Municipal Politics – Page 29

Problem gambling or problem busybodies?

December 19, 2012 by Peter Lowry

We all know who the people are who will tell you what is sinful or wrong with having a casino in your town. The most vocal are the bluestockings, afraid you might have a little fun, and the hypocrites who know nothing about gambling. They are the paternalistic politicians trying to stand out in their negativity and they are the bureaucrats who do not want to be bothered.

The truth is: people gamble. Some gamble more than others. There are also people who see no sense to gambling and they are entitled to their opinion. For the rest of us, gambling starts at a young age. It is buying that first lottery ticket with a prize you want and liking the feeling of believing you can win. It is the rush of the first time you ever shout “bingo” in a church basement. It is the thrill of playing poker for the first time, for real money. It is that first wide-eyed visit to Las Vegas, where gambling is king.

The thrill of imagining your possible winnings in lotteries has morphed into a multi-billion dollar industry in Ontario—run by the government. What started as a way to compete with the Irish Sweepstakes has turned into a nationwide industry. And what must have started as a totalizer on the chariot races in the Coliseum has become a world-wide network of racetrack betting. There is a time-honoured tradition in Canada of the office pool for lotteries and hockey games. We support the 50-50 draw to raise money.

And yet we let hypocrites in public office tell us if we can or cannot have a casino in our town. Ontario Lottery and Gaming has made an open offer to cities and towns throughout Ontario to have a casino. Our councils shilly-shally and shame us. They offer public consultation and listen to the wrong people.

Here in our town, we can add the local Medical Officer of Health to the naysayers. It is reported that he sent a letter to the mayor recently saying that problem gambling is linked to alcohol and drug misuse, mental illness, hypertension and digestive-system disorders. And to make matters worse, he adds that associated social harms include bankruptcy, family disruption, and possible involvement in crime.

The question that comes to mind is whether this man is lacking meaningful challenges in his work? Surely his job description does not include paternalism.

It is further reported that he said in his letter to the mayor that there are a large number of low income people in this town. He quotes a figure of 2,300 families. He worries that they may be put at risk. At risk of what? They obviously would not have the funds to become habitués in a casino. Would they be at risk of getting jobs? Would they be at risk of having their high municipal taxes reduced?

Our municipality has the amenities. It needs the breadth of activities to attract people to come here. A casino can be an excellent year-round addition to the mix.

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Babel’s blocker.

December 4, 2012 by Peter Lowry

You sometimes wonder if the guy works for the local Conservatives. He seems to step into the municipal fray whenever there is a strong Liberal running. He appears to be running just to draw off some of the Liberal vote. We first wondered about it two years ago when a Liberal had already challenged for the mayoralty. The tactic failed then. It worked yesterday.

The tactic failed two years ago because there were two strong Conservative challengers and he came into the race as the second Liberal challenger. There was no way his one-man campaign could compete with a strong, winning door-knocking campaign across Babel. His campaign at that time was poorly conceived and weak.

But the leftovers from what was a weak mayoralty campaign can look strong in a by-election for a small ward. With a turnout of less than 30 per cent of voters and a field of 11 candidates, the Conservative winner got the council seat with less than 600 votes. In an exercise where the person who pulls out the vote wins, only the Conservative had a cohesive organization. It might have been a small organization but it was determined.

Now wait a minute. You were going to say that there is no party politics in municipal council elections. If you believe that, you must also believe in Santa Claus and the tooth fairy.Ontario municipalities easily reflect the political parties that provide them with candidates. Babel’s current council only has one councillor whose current party membership might be in question. He tends to wander.

Looking at the posted results from the by-election, it is interesting to note that, of the three women in the running, only one received more than 100 votes. There were really only three candidates: the Conservative and the two Liberals. If it was any consolation, the two Liberals combined got over 200 votes more than the Tory.

It would certainly have been a better race if there had only been one Liberal running. The problem is the schism between the federal and provincial Liberals in Babel. That is a problem that needs to be addressed.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

The phony war against casinos.

