We've been in the lower mainland for two days and a bit, now... and I continue to be surprised by the amount of snow that lingers... huge drifts of wet, heavy stuff. It rains a bit, then it freezes a bit, then it snows a bit... nothing out of the ordinary for Ontario, and not that uncommon for parts of Alberta. But to the greater Vancouver area, this is causing major consternation! There just aren't enough snowplows. Heck, there aren't enough snow shovels! The sidewalks are not being shovelled. Driveways are not being shovelled. People have simply dropped their vehicles on clear patches of the road in front of their homes, making it very difficult to get around on the side streets. And the secondary roads that have been plowed have been done with such caution for the curbing and property frontages that the passable portions are very narrow... a lane-and-a-half in way too many places. The municipalities really haven't got the infrastructure to delivery ice melt/sand in the proper mix for the climate. I must note, however, that I haven't seen a huge number of traffic accidents... people are very wary of the conditions. If this was Edmonton, they'd simply ignore the potential and become the disasters...

Currently we are staying with friends in Langley; they've got the right vehicle for travel with these road conditions, and they live in a townhouse complex that has good drainage for dealing with the bulk of the snow and rain... but tonight we are transferring over to friends in West Vancouver who are not set up for this quite so well. The West Vancouverites have had their two vehicles (a vintage Ford Mustang and a late model Jaguar) trapped in their respective garages by the snow build up in the access alley, or lane. The lane rolls down into a bit of a depression, a step on the way down to the sea, and the snow has been collecting there making things a bit of a challenge... when we spoke with them on Sunday, they had been housebound for two days and were about to try their escape.

The kid and her air travel woes...

Our eldest daughter finally made it to Toronto yesterday, and hopefully will be finding her way to Pittsburgh today... but, in her parlance, "What a gong show!"

J started out for Harrisburg, Pennsylvania on Christmas Day... routing from Edmonton to Vancouver to Seattle to Harrisburg. Her flight into Vancouver was cancelled. So, she was re-scheduled and re-routed to fly Edmonton to Toronto to Cleveland to Harrisburg yesterday, which she did, but only part way. She managed to get as far as Toronto before ice fogs cancelled her flight into Cleveland.

While standing in line for three and a half hours to get her flights juggled, yet again, she passed out, falling and smacking her head with some force on the simulated marble floors of Toronto International. EMTs were called...

She passed out because she had nothing to eat or drink for over three and a half hours... she was afraid to leave her place in line, and of course there are rules about abandoning luggage et.al. in an airport, or in asking for others to look after it while you seek out refreshment.

Aside from the goose egg sized bump on her head, she appears to be okay.

When she did come to... and she was already out of line, she made an emergency phone call to her roommate in Edmonton, who then called me asking if I could make a booking for J at the Travelodge near the airport just in case she didn't get a flight out that night. I was, unfortunately, sitting in the middle of the Edmonton airport fearing the worse for my own flight to Vancouver. Oh, and J doesn't have a cell phone... she cancelled it to save money. J was phoning Edmonton from a payphone using spare change; there was no way to phone her back. And did I tell you that she also recently cancelled all her credit cards? The girl is just dreadful with money management...

Okay, so I called the national reservation line for Travelodge and was told that they would be more than happy to reserve a room for her, but needed my credit card number to hold the room, given that it was already after 4 pm local time... I asked the obvious question; what happens if she gets a flight out and doesn't use the room? "Oh, well, we'll just have to charge the 'no show' to your credit card, sir!"

I decided not to make the reservation... instead I phoned the Travelodge directly and spoke with a lovely woman who was really quite helpful, up to a point. First of all she assured me that there were plenty of rooms available, and that if J did show up, they would be able to give her one without an 'official' reservation. Secondly, she would be sure to give J a message to call me immediately. So far so good, eh? Now it gets just plain stupid. She also told me that she could not accept my credit card as payment for the room, should J show up on their doorstep, unless I could fax her my signature, and an image of both sides of the card.

Travelodge will take your 'third party' credit card for a reservation, and 'hit' it if your party doesn't show, but their company policy is not to take a third party credit card for payment on a room actually occupied.

J did show up at the Travelodge while we were in the air on our way to Vancouver. The Travelodge had a real problem with her wanting to pay cash... and only gave her a room when she assured them that she would get in touch with me, and I would be providing a credit card number, as soon as I landed. The hotel manager, Brendan, was gracious enough to break the rules to allow me to do the 'third party' thing for her room...

Damn, but this is turning into a very expensive December!

Its our understanding that J will be on a flight to Pittsburgh later this afternoon... her friend in Harrisburg will be driving the 3 hours to pick her up there. I just wonder how long its going to take for her to get back to Edmonton...

Delayed...

