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Miscellany, News

Bob Mackin

West Vancouver’s Yihao Wang will be sentenced May 10 in North Vancouver Provincial Court after pleading guilty April 24 to driving a supercar 150 kilometres-an-hour above the speed limit last summer. 

Wang’s lawyer, David Baker, asked the court for a Mandarin interpreter to be present for the sentencing. Wang had no problem understanding when Baker asked where his vehicle was outside the courthouse.

Wang had just emerged from the lobby wearing a black baseball cap, sunglasses and surgical mask. He strode briskly, in a pair of $1,000 Salvatore Ferragamo velvet gold-monogrammed loafers, to a parked white Porsche SUV after ignoring questions from reporters. Wang occupied the passenger seat, while another man, wearing a similar surgical mask, got behind the steering wheel. 

Ferrari supercar impounded July 4 (WVPD)

West Vancouver Police impounded Wang’s $300,000, 2015 Ferrari 458 on July 4, 2017, after he flew across the Lions Gate Bridge at 210 km-h. The posted speed limit is 60 km-h. He was banned from driving for 16 months. 

Outside the courthouse, Baker called that “the sentence prior to the verdict.” He said the guilty plea to avoid the trial “is favourable to my client and meets the Crown’s needs.” 

“He’s very sorry for what occurred, he regrets it, he’s been taken off the road for 16 months which is a significant penalty already and he’s taken responsibility by entering a plea today,” Baker told reporters. “Many other young people get tickets for speeding and they continue to speed. I expect now that he’s been sanctioned in this way, he’ll slow down significantly.”

Court files show that Wang, born in 1994, was found guilty of failing to produce a driver’s licence or insurance in 2013 and 2015. He did not dispute speeding tickets in 2015, 2016 and 2017, and was ticketed for using an electronic device while driving in 2017. In April 2017, Wang was caught driving 126 km-h over the same bridge behind the wheel of a Mercedes Benz CLS66. 

Fuerdai is the Mandarin term for “rich second generation” and Wang has all the trappings of being the scion of wealth. The Ferrari driver lives in a British Properties mansion that was assessed at $6.29 million and registered to Xinghui Wang. Yet, Baker refused to say whether Wang is a student or has a job. He would not comment on the source of Wang’s funds or whether he was returning from a casino when cops nabbed him. He said that Wang’s family is involved in a legitimate business, but declined to provide details.  

Yihao Wang (left) (Mackin)

“I have no idea where he was coming back from [on July 4], this case has absolutely nothing to do with casinos and money laundering,” he said. “This case is about a young person who drove too fast.” 

Const. Jeff Palmer said that West Vancouver Police have impounded 96 vehicles for excessive speed in 2018 so far, compared to 46 for the same period in 2017. Palmer said the increase is partly due to staffing, because traffic officers who were recovering from on-duty injuries in 2017 are back on the job with a similar shift rotation to patrol members. 

Only 11 of the drivers whose cars have been impounded in 2018 are West Vancouver residents, Palmer said. Approximately 60% of impounds were for excessive speed on the Upper Levels Highway, 30% on Cypress Bowl Road and only two so far on the Lions Gate Bridge. Of the 96 drivers, 77 were male, ranging from 19 to 55. 

The highest alleged speed this year is 187 km-h in a 90 km-h zone.

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Bob Mackin West Vancouver’s Yihao Wang will

Business, News, Sports

Bob Mackin 

The much-anticipated expert report into money laundering at Lower Mainland casinos may not be published until the end of May. 

So said Attorney General David Eby in an April 20 interview with theBreaker.

Eby received University of British Columbia law professor Peter German’s 250-page, 48-recommendation document at the end of March, which he called a “comprehensive report about the history of the issue in British Columbia casinos.”

“I’m hopeful to have it out by the end of the [spring] session; we’re doing some due diligence to make sure we’re not going to interfere with any law enforcement investigations by publicly releasing it and that we’re not unintentionally releasing anyone’s private information,” Eby said. “The goal is to get it out to the public as quickly as possible because that’s why we commissioned the report in the first place.”

B.C. Attorney General Eby in Ottawa, March 27. (ParlVu)

The spring session of the Legislature is scheduled to end May 31.

