Northern Manitoba: Orange Crush for the NDP

Steve Ashton, minister of infrastructure and transportation, and Thompson’s NDP MLA since 1981, making him the marathon man of Manitoba politics, did what every political analyst and commentator in the province believed was impossible. He lost the supposedly safest NDP seat in Manitoba to Progressive Conservative rookie Kelly Bindle by 210 votes. “Bindle received nearly 45 per cent of the vote compared to a little over 39 per cent for Steve Ashton and 16 per cent for Liberal candidate Inez Vystrcil-Spence,” wrote Thompson Citizen editor Ian Graham in his online election night story. “Ashton took 68 per cent of the votes in the 2011 election, more than double the total of the PC candidate Anita Campbell.”

The turnout in Northern Manitoba was the lowest in the province. Here in Thompson, where the weather was sunny and 21.2°C, way above the normal daytime high of 6°C, voter turnout was 38.12 per cent, with only 3,865 of 10,138 eligible voters casting a ballot. Thompson had 21 rejected ballots and 20 voters declined ballots. The turnout here was about 20 per cent less than the provincewide turnout of 58.86 per cent.

There have only been 13 provincial general elections since the Thompson constituency was created in June 1969. Progressive Conservative Labour Minister Ken MacMaster, who won the seat in the Oct. 11, 1977 election, and held it for four years until 1981, was the only Tory to ever hold the seat before Bindle. Before MacMaster, Ken Dillen, who ran against Ashton as a Liberal in the 2011 election, held the seat for the NDP from 1973 to 1977, while Joe Borowski held the seat in 1972-33 as an Independent NDP, and from 1969 to 1972 as an NDP member. Borowski defeated former Thompson mayor Tim Johnston’s father, Dr. Blain Johnston, by seven votes in the Feb. 20, 1969 byelection in the old provincial constituency of Churchill, which included the town of Thompson. He went on four months later to win the newly-created constituency of Thompson in the June 25, 1969 general election.

Ashton had won nine consecutive elections between 1981 and 2011 before going down to defeat in 2016 in his bid for 10 in a row. For that, he can thank mostly Premier Greg Selinger, first for increasing the PST in July 2013 by one per cent from seven per cent to eight per cent without a referendum, less than two years after promising voters in the 2011 election campaign that he wouldn’t raise the tax without a referendum, and secondly for the premier desperately clinging to power as his popularity plummeted, still hanging on futilely after beating former health minister Theresa Oswald by 33 votes on the second ballot of a leadership campaign vote in March 2015. Ashton, who also ran against Selinger for the leadership in 2009, was dropped from the 2015 race after finishing last on the first ballot. While his own party couldn’t quite get rid of Selinger, Manitoba voters as a whole proved themselves as being more than up for the job, dispatching the NDP from power for the first time since the last millennium, although the premier has the consolation – if it is any – of holding onto his own St. Boniface seat.

Long-victorious politicians like Steve Ashton almost always only lose their seats when the tide turns against their party in a huge way, and they’re swept out, along with most of their colleagues. Nothing personal, more or less, although there has been an undercurrent in Thompson since the 2011 election that perhaps now was the time for “Steve to go.” Go in the sense that maybe after more than three decades, it was time for Steve to stand aside. Most Thompsonites would likely have preferred to see Ashton make that call on his own to retire on top, rather than be turfed at the polls, but rare is the politician from any party who knows when it is time to go and exit gracefully.

Brian Pallister’s Progressive Conservatives, which take office May 3, won 40 of the 57 seats in the Manitoba Legislative Assembly in Tuesday’s landslide victory, tying a record for most seats set way back in 1915 when Premier Tobias Crawford Norris’ Liberals also won 40 seats in the Aug. 6 election in a legislature with 47 seats. The Manitoba Legislative Assembly has had 57 seats since 1949. The NDP won 37 of the 57 seats in the 2011 election but only 14 this time.

Ashton was first elected to the Manitoba legislature at the age of 25 in the Nov. 17, 1981 provincial election, defeating MacMaster by 72 votes in a race that has entered the realm of local political folklore, as the April 19, 2016 provincial election no doubt will as well.  Ashton garnered 2,890 votes to MacMaster’s 2,818 in the 1981 election. Liberal Cy Hennessey finished dead last with 138 votes. At the time of his first election, Ashton was involved in an Inco strike as a member of Local 6166 of the Steelworkers. Ashton still gets a kick out of pointing out his shift boss voted him for him, saying he would make a better politician than a miner.

Chris Adams, vice-president of Probe Research, and an adjunct professor at the University of Winnipeg in the Department of Political Science, who has served as an election desk analyst for various media outlets in Manitoba, suggested to Winnipeg Free Press multimedia producer Kristin Annable the results of Tuesday’s provincial election in Northern Manitoba, including in the neighbouring Kewatinook constituency, formerly called Rupertsland, where another veteran NDP cabinet minister, Eric Robinson, also went down to defeat, to Liberal challenger Judy Klassen from St. Theresa Point First Nation, show the core of the NDP  is more damaged than previously thought. Even in The Pas and Flin Flon constituencies, the NDP barely clung to their seats. Adams, who has written extensively on Manitobans’ voting patterns, said he was surprised at Ashton’s and Robinson’s defeats. The NDP’s core electorate is based in inner-city Winnipeg and Northern Manitoba, he said.

Damaged core for the NDP is right. Think engine room and a warp core breach on the USS Enterprise (NCC-1701),  a Federation Constitution-class starship, and you’ve got the provincial NDP picture for Northern Manitoba right now.

My own election prognostication, while accurate for the province as a whole, also missed the shifting ground in Northern Manitoba. Two days before the election, I wrote: “If the pollsters are correct, the provincial NDP, which have won four consecutive majority governments dating back to 1999, are about 48 hours away from being turfed from power, having been at the helm since 1999, with Pallister and his PCs easily forming the next majority government.

“Frankly, that wouldn’t surprise me at all. That’s how democracy works. Every political party and every politician has a best-before date. The NDP may be rapidly approaching shelf life expiry. Certainly, even if they somehow manage to hang onto power Tuesday, it will be as a very marked-down electoral product in most of Manitoba. Not so here in Northern Manitoba methinks. Perhaps it is the cold climate, but I expect the NDP to have an extended shelf life here, illustrating for the first time in this millennium perhaps the political divide that can exist between north and south in Manitoba at times, although the 31 Winnipeg constituencies will likely be the wildcard that decides which party will govern in the 57-seat legislature, not, alas, the four loyal orange Northern Manitoba constituencies of The Pas, Flin Flon, Kewatinook and Thompson.”

