CogecoTV 13 - LIVE - 7:00 PM Monday, December 12

[macphail]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE


What do you think was Kingston's
biggest news story in 2005?


Kingston, ON (December 8, 2005) Kingston Electors wants to find out the top news story in Kingston in 2005. TVCogeco 13 viewers are invited to call Kingston Matters, the live television show on Monday, December 12 from 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. to answer the question "What do you think was Kingston's biggest news story in 2005".


Hosted by Vicki Schmolka, the show will feature media columnists Paul Schliesman from the Kingston Whig-Standard and Jamie Swift from the Independent Voice.


Viewers can participate by calling 544-6347 during the live broadcast or by posting comments on the Kingston Electors web site (http://www.kingstonelectors.ca (http://www.kingstonelectors.ca/)) after the show.


Kingston Electors is a grassroots civic group comprised of Kingstonians with an interest in public policy, and a commitment to encouraging in-depth discussions of issues that affect our community's well being. The monthly Kingston Matters call-in show on TVCogeco 13 focuses on topics of local interest.






For further information, contact:

Derek MacPhail, Community Producer – TVCOGECO “Kingston Matters”
531-9461 or dmacphail@cogeco.ca (dmacphail@cogeco.ca)

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[Evelyn King]

Hey Derek:

Great show tonight. Very informative for the Kingston community.

I would bet Paul will do an editorial on the results of the show.

Best regards,

Evelyn

[Lisa]

I feel that deciding whether to move forward with the LVEC and rejecting the Anglin Bay site is the largest news story in Kingston for 2005.

However, running a close second is Kingston's new Tree Conservation Bylaw, just brought into effect November 23, 2005.

It was last winter that the woodland on Midland Avenue next to the new Walmart and the woodland south of Taylor-Kidd Blvd in Waterloo Village disappeared. The City responded to dozens of calls regarding the tree clear-cutting and held a public meeting in February to propose a tree conservation bylaw. Many months later in the fall of 2005, over 150 acres of woodland off Highway #2 East were clear-cut. Council held another public meeting with a draft of the bylaw and although the draft is not perfect and amendments are needed, the bylaw was passed less than one week after the second public meeting.

Kingston has significant natural heritage including woodlands, wetlands, and wildlife. The City should preserve it.

Lisa Osanic

[Lydia]

Well Said Lisa, I agree fully. That would have been my second most important news story.

I find it odd that the councilors who TALK about conversation didn't do anything about this matter. I would have thought that these councilors would have opened their mouths wide and loud. :rolleyes: :)

[Exhibitionist]

Long hiatus looms for Grand Theatre
Renovation delay may push reopening back to fall 2007

Rob Tripp Whig-Standard Staff Writer
Local News - Wednesday, July 05, 2006 @ 07:00

The marquee of Kingston's historic downtown theatre likely will remain dark much longer than expected.

City Hall will try again to get bids it can afford to rebuild the theatre, further delaying a troubled project that is behind schedule and headed over budget.

"A determination has been made to step back in pursuit of an economically more viable plan," Mayor Harvey Rosen said Monday.

Last week, builders vying for the contract to refurbish the Grand Theatre on Princess Street were told they won't get the job.

"[Staff] did send some letters out informing the contractors who had provided pricing that [we] were not going to accept any of them," said senior manager Cynthia Beach.

The contract was to have been awarded by now.

Instead, city staff will have to repeat the detailed process of seeking bids, identifying a preferred submission and negotiating a deal.

The theatre, which accommodates the Kingston Symphony, stage productions and concerts, closed roughly a year ago to undergo a renovation budgeted at $9.8 million. The city also secured a $2-million federal grant.

Work was halted in May this year and an internal review was ordered when the city concluded the project was headed for a cost overrun of more than $3 million.

"It may be tendered in smaller pieces," Rosen said. "I'm not sure exactly what the plan is but there has been some suggestion that the second phase of the project be broken up into smaller pieces and [that] may result in some cost savings.

The interior of the theatre was stripped and gutted and some restoration of structural weaknesses done. The theatre remains closed and empty.

The over-runs are blamed on unexpected structural problems and high construction costs.

An internal review released last month concluded the city's finance department had almost no oversight of the evolving project budget.

In March 2005, when the budget for the project was hiked from $6.5 million to $9 million, city staff projected that the theatre would reopen this fall.

Rosen said that he hopes reconstruction will start this fall.