Eby appointed German late last September after releasing a 2016 consultant’s report that had been suppressed by the previous BC Liberal government. The MNP report said gamblers from China used underground banks to bring large volumes of potentially dirty money to play at River Rock Casino Resort in Richmond, the flagship of Great Canadian Gaming Corp.

theBreaker was first to report that criminology professor John Langdale warned an Australian police intelligence conference last November about the “Vancouver model” of money laundering. Langdale told the conference that the “Vancouver model” involved transnational drug trafficking and capital flight from China that led to investment in Canadian real estate. Key to the scheme are B.C.’s Chinese sister province Guangdong, financial centre Hong Kong and gambling haven Macau.

River Rock and all other casinos in B.C. are operated in partnership with B.C. Lottery Corporation. Eby told theBreaker that the Crown corporation’s top officials have his vote of confidence.  

“If I had any reason to believe that someone had acted unlawfully or inappropriately to the extent that it compromised their ability to do their job, certainly those individuals would be removed,” Eby said. “Currently, I have total confidence in the ability of the BCLC executive to work with government in implementing the recommendations of the German report.”

BCLC CEO Jim Lightbody was the Crown corporation’s vice-president in charge of casinos from 2011 until 2014 when he was promoted to replace Mike Graydon, who quit to work for the company behind the Parq Casino beside B.C. Place Stadium. Brad Desmarais, a former senior police officer with the RCMP and Vancouver Police, joined BCLC in early 2013 as vice-president of corporate security and compliance. He took over the casino division in mid-2015. 

In the BCLC service plan released the same day as the BC Liberal government’s 2015 provincial budget, Lightbody reported: “The fastest growing segment of our revenue – high-limit table games in casinos – is heavily dependent on an international player base and is largely tied to the health of the tourism industry. The recent slowdown of international economies and currency restrictions presents risks for the growth of business.”

Great Canadian Gaming reported a 30% year-over-year increase in net revenue from table games during Chinese New Year in 2014.

theBreaker asked Eby specifically to comment on whether the jobs of Lightbody and Desmarais are safe.

Said Eby: “I’ve been working closely with the executive at BCLC throughout the German review and will continue to work closely with them as we work to implement the recommendations that he has put forward. Mr. German’s report will speak for itself, in terms of what exactly the issues were he identified in his review, and I look forward to releasing it as quickly as possible.” 

BCLC’s Jim Lightbody (left) and Brad Desmarais (LinkedIn)

According to the 2017-released compensation report, BCLC paid Lightbody $415,060 in pay and perks, while Desmarais’s package was $269,551. 

In 2007, BCLC’s board fired CEO Vic Poleschuk after a damning report by Ombudsperson Kim Carter into the unusually high rate of big lottery wins by retailers and retail employees. Carter found major gaps in BCLC prize payout procedures, lax enforcement and poor protection of consumers.

Poleschuk left with a $735,000 severance and became a consultant to Great Canadian Gaming, which hired him to run its Eastern Canada operations in 2010. Lightbody was BCLC’s vice-president of lotteries under Poleschuk. 

The BCLC board is down to four directors after the Dec. 31, 2017 expiry of appointments for BC Liberal-aligned auto dealer Moray Keith and tech entrepreneur Matthew Watson.

Chair Bud Smith, the former Social Credit attorney general, continues to serve with tech consultant Andrew Brown, ex-KPMG partner Robert Holden and hotelier Wendy Lisogar-Cocchia. Lisogar-Cocchia’s chain of Absolute Spas counts a location at River Rock. 

Eby said he asked German to make recommendations about changes to BCLC’s corporate structure, which could apply to the board. 

“I didn’t want to appoint any new board members until I had a sense about what was coming down the pipe. Now that I have an idea, we’re currently doing the work around identifying appropriate new board members who will assist us in any transition that we need to do,” Eby said. 

“My goal is to have some overlap between the current board members and incoming board members so that they can have a little bit of background about the organization and come up to speed on the current challenges at BCLC and any opportunities as well.” 

BCLC’s latest annual service plan contemplates a $55 million drop in net income for the casino division, partly due to the crackdown on casino money laundering. BCLC counted $1.34 billion in profits in fiscal 2016-2017. 