November 7, 2012 by Peter Lowry

It is wrong and it is tiresome. The Toronto Star is on a crusade to stop casinos from coming to Toronto. It is a crusade that leaves no pedantic unused. Star writers are not bothered by the truth. Today an op-ed article headline reads: Casino backers playing with stacked deck. The subhead adds that: Torontonians are being bombarded with one-sided and misleading information. They certainly are. And most of this misleading information is coming from the Toronto Star.

Today’s article throws about statistics like so much chaff. First we hear that those invidious slot machines are “programmed for near misses and losses disguised as wins.” That is ridiculous. Whether using an old fashioned set of rotating wheels or an electronic chip with a random number generator, you do not program a slot machine. The reason you can predict earnings from a slot machine is based solely on the law of averages.

The article goes on to tell us that because of the “perpetual intermittent(?) reinforcement” between 10 and 12 per cent of slot players are problem gamblers. The writer fails to tell us where he got this interesting statistic. Since we know that problem gamblers can be somewhere between two and three per cent of the population, we suspect that he is basing this on slot players being about 25 per cent of the population. If he is right about that, you have to agree that slot players are a heck of a big market.

One statistic the writer uses, that is attributed, is about the 2.7 per cent of gamblers in Australia who supposedly fund 80 per cent of the profits. This seems somewhat vague, especially in light of the Aussies well known penchant for what they call punting. While there are some great casinos there now, historically Aussies have loved betting on horses.

There is no point in arguing the Ersnt & Young figures supplied to the city. Forecasts of earning by new ventures are nothing more than a good guess. Nobody knows for sure what a Toronto casino might earn for the city, the province and for the operators.

To argue about the money that Ontario Lottery and Gaming provides to support systems for problem gamblers seems rather inappropriate. If Ontario’s liquor industry contributed half as much (percentage wise) to resolving the needs of problem drinkers, we would have the happiest drunks in North America.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

Babel wants our opinion on a casino.

November 5, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Babel citizens are being asked for their opinions on having a casino. City council members do not know what to think. And when our city leaders have to ask for direction, you know that nobody knows what to do. Either that or they are afraid they will incur the wrath of Babel’s Pentecostal church leaders for encouraging gambling.

The problem is that Ontario is still a repressed society. People grow up in this province with heavy-handed government control of liquor, racing, gambling, banking and many other aspects of our daily lives. Even the new immigrants, who add so much to the cultural growth of our society, come mainly from countries where they lived under the heavy hand of police and government. The more open approach to Canada’s rights and freedoms since the 1980s is only now slowly awaking our society to our possibilities.

Some of the old repressions continue to this day. You will hear people quote the old Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) arguments against the ‘Demon Rum.’ Some continue to worry that casino gambling is addictive. Which, it can be. It is just less addictive than smoking, drinking or drugs.

But the blue-stocking crowd no longer run Ontario. Gambling is now legal. What we have recognized is that gambling is an attraction for tourism, for conventions and can be part of the mix that creates a holiday destination. We need more of those in Ontario. And we want to bring people to Babel and have them enjoy our beautiful parks and waterfront. And we want them to spend money while here that works its way into our local economy.

And we have an even better deal for a casino-resort-entertainment complex than you would expect. It is at the corner of Lakeshore, Tiffin and Essa. It is fronted by the historic Allandale train station that we have spent so much on restoring. It is located at the GO station that can bring visitors and holiday travellers to our casino-resort. It can bring conventioneers to our casino-convention/entertainment centre. It is an ideal location and we can be confident that all parties interested in this property would agree. There is certainly enough money to be made by all.

Of course there are the foot-draggers on council who are unlikely to ever agree to a casino. They quote the social costs of gambling. They fail to provide any firm statistics or even anecdotal examples. One councillor claimed to a reporter that he “will never, ever, support it (a casino), even if 100 per cent of the people told me they support it.” There is a guy who sticks by his convictions!

Another member of council states that he is concerned about the business case for a casino when Georgian Downs in Innisfil already offers slot machines. The facts are that while a slot machine operation is cheaper to operate and can be a stand-alone entity, the public prefers casinos that are complete with table games. A full casino operation is best in a resort-entertainment centre location.