"It's conceivable that, late spring, early summer of 2007, perhaps maybe the fall of 2007, we'll have an opening," he said.

Beach said Mark Fluhrer, the city's director of culture and recreation, is reviewing the project, "basically looking at ways to bring it in within budget."

Beach said the city decided to notify contractors last week that it would not proceed because it has been almost 90 days since the tenders were opened.

Construction bids include a term during which the price is guaranteed.

"We already asked for one extension and had revised pricing come back," she said.

She could not say if the revised bids were higher.

Rosen said the reconstruction plans may be changed. "There's an opportunity for some revenue generation that may help offset costs that were not anticipated," he said.

A complete makeover of the interior was planned, including the installation of new seating, the enlargement of the Baby Grand - a small theatre within the theatre - and the replacement of mechanical and electrical systems.

"There may be some cost overruns even with the re-tendering and the breakup of the contract," Rosen said. "We may have an opportunity to address that smaller overrun through enhanced revenue opportunities during operations."

A 2002 consulting report, the Grand Theatre Needs Assessment, concluded a substantial makeover of the theatre would cost roughly $5.9 million.

Building a brand new theatre would cost, at most, $12.1 million, the consultants concluded.

The city's latest estimate for the total project is $14.4 million.

Rosen said he doesn't recall seeing the estimates in the 2002 consulting report, completed by local architects and theatre consultants.

The city has not asked those consultants to explain why their estimates were so far off, Rosen said.

"That hasn't been considered," he said.

The review of the project completed by consultants from KPMG concluded the city was "vulnerable to significant cost deviations" because it undertook limited assessment of the theatre's condition.

"There are factors that you have to face when dealing with an existing historic structure," Rosen said. "The cost of the work itself is not necessarily the cost of the project in terms of what you find when you get in there."

Rosen said a report is expected to come to city councillors at their only meeting this month, July 18, about the next steps to get the project moving again.

If the final plan still includes cost overruns, political approval will be needed.

"There's certainly a possibility we can bring it all home inside the tent, but it appears to be doubtful at this point," he said.

Rosen said a special meeting of council may have to be called to deal with the theatre, since only two meetings are scheduled this summer.

rtripp@thewhig.com

Grand renovation

March 1, 2005: Council increases budget from $6.5 million to $9 million.

May 2005: Grand closes to prepare for renovation.

August 2005: City politicians raise the budget by another $830,000, after they are told it will allow the city to seek a $2-million federal grant.

December 2005: City receives $2-million federal grant.

May 5, 2006: Chief administrator Glen Laubenstein announces a review of the project, given "the anticipated $3.3 million overrun."

June 2, 2006: Consultant's report is released indicating that the project is plagued by almost non-existent finance department control, poor communication and lack of accountability.

June 30, 2006: City rejects all bids for reconstruction.

[Florence]

So? Just do it.

[Exhibitionist]

I surely would have wished (the interested parties) to have completed a complete project plan before they even started into this renovation.

But, because of the high risk of this old, poorly maintained building we are now burdened with a whole new public project /situation.

I would suggest they take their time (this time) and follow a project plan, priorities - and get it right!

I have no information or reasons why (I) need to through more tax dollars at this one!

Do you?

[Lydia]

When we use the words Just Do it, Please say Just Do it RIGHT.

Now you understand ************* why I get a little ticked off with the Financial representatives and high Managemant of the the City.

They sure didn't get it RIGHT with this project and it looks like they JUST DID IT WITH THE SEWAGE GOING INTO OUR LAKE AGAIN

They are always JUST DOING IT but they NEVER SEEM to get it RIGHT OR DONE so that they don't have to DO IT AGAIN .

Sorry Florence, I understand that you might be tried of the crap that City Management are not complete anything correctly and therefore i can understand your command. I agree with you but I want them do JUST DO IT RIGHT for a change.

[Exhibitionist]

I agree with you both - now that we have some context to the overall meaning behind ones feelings towards "City Projects".

The sewage overflow - I frankly do not understand how the release was necessary. Considering they just built an overflow tank to handle (a certain amount) of overflow.

Although the types of downpours we have inherited from our Global Warming situation seen in recent years - has certainly complicated the "math" for engineers to figure out what size of a holding tank can handle mother natures latest weather moods.

I also know the amount of rain fall and flooding has been "extreme" this year. Not only here but in the North Eastern States. They just closed many of their locks etc. to drain Lake Ontario some.