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Bob Mackin  The much-anticipated expert report into money

Miscellany, News, Opinion, Sports

Calgary, the 1988 Winter Olympics host, is one of seven cities showing interest in bidding for the 2026 Games.

The International Olympic Committee will vote on the host city in September 2019. 

Last week, city council voted 9-6 against abandoning the bid. Now debate shifts to a plebiscite. 

On this edition of theBreaker.news Podcast, host Bob Mackin interviews guest Tom Sindlinger of No Calgary Olympics.

Sindlinger says there must be a plebiscite, to let the people decide whether to back the bid. But it should be open to all Albertans, not just Calgarians.  

The economist and former member of Alberta’s legislature loves the Olympics, but not the five-ring circus’s massive public spending and debt. He points to the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics as a cautionary tale: the British Columbia auditor general never did a final report and organizing committee board minutes and financial documents are out of the public’s reach until 2025.

Sindlinger also offers his take on Alberta Premier Rachel Notley’s threat to use taxpayers’ money to buy a stake in the stalled Kinder Morgan pipeline expansion. 

All that, plus regular commentaries and a look at news headlines in Cascadia and around the Pacific Rim. 

Listen by clicking below or go to iTunes and subscribe. 

Have you missed an edition of theBreaker.news Podcast? Go to the archive.

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Calgary, the 1988 Winter Olympics host, is

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Bob Mackin

The Vision Vancouver cameraman who pretended to be a media worker during the 2014 election campaign received more than $50,000 in patronage contracts from Mayor Gregor Robertson’s office. 

The spending report for 2017, tabled at city council’s April 17 meeting, shows Mark Vonesch received two payments totalling $12,000 last year for video production. 

Mark Vonesch (left), Gregor Robertson and Justin Trudeau in 2015 (Twitter)

Vonesch was also paid $10,000 at the end of 2014, after Robertson’s re-election. He took in another $15,000 in 2015 and two more cheques totalling $14,400 in 2016.

In total, Vonesch has received $51,400 in payments from the city treasury. All of the lucre came after the 2014 civic election campaign, in which he collected footage for Vision attack ads at NPA mayoral candidate Kirk LaPointe’s news conferences.  

One of his 2015 assignments was to capture Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s jubilant post-election visit to Vancouver city hall, an event that was covered by all major media outlets in the city. 

Vonesch boasted to the Vision-friendly Vancouver Observer in 2011 that he signed-up 100 volunteers to campaign for Robertson, “and a lot of them were under 35.” He heavily promoted Vision and the successful re-election campaign on his social media channels in 2014.

Vonesch is the co-founder of the Tides Canada-funded non-profit Reel Youth. Reel Youth was recently featured on CBC’s The National for helping youths near Toronto produce short documentaries about homeless seniors.

Neither Vonesch nor Robertson nor his chief of staff, Kevin Quinlan, responded for comment. 

Robertson’s staff spent more than $9,500 on communications supplies in 2017, including $3,000 on Facebook ads. City of Vancouver also has a communications department of more than 40 people, headed by Rena Kendall-Craden. She was paid $168,609 in 2017. 

Payments to Vonesch were part of the $116,451.68 that Robertson spent on consultants in 2017, up from $106,314.67 in 2016.

Claudia Kelly Li was the highest-paid consulting contractor. She invoiced for almost $50,000 as “community engagement consultant,” plus $4,500 from her Art of People company. Catherine Chan invoiced $30,000 for Chinese translation and Chinese media monitoring.

The Mayor’s Office spent $935,223.35 last year. The biggest line item, $640,479.05, was for salaries for political staff. 

Two of Robertson communication aides, Katie Robb and Sarah Zaharia, left 12th and Cambie in 2017 to join the NDP government. Zaharia’s former partner, Adrian Crook, is seeking the NPA’s nomination to run for city council on mayoral hopeful Coun. Hector Bremner’s slate. Crook volunteered for Vision during the 2014 campaign. 

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Bob Mackin The Vision Vancouver cameraman who pretended

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Bob Mackin

His nickname is Mayor Moonbeam. But it really ought to be Mayor Sunwing, like the travel agency. 

Since leading Vision Vancouver to power in 2008, the tuba-playing Gregor Robertson has toured the world like a rockstar on civic business for the equivalent of almost an entire calendar year. 