We are supposed to be in BC with friends at this point. We aren't. Vancouver airport just doesn't seem to be able to deal with snow and freezing rain. We had arrived at the Edmonton airport on time yesterday afternoon, having checked before we left home that the flight was posted as being 'on time', when all of a sudden the gentleman at the gate announced that we would be delayed leaving for a minimum of two hours because Vancouver (YVR) had shut down to deal with the snow and rain. After an hour of waiting, the airline (Westjet) just gave up and cancelled the flight. We were sent home... and we try again this afternoon at 5:15 pm.

I do worry about both Vancouver's and Victoria's ability to deal with snow and crappy weather; what the heck are they going to do if the weather turns foul during the 2010 Olympics? Hopefully this botched Christmas season was a wake up call to the airport authorities, and the airlines!

Westjet was very good... very helpful, and very cheerful throughout the process. Avis, on the hand, was less than accommodating. I phoned the Vancouver outfit that we were supposed to rent a vehicle from to let them know that we wouldn't be arriving until the next day. But they informed me that they didn't have a car to rent me the next day! I offered to pay the extra day for the car that they were going to give me if we had arrived on time, but they are unable to process payments over the phone! So, we end up loosing a day's vehicle rental... but they end up loosing a customer. I've booked a car with another renter, to be picked up on Sunday.

The other thing that annoyed me was the cost of the cab to get home to St. Albert... I've done the math over and over, and can't believe that it is cheaper to drive my own vehicle to the airport and pay for parking there for the week than it is to take a cab both ways. It really is no wonder that the airport authority has had to expand its parking facilities, and that the taxi queue at the airport is always very long and never seems to move... I suspect that a lot of the greater Edmonton residents using the airport have figured out that it is cheaper to 'park and fly'.

I just keep muttering to myself; we could have driven the jeep to Vancouver...

In the meantime, I figured that I would just post a couple of pictures; me, my father, and G., and my father and G. These were taken last week when we attended the memorial of one of Dad's sisters in Victoria...

Merry Christmas... Ho Ho Ho... Damn!

Its 10:30 pm on Christmas Day evening... G. and my younger sister have retired for the day, leaving me with time to update this blog. And yes, I do know that I haven't touched it for a couple of weeks... and a few things have happened, not all of which I'll go into tonight, but I will get to them eventually... like the trip to my aunt's memorial service in Victoria, with snow (wierd damned weather this year!) and the rental car that I banged up (damn! but I wish there was someone/something to blame that on), visits with my Dad, and the other two aunts, cousins and staying at a fabulous little boutique hotel, The Magnolia... and then there is the latest round of visits to the heath care support team; iRSM for the swallows (expect a new floroscope in the new year) and the Cross Cancer Institute physio team about my shoulder. But for tonight we stick to the last couple of days.

By the way, the weather in Canada sucks. Why the hell do people live here? For the first time in nearly twenty years, the entire country, including Victoria and Vancouver, is having a white Christmas. The normal average temperature for Christmas Day in Edmonton is -7.5 degrees C. Today it was -22 C. (Throw in an expletive wherever it makes more dramatic sense.) I tell ya, its @#$%^&* cold out there... and I'm not enjoying it this year. My hands have never been colder... and it feels like its all the damn time. I once enjoyed the cold, and the snow. Really. Not this year. It just feels like an imposition. And this bloody weather may compromise our attempt to get to Vancouver to see friends. We're supposed to fly out tomorrow afternoon, but it may not happen... the snow in Vancouver has caused more than one flight to be cancelled today, and yesterday, and the day before...

In fact eldest daughter J's flights routing her through Vancouver>Seattle>Harrisburg got pulled today. She's back home trying to figure out how to get into New York to be with her good buddy to plan a wedding; J gets to be 'Maid of Honour'.

And that flight was one of the reasons that we did something a wee bit different for Christmas. Well, that and the need for our youngest, K, to spend the day with her in-laws and out-laws. There's some awkwardness there that needed to be addressed, so we (her mother and I) graciously agreed to give the Christmas Day dinner a pass, and instead we did a Christmas Eve dinner... with fifteen. Add the appropriate expletives as you see fit.

We decided that a roast of beef was fit Christmas Eve fare; we selected a 15 lb sirloin roast. Do you know how BIG a 15 pound roast of beef is? Add another expletive.

The dinner guests included K and husband, J and a posse of 3 (all good, lovely, single young women who seem to take a real interest in our world), good friends Nancy and John, with their son and his girl friend, and then John's parents, Don and Terri. And don't forget my younger sister, who drove up from Calgary. Quite honestly, our place is just a wee bit small for fourteen and the obligatory dogs... the dinner table really only handles 12 with any level of comfort. And I was 'forbidden' to set up a kid's table...