But that is only this Babelite’s opinion.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

Babel’s birds on a wire.

November 3, 2012 by Peter Lowry

They lined up like blackbirds on a telephone wire. There were only ten at this event. It little mattered. Babel’s eighth ward is having a by-election to replace a missing councillor. Some eleven citizens have thrown their hat in the ring. They want to prove that democracy can work for them.

But democracy cannot work for them until they understand how democracy works. They cannot just sing the song of birds on a wire—a song that is just the monotony of “Me, me, me.” These are mainly novices. They do not all have the skills of experienced politicos.

One of the candidates might have been doing some serious toking in the parking lot before the meeting. That candidate had the audience laughing through the introductions and first couple questions but flat lined by the third question.

As is typical in these municipal situations in Ontario, you expect to find a semi-official Conservative party candidate. Municipal politics is where the party prepares its comers and stores its has-beens. The reason the party was not standing behind its candidate was obvious when you recognized him. The local Conservatives are testing a candidate with an ‘ethnic’ name in white-bread Babel. They are standing back though, as the party does not want to be identified with a possible loss.

In the usual unorganized fashion of Liberals, there are three card-carrying Liberal party members in the running. One is the de facto provincial party candidate. Another is from the federal party in the area and one is there because he feels like it. There is little love lost between them.

There are only three women in the running. In these days of gender equality, that gives them an unfair advantage. Overheard at one point was a heated discussion by three local women voters over which of the three women they would support.

The only person doing anything useful at the meeting was the chair person who limped with his cane to hand each candidate the microphone and to say who they are. Only one of the candidates actually knew how to use a microphone and he would have done much better if he had something serious to say that was different from the others.

Luckily, the chair person also kept track of the time for each candidate to speak. He did an excellent job. Most of the applause in the meeting was for him.

But as you listened to these birds on a wire, you realized that one of them has to win. That choice will not be based on anything at this meeting. The ward by-election is on December 3.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

“No facts, please. I’ve made up my mind.”

October 15, 2012 by Peter Lowry

People must be bewildered by the ongoing arguments in Toronto about casinos. Between the news media, the local politicians and various citizens groups that are cropping up, less and less light is being shed on the issue. Having studied and written on the gambling scene for many years, we will also have to add our few cents.

First of all, there is a misconception that people in Toronto get a vote on this. Is there any reason why they should? The province has said that communities will not get a casino if they do not want one. That leaves the decision to city council. Do you think that a casino on the north side of Steeles Avenue, and therefore in Markham or Vaughn, will not allow Toronto residents to enter their premises? A vote on where a casino can locate in Toronto would be a waste of time and money.

And what right does anybody have to say whether there can or cannot be casinos. Do the bluestockings of Toronto run the city? For your information, casinos are legal in Ontario. That issue was settled years ago when politicians found out about the profits to be made on legalized gambling.

One indication that a person has no idea what they are talking about on this issue is when they tell you that casinos attract crime. That is a ridiculous statement. Some of the most dangerous places around Toronto today are the industrial malls and banquet halls where people are running illegal casino type games. These are magnets for card sharks, thieves and other criminals. If the police do not know where they are located, how can they protect the players from the criminals?

There is also the claim that casinos destroy the neighbouring area. This seems to be based on conditions in Atlantic City when it became a gambling centre. The casinos in that city were dropped into the midst of one of the most tawdry towns in North America. If anything, the casinos have returned some self respect to Atlantic City.

The last resort of the meddler in this question is to claim that casinos create problem gamblers. Well, they do, in a way. They create problem gamblers in the same way bars create drunks. There are millions of people in the Greater Toronto Area. There are some that should not drink and some that should not gamble. What has to be realized is that bars do not want to serve drunks and casinos do not want to cater to problem gamblers. Problem gamblers are bad for casino business. Casinos thrive on repeat business by people who gamble sensibly and have fun in their establishment.