But on a more positive perspective, as they say **** runs down hill - and the Americans sometimes need some to keep them in line, so we get a little respect from time to time.

[Exhibitionist]

Welfare trend reverses

By Rob Tripp
Local News - Friday, July 07, 2006 @ 07:00

For the first time this decade, the number of people collecting welfare in Kingston is slowly but steadily increasing.

Over five years, from 2000 through 2004, the number of households receiving welfare decreased by roughly 40 per cent.

City Hall statistics for the first three months of this year show that there were roughly 2,700 households receiving welfare, up from 2,628 in 2005 and up from 2,610 in 2004.

The figures represent the average caseload.

Lance Thurston, the senior city manager responsible for social services, said he isn’t concerned, yet.

“They bottomed out a year or two ago and they are starting to inch up a bit,” he said. “Everybody’s kind of watching and saying, What does this mean?’

“We watch very carefully.”

Thurston said people who work in the system and study it expected the increase. During the past few years, welfare clients who were easily employable left the welfare system because of reforms designed to wean people from assistance.

“We’re now dealing with those who have multiple barriers to employment for a variety of reasons, whatever that might be,” he said. “You’re now dealing with the core caseload and we don’t expect that to diminish too much.”

Kingston’s core caseload is large. More than 10 per cent of the city’s population, an estimated 13,000 people or what Thurston calls “a big chunk of the city” lives on some form of welfare.

Tara Kainer works on social reform with the Sisters of Providence in Kingston and has been an advocate on behalf of the city’s poor for more than a decade.

“Despite the economic upturn that we keep hearing about, I would say that people on assistance are worse off than they’ve ever been,” said Kainer, who also has worked with agencies that deal with homelessness.

Recent research suggests that welfare payments today, taking into account inflation and the cost of living, are at the same level they were at in the 1970s.

A single person on welfare in Kingston can receive $536 a month at most.

“It is a remarkably small amount of money,” said Kainer.

Despite the small payouts, there is a huge drain on the public purse.

The City of Kingston now spends about $20 million annually to administer welfare programs and pay clients, while the province pays the bulk of the cost. It’s estimated that roughly $120 million is spent each year in Kingston by three levels of government on social assistance programs.

The welfare statistics understate Kingston’s problem. There is another group of citizens who live in poverty, despite efforts to escape it.

“There is a vast legion of low-paid workers,” said Jamie Swift, a Kingston writer and advocate for social reform. “That is something that really is below the radar screen.”

The so-called working poor may be a bigger group than Kingstonians receiving welfare.

The working poor are virtually invisible, buried within community-wide statistics about household incomes.

Those numbers hint at but do not clarify the problem.

Median household income in Kingston, according to Statistics Canada data from 2000, was more than 16 per cent lower than the provincial figure.

A demographic portrait of Kingston completed this year by City Hall showed that in the city’s north end, the Rideau Heights neighbourhood, median family income in 2000 was $27,000.

Median family income in Ontario was $61,000.

Thurston acknowledges that the city does not know how many citizens fill the ranks of the working poor.

Some of them appear on the caseload of Kingston’s central food bank, the Partners in Mission. About 10 per cent of the more than 5,700 people helped by the food bank last year were working, but could not afford to feed themselves.

“The number of people that we’re helping is fairly consistent,” said Sandy Singers, director of the food bank.

He’s seen growth in another segment.

“We’re seeing an increase of people coming to us with no income,” Singers said.

Last year, 13 per cent of clients reported no income. While these citizens may represent former welfare recipients, the city and province can’t say for certain. The governments have no tracking mechanism to follow recipients who drop off the rolls. The dramatic decline in Kingston’s welfare roll over the first few years of the decade was attributed, in part, to the movement of people onto the caseload of the Ontario Disability Support Program. One of the two provincial welfare programs, it provides long-term assistance to people with disabilities.

Welfare, or Ontario Works, is intended to provide short-term assistance.

As the welfare roll shrank for five consecutive years, the disability support program caseload grew dramatically, jumping by about 15 per cent between 2000 and 2006.

There are now 3,800 Kingston households on the disability program.

But both caseloads are now growing.

Thurston said there have not been any policy shifts that would explain the growth.

“There’s no real substantive policy rationale for numbers going up or down at this point,” he said.

Kainer said there’s little political action to address underlying problems.

“We’re dealing with a powerless group of people,” she said.

rtripp@thewhig.com