penny to our name.

What’s next, the loonie — the very symbol of all things Canadian? The toonie? Where does it end, rounding everything to the nearest five dollars?

No, when you count the pluses and minuses, there’s more bad than good in this. And that cashier I gave the three toonies to the other day? She didn’t even offer me my penny’s change. So I just drove away.

If I had a nickel for every time that’s happened….

Mayor absolutely right on Tournament Capital ‘branding’

I attended the annual Kamloops Chamber of Commerce AGM banquet Thursday night, my last meeting as a director, as I’ve stepped down from the board. They presented me, and fellow outgoing director Mona Murray, with nice plaques, which were greatly appreciated.

It’s been an absolute pleasure to sit on the chamber’s board for the past five years and I’ve learned a great deal through sitting on, or chairing a number of committees, including the Pacific Gateway committee, policy committee, awards committee and social issues committee. I’ve also enjoyed being the chamber’s liaison member on the boards of the Graffiti Task Force and Coordinated Enforcement Task Force.

There were times when I disagreed with decisions of the board but I’ve found it to be a great organization with excellent staff and dedicated volunteer board members.

I had to sneak out of the meeting before Mayor Peter Milobar spoke, as I had some pressing matters back at the office to attend to, but from The Daily News story today I see that he touched on the age-old issue of “branding.” He told the crowd that there is talk of abandoning the Tournament Capital theme for something more mod.

He’s of the view that we need to remain true to the TC branding and I totally agree. I’ve written many times before that it’s a mistake to think a city must be only one thing for all people. There are many facets to our community that we can promote to a variety of markets.

We can be the modern hi-tech city or the quaint heritage-steeped town, the sport-fishing mecca, golf central or tournament capital all at the same time. The secret is to direct each of those attractions to the right audiences.

The Tournament Capital has proven an excellent investment — it ain’t broken so let’s not try to fix it. Add to it, sure, but not abandon it.

Will Kamloops council ever take a stand on Ajax?

The question, suddenly, is not whether City council will support the Ajax mine, but whether it will take a position at all.

The neutrality option reared its head this week as Coun. Donovan Cavers put forward a motion to ask KGHM boss Herbert Wirth for a meeting.

The motion went through, unanimously, but only after some uncomfortable discussion about when the meeting should be, how the request should be worded, and the how to do so in a neutral-sounding manner.

Which has brought to the surface the matter of whether council has the appetite for taking a stand, ever.

Coun. Arjun Singh says he’s of “two minds” on that. On the one hand, there’s the view that this is a big deal and council should show leadership by expressing an opinion.

On the other hand, it’s very divisive, and council has no authority to accept or reject the mine, so stay out of it.

From her comments at the meeting, Marg Spina appears to be strongly in favour of staying inside the box on this one as well.

Then there’s Nancy Bepple, who excuses herself every time the word “Ajax” comes up. She does so, she says, because she owns $5,000 worth of Abacus shares and because her partner is on the board of a company that has sub-surface exploration rights within the Ajax footprint.

The latter isn’t technically a conflict but some people might perceive it as one. When it comes to conflicts of interest for politicians, perception is as important as reality.

“I could sell my shares but I’m not getting rid of my partner,” she says.

Other than Cavers, who has been on record against the mine since before he was elected, Tina Lange is the only other council member who seems anxious to get the Ajax discussion on the table.

“If this mine goes ahead, it’s the biggest impact of anything we’ll see in our lifetime,” she told council. “Each of us will have a different opinion on what’s best for this community and there won’t be a neutral stand taken on this, if we’re to be the leaders we’re expected to be in taking care of the city.”

Lange is right. It’s a question of leadership. How can council claim leadership but avoid taking a stand on the most controversial issue facing Kamloops in years? Though City Hall has no power over Ajax, its views would strongly influence the federal and provincial decision makers.

Yet, as Singh says, how does council judge what the majority wants?

One answer is that council must take a stand based on principle — simply put, is Ajax good for Kamloops or not? Another option lies in the truth that every good politician knows — there are times to lead, and times to lead by following.

Water meters have divided Kamloopsians for decades. Back in 2001, the public was so divided over water meters it was impossible to read, so the council of the day put it to a referendum (though last term’s council ignored that result and approved them anyway).

The difference between water meters and Ajax is that meters are a taxation issue with measurable consequences while Ajax has much to do with less tangible things like aesthetics.

But maybe Ajax is big enough, divisive enough, that council should find a way to ask people what they want.

