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A Streetcar Named Controversy: Lawsuit ensnares council · Kvetch & Release

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  John Lynkey here on AM eight hundred CKLW. We've got news coming out of
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  City Hall. We've been hearing about it for the past couple of days going
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  into last week, with this lawsuit that is alleging corruption at city Hall.
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  It was launched by a dismissed former engineer, Chris Nepsy, who listed five
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  proprieties that he resisted participating in at city Hall, which included fixing parking tickets,
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  delaying reports for political advantages of the mayor and then having to take responsibility
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  for those delays, canceling approved infrastructure projects in certain wards while approving other infrastructure
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  projects, and other wards which weren't approved. And one of the big ones
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  right now that's getting a lot of attention is covering up of the legacy Beacon
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  streetcar costs. And there's not much that we can talk about because it is
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  a lawsuit and it has to unfold, and again these are all allegations at
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  this point, need to be very clear about that, but we wanted to
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  have little bit of a deeper discussion about how project funding works in the process
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  involved with it. Joining me to discuss right now is Ward nine counselor Kieren
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  McKenzie who's actually changed his position on this file. How you doing today,
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  kierenm Well John, thanks for having me on. Thank you so much for
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  having for joining me here. So I guess explain to me, you know,
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  what is your position today and what's caused it to change. So you
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  know, this is the last time Counselor of the opportunity to deal with the
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  Beacon prou the Legacy Beacon project. It's it's almost two years now, I
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  believe if I'm remembering correctly, but at the time, and there's a long
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  history on this file, very long history because it's all part of the Central
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  Riverfront Improvement Program, which is a very robust process that started I think over
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  ten years ago, well over ten years ago, that engaged the community to
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  look at what it is that we wanted you to further activate the water front
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  with the types of amenities and things that we want to see on that stretch
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  between the Ambassador Bridge and uh well the old Hiron Walker plant. So so
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  that whole stretch the Central Riverfront as it's referred to. So the Beacon and
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  the Beacon concepts were a part of what came out of that process, and
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  there's going to be at the end of it, at the end of this
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  the beacon process, there'll be five beacons. There's two, there's one currently,
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  uh, there's a second one that as we know, the one we're
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  talking about is that's under construction. So with respect to the what was,
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  I think I think they'll probably be a different name. But then it was
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  referred to as the Legacy Beacon, and therein lies the change in the position
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  that I had. So when it first came to council the proposal to place
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  the streetcar at the new location. We remember the celestial Beacon discussion as well,
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  and that was scrapped for iea of reasons. They decided to or the
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  administrative recommendation was to move it to a location a little bit closer to the
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  downtown core where the Legacy Beacon was going to be located. The concept behind
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  the Legacy Beacon was a return back to a previous era prior to development of
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  our community. So it was kind of the concept was a naturalization or a
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  renaturalization of that space. I objected to the Legacy Beacon being changed to the
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  streetcar concept because there was a massive departure from what was originally and what was
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  originally agreed to through the Central Riverfront Improvement Plan process. The fact that the
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  community hadn't had the opportunity to be fully consulted and around this change was something
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  and I didn't think that there was enough good process, governance and transparency and
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  all of those things that are supposed to be accompanying any type of council decision,
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  and the fact that it was dramatically changed kind of on the fly didn't
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  sit well with me. I asked a number of questions about why the change
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  was being proposed, and ultimately I wasn't satisfied with those answers, and I
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  voted against the change. That doesn't change the fact that I supported the CRYPT
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  process at a higher level, you know, previously. So when it came
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  now to the funding discussion that we most that we voted on nearly two years
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  ago, I'd already expressed my view that I didn't like the change in the
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  project in the scope of the project, but the fact that the support for
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  the Deacon concept didn't change. Council made this decision with respect to the change
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  in the in the in the in the concept. So when it came down
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  to funding, yes or no, are we going to fund this project.