Expense reports analyzed by theBreaker from 2009 (his first full year in office) through 2017 (his last full year in office) show Robertson spent 331 days traveling and visiting other cities, for a cost to taxpayers of $126,534.23. 

Robertson (2nd from left) with environment minister Catherine McKenna at a Loblaw’s promotion in Toronto. (Twitter)

Last year was Robertson’s most-expensive: 14 trips totalling 59 days at a cost of $27,554.11. The total discretionary travel expense in 2017 for the Office of the Mayor, including travel for Robertson’s aides, was $41,819.88. 

Vancouverites paid Robertson $168,055 in 2017. He traveled on civic business for almost two months during a year that deaths from opioid overdoses and the affordable housing crisis dominated headlines and caused his own supporters to turn against him. 

Robertson also billed for 59 days of travel in 2015, when he spent $22,038.85.

Six of the trips in 2017 were to advance Vision Vancouver’s green agenda, including the European Forum Alpbach in Germany ($2,057.11, Aug. 27-30) and Environmental Grantmakers Association Conference in Seattle ($739.99, Sept. 27).

Robertson has not shied away from flying to conventions around the world on polluting airliners, despite being one of Canada’s most-prominent climate change alarmists.  

theBreaker emailed Robertson, his chief of staff Kevin Quinlan and spokesman Tony Chen to ask for comment about the costs and reasons for all the non-essential travel. No one replied. 

The travel expenses report for city council was tabled at the April 17 meeting without discussion or debate. It indicates that Robertson visited Ottawa three times in the first half of the year — once to attend the Juno Awards and twice for the Big City Mayors’ Caucus.

The most-expensive trip charged to taxpayers for 2017 was $6,524.02 for Robertson’s May 3-7 junket to the New York Smart Cities Conference with Quinlan. Robertson was accompanied to Brussels by his operations director, Shea O’Neil, to the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy board meeting from June 22-28. That was more expensive at $6,690.77, but $5,918.80 was paid by a third-party that was not identified in the report to city council. 

Robertson also traveled to Beijing, Shanghai, Sydney and Chicago; he also made a second trip to New York in September.  

The China/Australia junket, which included aide Naveen Girn, cost $4,922.04. 

Vancouver’s mayor sandwiched by the ex-president and his ex-chief of staff.

Robertson’s staff did not issue a news release before he left for the September China trip, which was billed as a Vancouver Economic Commission trade mission. They only confirmed to media that he was in the Middle Kingdom on the day before his itinerary concluded in Shanghai.

The visit to China was his fourth as mayor. 

In Chicago, Robertson posed for a photograph with Mayor Rahm Emanuel and ex-President Barack Obama at a climate summit for mayors last December. In 2015, Robertson went all the way to the White House with ex-New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, but only met Secretary of State John Kerry. 

In August, Robertson charged taxpayers $518.01 to fly from Cortes Island, home of the Hollyhock new age retreat, to Vancouver for a speech outside city hall on Aug. 19. A fringe anti-Islam group from Alberta had planned to protest immigration policies, but the leader cancelled at the last minute. Images of Robertson speaking and glad-handing were among several thousand counter-protesters was captured for potential use in his 2018 re-election campaign. He flew back to Cortes to continue his vacation. 

In early January, Robertson revealed he would not seek a fourth term in office. Officially, Vision Vancouver is not planning to field a mayoral candidate for the Oct. 20 election. Shauna Sylvester, a former board member who is close to both Robertson and Vision bagman Joel Solomon, announced a run earlier this month as an independent. 

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Bob Mackin His nickname is Mayor Moonbeam. But

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Bob Mackin

A proposal for federal funding obtained by theBreaker shows that the Victoria company at the centre of the Facebook data breach scandal contemplated “volume testing to 40 million voters” for the software it was developing. 

But AggregateIQ’s submission for National Research Council funding claimed no personal information would be compromised for its “Platform independent political campaign online reporting tool.” 

The $100,000 Industrial Research Assistance Program grant for the nine-month, 2017 project was intended to help AggregateIQ develop the system to predict voter turnout, candidate support and the outcome of a campaign communications strategy. AggregateIQ proposed to pay the remaining $150,000 from its 2015 profits and anticipated 2016 revenues. 

AggregateIQ co-founders Zack Massingham (left) and Jeff Silvester.

