ONE CONTROL FREAK LEARNS FROM ANOTHER

Many years ago prior to Susan Bryant revealing herself as being a bought and paid for supporter of our local political establishment; Susan shared an insight with me regarding former Council member Pat Mclean. I had always wondered, since 2000, when they became so chummy, what the reason was. I also was shocked even earlier on when I learned that Susan's then buddy, Sylvia Berg was running for Mayor with the assistance of Bob Waters. That never made sense considering his antipathy towards the so called outside radicals (APTE) at the time. Regardless Susan advised me that Councillor Pat Mclean was a "control freak". Indeed I certainly saw this through CPAC as Pat constantly was usurping authority as CPAC Chair that she did not have. Other Council members at the time also saw Pat manipulate members and votes privately only to learn at the last minute that their issue or concern suddenly had lost crucial support.

Back to our Mayor. RAC & TAG otherwise known as Really Awful Chemtura Truth Avoidance Groups are an example of the efforts of a control freak. Nasty and somewhat uncontrollable citizen participation has been reduced to a charade. Pat Mclean and various Mayors and Councils have long been offended when individual citizens failed to follow their scripts. Almost as if these citizens including myself thought that we had control of our own thoughts, words and opinions.

RAC otherwise known as the Remediation Advisory Committee is made up of Sandy Shantz, Sandy Shantz and Sandy Shantz combined with the Region of Waterloo, GRCA, Chemtura, M.O.E., the handpicked Chair of TAG plus two more handpicked TAG members. I've listed Sandy three times because afterall she is a Regional Councillor as well as a member of the GRCA all due to her being Mayor. Chemtura and the M.O.E. don't get votes as if they need them within this group. Talk about Pat being a control freak. Sandy puts her to shame with this setup.

TAG consist of the Chair, paid by Chemtura, perhaps funnelled through Woolwich Council. The appointed (by Council) members have zero influence unless they are the two put on RAC. There may well be some knowledgeable and independent members but they will have zero influence. Pat and Susan are in here and they are both grossly comprimised by their years of being recipients of benefits both directly and indirectly from the Region, GRCA and Chemtura. Hence they are in a gross conflict of interest and once again we see the Mayor and Council contravening their own rules and regulations which for them is now publicly proven (ombudsman-in camera meetings & election act violations) standard operating procedure.

Such is the state of "public consultation" now in Elmira and Woolwich. Citizens the only way this can ever be improved upon is by you becoming involved. Liars and cheats thrive within in camera meetings and within environments where honest citizens are too busy to hold our elected politicians accountable. Democracy is not a once every four years exercise. It must be constant supervision.