Just how thoroughly NDP orange Thompson was surprised me when I first moved here in 2007. Thompson is a place where I discovered not only did many members of the local Thompson Chamber of Commerce support the NDP, some were even on the local NDP provincial constituency executive! Nowhere else had I lived in Canada where the NDP had that kind of support from Chamber of Commerce folks. Past mayor Tim Johnston ran against Ashton as a Liberal in 1995 but was himself a card-carrying NDP member and loyal Ashton supporter by the time I arrived in Thompson nine years ago. That Ashton had a lock on the local political establishment was indisputable. In 2008, Louise Hodder, district supervisor of the Thompson Assessment office for Manitoba’s Department of Intergovernmental Affairs at the time, served as president of the Thompson Chamber of Commerce, while a card-carrying NDP member. Hodder, who is also a certified municipal administrator, was later appointed by an order-in-council of the provincial NDP government as the $88,000 per year resident administrator of the Local Government District (LGD) of Mystery Lake on Jan. 28, 2013.  Margaret Allan, a former CBC Radio producer and manager of the Thompson Chamber of Commerce back in 2008, was also an ardent NDP supporter. The Thompson Chamber of Commerce NDP membership affiliations – even a single one – would be considered remarkable in much of the country. Here, it was just considered good business. Thompson really was a different world.

Mind you, Kelly Bindle, who was recruited by Pallister’s Tories to run surprisingly successfully against Ashton in what turned out to be a classic David-and-Goliath contest, is far from an unknown in Thompson, albeit he is a political novice. Bindle is a popular small businessman, who after the 2011 provincial election wound up taking over Carroll Meats, which had been closed for more than a year, on March 15, 2013, when Dave Carroll retired for health reason, renaming his business Ripple Rock Meat Shop. “Before I started I didn’t know anything about butchery,” Bindle told the Thompson Citizen in 2013.  “Part of the deal in buying the place was getting trained by Dave [Carroll]. I purchased all the assets and part of the deal was he would train us and help set it up.” Bindle, who is also a civil engineer and in 2006 opened his engineering consulting firm Bindle Engineering Limited, which he still works at, spent more than three years before that working for INCO in Indonesia before returning to Thompson, after growing tired of the isolation of sitting in an office behind a computer all day.  Bindle’s late father, Otto, first came to Thompson as one of the pioneers here in 1959 to run the Thompson Inn, or TI, as locals usually call it, as well as the Burntwood Hotel, across the street almost, and later owned Thompson Bargain Furniture. His mother, Grace, a retired teacher, is a well-known member of St. James the Apostle Anglican Church in Thompson, and a former Thompson Volunteer of the Year, an award established by the City of Thompson, as well as a Thompson YWCA Women of Distinction recipient.

Ashton, a native of Surrey in England, came to Canada at the age of 11 with his family. His dad was unemployed, he noted in April 2008, when they arrived in Toronto in 1967, and they moved the same year to Thompson. A graduate of R.D. Parker Collegiate in Thompson and the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, he received his master’s degree in economics from Lakehead University in Thunder Bay and is an economist. He was president of the University of Manitoba Students Union in 1978-79 and lectured in economics for the former Inter Universities North in Thompson and Cross Lake.  Ashton’s wife, Hari Dimitrakopoulou-Ashton, has taught mathematics in the business administration program in the Roblin Centre at Red River College in Winnipeg, and is from Alexandroupoli in northeastern Greece originally. She moved to Thompson with him in December 1979. Also an economist, Dimitrakopoulou-Ashton has lectured at the post-secondary level in economics, management and women’s studies. She authored Women Entrepreneurs in the North, and as well is a former trustee with the School District of Mystery Lake (SDML), as his son, Alexander, who chaired the SDML for two years during a turbulent period several years ago. He did not seek re-election when his four-year term expired in October 2014. From 2009 to 2014, he was employed at University College of the North (UCN) in Thompson as a civil technology instructor. He spent last year in Denmark working on a master’s degree in urban planning and management at Aalborg University.  Steve Ashton’s daughter, Niki, is serving her third term in the House of Commons as NDP MP for the federal riding of Churchill–Keewatinook Aski after besting Liberal challenger Rebecca Chartrand by 912 votes in last October’s federal election. She was first elected to Parliament in October 2008 and re-elected in the May 2011 election. A former instructor at University College of the North (UCN), she is married to Ryan Barker, who moved here with her, and is now a local school teacher and Juniper Elementary School-R.D. Parker Collegiate school connector from Mayerthorpe, Alberta.

Ashton also has two family members who are doctors in Northern Manitoba. His brother, Dr. Martin Ashton, is based in South Indian Lake, and his cousin, Dr. Sarah Ashton, is stationed in Oxford House.

While Steve Ashton has lived and breathed Manitoba politics for seemingly his entire adult life, he also some other interests that while still political, are not Manitoba specific. He is the chair of the Canadian Committee for the Restitution of the Parthenon Marbles, seeking the return of the sculptures from Britain to Greece. He’s a delegate to the International Association for the Reunification of the Parthenon Sculptures, speaks Greek and has written on the political culture of Greece.

The Temple of Athena Parthenos on the Acropolis of Athens is the symbol of the Golden Age of Greece and of the ideal of democracy. It is considered an integral part of the identity of the modern Greek nation and a monument of worldwide significance. Lord Elgin in 1801 removed several of its sculptures, which are housed in the British Museum in London. In 1982, Greece petitioned the British government for the return of these sculptures. The Canadian committee was formed in 2000.

The Tiger Dam controversy “that has dogged Ashton was also a likely factor in his loss,” Adams told Kristin Annable April 19.

“Ashton has faced months of allegations surrounding his attempt to secure a $5-million, sole-source contract for Tiger Dam flood-mitigation equipment.”  Annable wrote. The company involved was represented in Manitoba by Winnipeg restaurateur Peter Ginakes with whom Ashton “had a strong personal and professional relationship,” she said. Ginakes owns the Pony Corral Restaurant & Bar on St. Mary Avenue in downtown Winnipeg. He and his family have been in the restaurant  business in Winnipeg since the 1950s, owning popular eateries such as the Thunderbird Restaurant, Rib Shack Restaurant and Lounge and the  Town & Country. Ginakes had donated two years before the 2011 floods to Ashton’s unsuccessful leadership campaign in September and October 2009 to become Manitoba NDP party leader and premier, after Gary Doer stepped down to become Canada’s  ambassador to the United States in Washington. Outgoing Premier Greg Selinger took almost two-thirds of the ballots cast and sailed to victory in the two-way race with 1,317 votes to Ashton’s 685.  None of Ashton’s cabinet colleagues – some who had sat around the cabinet table with him for a decade – supported his bid to become premier in 2009.

Ashton did not serve in the cabinet of Howard Pawley for the seven years he led the NDP in Manitoba as premier from 1981 to 1988, but Ashton easily won re-election in Thompson as an MLA 1986, 1990, 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2007. The NDP were defeated in the provincial election of 1988 and Ashton served for a time as house leader for the NDP in opposition. He also served at various times as the NDP’s labour critic, health critic, and led the unsuccessful fight against the PC’s privatization of MTS in 1997. He finally made it into cabinet in October 1999 when Doer appointed him as minister of highways and government services. Following a cabinet shuffle in September 2002, Ashton became minister of conservation. In June 2003, he was also made minister of labour and immigration with responsibility for multiculturalism and administration of the Workers Compensation Act. In November 2003, he was named as the province’s first minister of water stewardship and in 2007 was shuffled to the post of minister of intergovernmental affairs and minister responsible for emergency measures.

Ashton asked  Ron Perozzo, recently retired Manitoba conflict-of-interest commissioner, for a formal opinion on Ginakes’ contribution to his 2009 leadership campaign in June 2015, as the Tiger Dam controversy continued to swirl. Ashton asked Perozzo for an opinion on whether the restaurateur’s contribution to his 2009 leadership campaign created a conflict of interest.

