Dave Brister Is Running For Mayor

You have to take pity on my wife. The poor woman has had to learn DJW resuscitation rather than call an ambulance and take me to Emergency every time I read one of these absurd stories about the City of Windsor. My jaw drops so much that I get into intense pain.

Now I think I am suffering from SSW– Split Sides Windsoritis– from laughing so hard when I read ridiculous stories in the Star. Fortunately, she figured out what the issue was so that we did not have to bother the Emergency services again.

My day started out with hilarity when I read the following from mini-Gord:

“The mayor asked for a recorded vote, probably so he could cast his own for posterity. He voted this way: “Support-I-actually-ran-amom-and-pop” – a touche reference to the Francis family pita business he rescued after his father died. (Chris Vander Doelen Windsor Star May 24, 2012)

Hmmmm I wonder who that fellow was that was walking around the Edgar (aka Eddie) campaign office that someone told me was Eddie’s father when Edgar first ran. Here is what I had always read about Edgar’s father:

“In 1997, just as I was graduating, he decided to open up another pita bread operation. But he became ill, and couldn’t continue.”

Francis returned home for the summer to help his brothers, Roger and Fred, get the business off the ground.”

(Nicole Laidler Western Alumni Gazette November 21, 2008)

In passing, just check out for fun who Nicole is.

Now, dear reader, I could have made this a Vander Doelen Watch article. But I was laughing too hard. You will understand now why I don’t take too seriously the facts set out in a mini-Gord article. Moreover, I think the editorial fact checkers at the Star must have been on holiday as well.

However, that is not why I had an attack of SSW. It was caused by this article: “Five sponsors pledge $360,000 for Children’s Games” by Don Lajoie
Windsor Star May 24, 2012.

Truly, it was a knee-slapper as well as a side splitter from laughing so hard.

“Five sponsors, pledging a total of $360,000, have stepped forward to help Windsor and Essex County host the 2013 International Children’s Games.

The corporate and community pledges from five organizations were announced Tuesday as Mayor Eddie Francis and County Warden Tom Bain officially kicked off the ICG Summer Games sponsorship campaign with five cheque presentations.”

Apparently we need three million dollars to host the Games for just over 1,000 children plus of course the 70+ million dollars for the elitist swimming pool.

Let us see who the sponsors were. Caution do not hold any hot drinks as you read this Article. I will not take responsibility for you possibly spilling the liquid all over yourself and perhaps getting a serious burn.

Tourism Windsor Essex-Pelee Island—$200,000

Get the money from the Untourist Board of which Edgar and Warden Bain are members and where Bain’s daughter works as Vice President. The CEO is Gord Orr who just recently announced that the program that he had with Edgar’s wife to do movie reviews on CKLW has ended. So sorry about that.

In this way, neither Edgar nor Tom have to go back to their Councils and ask for money. They just scoop it out of the Untourist Board budget.

The Windsor Essex Community Foundation—$50,000

Edgar is a Nominator there.

However, I took a look at their grants and I saw very little around the size of $50,000. Take a look at their webpage Grant Stories where you will see that most of their grants rarely exceed $5,000

In fact, look at how much money they said they gave out in their last Annual Report:

“From July 1, 2010 to June 30, 2011, the Community Foundation continued to grant to support community programs. For the last fiscal year, we issued 30 grants to registered charities totaling $114,161.28.”

I also note this comment:

“Do you fund large projects and capital campaigns? Since the Foundation aims to achieve the greatest impact possible with its grants, it generally does not fund projects that are part of a larger initiative or capital campaign. Elements or phases of larger projects may be funded where the applicant has shown that the grant will make a substantial contribution toward completion of that piece of the project and/or leverage funding from other sources.”

Green Shield Canada—$50,000

I noticed this in the City’s Budget Issue Detail document:

“Will In Green Shield’s 2012 rate renewal documentation, they are requesting a total premium for 2012 of approximately $17.7M (i.e. ($12,082,417 * 8%RST) + ($4,331,718 * 8%)) not including travel rates.
• Factoring in travel rates which are approximately $995,000 inclusive of RST will bring the total Green Shield budget to approximately $18.6M
• In a meeting held on November 2, 2011 with the City’s benefits consultant, a discussion took place on creating stop loss on the travel benefit and making it partially ASO. It was agreed that the consultant should have a discussion with Green Shield to see if he can attain a stop loss limit of $250,000. Green Shield has already agreed to a limit of $100,000. Based on introducing stop loss and making travel partially ASO, it is anticipated that the savings would be between $400,000 and $600,000 a year. As a result it was decided to reduce the 2012 budget to $18.1M.”

Heart and Stroke Foundation—$10,000

I saw they do this:

“Heart and Stroke Foundation * raises funds for research and health promotion * raise awareness of heart disease and stroke * educational programs *”

I guess they will justify this grant as heart healthy habits for kids that will last a lifetime.

What about the last $50,000 you are asking and what about the Councillor formerly known as Councillor Budget you may be wondering:

Nature Fresh Farms—$50,000

From our good friend Gord:

“He’s back and he’s loaded for bear – in both smoking barrels – which must come as depressing news for the dreamers who figured Dave Brister would slink off into the wilderness, to be heard from no more, after failing to bag the Essex provincial riding last October…

Where has he been since that fateful Oct. 6? “I never left. I never stopped campaigning. The day after the election I started working on the next one,” insisted Brister.

He spent a couple of months working off a honey-do list of improvements to his Kingsville home and in January started work in Leamington as new business development manager for Nature Fresh Farms, the largest greenhouse grower in Ontario, and South Essex Fabricating Inc., which builds greenhouse structures, parts, equipment and heating systems.

The founder and president of those businesses, Peter Quiring, is one of Essex County’s great entrepreneurial stories.” (Gord Henderson Windsor Star March 31, 2012)

Don’t you get it, Gord knocked out a whole bunch of mayoral candidates in one of his recent columns setting things up perfectly for when Brister decides to announce that he’s going to run for Mayor. He has been campaigning but Gord did not tell us for what.

Right now, Brister has no chance of knocking out the NDP MPP. Accordingly, his choice is either to run in Windsor West as a Conservative and perhaps lose again or to build on his base that he thinks that he has in Windsor and run for Council or, because of his ego, for Mayor. That should help make it easier for Edgar to become Mayor for a fourth term.

The Games take place in 2013 and, as a representative of one of the Big Sponsors, I would expect to see Brister’s face in lots of the media stories before, during and after the Games.

No wonder Gord did not mention Gignac in his column either.

I do want to write some more about this but I can’t right now. I have to put ice packs on my sides to ease the pain from laughing so hard.

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