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  My answer was yet, because I still believe in the overarching concept that was
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  associated with the crypt process. Well, I can appreciate that, and you
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  know, when it comes to how these things unfold and project funding, it
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  gets to be fairly complex. But I think some of the public is having
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  a little bit of issues when it comes to whether or not they can place
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  their trust in the administration and the city as a whole. When it comes
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  to, you know, seeing some of these well this lawsuits specifically and what
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  the allegations are, what would you say the public needs to understand though when
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  it comes to trusting administration and the city broader. So this is this is
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  I'm glad you asked that specific question, John, because I think that there's
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  a there's there's there's a real challenge that we have in our community around having
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  the scope of the discourse that we have, and not just not just the
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  city windsor all across Canada. The level of the political discussion that I think
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  that's happening across Canada and perhaps even the world is deteriorating, and it's it's
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  taking us out of the opportunity to have reasonable and civil debate around public policy.
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  Discussions and issues where people may disagree, and what we're too often prone
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  to do, I think is to conflate corruption with disagreement. And do I
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  think we have a city hall a transparency problem? Yes? Do I think
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  we have a problem with respect to governance, yes. And if you look
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  at my record over over my time one counsel, and I say this with
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  humility, but at the same time, just the awareness of what's gone on
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  in that chamber. Nobody, there is not a single one of my colleagues,
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  current or former, who's done more to try to bring greater transparency or
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  greater or better governance practices into how we govern the city. I've challenged our
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  administration on numerous friends. If you just think of a housing accelerator fund debate,
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  nobody has done more to try to bring good and transparent process into how
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  we govern in the City of Windsor. But having said all of that,
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  we have some problems with respected governance. I do not believe that there are
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  corruption problems at the City of Windsor. I keep a very close eye on
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  how we do things, why we do things, and I bring out those
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  challenges and I bring out those those things that I've raised concerns with me,
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  but I don't believe for a second that there's corruption. I disagree with some
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  of the decisions, of course I do, and people, anyone who's watched
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  my career knows very well that I have no fear or hesitation to raise issues
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  that I think need to be raised, even when they are fundamentally opposed to
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  some of the most powerful people in our community. Having said that, I
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  do not believe that the ethics is the issue. But process wise, we
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  have a long way to go to make things better than they are today.
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  So you've discussed a little bit in terms of how you have sought greater transparency,
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  and that's something that you've been advocating for. We understand, you know,
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  admin makes their administration makes their recommendations, and we understand what your role
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  is when it comes to that. But maybe really briefly you could explain,
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  like, so you get a report, how do you quickly assess, you
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  know, like the merits of it. Well, you know, as somebody
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  who's even prior to being on council has been a council watcher, uh and
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  now having you know, in my second term on council, I have a
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  lot of the information that goes along that that informs a lot of the reports
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  that come to us. So you know, in that context, and when
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  you think about the reports as they're written, I'm gonna say there's two things.
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  Yes, there's no there's absolitely no question that they get vetted through a
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  process that includes uh elected you know, one particular elected officials a mayor,
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  and certainly especially and especially now in the context of strong mayor powers, but
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  even prior and I know going back to eras of previous mayors, there is
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  absolutely no doubt that they're is a that included in that betting process for any
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  report that comes forward, that part of that filter includes the mayor's office.
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  That's that's that's that's a reality, and that's the reality that's been in place,
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  I think for for generations. There's no different than than many other communities
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  in across Ontario and across Canada. It's my job as somebody who at the
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  opportunity to read all of these reports and I have all of that historical context
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  at least the extent that you know, I've been able to to to be
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  aware of it. Is to pull out those pieces that don't perhaps make it
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  into a report and in fairness, Sometimes those things it's just it's just because
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  perhaps somebody is making a decision that a particular data point is in germane to
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  the discussion at hand. Sometimes there's people who are making decisions that might have
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  a more political flavor to it. Having said that, again, the difference
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  between transparency, a transparency problem and a governance problem versus outright corruption is significant.
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  I don't believe this corruption. I think we can improve on that front
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  of being able to provide better and more consistent information in a framework that allows
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  for more people to be engaged. I've thought that battle, I continue to
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  fight that battle, and I won't stop fighting that battle on this particular issue.
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  We'll see what happens in terms of the process that gets played out.
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  That's gonna as you mentioned, that's in the courts, and you know,
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  we'll see as the evidence continues to and the information kind of becomes available to
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  the to the public and even myself, where we what we think needs to
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  be improved moving forward. If anything,