Perozzo said it had not.

“In my opinion, a contribution to a leadership contestant made in accordance with the terms of the Election Financing Act would not be a fee or commission paid to a person for representing the interests of another person,” Perozzo said in his report last July 15.

Carson City, Nevada-based US Flood Control Corporation markets the Tiger Dam system, which bills itself as an alternative to sandbagging prior to a flood, and consists of elongated flexible tubes which maybe quickly stacked, joined end to end and filled with water. International Flood Control Corporation of Calgary is the Canadian subsidiary, which Ginakes acted as Manitoba Tiger Dam distributor for. Tiger Dam’s pyramid-shaped structure forms a barrier to protect buildings, resort properties and any other structures prior. The tubes can be filled with a two-inch pump, a fire hydrant or even a garden hose. The tubes are capable of being stacked up to a maximum of 32 feet high and linked together seamlessly for miles. They can be virtually any length and take any shape. Each tube weighs 65 pounds dry and 6,300 pounds when filled with water.

These temporary engineered, interlocking, flexible tubes are then drained of water which flows back into the river when the flooding subsides. The result is a reusable system that protects property without the need of sandbags. When the floodwaters recede, the tubes can be drained within minutes, rolled up and reused again and again.

Manitoba Ombudsman Charlene Paquin said in a Jan. 7 report Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation (MIT) did not have sufficient reason to try to purchase the Tiger Dam flood-fighting equipment  in 2014 without going to tender. Her report into the attempted purchase – which didn’t go through and was then sent to tender in December 2014 in the form of a Request for Proposal (RFP), which was subsequently not awarded – also found that Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation did not do enough research and analysis into whether the particular type of flood-fighting equipment that the Interlake Reserves Tribal Council (IRTC) wanted for the Interlake Emergency Operations Centre was the best way to fight flooding.

“No MIT staff we interviewed knew of research the department had conducted or considered regarding the flood protection needs for First Nation communities in the Interlake region of the province or for the purchase of $5 million of Tiger Dams, despite the guidance in the PAM [Procurement Administration Manual] to do ‘research and analysis’ in the first stage of the procurement cycle,” Paquin said in her report.

“Our understanding is that the department did not conduct this research and analysis because IRTC had already stated to the department that it wanted a specific brand of water-filled barriers and because it was directed to prepare a submission accordingly. We are not satisfied that IRTC requesting specific equipment is sufficient justification for the department not to follow the guidance in the PAM that encourages departments to provide research and analysis regarding what goods or services should be purchased.”

Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation submission to the Treasury Board Secretariat in Manitoba Finance proposed waiving a competitive bidding process because it felt the sole source exception – one of four acceptable circumstances under which untendered purchases for more than $50,000 can be made – applied. “Individuals we spoke with at MIT indicated that departmental staff did not agree with waiving a competitive procurement process,” wrote Paquin. “However, as noted previously, the department was directed by the minister of MIT [Steve Ashton] to draft a submission that proposed an untendered contract for Tiger Dams. The department indicates that the direction supported IRTC’s request for this equipment because IRTC had this equipment in its inventory and had experience using it.”

While Paquin determined that Manitoba Infrastructure and Transportation did not conduct sufficient research and analysis to support the type of flood-fighting equipment to be purchased, she also said “overall the investigation found that legislation and policy related to tendering were followed.” You can read the 35-page Report on Flood-Fighting Equipment for the Interlake Emergency Operations Centre: The Tiger Dams Proposal is on the ombudsman’s website at: https://www.ombudsman.mb.ca/uploads/document/files/ombudsman-report-on-flood-fighting-equipment-en.pdf

The Interlake Reserves Tribal Council  (IRTC), which currently is comprised of the Dauphing River First Nation; Kinonjeoshtegon First Nation; Lake Manitoba First Nation; Little Saskatchewan First Nation; Peguis First Nation; and Pinaymootang First Nation wound up purchasing the Tiger Dam equipment using federal funding instead.

Just four days before the provincial election, OmniTRAX Canada filed a lawsuit April 15 against the province, along with Selinger and Ashton, named as individual defendants, alleging they interfered last December in the sale of Hudson Bay Railway to a consortium of 10 Northern Manitoba First Nations, led by Mathias Colomb Cree Nation, by disclosing confidential financial information about OmniTRAX Canada to consulting firm MNP LLP and Opaskwayak Cree Nation (OCN) at The Pas.

The claim states at the time OmniTRAX Canada was exclusively negotiating the sale with a consortium of 10 northern Manitoba First Nations led by Mathias Colomb Cree Nation. “The unlawful and wrongful conduct of the defendants as aforesaid amounts to a deliberate, high-handed, wanton and outrageous interference with the plaintiffs’ rights,” OmniTRAX Canada claims in their court filing in the Manitoba Court of Queen’s Bench. The alleged breach of the March 2015 non-disclosure agreement “compromised and threatened the plaintiffs’ negotiations for the sale of the plaintiff’s business and assets thereby interfering with the plaintiffs’ economic relations and causing the plaintiffs to suffer loss and damage,” OmniTRAX Canada claims in the court filing.

OmniTRAX Canada entered into a deal last December to sell the Port of Churchill and Hudson Bay rail line to a group of First Nations led by Mathias Colomb Cree Nation.

OmniTRAX Canada has not said how the alleged disclosure of the financial information to Opaskwayak Cree Nation affected the deal.

“Based on internal reviews already undertaken, the government intends to deny the allegations,” Shane Gibson, a government spokesman, said in a statement.

The allegations by OmniTRAX Canada have yet to be tested in court before a trier of fact.

OmniTRAX Canada is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Denver-based short line railroad, which owns Hudson Bay Railway. OmniTRAX in turn is an affiliate of The Broe Group, owned by Pat Broe, who founded the company in Denver in 1972 as a real estate asset management firm.

OmniTRAX created Hudson Bay Railway in 1997, the same year it took over operation of the Port of Churchill. It operates more than 1,000 kilometres of track for freight service in Manitoba between The Pas and Churchill. OmniTRAX Canada, Inc. bought the Northern Manitoba track from CN in 1997 for $11 million. It took over the related Port of Churchill, which opened in 1929, when it acquired it from Canada Ports Corporation, for a token $10 soon after buying the rail line.

Via Rail Canada also rents the use of the track for passenger service along the Bayline to Churchill from OmniTRAX Canada. Along the Hudson Bay Railway Bayline between Gillam and Churchill is Bird, Sundance Amery, Charlebois, Weir River, Lawledge, Thibaudeau, Silcox, Herchmer, Kellett, O’Day, Back, McClintock, Cromarty, Belcher, Chesnaye, Lamprey, Bylot, Digges, Tidal and Fort Churchill.

The Bayline reached Churchill on March 29, 1929.

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Steve Ashton: Manitoba’s longest-serving MLA since 1981 resigns from cabinet to seek premiership for a second time

Thompson NDP MLA Steve Ashton, minister of infrastructure and transportation and the marathon man of Manitoba politics, met with Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger this morning and submitted his resignation as minister to run for the leadership of the party and premier’s job. It is Ashton’s second bid to become premier. He lost to Selinger in October 2009. Ashton’s resignation from cabinet is effective at midnight tonight.

