Enwin/WUC Monies

By Ed Arditti

I prepared the attached table just to let you know how much money the Mayor and Members of Council received from the Utilities every year. Click here for a better view of it.

Did we get value for money for all of these fees paid out? I guess we won’t know for a while until these organizations are audited and who knows when that will be. Enwin Energy as an example doesn’t seem to be doing too much so why are there so many Directors and how much money do they receive every year?

I gathered this information from Windsor Star stories over the past few years. It may not be hundred percent accurate but it gives you an indication, dear reader, of the amount of money that is paid over by Enwin/WUC. There is an issue with respect to the Mayor’s salary dealing with Municipal Elected Officers’ Allowance and exactly how much the Mayor received from the Utilities because the Star stories don’t deal with these very well as far as I am concerned.

You need to ask yourself how many meetings are required to deal with important matters in these Organizations. The Star reported at one time what the fees were:

http://www.windsorsquare.ca/2012/03/enwinwuc-monies/

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AG Blocked From Investigating Fraud

By Chris Schnurr

On the CBC, Mayor Francis may dismiss allegations that he, the CAO, and the audit committee prevented the city’s Auditor General from doing his job as “irrelevant” in the court of law; but when it comes to the confidence taxpayers place in both administration and council, these allegations are very troubling.

In fact, they are so relevant that hundreds of people are signing petitions throughout the city including one calling upon the Auditor General of Ontario (AGO) to take a look at Enwin Utilities, Enwin Energy and Windsor Canada Utilities Ltd. and another asking the AGO to review Windsor’s Office of the Auditor General. A residents group Taxpayers for Accountability in Municipal Affairs has also been created, of which I am a member.

Now we’ve learned through Anne Jarvis’ column the Auditor General, Todd Langlois, was being shut out of fraud investigations and according to emails acquired by the Windsor Square, this may have included an ongoing investigation.

http://www.windsorsquare.ca/2012/03/ag-blocked-from-investigating-fraud/

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Junior’s Bus Tour Forces Edgar To Announce He Is Running In 2014

By Ed Arditti

I am not fooling. He announced that already, on CKLW, on his love-fest on Tuesday morning. That is the way that Edgar believes that he can control his Councillors and keep them in line so that they will not dare go against his wishes by saying that he is not going to go. Knuckle under or face his wrath for the next 6 years is the threat. No wonder a couple of Councillors were seen turning white today. There go their dreams of being Mayor!

You did not have to go on the bus tour with Ken Lewenza Junior to listen to what was said. All you need to do going check my colleague’s posting where he took a video of the entire trip. Go listen to it for yourself.

Again, the Windsor Square presents to the people of Windsor the opportunity to watch and hear for themselves and to draw their own conclusions without any filtering by the media or even from our own website. You decide for yourself.

Apparently, while the tour was taking place, Edgar (aka Eddie) told us on CKLW that he was at home playing with his children “the wheels on the bus.” Taking such a cavalier attitude to serious allegations like those made by Junior could mean that the wheels might fall off of Edgar’s bus more quickly than he can imagine!

http://www.windsorsquare.ca/2012/02/22/juniors-bus-tour-forces-edgar-to-announce-he-is-running-in-2014/

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Please feel free to add feedback, additional info, alternative contact details, related links, articles, anonymous submission, etc. as a comment below, via web-form, through social media or mail us directly and confidentially at: operationenwin [at] gmail [dot] com

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The Auditor Fiasco: Curiouser And Curiouser

By Ed Arditti

Seriously, is it any wonder that this City is at the bottom of almost every list of how a City should be managed. It cannot be more ridiculous than this can it?

Oh yes it can. Another twist in the continuing saga of the termination of Todd Langlois.

Now we find from a Dave Battagello Star story that the Auditor was taking a look at the Aquatic Centre at the time that he was terminated. What a bombshell that is. Enwin and the swimming pool. The guy was walking on thin ice. It is no wonder that he received such a shock.

What next?

http://www.windsorsquare.ca/2012/02/13/the-auditor-fiasco-curiouser-and-curiouser/

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Please feel free to add feedback, additional info, alternative contact details, related links, articles, anonymous submission, etc. as a comment below, via web-form, through social media or mail us directly and confidentially at: operationenwin [at] gmail [dot] com

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Errors, Inaccuracies And Misstatements

By Chris Schnurr

Todd Langlois’ press conference outlining his experience as the Auditor General for the City of Windsor was dismissed outright by Mayor Francis as being full of “errors, inaccuracies and misstatements.”

But as more facts emerge it seems some of those inaccuracies are accurate raising the red flag over what is supposed to be the independence of the Auditor General.