The Canadian Press was first to report on the NRC funding on April 6, the same day that Facebook announced it suspended AIQ for improper receipt of user data. theBreaker obtained copies of the partly censored proposal and agreement from the NRC’s access to information office on April 12. Those documents are published below.

AIQ claimed in the proposal that it had 10 employees, including eight technical staff under directors Zackary Massingham and Jeff Silvester. But the entire first paragraph under the heading “Ownership and Management” was censored. British Columbia does not yet have a law requiring the beneficial owners of a company be disclosed in public filings. 

“Our team is made up of engineers, computer scientists and software developers,” the proposal reads. “They are all experienced at programming for political related software solutions in the context of the changing political and technological landscape.”

Functions of the project included ad network and server data processing and data matching/normalizing algorithm and data analysis algorithms design and refining. 

“With no personal data and no data that could be matched back to an individual, we believe that this project meets all ethical requirements and does not require further ethical review,” according to the proposal.

Massingham and NRC advisor Olga Kargina signed the funding deal for January through September 2017. Kargina, coincidentally, was an assistant professor of chemistry at Russia’s Kazan State University from 1986 to 1990. 

Neither Massingham nor Silvester responded to theBreaker for comment. In a short statement on its website, AIQ claims it did no wrong and followed applicable laws. 

Victoria’s Christopher Wylie, the Facebook-Cambridge Analytica whistleblower, testified at a U.K. House of Commons hearing last month that AIQ was a “franchise” of Cambridge Analytica, which habitually disregarded the law. AIQ is under investigation by privacy watchdogs in Canada and the U.K.

The proposal pointed to the shortcomings of traditional polling companies that failed to accurately predict the 2016 U.K. referendum on European Union membership and the 2017 U.S. presidential election. Political decision makers, it said, were turning to “internal data analytics to decide where to spend money, allocate resources and ultimately find out if they are going to win.”

AIQ said its customers include political parties, candidates, independent issue based organizations, campaigns and similar minded organizations, while all of its competitors are U.S.-based: Targeted Victory, Nation Builder, i360, NGP Van, and Campaign Solutions. AIQ stressed that it had customers ready to use the program, “so our sales cycle is essentially zero.” 

It was also recruiting co-op students and offering relocation costs to lure experienced talent from Vancouver to Victoria in search of lower housing costs, shorter commutes and a slightly lower key city. 

“This will make our consulting business able to handle more clients and open a new line of revenue in sales and support of a much needed tool in the campaign space.”

The proposal to the NRC lists the address of AIQ’s registered office, which is the Cox Taylor law firm. One of the law firm’s partners is Frank Carson, constitutional advisor to the BC Liberals and husband of ex-BC Liberal caucus executive director Primrose Carson. 

Silvester and Wylie both know each other through their work for the Liberal Party of Canada. In 2016, Wylie briefly worked on a project to set-up social media monitoring for the Liberal research bureau.

Christopher Wylie testifying to a U.K. Parliamentary committee on March 27.

Unlike NRC, B.C.’s Jobs, Trade and Technology and Advanced Education, Skills and Training ministries said they had not made any grants to AIQ. 

During the period of the NRC-funded project, AIQ also worked on three BC Liberal election campaigns, for Doug Clovechok (Columbia River-Revelstoke), Dave Calder (Saanich South) and Mike de Jong (Abbotsford West), The Tyee reported. Clovechok and de Jong won their ridings, but Calder, who worked in the BC Liberal government from 2006 to 2014, didn’t. 

AIQ also made a proposal to the BC Liberals early last summer, in anticipation of a snap election that didn’t happen. Earlier this year, AIQ worked on ex-transportation minister Todd Stone’s failed leadership campaign, but was caught creating email addresses for 1,400 members recruited in Surrey’s South Asian community and Richmond’s Chinese community. In 2016, AIQ was contracted by the BC Greens to build a voter database.

More than 620,000 Facebook users in Canada and 87 million worldwide were victims of the Cambridge Analytica data breach. 

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Bob Mackin A proposal for federal funding obtained

Miscellany, News, Opinion

Bob Mackin

John Langdale isn’t a household name in British Columbia. 

But two words from the Sydney professor’s speech last autumn are famous. 