Ashton had served as minister of infrastructure and transportation since November 2009. In October 1999, Ashton was first appointed to that ministerial portfolio in what was then the job of minister of highways and government services (the department was renamed in January 2001 as transportation and government services) and he held the post until a September 2002 cabinet shuffle when he moved to to conservation – and so on around the cabinet table over the years –  until he returned to infrastructure and transportation more than five years ago.

Ashton recalled in a conversation with me a few years ago how much satisfaction he had as minister getting to re-jig the Official Highway Map of Manitoba to better reflect Manitoba “North of 53,” pointing perhaps to that interesting mix of policy wonk (he knows his facts and then some) and proud Northerner that he is.

He’s the second NDP MLA to toss his hat into the ring, along with former health minister Theresa Oswald. Both are running to replace Selinger, who is also expected to run for this own job. Last month, five Manitoba NDP provincial cabinet ministers, the so-called Gang of Five, made up of Oswald, Jennifer Howard, Erin Selby, Stan Struthers and Andrew Swan, resigned on the same day, citing concerns over being able to speak their minds in government. Ashton did not join them at the time in resigning.

The deadline to join the race is Jan. 6 and voting is expected to happen in March during the NDP convention.

In his resignation letter to the premier, Ashton writes:

“I would like to thank you for the opportunity to serve in your cabinet as Minister of Infrastructure and Transportation and as Government House Leader. It has been an honour and a privilege to serve the people of Manitoba in a number of senior roles within the Legislature and government as an MLA and Minister.

“Like many others, I regret the public conflict within both the government and party and confusion and negativity this has created with the general public.

“I understand that within all parties, caucuses and cabinets there are always legitimately and strongly held differences of opinions between individuals. I also have respected the long standing traditions of both the party and parliamentary system where those differences have been dealt with internally. If the differences were irreconcilable, the honourable action was for resignations to be offered and Cabinet and caucus solidarity and confidentiality upheld.

“Although we haven’t agreed on all issues over the years, I have respected your position as Premier and the positions of fellow cabinet and caucus members. I believe that you have acted with principle and integrity in your role as Minister and Premier.

“Our government has many accomplishments to be proud of. We have brought in many important initiatives that have enhanced the quality of life for all Manitobans. We should all take credit for the successes we have shared and responsibility for the times we have fallen short of the mark. We all know that we have much more to do, but unfortunately the events of the past few weeks and months have temporarily distracted us from that goal.

“I believe that we are at a crossroads as a party and a government. I believe we must reconnect with Manitobans and put forward a clear vision for our province. We must lead our party and government through this current crisis and beyond. That is why I am entering the leadership race.

“I believe we need to give the party membership the opportunity to choose a Leader who can engage our membership, bring the party back together and reconnect with Manitobans.

“Greg, my entry into the race should not be interpreted as any reflection on your personal commitment and the hard work you and our government have done over the past six years. I have particularly appreciated working with you on such critical issues as fighting major floods and building our core infrastructure. We should be proud of what we have accomplished and I believe that the NDP can continue to enhance the quality of life for all Manitobans.

“I will be tendering my resignation from Cabinet effective 12:00 midnight December 22, 2014 as I believe that it is inappropriate to continue to be a member of Cabinet while competing for the leadership of a party in government. This will enable me to put forward my ideas, hopes and aspirations for a united party based on the principles and long traditions of the NDP and a return to government that translates those fundamental beliefs into positive action.

“I assure you that whatever the outcome of the leadership contest, I remain committed to working with the NDP, our caucus and within government, no matter who the Leader is, to continue to create a better Manitoba.”

There has never been a Manitoba premier from Northern Manitoba. Former NDP premier Gary Doer stepped down in 2009, before being named by Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper as Canada’s ambassador to the United States, Ashton ran for the party leadership and premier’s job in 2009 against Selinger and former justice minister Andrew Swan, who dropped out of the race early making it a two-way Ashton-Selinger contest.

While Ashton outspent both his rivals in the leadership race in 2009, Selinger  took almost two-thirds of the ballots cast and sailed to victory in the two-way race with 1,317 votes to Ashton’s 685. None of Ashton’s cabinet colleagues, some who had sat around the cabinet table with him for a decade, supported his bid to become premier in 2009, but this may well be a different sort of race in 2015. Ashton is expected to get at least some benefit in certain NDP quarters for remaining loyal during the Gang of Five crisis this past fall, where Selinger named him to replace Swan as government house leader.

There have only been a dozen provincial general elections since the Thompson riding was created in June 1969. Ashton has won three quarters of them – or the last nine – which is every one he has contested.

Ashton, a native of Surrey in England, came to Canada at the age of 11 with his family. His dad was unemployed, he noted in April 2008, when they arrived in Toronto in 1967, and they moved the same year to Thompson.

Ashton, 58, is a leap-year baby, born Feb. 29, 1956. A graduate of R.D. Parker Collegiate in Thompson and the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, he received his M. A. in economics from Lakehead University in Thunder Bay and is an economist. He was president of the University of Manitoba Students Union in 1978-79 and has lectured in economics for the former Inter Universities North in Thompson and Cross Lake.

At the age of 25, Ashton was first elected to the Manitoba legislature in the Nov. 17, 1981 provincial election for the NDP in the Thompson riding, defeating one-term Progressive Conservative Labour Minister Ken MacMaster, the 47-year-old incumbent elected in 1977, by 72 votes in a race that has entered the realm of local political folklore.  Ashton garnered 2,890 votes to MacMaster’s 2,818. Liberal Cy Hennessey finished dead last with 138 votes. At the time of his first election, Ashton was involved in an Inco strike as a member of Local 6166 of the Steelworkers. Ashton still gets a kick out of pointing out his shift boss voted him for him, saying he would make a better politician than a miner.

In November 2006, looking back at having served 25 years as Thompson’s NDP MLA, Ashton noted, “What matters is getting results,” he said, pointing to former Premier Ed Schreyer and Joe Borowski as two people he looked to for inspiration.

Borowski, Thompson’s first MLA when the new provincial riding came into existence in June 1969, defeated former Thompson mayor Tim Johnston’s father, Dr. Blain Johnston, by seven votes in the Feb. 20, 1969 byelection in the old provincial riding of Churchill. He went on four months later to win the newly created riding in the June 25, 1969 general election.

Ashton joined the NDP because he says he was inspired by what “Joe Borowski and the NDP had done in the North, particularly in terms of highways and what Premier Ed Schreyer and the NDP had done in the North and provincially.” He volunteered in the 1973 campaign and canvassed around Pike and Pickerel crescents where he currently lives.

He worked at Inco numerous times – either as a summer student or full time between 1972 and 1981. This included working in transportation, process technology, maintenance, the smelter and refinery, and finally in 1981 T-1 underground.

To understand the longevity and the consistency of Ashton’s left-of-centre democratically socialist ideology, look back to two key years – first, 1977, and then the fall of 1981 and his first victory as MLA: “To understand 1981 you have to go back to 1977,” Ashton told me in October 2011. “Schreyer and the NDP had been defeated. A few weeks after the election Thompson was hit by major cuts in jobs at Inco. It was also hit with major cuts and layoffs by the Tories. This initially included initially eliminating the Inter Universities North, which was the only university presence we had in the North at the time. Construction on the Limestone Dam was also stopped. The combination devastated Thompson.”