Gamblers just need to realize that it is a mathematical certainty that two out of every three times they go to a casino, they will lose money. If this were not the case, the casinos would not be in business.

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When is a ‘windfall’ a fool’s folly?

October 5, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford said it was probably one of the largest windfalls the city has ever seen, or ever will. It might seem like a windfall to Ford but the reality is that he sold far more than he realized. He sold an important piece of Toronto’s heritage. In a move based on greed and misinformation, he convinced city council to sell its share of Enwave.

Envwave started up in 1964 as the Toronto Hydro district steam plant on Pearl Street. The mandate for the steam plant was to provide heat to municipal properties and institutions in downtown Toronto. Toronto citizens grumbled as the street or just traffic lane closures occurred as piping started to be run throughout the downtown area to carry steam to the district plant’s customers.

Flash forward to 2012, almost 50 years later, and Enwave Corporation is providing heating and cooling to more than 50 per cent of the potential market in downtown Toronto. Because of the capital costs required to built the Deep Lake Water Cooling capability, Enwave has become a corporation under the Ontario Corporations Act owned 50 per cent by the City of Toronto and the other by a branch of the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement Savings System (OMERS). This new corporation had the expertise to also take over and run another district heat and power system in Windsor.

Enwave has deserved the awards and praise it has gained over the years. It is successful because it has grown by innovation. It has installed more than 40 kilometres of piping under the streets of Toronto to carry both cold water and steam to cool and heat Toronto’s downtown towers and other facilities.

And now, city council has sold its citizens’ share of this priceless part of Toronto’s downtown infrastructure for just $168 million. With little thought for the future, council has opted for today’s financial gratification and are letting tomorrow look after itself. Those in favour of this fiasco are saying that the city gained a profit of $100 million from the sale as Toronto’s total contribution over the years was supposed to be just $68 million.

But Toronto’s contribution was far more. There are pipes under the downtown roads that were allowed to be placed there by Toronto pedestrians and drivers who endured the disruption to their city. It is money that the citizen’s invested over the years through their taxes and fees. Enwave belonged to them.

And yet Toronto councillors are now squabbling over the proceeds. When you kill the golden goose people, you end up with nothing. You are bad managers of the public trust.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

More tasking of Babel’s tyros.

October 4, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Babel’s tyros (beginners or novices) who run this city continue to be a trial. Frustration with them rose when talking to the city council earlier this week. The problem was part of a presentation about the missed opportunity to make the already operating heat and power facility at the sewage works into Babel’s first district energy operation.

A large part of the problem with the presentation was the blank looks on the councillors—we were not making it clear enough to them. We had also forgotten to bring water to the podium and you know what it is like when your mouth is dry and you cannot clear your throat. The pitch was something of a disaster.

It really fell apart when in the conclusion, the suggestion was made to subsidize garburators for condominium owners to increase solids to the sewage works and improve production of methane gas. It seemed like a good idea to us because condo owners have been paying excessive municipal taxes. These taxes pay for garbage, recycling and green bin pick up from homes but not from condominiums. The condominiums have been lobbying for years for some level of compensation. And since there is no current solution for a way green bin (compostable material) can be stored for pick up at condominiums, garburators are an ideal solution.

One of the councillors innocently asked the general manager of infrastructure and development if garburators were even legal in Babel. We had trouble hearing the mumbled answer but it sounded like they have been discouraged because they would overtax the sewage system. This seems patently untrue as the recent upgrade of the sewage system is designed to handle a much greater inflow than currently handled.

Our expert pointed out that in a study in New York City, two similar districts were tested, one with garburators and the other without. The small percentage increase in the garburator-using district had no impact on the sewage system. The only difference is that for every one per cent of solids from the garburators increased the available methane gas by an average of four per cent. The reason is that garburator materials such as vegetable peels, table scraps, et cetera produce a much higher volume of methane than fecal matter.

But you should not bother the tyros who run Babel City with the facts. They will create their own facts to suit their opinions.

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Complaints, comments, criticisms and compliments can be sent to [email protected]

The Mirvish kid is late for the party.