Langdale is an expert on transnational crime and financial crime at Macquarie University’s Department of Security Studies and Criminology. He gave a lecture to the New South Wales Police Force’s intelligence conference last Nov. 2, that was titled “Impact of Chinese Transnational Crime on Australia: Intelligence Perspectives.”

In his presentation, Langdale warned of various tactics employed by criminal gangs in Guangdong, China, to enable the export of money, drugs and counterfeit goods from China. 

The speech described what he called the “Vancouver model.” 

Macquarie University’s John Langdale.

Almost a month later, on Dec. 1, 2017 at the University of British Columbia law school, Attorney General David Eby told a Transparency International conference that he was advised “at least one international intelligence community” had called the particular style of money laundering unique to B.C. casinos the “Vancouver model.” 

Eby did not identify the source, but a copy of Langdale’s presentation was emailed to him on Nov. 27 by Eby’s aide, George Smith. It was released last week to theBreaker under the freedom of information law. 

In his 38-slide presentation, Langdale delivered four case studies to outline the threat to Australia, focusing on historic alliances between Chinese criminal gangs and Latin American and European criminals and a possible alliance between North Korea and Chinese criminal gangs. 

The final case study was what Langdale called the Vancouver model, which is comprised of “complex networks of criminal alliances.” 

“Chinese underground banks are at the heart of Chinese criminal activity. Money [is] laundered from Vancouver into/out of China and to other locations (Mexico, Colombia),” reads a slide from Langdale’s presentation.

He further described how North American illegal drug networks are supplied by Chinese and Latin American gangs; the Chinese specialize in methamphetamines and precursor chemicals, while the Latin Americans are in the cocaine trade. 

Capital flight from China, he wrote, is facilitated by high rollers using Canadian casinos, with help from junket operators, resulting in investment in Canadian real estate. 

In an interview with theBreaker, Langdale said there is a lucrative industry for gambling tour operator companies to Macau, Philippines and Vancouver. Some of the companies are even listed on the Hong Kong stock exchange. 

“I think of [junket operators] as a finance company, essentially, that will provide transport, services and accommodation, but ultimately they provide the money,” Langdale said. “So when the high roller shows up at the casino, the money is there to gamble. The junket operators use underground banks.”

If a gambler loses $1 million on the trip, he said, the only recourse for the operator is to send a criminal gang to collect the debt when the gambler returns home to China. 

The July 2016 report to the BC Liberal government by MNP, which was finally released by the NDP government last September, described how high rollers visiting from China were using underground banks to access cash in bulk for gambling at River Rock Casino Resort in Richmond. 

Langdale’s research focused on Guangdong, which is in a state of flux. The province of 100 million grew rapidly using low-wage migrant labour, but the region has shifted into high tech products and services, resulting in a rise in cybercrime. 

British Columbia’s sister province in China is an epicentre of Pacific Rim crime, rife with trafficking in illegal drugs and counterfeit goods. It has a deep pool of both skilled labour and unskilled migrants and benefits from world class logistics networks, strong links to global Chinese diaspora, and proximity to the key centres of Hong Kong and Macau. 

Hong Kong is a global banking and business hub where shell companies help wealthy and politically connected Chinese shield their fortunes. Macau boasts the world’s largest casino turnover, with a history of facilitating crime, money laundering and capital flight. 

Langdale said the Vancouver model of 2017 is guaranteed to evolve, as authorities play catch-up with improved intelligence, and stronger laws and enforcement. 

“What I talk about in the Vancouver model today might not be the same in a couple years time, they’ll move on to a different way of doing things,” he said. “By being flexible, they’re opportunistic, they’ll respond to opportunities like new markets, obviously illegal drugs are a key way. If regulations tighten up, as I’m sure they will in Vancouver, they’ll have to use other means to launder the money.”

UBC law professor and anti-money laundering expert Peter German tendered his review of money laundering in Metro Vancouver casinos to Eby on March 31. Its public release is imminent.

Some of German’s preliminary recommendations for better compliance and enforcement may have had an impact already. Eby told a House of Commons committee last month that there was only $200,000 in suspicious transactions in B.C. casinos in February, compared to $20 million in July 2015. German’s next task is to review money laundering in the Metro Vancouver real estate market. He has already recommended luxury auto dealers be required to file reports to authorities when customers make large cash payments for supercars. 