Dinner went off without a hitch. Well, mostly, anyway... timing on the Yorkshire puddings was a bit off, and one of J's posse had a momentary breakdown as the weight of her world came crashing in on her. (It is so tough to be a witness to a young woman's pain... an ugly breakup with a lover, the schizophrenic mother that she has had to invoke power-of-attorney over, the questionable support from her siblings, and having to work on Christmas Day...)

Good booze, though. Have you tried any of the "Dan Akroyd" wines? Surprisingly good...

After dinner, we managed to squeeze the electronic piano into the dining room so that Daniel, son of Nancy, could play for us... and that's when the phone rang. A good friend who has recently moved into the condominium complex returned home to a cracked toilet tank and flooded home. (This is the same newly divorced woman who has threatened to have the sentence "If you can see this there had better be significant jewellery involved!" tattooed in a rather intimate location.)

So I go running off, with ladder over one shoulder, carrying a drill and extension cord (got to drain the water out of the dry wall ceilings before they collapse; the offending toilet was on the second floor), and buckets and towels to staunch the flow, while younger sister is regaled with stories of flying Phantoms in Europe by Nancy's father (ex-fighter pilot, of all things), Daniel is trying desperately to remember suitably Christmassy tunes but ending up with Billy Joelish stuff, G is trying to convince our guests to eat dessert, and J's friends start nodding off. K's husband snuck upstairs to the big screen to watch the end of the Hawaii/Notre Dame game and wasn't even missed.

By the time I got back, we were down to just the girls, the husband and the posse... and gifts were being exchanged.

G. had insisted that we give the youngest daughter a book on pregnancy, over my objections. I didn't feel that we should be applying that sort of pressure... and I'm not ready to be a grandfather, damn it. The timing couldn't have been more perfect... K quietly announced that we would see the rest of our present in about eight months....

So much for the mythos of 'Silent Night'.

End of the Week

I have spent my last work week sequestered with 14 mid level/senior level IT managers from our current client reviewing the results of a significant RFP (Request for Proposal). The ‘winner’ of this RFP will be awarded a multi-million dollar contract to provide services province-wide. The participants have all analyzed the responses from the qualified Vendors in detail, and we’re now meeting to establish consensus. My role is to monitor the ‘fairness’ of the process, and not really to provide opinions. This stuff is really interesting… seriously. I’m listening to this group rationalize their scoring for questions such as “Supplier should describe its approach to disentangling the Services from other service providers without interrupting any services to End Users.” Huh? You’d have to have been involved in the entire process to get it… My assignment to monitor the fairness of the evaluation of the RFP responses is a continuation of the work I was doing before my ‘hiatus’. It is actually quite interesting to see what they did with the strategy that I helped define when they finalized the RFP.

This evaluation process is not something that you would normally find in the private sector. Yes, this is public sector stuff… This evaluation process has been going on since September 24th… and will continue on into January. The level of detail they are going into is gratifying… at least we know that at least the public sector IT teams are being very careful with how they spend tax dollars. I’m not convinced that the private sector would expend this kind of energy analyzing the RFP bids. But by the same token, I’m also not sure that the private sector would write such detailed RFPs…

***

I did take some time out of the evaluation process to get a cracked filling fixed; the filling was cracked as part of the surgery last year.

***

And I was supposed to meet with my speech/swallow therapist; the receptionist at iRSM screwed up the appointment, however. It was clearly marked on my chart, but the digital appointment system showed other people in my time slot. I was very annoyed, mostly 'cause I couldn't justify not going back to work...

***

Today is our 20th wedding anniversary.

Overheard...

Apparently Ed Schreyer, Governor General from 1979 to 1984 said something like the following today in an interview on CBC:

"The People choose a Parliament; the Parliament chooses a Government." And he should know the Constitution... he's been there, with the Joe Clark minority government that lost a confidence vote.

That being said, if Parliament (the elected representatives) choose a coalition government by majority vote of the House of Commons, then democracy has been served.

Federal Coalitions and Municipal Absurdities

I spent the early part of last evening watching television… bouncing back and forth from the news channels that are reporting on the state of affairs in Ottawa to the local station that broadcasts the budget deliberations of the St. Albert City Council. What a mess, on both counts.

Federal Politics
Astounding! I am absolutely astounded by the way the media is portraying how the Canadian people are reacting to the thought of a Coalition Government! If you were to listen to the media, it’s the one issue that is ‘top of mind’ for all Canadians. Wow. If we could only get that kind of interest in an election…

I really doubt that there are that many people who are that concerned. In the client workplace that I am currently working from it is rarely mentioned… and I am working from Provincial Government offices. In fact, I think that the only person who raises the topic is me!

This silliness over the undemocratic nature of a Coalition is just that; silliness. I’ve been told that a number of European countries function with coalition governments. In fact, Switzerland has had a coalition government since 1959, or some such date. As I’ve mentioned before, Israel has a coalition government.