Ashton did not serve in the cabinet of Howard Pawley for the seven years he led the NDP in Manitoba as premier from 1981 to 1988, but easily won re-election in 1986, 1990, 1995, 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2011.

The NDP were defeated in the provincial election of 1988 and Ashton served for a time as house leader for the NDP in opposition. He served as labour critic, health critic and led the fight against the privatization of MTS in 1997.

When Doer became premier in October 1999, Ashton was appointed as minister of highways and government services. Following a cabinet shuffle in September 2002, Ashton became minister of conservation. In June 2003, he was also made minister of labour and immigration with responsibility for multiculturalism and administration of The Workers Compensation Act.

In November 2003, he was named as the province’s first minister of water stewardship and in 2007 was shuffled to the post of minister of intergovernmental affairs and minister responsible for emergency measures.

Hari Dimitrakopoulou-Ashton, his wife,teaches mathematics in the business administration program in the Roblin Centre at Red River College in Winnipeg. She is also the author of Women Entrepreneurs in the North. She moved to Thompson with Steve in December 1979.

The Ashtons have two children. Daughter Niki Ashton is serving her second term in the House of Commons as NDP MP for the federal riding of Churchill here in Northern Manitoba. She was first elected to Parliament in October 2008 and re-elected in the May 2011 election. A former instructor at University College of the North (UCN), she is married to Ryan Barker, a local school teacher and an up-and-coming Thompson Playhouse thespian and audience favourite. Steve and Hari’s son, Alexander Ashton, Niki’s younger brother, recently completed a four-year term on the board of trustees of the School District of Mystery Lake, including a stint as board chair. He is a civil technology instructor at UCN and has been living abroad in Europe for the past few months.

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The Red Velvet Cake War: Thompson Playhouse returns with Southern fare and flare in its third Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope and Jamie Wooten production in four years

Comedy of a certain south-of-the-Mason-Dixon-Line type plays very well here North of 55 in Thompson, Manitoba. By way of parallel, it would be like community theatre audiences in Georgia or Texas falling in love with the Trailer Park Boys from fictional Sunnyvale Trailer Park in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, if it was a play, although the Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope and Jamie Wooten fare on offer here is a tad less ribald, if only because it would be hard to match Ricky’s four-letter word vocabulary even in a NC-17 production, much less PG-13, if Jones, Hope and Wooten were writing movie scripts rather than plays, which they’re not. I’ve lived in Nova Scotia. And I’ve lived in the United States south of the Mason Dixon Line, so I think I get some of this. A more detailed explanation of why Northern Manitobans like Southern comedy is an interesting question for another day perhaps. But not today. For now, let’s just say it has something to do with universal appeal and mass audiences.

Give the Thompson Playhouse credit for having found a tried-and-true winning formula when it comes to selecting comedy.  Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope and Jamie Wooten are three of America’s most prolific and popular playwrights and this weekend at R.D. Parker Collegiate’s Letkemann Theatre, on both Friday, Nov. 21 and Saturday, Nov. 22, at 7 p.m. sharp both nights, Thompson Playhouse is mounting a production of The Red Velvet Cake War, which had its debut in October 2010 with  Johnson City Community Theater in Johnson City, Tennessee. Tickets are $10 each. The producer is Wally Itson, recently retired principal of R.D. Parker Collegiate and now back to work general manager of  Thompson Gas Bar Co-op Ltd. at Cree Road and Thompson Drive, while Donna Wilson,  former general manager of the Thompson Citizen and Nickel Belt News, who is now the general manager of Thompson’s Quality Inn & Suites on Moak Crescent, directs. By happy coincidence you can pick up your tickets for The Red Velvet Cake War at … Thompson Gas Bar Co-op Ltd or Thompson’s Quality Inn & Suites. Tickets are also available at Don Johnson Jewellers in City Centre Mall and from some cast members.

Last November, Wilson, who is also president of Thompson Playhouse, directed a Jones, Hope and Wooten production of  Dashing Through the Snow, set four days before Christmas in the tiny fictional town of Tinsel, Texas where a colourful parade of eccentric guests arrive at the Snowflake Inn.

Wilson made her directorial debut three years ago in November 2011 with Dixie Swim Club, also a Jones, Hope and Wooten production set on North Carolina’s Outer Banks. The playwriting trio of Jones, Hope and Wooten have more than 2,500 productions to their credit and counting and are among most produced playwrights in America.

In November 2012, Thompson Playhouse changed the script slightly and offered a production of Chicago playwright Jack Sharkey’s (aka Rick Abbot’s) 1980 comedy Play On!, which Wilson co-produced with Itson.

While there are always some new faces, look for some familiar ones in The Red Velvet Cake War this weekend. Coral Bennett, who has acted in previous plays and made her directorial debut alongside Sue Colli, who has since retired to  Cape Forchu, Nova Scotia, near Yarmouth, with Dixie Swim Club, is back on stage.  As is local lawyer Serena Puranen; Kevin Hopton, a technology and trades instructor at the University College of the North here; teacher Ryan Barker, husband of Churchill riding NDP MP Niki Ashton; Delsie Jack;  teacher Robyn Foley; and the real-life husband-and-wife team of writer Angela Wolfe and Anthony Wake.

In The Red Velvet Cake War, the three Verdeen cousins – Gaynelle, Peaches and Jimmie Wyvette – decide to throw a family reunion in the fictional small town of Sweetgum, Texas. Having “accidentally” crashed her minivan through the bedroom wall of her husband’s girlfriend’s double-wide trailer, Gaynelle is close to … well, a meltdown. Peaches, the top mortuarial cosmetologist in a three-county area, is struggling to decide if it’s time to have her long-absent trucker husband declared dead. And Jimmie Wyvette, the store manager of Whatley’s Western Wear, is resorting to extreme measures to outmaneuver a “priss-pot” neighbor for the affections of Sweetgum’s newest widower, as the eccentric Verdeens gather on the hottest day of July, smack-dab in the middle of Texas tornado season.

You can listen to a brief 32-second audio promo clip for this weekend’s production of The Red Velvet Cake by Thompson Playhouse right here: http://www.driveplayer.com/#fileIds=0ByoS9i0FECzWek4yQ0FlejFNcXRaa25sY1hob3I4WTROcXJV&userId=101189087505862053096

The most recent outing for Thompson Playhouse was May 31 when they presented Murder at the Tonylou Awards, an audience participation murder mystery – and play on their names  –  written by Tony Schwartz and Marylou Ambrose of the Lakeside Players in Tafton, Pennsylvania in 2002, as a fundraiser for the Juniper Centre, which brought in more than $7,000, Wilson said at the time.