One unknown is the impact on B.C., and the rest of the Pacific Rim, of Chinese president Xi Jinping’s indefinite rule, after the Chinese Communist Party recently scrapped term limits. 

“He will try to keep the corruption crackdown going,” Langdale said. “He’s got huge problems, there is a lot of corruption in China. At the local government areas, some provinces are more corrupt than others, Guangdong would be among the more corrupt, it’s where the money is. There is an old Chinese adage, the mountains are high and the emperor is far away. It still applies. 

“If you’re far away from Beijing, you can get away with quite a bit.”

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Bob Mackin John Langdale isn’t a household name

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Bob Mackin

Salaries for civic employees cost Vancouver taxpayers almost half-a-billion dollars last year, a jump of $130 million since 2009.  

That is according to Vancouver city hall’s 2017 statement of financial information, which goes to city council this week. 

In 2009, the first full year of Gregor Robertson’s mayoralty and Vision Vancouver’s majority, the cost of labour was $367.9 million. If adjusted for inflation, that would be $423.6 million, which is almost $75 million less than the actual 2017 figure of $498.45 million. 

From 2013 to 2017, the Canadian Union of Public Employees, which represents unionized civic staff, donated $247,100 to Vision Vancouver. The NDP provincial government banned union and corporate donations to candidates and parties last fall. 

City manager Sadhu Johnston has more than 337,000 reasons to smile (UBC)

In the same period, expense claims grew from nearly $612,000 to $1.51 million.  

Nineteen senior bureaucrats were paid more than $200,000 last year, up from 16 in 2016. 

Topping the list was city manager Sadhu Johnston at $337,914, plus $2,403 in expenses. Johnston’s salary increased from $328,583.08 in 2016. His predecessor, Penny Ballem, was paid $334,617 in 2014, her final full-year of employment, according to CityHallWatch. She was fired in September 2015. 

Real estate general manager Bill Aujla ($296,039), city solicitor Francie Connell ($292,695), chief financial officer Patrice Impey ($290,790), and city engineer Jerry Dobrovolny ($286,473) rounded-out the top five of 2017. 

Park board general manager Malcolm Bromley was the highest-paid at city hall’s Stanley Park subsidiary, at $284,563. 

The number of city white collar and blue collar workers in the $100,000-plus club reached 1,309 — up from 914 in 2016. 

Another 253 were paid between $95,019 and $99,986, five more than the 248 paid above $95,000 and under $100,000 in 2016. 

In the expenses column, streets director Taryn Scollard led with $22,149 in claims, up by more than $10,000 from 2016. She was followed by cultural services managing director Branislav Henselmann ($17,808) and assistant emergency management chief Scott Morrison ($13,974). 

In 2016, Robertson’s then-chief of staff, Mike Magee, was the biggest spender at $20,265.56. 

Forty-six bureaucrats charged $5,000 or more in expense claims, com pared with 22 in 2016. Planning general manager Gil Kelley ($10,812) and Impey ($9,458) were the highest claimers among senior management. 

Nobody at city hall’s 40-person communications department was able to answer questions from theBreaker on April 15.

On April 16, spokeswoman Ellie Lambert said in an email to theBreaker that Scollard represents the city on “a number of councils that require her to travel nationally to attend meetings.” Lambert did not name the councils. She said the city is also partially reimbursing Scollard for her MBA studies, but did not name the institution offering the degree.

As for the cost of salaries, Lambert said variables include the number of employed staff, amount of straight time and premium pay, and the outcomes of collective bargaining agreements.

“In particular, those agreements relating to public safety (some of which were determined through arbitration) have exceeded inflation over most of the time period in question,” she said, “while inflation itself has been relatively low over the same time frame.”

 

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Bob Mackin Salaries for civic employees cost Vancouver

Miscellany, News, Opinion, Sports

In six months, Vancouverites will choose a new mayor. That is because Gregor Robertson won’t seek a fourth term. 

Will it be Shauna Silvester, the Robertson-blessed, Vision Vancouver insider who calls herself “independent”? 

Will it be former Park Board chair John Coupar, lobbyist and Coun. Hector Bremner or accountability activist Glen Chernen for the NPA? 