I’m hearing, again through media filtering, that business owners/leaders of all stripes are angry that the Conservatives presented the economic update that they did. I’m hearing that business is angry with Harper for being so bloody petty. I’m hearing that business is starting to question whether Harper should be PM… lack of leadership issues. And I’m getting mixed signals on the nature of the Coalition. Some damn the Liberals and NDP for getting into bed with the Bloc, while others are pleased that Mr. Duceppe is involved because he’s the only one with any real integrity.

I am pleased to see that the media commentators, even the talk show moderators, are finally laying the blame for the current Federal political situation at Stephen Harper’s doorstep. There are acknowledgements that Mr. Harper has been acting mean-spiritedly. There have even been comments made, out loud, in the print media and on the air, that Mr. Harper should be replaced by someone like Mr. Prentice.

Municipal Politics
Now, before you read the next bit, just be aware that I do have a close personal relationship with one of the players…my comments, observations are not entirely dispassionate.

One of the most interesting experiences for a novice to the municipal political world is to just sit back and watch how it works, or doesn’t, as the case may be. The St. Albert City Council Budget Deliberations, currently being broadcast on the local cable provider’s community channel (channel 10 in St. Albert/Edmonton) are a brilliant way to observe. These Budget Deliberations are conducted in a format referred to as ‘Committee of the Whole’; it is not a City Council meeting, per se, but it is the entire City Council confronting representatives from the City Administration, and they follow a good chunk of the rules of order used in a regular Council Meeting, with the occasional deviation, and a slightly ‘informal’ air.

One of the challenges about this formalized approach to budget deliberation is that it fosters the perception that the various Administration Teams are not allowed to defend their budget submissions unless specifically asked to. It has the appearance of a lopsided ‘don’t speak unless spoken to’ environment, similar to regular Council Meetings. What the optics seem to reveal is that the Administration has submitted a budget for the next year, City Council has gone through the budget line by line and has made a series of motions challenging specific line items, usually by changing the scope or reducing the monies. Each motion is voted on. In some cases there is a defense of the line item offered by a representative of Administration, if they are given an opportunity to defend the line item. In very rare cases, a member of the Council will champion the line item. In even rarer occasions, a member of the Administration Team is called to speak for the defense of the line item who has some passion for what that item means to the provision of services to the public.

These cost cutting motions range from quashing of the acquisition of new goods and services, stifling the improvement/development of existing goods and services, reduction/removal of budget items that support the basic tools needed to provide service to the public, to defeating new staffing initiatives. An example that resonated with me was the emasculation of a Capital Projects Project Management Team.

Unfortunately the public viewing these deliberations are not getting a true sense of the impact of this sort of decision making process. The real implications of the cuts are not necessarily being adequately discussed on camera, again, presenting a very lopsided view.

What also seems to be happening in the background is quite interesting and a little disconcerting. The Mayor himself is admitting on a fairly regular basis that if a member of an Administration Team manages to get the Mayor aside and have a private chat with him about a specific motion (the bulk of the motions are recorded in advance, and the bulk of the cost reduction motions seem to be coming from the Mayor), pitching their case personally, he tends to withdraw the punitive motion during the Budget meetings. If the Administration Team that is affected by one of his cost cutting initiatives plays by the rules and works hard to prepare Information Requests that substantiate their case, they do not get the same level of hearing in the Budget Meeting as they would through a meeting in an office or a ‘chance’ exchange in a corridor, and for the most part, lose their case, and the corresponding line item.

I do wonder how a City like St. Albert is going to maintain current levels of service to the public with such cuts. If memory serves, there was another Mayor some years ago who got the shock of his life when he discovered that the majority of the public was more interested in the quality of services provided rather than in the tax increase. There was a vocal minority who did not truly represent the interests of the majority with their complaints about taxes.

And again this time there does not seem to be any attempt at managing the public’s expectations.

My biggest concern, aside from the impact to my ‘internal contacts’, is the effect it will have on staff moral, and then on the delivery of services.

One of the good things of broadcasting these ‘Committee of the Whole’ sessions, is that the public can see the behaviour and effectiveness of each member of Council; which Councilors are prepared for the meetings, having read the submissions from Administration, and which haven’t bothered to do their homework. And they can see the behaviour of the Mayor.

Elected officials at this level, in this size of municipality are there to provide governance. In most cases they are amateurs when it comes to administering a city of the size of St. Albert. Governance is turning to City Administration and saying “Cut $2 Million from the Operating Budget.” Leave the actual cuts up to the professionals who actually run the City. Unfortunately what is happening in St. Albert is that the City Council, led by the Mayor, is attempting to manage in areas which it is not qualified to manage. There is a reason why you hire professional municipal managers, just like there is a reason why you hire lawyers and accountants, and plumbers. Some jobs are just too big and complex for the average resident. And this Council is not just ‘managing’, it is micro-managing.