Mayor Francis initially claimed that Langlois, “never indicated that in writing, Todd never indicated verbally to anyone at the audit committee, to myself, or to anyone in the administration that anyone was blocking him from doing anything.”

The Mayor also said if Mr. Langlois was experiencing any road blocks, “As the auditor general, he would have, I’m certain … issued a report and made that report public – either to the audit committee, to council, or to you saying that he is running into roadblocks – that never happened.”

Except he did – he advised the Mayor and apparently the city’s CAO as well as Bill Carter of the audit committee.

http://www.windsorsquare.ca/2012/02/13/errors-inaccuracies-and-misstatements/

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Selling part of Enwin a city option

Selling part of Enwin a city option
Written by Administrator
Thursday, 10 September 2009

The option of selling part of ENWIN utility to private sector has recently come up.
Should Windsor sell off part of its electrical utility company to the private sector?

That’s one of the “strategic options” contained in a report that city council will discuss Monday night concerning the future of Windsor Canada Utilities Ltd., the wholly owned city entity that is the holding company which in turn owns subsidiaries Enwin Utilities Ltd. and Enwin Energy Ltd.

Coun. Drew Dilkens also favours looking into privatization. Investing the proceeds of any sale of assets may be a strategically better option for the city, he said.

Dilkens said it was “not necessarily the case” that going private automatically means utility rates for customers would go up. He said that, as “one of the most highly regulated businesses out there, next to liquor,” that applying for any utility rate increases is “a huge process.”

Halberstadt points out that Enwin was granted a rate increase of 4.8 per cent this year, while the dividend paid out to the city by WCUL for the most recent year reported (2008) jumped to $4 million from the previous year’s $3 million.

But Mayor Eddie Francis, who chairs the WCUL, and Coun. Fulvio Valentinis, vice-chairman of subsidiary Enwin Utilities Ltd., both caution against readily selling out to the private sector.

Francis said even selling a 10 per cent stake in the utility, which he said is the maximum allowed under current provincial guidelines, risks “surrendering control” of a vital public asset. While Enwin has struggled in the past, he said it is now well-managed and doing the job, with its debt load halved and capital re-investment doubled over the past five years, and now paying “very healthy dividends” and building up its assets.

While “everything’s an option,” Valentinis said what makes him “very, very leery” about any possible sale is the fact that “many” municipalities looked at private sector partnerships after the province deregulated the field at the start of the decade, but that, despite a number of mergers among existing utilities, “there seems to be a real reluctance to move it out of the public sector.”

Both Francis and Valentinis argue a private partner would not want to re-invest in the utility’s infrastructure to the extent that’s being done today (about $21 million in 2009), and Valentinis said eliminating the current $4 million annual dividend would force council to either find budget cuts of a similar magnitude or hike current tax rates a percentage point.

The staff report shows Enwin Utilities itself looked at 14 transactions involving Ontario utilities distribution companies, and only two of them involved private sector investments, each to acquire 10 per cent stakes. Five of the transactions were mergers, like Hamilton with St. Catharines, and six were acquisitions by public entities, like the Town of Essex’s $12.8 million purchase this year of its municipal neighbours’ stake in ELK Energy.

http://canadawindsor.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2244&Itemid=111

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Another CBC Radio Commentary

Openness and Transparency, reflects two vital principles underpinning our democratic system of government. If the processes of government are not open to scrutiny and evaluation, then government becomes less accountable. This openness may be to the media, the public or opposition parties. Let us not forget that the government is there at the pleasure of the governed. Transparency and accountability are essential to a free society.

I enjoyed the patronizing Editorial by the Star giving Labour an education in Municipal Finance 101. If the Star was doing its job frankly, we would have known by now what “are major issues pending involving the Windsor-Detroit tunnel and Enwin that will consume a significant amount of taxpayer resources.” Do you know who was the Councillor who revealed that there was a problem but would not tell us what it was. Why none other than Councillor Budget of Ward 1, the same one that the Star praises so highly!

What financial surprises is the Star not reporting? And why not? I guess they do not want to win any more newspaper awards for investigative journalism.

Have you seen the Star take action after Councillors received a huge salary increase by attending meetings trying to fix Enwin’s problems? What will the real cost of the Tunnel Ventilation Building be? What deal is being proposed re leasing and operating the Tunnel? What is the true financial position of the Tunnel after years of low tolls. Even Gord was “damn anxious to know what misery is coming at Enwin and the tunnel.”

So why aren’t our fiscally responsible Councillors telling us? And where is the Star demanding answers from their favourite, fiscally responsible Mayor and Councillors? Where is the Star demanding open and transparent government?

http://windsorcityon.blogspot.com/2006_07_16_archive.html

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