Pollster Mario Canseco’s research says many Vancouverites like Green Party Coun. Adriane Carr. But will she throw her hat in the ring? 

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Bob Mackin

Richmond city councillor Chak Kwong Au didn’t win the Richmond South Centre seat for the NDP in last spring’s provincial election. But he hosted Premier John Horgan for a fundraiser last summer and kicked-in $5,000.

A document released under the freedom of information law shows Horgan attended “lunch with Chak Au and guests” on Aug. 25, 2017 at a private dining room. The location was censored by the government for security reasons, but is believed to be in Burnaby. The schedule document includes a list of 22 confirmed guests, including management from Richway New Media Technology, Global Direct Trading Inc. and Global Fibreglass Solutions Canada. 

Richmond Coun. Chak Au lost for the NDP in spring 2017, but hosted a fundraiser in summer 2017. (Facebook)

According to Elections BC returns for 2017, those three companies, and Au himself, each donated $5,000 to the NDP, but the date listed in the Elections BC database is Sept. 13, 2017. The NDP returns do not include an Elections BC Fundraising Function report for either Aug. 25 or Sept. 13. 

Also on Sept. 13, 2017, the NDP reported $5,000 donations from Hui Zhang, Saltwater City Holdings and Yan Wang; $4,000 from Lai Fong Hui, $2,500 each from Xiao Jun Hao and Xue Wei Gong; and $2,000 from Top Western. All of the above donations total $46,000. 

At the Aug. 25 event, Horgan spent 15 minutes posing for photographs with guests and speaking for 15 minutes before lunch. He then participated in what was billed as an “open dialogue.” 

Horgan’s press secretary, Sheena McConnell, is listed on the document. Instead of commenting, she referred theBreaker to party communications manager Heather Libby. Libby did not respond.

One of the Aug. 25 guests was Guo Ding, a commentator and producer with Rogers-owned Omni TV. The NDP government appointed Ding at the end of December to the board of the Professional College of Traditional Chinese Medicine Practitioners and Acupuncturists. 

Au did not respond to theBreaker’s request for comment. His $5,000 NDP donation is worth just under one month’s salary at Richmond city council, where he is paid $61,353-a-year. Au is also a professional family therapist with Vancouver Coastal Health in Richmond. 

Meanwhile, the NDP appears to have raised as much as $52,500 from a controversial event at the home of a Surrey trucking company owner last Sept. 6. 

The host of the event was Kulwant Dhesi, owner of the Dhesi Enterprises trucking and logistics firm. Dhesi made a $10,000 donation to the BC Liberals, but it appears in the Elections BC database as Oct. 17, 2017. 

Sims, Horgan, Hepner and Meggs in Surrey Sept. 6.

There were also $5,000 donations from Padda Enterprises, Jasjeet Bhullar, Baltej Samra, Dhillon Designs Ltd., R.S. Gill Express Ltd., Raja Trailers and Equipment Sales, Shergill Transport and Super Fast Trucking and $2,500 from Raj Khela Real Estate. There is no Fundraising Function form for either Sept. 6 or Oct. 17. Dhesi declined comment when contacted by theBreaker. 

The BC Liberals slammed Horgan, chief of staff Geoff Meggs and Citizens Services Minister Jinny Sims for posing at that event in a group photograph with Maninder Gill and Jawahar Padda. Gill is the former Radio India manager appealing aggravated assault and weapons convictions over a shooting outside a Surrey temple in 2010. Padda is a pizzeria owner who is scheduled to appear May 22 in Surrey Provincial Court on charges of pointing a firearm, uttering threats and unlawful confinement. 

At the time, Horgan said that he was not privy to the invitation list, but would be more careful in future. 

“I abhor what [Gill] has done and he has been convicted and he will pay the price for that,” Horgan said.

While in opposition, the Horgan-led NDP often criticized BC Liberal Premier Christy Clark for holding similar events where attendees made large donations in order to have an audience with the premier. Last fall, the NDP banned corporations and unions from donating, and set a $1,200 annual limit for donations by individuals who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents. 

The new law also includes new rules for reporting fundraising events and for a $100-per-person cap on admission to fundraisers at a private residence.

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Bob Mackin Richmond city councillor Chak Kwong Au

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