Prostitution debate isn’t over, not by a long shot

I’d like to think the lull in street prostitution in the downtown and Tranquille business districts is permanent, but I’m not optimistic.

I don’t totally get the Ontario Court of Appeal ruling that says sex trade workers should be able to hire bodyguards and work in brothels but communicating for the purposes of prostitution is still not OK.

In Canada, as we know, prostitution itself isn’t illegal, but talking about it is. It’s a very practical approach, since catching people making a deal is a lot easier than catching them in the act.

What I’m wondering about is how, if the Ontario ruling becomes the new way of doing things, the prostitution business will work. How does someone set up shop with support staff and an address but not tell anybody about it and then expect to make a profit?

It would be like having widgets for sale but keeping it a secret.

The mayor of Kamloops says the issue of brothels has never been discussed by City council. That’s not true, not by a long shot.

Street prostitution, and the alternative of brothels, has been a matter for debate inside and outside City Hall since the 1990s (during which business-licence fees were boosted for escort agencies) and led to the Task Force on the Sex Trade in 2000.

At that time, and for years after, the very focus of the prostitution debate was the impact of the visibility of the street trade versus the alternative of keeping it out of sight in brothels.

“Various possibilities are routinely suggested: legalization, decriminalization, red-light zones, neighbourhood brothels,” I wrote in a column in February of 2000.

“There isn’t much new under the sun, and most of these have been tried somewhere in the world. Red-light zones have flopped in tragic ways as they become magnets for criminal activity. Legalization has sometimes proven just another way to create a corrupt bureaucracy. And who would want a brothel next door to where you live?”

Indeed, zoning for brothels would result in some very interesting public hearings. Ultimately, though, there isn’t much civic governments can do about prostitution except try to reduce the harm it causes.

“Several cities have passed prostitution bylaws only to have them thrown out of court because they are beyond municipal jurisdiction,” I acknowledged in the same column.

“My own feeling is that we should use the tools at our disposal: Do the best we can to keep prostitutes safe, but go after the sex trade and clear it out of the downtown. If it moves somewhere else, follow it wherever it goes.”

If, as Ask Wellness Centre director Bob Hughes suggests in a story elsewhere in today’s Daily News, the “stroll” is a thing of the past, all to the good.

I hope he’s right, and that prostitution won’t make a return to the streets. But here and elsewhere, the issue will never go away, and we’re going to be talking about it — including so-called “chicken” or
“bunny ranches,” the safety of sex-trade workers, and the attendant social issues of drug addiction and violence — for many years to come.

So if the current council hasn’t turned its mind to it yet, maybe the Ontario ruling is a good place to start.

All talk, no action on connecting boonies with high-speed

I am confused and frustrated.

We’ve had more offers to provide high-speed Internet in our part of the woods than a dog has fleas and yet — the ol’ dial-up still churns away, slowly and not-at-all surely, our only connection to cyberspace.

If I were to email a photo from my home in Black Pines to my office in town, I could drive 35 minutes to The Daily News and the picture wouldn’t have arrived yet.

Last spring, some provincial money was handed out for the installation of high-speed wireless Internet in the boonies, including Black Pines. Hopes soared. A company called ABC Communications is supposed to make it happen. We wait.

A few months ago, I got a call from Telus. More precisely, from Rose, who resides in the Philippines. She offered a pretty good deal if we’d switch from our TV service to Telus.

What about Internet, I asked. When is Telus going to add Internet to the rural package? There were plans, she said, but no timeline yet.

We chatted a couple of more times about TV, but just as I was getting ready to do some bargaining, she dropped me like yesterday’s newspaper.

Then there’s the ExplorNet satellite-dish option, which seemed complicated by the time I drilled holes and strung wires through the attic and fished them through the walls to the computer.

This week, the phone rang again. I didn’t catch her name, but she wanted to know if our household would be interested in Shaw Cable.

“I think we’re a little outside your service area,” I said.

Yes, she said, but Shaw is thinking about an expansion.

“We’re quite a ways off the road,” I said. “That’s a lot of cable.”

“There might be a $500 charge,” she said. But, she said, the new service would include Internet, TV and phone.

I indicated an interest pending details. Based on experience, I don’t expect to hear from her again any time soon.

First the federal Liberals, then the Conservatives, have been promising rural Internet connectivity for years. Jean Chretien promised every Canadian home would have access to high-speed by 2004.

“High-speed Internet for rural towns coming, MP McLeod promises,” read a headline in this newspaper just last week.

Right. So is the end of days.

Lots of promises, little action by the feds, the provincial Liberals, or the regional district, certainly not in my neck of the woods.