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‘Most Read Popular Thompson News’, Bill Comaskey and the Chief, Beer & Skits, and a salute to our favourite curmudgeons, Len Podbisky and Harold Kemp

While I’m still not entirely sure what I think of Glacier’s Oct. 16 redesign of the Thompson Citizen’s website, I can say the “Most Read Popular Thompson News” is an interesting revelation. While most newspaper stories are usually considered the next day’s fish wrap, a few (very few) stand the test of time. So it is we learn that the most read and popular story at the moment in the online edition of the Thompson Citizen, “Vale Inco restructures senior management: Position of Manitoba Operations president abolished” (http://www.thompsoncitizen.net/news/thompson/vale-inco-restructures-senior-management-1.1360946) ran … well, more than five years ago actually on July 22, 2009, the month after the paper first went online. Don’t get me wrong: I think it is a heck of a story; after all I wrote it. Same for the third of the five “Most Read Popular Thompson News”  stories today: “Canada’s most violent crime city: Thompson, Manitoba: Statistics Canada’s new rankings again paint a bleak picture (http://www.thompsoncitizen.net/news/thompson/canada-s-most-violent-crime-city-thompson-manitoba-1.1368767).  I wrote that one also in July: it ran on July 22, 2011, more than three years ago. Rounding out the top five list in Number 2, 4 and 5 spots  are three stories from last Wednesday’s Oct. 29 paper. Odd but interesting. I suspect the “Most Read Popular Thompson News”  list will very soon undergo some tinkering in terms of algorithms or delivery and my old Vale and Stats Can stories will be relegated to virtual fish wrap. C’est la vie. It was fun to see them again so prominently displayed in a vertical bar on Nov. 3, 2014 down the right hand side of the Thompson Citizen’s home page.

And not to carp (well, at least not too much), but are there any readers who actually find the digital ISSUU digital publishing platform edition easier to read online than the old-fashioned Adobe PDF of the weekly paper? Maybe. Let me know if you’re one of them. I’d be interested to know how that’s working for you.

Oh. And that hypertext link at the bottom left of the home page to the Flin Flon Reminder (www.thereminder.ca), as one of the Thompson Citizen’s “sister papers.” Dead (the link, not the Reminder).  Since about 2011 or even longer, if I recall correctly.

As for the main headshot or photo for someone appearing on the home page in the main story now in the new online version of the Thompson Citizen, think big, very big: Hello, Niki! That should make for some interesting pics and story choices to lead the home page as things unfold over on Commercial Place in the weeks ahead.

OK. I’ll stop. And dedicate this post to well-known raconteur Len Podbisky, a former Thompson Citizen reporter and former news director of Arctic Radio CHTM-610 AM, who wrote a very funny column intermittently, as both a staffer and freelancer, aptly named, “Tales from the Grumpy Old Men’s Club,” and the late Harold Everett Esson Kemp, who was the ripe old age of 93 when he died in 2011. Harold used to enrich and enliven the Page 4 editorial page in the Thompson Citizen from time to time with his letters to the editor.

I published Harold last letter to the editor on Dec. 1, 2010, and he was as blunt as ever. “Former Manitoba Operations Vale spokesman David Markham told me last June that the most recent information he had then was the mines here would close in 2028. Of course the life of the mines would be extended if any new discoveries were found. Diamond drilling underground is still being done. So far nothing new.

“Since I came here in 1967, nine mines have closed, some for lack of ore others due to content and prohibitive costs.

“For years now I have had general knowledge as to the life of these mines, maybe because I was a miner one time. When talking to Markham on this subject, I told him I was about to attend a meeting and advise the people the life of this mine is only till the year 2030 to 2035. It was then David corrected me by saying their estimate was 2028. His comment to me was, “Well, Harold, you weren’t out too much.

“Why bring this up! Because the mayor and others like Steve Ashton keeps talking about the great future for Thompson. UCN is a white elephant to begin with. Pick up your paper and you’ll read job ads for both campuses here and in The Pas looking for teachers and instructors. Another thing. Where are we to pick up 500 to 600 students to attend college when we don’t even have an industry here? Where is the tax money to be had? Down the line we’ll be lucky to have 4,000 to 5,000 people here. Looks to me Snow Lake is the place to be.”

Now, true enough, Harold was writing well before Vale’s “Thompson Foot Wall Deep Project,” at the north end of Thompson Mine, previously known as Thompson (1D), entered its current Front End Loading (FEL) 3 study stage, which looks at its feasibility, in Vale’s four-stage project development system, and may or may not amount to a big deal some day. But you’ve got to admire Harold’s directness and history may still prove him not far off on at least some of his observations. Time will tell.

As for Podbisky, long before he turned his pen to “Tales from the Grumpy Old Men’s Club,” he along with CBC Radio North Country host Mark Szyszlo, and now Winnipeg-based provincial civil servant Jim Stewart, were members of the boundary-pushing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Low Budget Trash Theatre triumvirate, from the original incarnation of Beer & Skits.

The original Beer & Skits, which had a long run at the Royal Canadian Legion’s Centennial Hall from the 1980s through the mid-1990s, was famous – or perhaps infamous – for taking on any number of sacred cows, including wickedly spot-on mimicking of former mayor Bill Comaskey, God rest his soul, or a monologue by Podbisky on just how aboriginal a certain local First Nations chief really was – while Comaskey and the chief were in the audience.

Unfortunately, it all ended rather badly in a legal debacle in the mid-1990s with a member of council – not Comaskey – among several people threatening defamation lawsuits.

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Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons Kevin Vickers reportedly killed attacker in Centre Block gunfight

Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons Kevin Vickers reportedly shot and killed 32-year-old attacker Michael Zehaf-Bibeau during a gunfight this morning in the Centre Block on Parliament Hill in an attack on the centre of government. Vickers was not injured in the volley of gunfire. Greg Peters, Usher of the Black Rod to the Senate of Canada, reportedly injured both legs after jumping from a second storey roof, while the attacker was outside his office. Peters was reportedly aiding a House of Commons Security Services  staffer, who had been shot in the leg, escape at the time. Both were treated and released from The Ottawa Hospital. A retired RCMP superintendent from Souris, Prince Edward Island, Peters, 54, is responsible for security within the Senate red chamber.

The gunfight took place in the Hall of Honour, the main entrance to the Centre Block beneath the Peace Tower, and part of the central axis of the Centre Block, joining Confederation Hall to the Library of Parliament, and providing access to the main committee rooms.

Vickers, 58, does not normally carry a sidearm, but he reportedly keeps a handgun in his office.

A 29-year veteran of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Vickers joined the House of Commons as director of security operations in June 2005. He was appointed as Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons in August 2006.

As Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Commons, Vickers is responsible for the safety and security of the Parliament buildings and occupants, and ensuring and controlling access to the House of Commons. Most people probably knew the job better until today for its chief ceremonial function – Vickers preceding Speaker Andrew Scheer into the House of Commons before every sitting, carrying the gilded silver mace, representing royal authority and a sign that the Queen has given the House of Commons the authority to meet and decide on the laws which govern the country, and which is kept in the custody of the Sergeant-at-Arms.

Parliament is supreme in a constitutional monarchy. It is a principle that dates back to at least December 1689 and the Bill of Rights passed by “the said lords spiritual and temporal, and commons, assembled at Westminster” to “resolve that William and Mary, prince and princess of Orange, be, and be declared, king and queen of England, France, and Ireland….”

Some would look back even further to King John of England signing the articles that would lead to the great council, forerunner of the British Parliament, with the Magna Carta on the meadow at Runnymede in June 1215.