October 2, 2012 by Peter Lowry

David Mirvish, son of Toronto icon the late ‘Honest Ed’ Mirvish has a new vision. With his father laid to rest, the younger Mirvish seems to have almost free rein with the family’s entertainment and retailing empire. He is cutting back on the family theatre holdings to enter new entrepreneurial heights as a condominium developer.

It hardly seems to matter that the younger Mirvish has no background or experience in the condo field as he has an architect and a development manager to help him replace the Princess of Wales Theatre with three condo towers up to 80-stories in height. Nobody is expected to miss the theatre that has looked temporary since it was opened in 1993 for a production of Miss Saigon. The facts are that Toronto has overbuilt the number of 2000-seat theatres it needs or wants, as it has also overbuilt condominiums in the market.

It was Ed Mirvish’s wife Anne who encouraged him to get into the entertainment business and buy the old Royal Alexandra Theatre on King Street. He paid $250,000 for the theatre in 1962 and then spent far more refurbishing it over the following year. It was back in business as a legitimate theatre in 1963. Part of Ed Mirvish’s genius was that he bought up some of the derelict warehouses west of the theatre on King Street and opened a series of restaurants to entice people back to that part of the city. The restaurants are long gone but today King Street, west from University Avenue, constitutes one of the most vibrant parts of the city as the entertainment district.

The people most upset with young Mirvish’s condominium caper are the bar and restaurant owners in the area. These people have enjoyed the fat years of having two large and active theatres in the area helping to draw customers for them. Having just 1500 or so new condominium dwellers in the neighbourhood will never replace the ever changing traffic the area previously drew.

But the real tragedy is that a condominium development could drive a stake into the heart of the Mirvish success in Toronto. The condo market in Toronto has already started to show serious signs of decline and the Mirvish vision could just ride that slippery slope to oblivion. To give up on the Princess of Wales Theatre for a pig in the poke such as condos is not something that ‘Honest Ed’ would have tried.

If David Mirvish would like a freebie he should consider refurbishing the Princess of Wales to create three smaller theatres in the 700-seat range and lower his sights from big hit musicals to reviving more intimate and more intellectually stimulating off-Broadway type productions. Oh well, for what it is worth.

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If you build it, the players will come.

September 23, 2012 by Peter Lowry

Ontario Lottery and Gaming boss Paul Godfrey used to be a politician. He knows that if he is going to find the location for the Toronto area casino, he has to pit the area municipalities against each other. Each of them wants the jobs and tax revenues and they need the tourism.

But Paul also knows that you have to let politicians posture for the voters. It can be as ignorant and simplistic as alluding to some mysterious dark and evil side to gambling and as complex as weighing tax advantages against pressures on existing infrastructure. That is not Paul’s concern. He is trying to meet the revenue demands of his political masters at Queen’s Park. The province needs the money.

Politicians who think they are serving their voters by railing against casinos are more often, unwittingly, helping criminal elements continue their illegal gaming establishments in industrial and banquet hall facilities throughout the Metro area. Legal casinos can be policed. Illegal casinos are an invitation to trouble.

But, in many ways, for a politician to stand Canute-like to stem the tide of the public demands for pleasure palaces is just plain dumb. There are smart politicians in the Toronto area waiting to eat Toronto’s lunch. Markham, Mississauga and Vaughan all have land available for a gaming cum entertainment complex if Toronto does something stupid and leaves the opportunity for others.

Nobody argues that a prime location will be the west half of the Canadian National Exhibition grounds. A second favoured choice is the existing Woodbine Entertainment grounds in Etobicoke. Shoehorning the casino and other amenities into the existing Toronto Convention Centre would probably be a very dumb and overly expensive idea.

Mind you, expense is not a concern that is on the plate. It is the need to ensure that any monies coming into the endeavour are clean and legitimate come first. Apropos of some remarks made recently to the Charbonneau Commission in Montreal about Ontario organized crime, we certainly need to be vigilant about that.

It will be a shame though if we cannot find Canadian entrepreneurs for the casino and entertainment complex undertaking. To send profits south will be a shame.

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