In this “i” age of apps and instant communication, dial-up is as current as eight-track tapes and hand-written letters. It’s so primitive that the federal government defines it as the equivalent of being “unserved” by Internet.

“Broadband Internet access is viewed as essential infrastructure for participating in today’s economy, as it enables citizens, businesses and institutions to access information, services and opportunities that could otherwise be out of reach,” says the Industry Canada website.

Yet governments at all levels seem content to treat rural residents as less than worthy.

Everybody sure talks a good game, though. To listen to the phone calls and read the headlines, you’d think there was a race to get the outback connected.

Truth is, the “Connecting Rural Canadians” program is a failure, surviving in little more than name.

At this point, if the Pony Express trotted through Black Pines and offered a reasonable monthly rate, I’m betting there’d be a crowd waving credit cards and signing up.

Some corrections more embarrassing than others

Publishing corrections comes with the territory in this business. When you publish several thousand words every morning there’s bound to be a glitch or two.

This will shock you, but even I make mistakes. Really.

Such as when I wrote the other day about the hiring of David Trawin as the next CAO at city hall. I complimented the outgoing boss, Randy Diehl, for putting together a great administrative team, including Trawin, public works chief David Duckworth and parks guy Byron McCorkell.

Except, Randy didn’t hire McCorkell. Randy’s predecessor, Joe Martignago, points out this fact elsewhere on this blog.

“Keep up the good writing,” says Joe, “but, in the interest of ‘just the facts’… I’m afraid it’s me that must be held responsible for taking Byron out of the prairie wilderness and foisting him on Kamloops. (I also hired Randy, waay back when).”

You can read Joe’s full comments, but suffice to say I’m a little embarrassed.

About the time Joe’s message was landing in my inbox Tuesday, I was listening to As It Happens on the way home, in which host Jeff Douglas was talking about a correction that ran in the Washington Post last Friday.

“A March 15 Metro article about a priest who denied communion to a lesbian at her mother’s funeral was accompanied by a photo of a different woman who has the same name, Barbara Johnson,” stated the correction. “That photo is reprinted here, beneath a photo of the Barbara Johnson involved in the story.”

Saturday, the Post ran a second correction, which explained it had learned the first photo was not of anyone named Barbara Johnson at all but was of Sarah E. Reece, director of a national gay and lesbian task force.

So, the Post printed it for a third time, finally getting it right.

A couple of weeks ago, the Portland Oregonian had its own embarrassment. Its Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial page editor, Bob Caldwell, had died at 63.

The paper, based on what it was told by a family friend, said he was found dead in his car. It then published a correction explaining he had actually gone into cardiac arrest during a “sex act” in the apartment of a 23-year-old college student he had been buying textbooks for in return for certain favours.

Newspaper mistakes and corrections are great fodder for people who like to make fun of the media. They collect them; some even publish books or blogs about them.

One of my all-time favourites is this one: “A headline on an item in the Feb. 5 edition of the Enquirer-Bulletin incorrectly stated ‘Stolen groceries.’ It should have read ‘Homicide.’”

How about this? “Due to incorrect information received from the Clerk of Courts Office, Diane K. Merchant, 38, was incorrectly listed as being fined for prostitution in Wednesday’s paper. The charge should have been failure to stop at a railroad crossing.”

The editor of the Ottawa Citizen knew he was having a bad day when he wrote this one: “The Ottawa Citizen and Southam News wish to apologize for our apology to Mark Steyn, published Oct. 22. In correcting the incorrect statements about Mr. Steyn published Oct. 15, we incorrectly published the incorrect correction. We accept and regret that our original regrets were unacceptable and we apology to Mr. Steyne.”

We remain, ever at your service…

Steelworkers’ president’s ‘vision’ of mining development

Received a sealed envelope today. It was a big white United Steelworkers District 3 envelope with a hand-written note on the front that said, “For Mel from Richard Enjoy — I liked your Saturday column.”

Inside was an eight-page document published in March 2011 and written by Steelworkers Local 7619 president Richard Boyce, who was the subject of the Armchair Mayor this past Saturday. More precisely, his comments about the Ajax mine were the subject.

The paper I received today is entitled “Appropriate Risk?” and does, I assume, represent his current opinion even though it’s now a year old. The first sub-headline inside is “Development with Vision.” Since I wrote Saturday about conflicting visions on the Ajax issue, this eight-pager is an appropriate elaboration on his position.

He can correct me if I’m wrong, but a reading of this manifesto leads to the conclusion that he is strongly in favour of Ajax for economic-benefit reasons, but that we must be careful to extract the greatest community profit possible from it.