Many members of the Conservative, Liberal and NDP parties were in their usual Wednesday morning caucus meetings, which had just gotten underway in many cases, when the shooting on Parliament Hill began shortly before 10 a.m. EDT. Niki  Ashton, NDP MP for the riding of Churchill in Northern Manitoba, has tweeted she is safe but in lockdown. “I’m ok. Thank you for your messages. My thoughts are with those keeping us safe,” Niki Ashton has tweeted.

During his 29-year career with the RCMP, Vickers held positions of increasing responsibility and scope, including district commander, Acadian Peninsula in northeastern New Brunswick, and director general, national contract policing branch. Vickers also served as an aide-de-camp for the lieutenant governor of New Brunswick. He is the recipient of the Queen’s Jubilee Medal, the Canada 125 Medal and the RCMP Long Service Medal, and was recognized for his work 15 years ago during the Burnt Church crisis, the lobster wars between the Mi’kmaq people of the Esgenoopetitj First Nation at Burnt Church and non-aboriginal Acadian fishermen.

Police are investigating two shootings, one at the Canadian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the  National War Memorial in Confederation Square and one in the Hall of Honour, part of the central axis of the Centre Block, joining Confederation Hall to the Library of Parliament, and providing access to the main committee rooms. Both locations are geographically close in a compact area that forms the centre of government for Canada and commercial activity in the City of Ottawa. The dead suspect is believed to be have been involved in both shootings and no other suspects are in custody, the Ottawa Police Service says.

All Canadian Forces bases across Canada have been closed to public access and the Royal Alexandra Bridge, the inter-provincial bridge between Ottawa in Ontario and Gatineau in Quebec, has been closed. Joint Task Force 2 (JTF 2), the highest readiness and most precise combat and counter terrorism specialized unit within the Canadian Special Operations Forces Command – the successors of the legendary U.S. and Canadian combined 1st Special Service Force from the Second World War or, as it was commonly known, “the Devil’s Brigade” – is being mobilized in Ottawa. Stephen Day, former head of JTF 2, told CBC the attack in Ottawa appears to be sophisticated and a clear attempt to psychologically destabilize the populace. Day said police, the RCMP, the federal police force, and the local Ottawa Police Service, would be lead agency initially, with JTF 2 in planning preparations. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is on elevated alert status. All MP’s constituency offices have been closed across the country.

Defence officials have advised all Canadian Forces personnel not engaged in active duty today to not wear their uniforms after work on errands on their way home, for instance, but instead to wear civilian clothing, as Canadian soldier appear to be deliberately targeted.

Cpl. Nathan Frank Cirillo, 24, a reservist from the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders of Canada (Princess Louise’s) in Hamilton, Ontario, part of an honour guard at the Canadian Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at the National War Memorial in Confederation Square, was shot and died at The Ottawa Hospital. A civilian passerby performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) on the wounded reservist. The Argylls are an infantry unit of the Canadian Forces primary reserves.

The shootings in Ottawa today came less than 48 hours after 25-year-old hit-and-run suspect Martin Couture Rouleau is believed to have aimed his vehicle at two members of the Canadian Armed Forces, who were on foot in a strip mall parking lot, in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, located about 50 kilometres southeast of Montreal. One of the soldiers, Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent, 53, later died in hospital, while the other suffered minor injuries. Rouleau was shot and killed after a police chase.

Globe and Mail reporter Josh Wingrove’s extraordinary 57-second video of the gunfight, filled with the sound of more than 30 rounds of percussive gunfire, is available on YouTube at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrGqoISd-do&sns=tw

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Not running: The big story of Thompson city council and School District of Mystery Lake elections Oct. 22

Elections are very often referendums on the incumbents seeking re-election. Voters are as likely to be voting against something or someone as for anything. But not always. The real  story of the upcoming Oct. 22 municipal election in Thompson is not so much the newcomers seeking office, but the vast number of city councillors and School District of Mystery Lake (SDML) trustees who are not seeking office and will complete their terms at 11:59 a.m.Thursday, Oct. 23, including Mayor Tim Johnston, a two-term mayor and one-term councillor, first elected in 2002, and SDML chair Rob Pellizzaro, a local lawyer, who was first elected in 1998, and is the longest serving trustee on the board.

Thompson had a strong turnout for the last municpal election in 2010, with 41.1 per cent of the names on the eligible voters’ list showing up to vote. That figure equated to 3,638 Thompsonites – 3,536 with valid, accepted ballots, 26 voters who declined their ballots – led by 12 decliners at the Riverside poll – and 76 spoiled ballots. Many voters did not vote for an entire slate of eight council candidates, with the average ballot featuring only 5.8 votes for members of council.

In April 2009, council invoked Section 78 of the Municipal Act to add an eighth councillor as of the October general election, along with the mayor, for a nine-member council, reverting to the size council was until the early 1990s when they dropped a seat.

City councillors are elected at-large in Thompson.

Dating back to 1867 and the British North America Act,  which sets out our basic post-Confederation governance structures, municipalities are creature of the provinces and the most junior level in our three-tier federal, provincial and municipal governance system. Without the consent of the Province of Manitoba, there is nothing the City of Thompson or any other Manitoba municipality can do.

It  was the second-highest voter turnout in Thompson history – the record still belongs to the 1986 general election, where 42.4 per cent of registered voters showed up to re-elect then-mayor Don MacLean to a fourth term, but 2010 did finish just ahead of the 41 per cent turnout from 2006, which had been in second place.

Born and raised in Thompson, Johnston is the son of Dr. Blain Johnston, a former city councillor who was the first regular, full-time doctor in Thompson. He graduated from R.D. Parker Collegiate in 1980. After graduating from the University of Winnipeg with a degree in administrative studies and working in Winnipeg for several years, Johnston returned to Thompson in the late 1980s, when he purchased J.B. Johnston Ventures Ltd. from his parents. A past president of the Thompson Chamber of Commerce, in 1999 and 2000, Johnston is the manager of North Central Community Futures Development Corporation, and plans to remain there and continue to live in Thompson, he has said.

Also leaving city council is its longest serving-member, Coun. Stella Locker, a registered nurse as well as real estate broker,  who chaired the city planning commission from 1967  to 1972 and chaired the industrial commission from 1982 to 1984. She was first elected to city council in 1989 and served as deputy mayor. In the last election in 2010, Locker finished on top at nearly every polling station, only finishing outside first place once – coming in third at Wapanohk in Eastwood.

Also stepping away is two-term Coun. Charlene Lafreniere, director of institutional advancement at the University College of the North (UCN) since September 2010, and previously executive director of the Thompson Neighbourhood Renewal Corporation (TNRC) and director of justice at Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO).  Lafreniere, who topped the polls in the 2006 council race, was re-elected, but with less support, in 2010.

Coun. Erin Hogan, first elected to city council in a city-wide byelection in December 2009 to replace Coun. Cory Young, was re-elected 10 months later in the October 2010 general municipal election. She is pregnant and expecting twins. During her almost five years as a councillor she served as a Manitoba board member on the  Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) national board of directors and was vice-chair of the standing committee on increasing women’s participation in municipal government. She works as a policy analyst in the aboriginal relations division of Manitoba Hydro.