“Will we be paid a fair share for a non-renewable resource? Will the Kamloops population benefit as a whole? Is there a plan in place that will maximize the economic benefits available? What will we leave for future generations?” he asks.

All good questions, of course, assuming developing the mine at all is a good thing. Boyce seems to have already made that judgment, and it’s a thumbs up as long as there’s a good dollar in it for Kamloops. “Development with vision means ensuring that all residents will benefit from mining development in Kamloops through the creation of jobs, positive economic spinoffs, increased tax revenue, and a better quality of life.”

In comparison, he pays scant attention to environmental concerns or the issue of location. Ajax, and New Gold, he writes, “seem to me to be the only bright lights on the horizon.”

Which, I am obligated to say, reaffirms my earlier comments about short-term and long-term vision. But I’m thankful for the document, which I hadn’t seen previously.

You can dress it up but open-pit mine will still be ugly in the morning

Winston Churchill said many clever things, but one of the best-known stories involved a woman who accused him of being drunk.

There’s some dispute as to whether his accuser was Labour MP Bessie Braddock or Lady Astor, but accounts of his reply are pretty consistent: “Yes, Madam, I am drunk,” he confessed.

“But in the morning, I will be sober and you will still be ugly.”

Much like an open-pit mine. You can dress it up with finery about what a fine addition it will be to our economy, and you can accuse its detractors of exaggeration, but in the morning it will still be ugly.

People like Richard Boyce of the United Steelworkers suffer from a rare form of myopia. In their idea of vision, the distance is blurry; only objects — such as dollar signs — that are right in front of their eyes come into focus.

He said at a Rotary luncheon this week Kamloops risks becoming a backwater — a “have-not” community, to be exact — if the Ajax mine is turned down.

Really, Richard? The very future of Kamloops depends on an open-pit mine? This would be one sadly inadequate city if all it had to look forward to was a big hole in the ground.

Boyce reflects a certain view, which is that the only hope for our children is this mine, and that those who oppose it should ‘wait for the facts.’ For those in favour, no need to wait.

Opponents of the mine are “a machine,” he was quoted as saying. Pity the ninth-largest copper producer in the world with its bottomless public-relations budget and only the likes of the chamber of commerce, one of the most powerful unions on the planet, and — at least indirectly, the premier of the province — to speak in its favour.

How can they possibly stand their ground against a coalition of TRU profs, Aberdeen residents and a couple of hundred members of a citizens group that isn’t even registered as a society yet? Such a machine.

Boyce is correct on one thing — there will be economic benefits. If that were really the only issue, then let the blasting begin.

Not everyone, though, is of the opinion that a mine is essential to the survival of the community. Why does that merit an accusation of being “anti-industry,” as Boyce called them this week?

Even if the project passes environmental muster under the less-than-perfect system of review, there’s something else to consider, namely that vision thing.

The fundamental difference, vision-wise, is between the close-up focus on immediate and tangible benefits versus the long-term vision of lifestyle and the everyday feel of the community — what we see, feel and hear around us.

Those of the latter view struggle with fitting a giant open mine pit and all its attendant unsightliness into their vision of Kamloops. They can’t understand why Kamloops can’t grow and prosper without this particular project. They think our economy can accommodate resource industry, just not within municipal boundaries. It’s about location.

The world needs mining. Kamloops has mining. Do we need or want more of it, especially beside the city’s biggest residential growth area? That’s their question.

They’re asking, “Who wants to sleep with an ugly step sister snoring in the next room?”

David Trawin a good pick for City’s top administrative job

Dave Trawin at City Hall during Wednesday morning's announcement.

In some circles, City council’s choice for its next chief administrative officer is a surprise.

There are many reasons, though, that David Trawin will be the kind of CAO who will be good for Kamloops. I say this not only because I worked with him when he was first recruited into City Hall eight years ago, but because of what I’ve come to know of him since.

He was part of the new wave of fresh faces brought in by Randy Diehl as the ranks of departmental managers were depleted by retirements.

Diehl was one himself. Though he’d been around awhile as the City’s planner, his hiring to the top job after Joe Martignago moved to Victoria brought a new way of doing things to the City’s administration.

Taking advantage of the opportunity to handpick his lieutenants to replace outgoing veterans, Diehl surrounded himself with comparative youngsters from out of town. Succession planning is always an issue but his choices proved to be inspired.

When the long-serving Dennis Kujat retired, Diehl hired ex-footballer Byron McCorkell as the parks, recreation and culture director. McCorkell is credited with stick handling the challenging Tournament Capital infrastructure file to successful completion.

Then, City engineer and public works director Ernie Kurtz also retired, and Dave Duckworth — who competes in triathlons in his spare time — was hired to take his place.

Diehl then transferred Len Hrycan from the planning department to head up corporate services, and brought Trawin down from Terrace as development and engineering services director.

Now, with Hrycan close to retirement, Trawin will have his own chance to handpick one of the three top department managers. And should Duckworth or McCorkell decide to move on to other opportunities, there could be further change.

Early in his tenure in the planning department (he is an urban planner, not an engineer, which he’ll point out to you if you get it wrong), Trawin seemed at times to struggle with the massive workload dropped on his shoulders, and it took time to adjust to the spotlight when called upon to speak on projects his department was involved with.

He doesn’t take over a room; he doesn’t dominate a conversation.

But he has grown steadily in the job. He’s stronger, more confident of his abilities. He doesn’t blow his stack. Throughout the parkade-at-the-park fiasco, for example, he remained cool, collected and professional even though he was under a lot of public pressure for his role in it.

I’m guessing council looked at such things and was influenced by the fact Trawin enjoys working things through with a team.

Not long ago, I witnessed an example of his collaborative style. The Graffiti Task Force was doing good work but from an organizational standpoint it was verging on dysfunctional. It needed somebody to help come up with a plan.

The task force board asked Trawin to facilitate some strategic planning. He did so over several evenings, and everybody in the room was impressed with the way he kept them on track, made sure all had a say, and pointed them in the right direction.

That sort of skill can be learned, to a point, but a lot of it has to come natural. It’s one of the strengths Trawin will bring to the City Hall board rooms.

 

Juggling apples and oranges in the in-camera numbers game

“If you think you’re gonna walk in here and tell us what to do and change the way we’ve been doing everything, and hold strategic planning meetings in public, you’ve got another think coming.”

— Incumbent councillor to mayor after election.

Change can be a good thing, but it ain’t easy, as the quotation above illustrates. And yet, the status quo has its risks as well.

After a letter from a Kamloops Voters Society member based on the society’s concerns about closed-door “shirt-sleeve” meetings, council has been feeling sensitive about the age-old secret-meetings issue.

So it asked for a report on the number of in-camera meetings held by the past seven councils dating back to 1991. As Coun. Pat Wallace put it, the KVS letter “casts a shadow” over council, even though Coun. Arjun Singh and Coun. Nancy Bepple pointed out that the KVS concerns arose from council’s strategic planning sessions, not in-camera meetings dealing with confidential matters.

The resulting report indicates a slight reduction in what might be called “regular” in-camera meetings during the past couple of terms but the numbers aren’t really very helpful — the number of those meetings has decreased because the number of weekly open meetings has decreased.

In-camera council meetings are approved at weekly open council meetings. For example, administration will ask today for an in-camera meeting next week to discuss a land-acquisition matter and another relating to negotiations on a municipal service.

Both are appropriate under the Community Charter, which allows or even insists that land, labor or legal matters be discussed in camera.

At roughly three-quarters of their regular weekly meetings, council approves an in-camera meeting for the following week for specific reasons. That’s just the nature of the business.

With the exception of strategic planning meetings, council itself almost never calls an in-camera meeting all on its own; staff handles the agenda (in consultation with the mayor), decides when an in-camera meeting is needed, and asks council to approve it.

That’s not the whole story, though.

For example, councils under Mayor Cliff Branchflower of the late 1990s held scheduled closed-door workshops once a month, without pretense that they were dealing with proper in-camera items.

They defended these as planning sessions, not real meetings at all. (Even using the current council’s definition of what constitutes a meeting, it’s unlikely locking the doors on a strategic planning session every month would fly nowadays.)

There’s also a hidden issue with respect to in-camera business meetings that no study can ever uncover, because it isn’t reflected in minutes or resolutions.

What can’t be calculated is the number of times issues that should be raised in an open meeting are brought up instead at a legitimate in camera meeting that has been called for an entirely different reason. That’s a matter for self-policing, and a mayor and council committed to accountability and transparency are the only safeguard against abuse of in-camera meetings.

If today’s report makes City council feel as though it has answered its critics, OK, but it’s a red herring — it doesn’t say anything to satisfy the strategic-planning complaint raised by the Kamloops Voters Society.

As for the quotation at the top of this column — yes, those words were directed at me shortly after I took office in 1999. And, yes, changing the way municipal government does things was painful back then, too.