The three incumbents seeking re-election as councillors are Penny Byer, first elected in 2010 also, Coun. Brad Evenson, a one-term councillor first elected four years ago, and owner of Patent Electric and former managing partner with the Wescan Electrical Company, who also served for four months in 2007 as  president of the Thompson Chamber of Commerce, and Coun Judy Kolada, the second-longest serving member of council, first elected in 1994.  She came to Manitoba from the south shore of Nova Scotia in the 1960s, following her graduation from Bridgewater Commercial College. She is a former executive director the YWCA of Thompson and before that retired from the provincial government, where she worked for the Department of Northern Affairs as a local government co-ordinator and the Department of Labour as a labour standards officer.  Byer  retired in April 2013 as Vale’s Manitoba Operations as corporate affairs co-ordinator, who moved to Thompson in 1978 to open up the CBC North Country studio and has a diploma in creative communications and certificates in marketing, public relations and journalism,

Two first-term incumbent councillors, Dennis Fenske and Luke Robinson, are seeking the mayor’s chair, meaning the loser will no longer sit on council.

Fenske, currently serving as deputy mayor, also controls DDAK Developments Inc., a family real estate development and holding company, and is a long time resident of Thompson. His parents, Len and Mary Fenske arrived in 1961 with six children planned to stay a couple of years until farming in Saskatchewan rebounded, he says on his Dennis Fenske for Mayor page on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Dennis-Fenske-for-Mayor/1558721681016070

A centre, who shoots left, Fenske played three seasons of Junior B hockey in British Columbia for the Victoria Cougars  from 1975 to 1978, and three more seasons between 1983 and 1986 for the University of Saskatchewan of the Canada West Universities Athletic Association (CWUAA). He returned to live in Thompson in 1988. Upon his return, he was hired by the City of Thompson as a recreation programmer for the Department of Recreation, Parks and Culture. In 1990, he was promoted to director, and served in that position until 1999. He then transferred to City Hall as the director of community development and human resources. He left the City of Thompson in the fall of 2007 for Vale where he is currently employed as engineering supervisor of support services for central engineering and the project management office.

Fenske is a widower. His wife, Don, died in May 2007 from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), sometimes called Lou Gehrig’s disease after the New York Yankees’ slugger, first baseman and outfielder who died of ALS in June 1941. Both of their daughters are R.D. Parker Collegiate graduates: Allison is a lawyer and Kate a nurse. Fenske, who was out of town Sept. 19 during the ballot draw by senior election official Dave Turpie to determine position randomly on the ballot (which Fenske won over Robinson) was away to get married, Turpie said. Fenske had been engaged to Germaine Leger, of Thompson, formerly of Winnipeg, since Oct. 12, 2013. Both are half marathon long-distance runners who have competed for several years in June in the Manitoba Marathon in Winnipeg.

Luke Robinson, who was out of the gate early, announcing his mayoral run in May, won the eighth and final seat on council in the Oct. 27, 2010 election in a nail-biter of a race all night long, with challenger Jasper Robinson and Les Ellsworth staying in the mix right until the final poll. He first ran for a council a year earlier , finishing as runner-up to Hogan in the 2009 byelection. An automotive, truck and coach heavy-duty mechanic, Robinson is a Francophone, originally from Kapuskasing, in Northern Ontario. Bilingual, he was educated in French in elementary school and finished high school in English. He moved to Thompson in 1999 with his son, Randy, and has worked at Vale since 2001, where is a mechanical underground worker at Vale. He also as a daughter, Tammy, and two stepchildren, Angela and Ryan Bonner, with his partner of 12 years, Heather Bonner, who is Métis and a community liaison worker at Ma-Mow-We-Tak Friendship Centre. Robinson says his grandson, Drayden, will be multilingual, speaking, English, French and Cree.

Robinson also has a private pilot’s licence, owns an ultralight plane, has a cabin at Turnbull Lake in Leaf Rapids, and served 12 years as a volunteer firefighter, as well as serving as a school board trustee in Northern Ontario. Robinson’s City of Thompson biographical webpage http://www.thompson.ca/index.aspx?page=162 lists him as an “active union steward with USW Local 6166,” but the Thompson Labour Committee, when it met last week decided for the first time in years to endorse none of the candidates   –  incumbents or challengers  –  who  had declared their intentions almost a week before nominations closed, and who are running for mayor, city council or School District of Mystery Lake trustee. Robinson brought greetings from the City of Thompson last Nov. 23 to the USW Local 6166 annual gala banquet and dance for their activists and stewards at the Juniper Centre.

Paul Andersen, long-time producer for Shaw TV in Thompson, Flin Flon and The Pas, is talking to Robinson at  9 a.m. today and took to Shaw TV’s Twitter account at https://twitter.com/ShawTVThompson last night to tweet, “If you have any questions to ask him, e-mail at shawcable11@yahoo.ca.”

Over at the School District of Mystery Lake meanwhile, the big news, aside from Pellizzaro not running again after 16 years on the board, is that Ryan Land and Caroline Winship are, as  reported here Sept. 14. If you missed it earlier, you can read the story here at  https://soundingsjohnbarker.wordpress.com/2014/09/14/ryan-land-and-caroline-winship-running-for-sdml-school-board-trustee-seats/

There are 11 candidates running for the seven SDML trustees seats.

Also stepping down after one term are 75-year-old trustee Sya Gregovski  and Alexander Ashton, who had taught at University College of the North (UCN) and is the younger brother of two-term Churchill NDP MP Niki Ashton and the son of Thompson NDP MLA and minister of infrastructure and transportation Steve Ashton and Hari Dimitrakopoulou-Ashton, an economist and university lecturer in economics, management, and women’s studies, who is also a former SDML school board trustee. Alexander Ashton plans to live abroad this coming year.

Running again is veteran trustee Guido Oliveira, who works at Vale and was the top vote-getter in the Oct. 27, 2010 election; one-term trustee Vince Nowlin, who also works at Vale; Leslie Tucker,  manager of Northern Region Training and Employment Services here for Jobs and the Economy Manitoba; and Janet Brady, who was elected in a byelection Nov. 17, 2011 to replace Valerie Wilson, who resigned and moved to Winnipeg, as a School District of Mystery Lake trustee. Brady easily swept by Julyda Lagimodiere in a 458 to 230 vote cakewalk.

Brady, 60, a Montreal native, is a product of Quebec’s Roman Catholic school system in the 1960s and early 1970s, and a senior instructor at the University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Social Work in the Northern Bachelor of Social Work program here.

A former social worker with Awasis from 1987 to 1990, Brady returned to Thompson in 2002 to teach at the University of Manitoba.

Brady has a master’s degree in social work from Carleton University in Ottawa.

In 1999, she sought the NDP nomination for the riding of Arthur-Virden for the September general election, but lost out to fellow dipper Perry Kalynuk.

She did secure the NDP nomination, however, in the riding of Turtle Mountain where she finished second, losing to Progressive Conservative incumbent Merv Tweed, now president of OmniTRAX Canada, the Bayline railway.

Other newcomers in the SDML trustee race include Don MacDonald, Liz Lychuk, Sandra Fitzpatrick, Doug Krokosz and Clint Saulteaux.  Lychuk is the manager of child and adolescent mental health programs and mental health promotion here at the Northern Regional Health Authority (NRHA),.

Among the 18 city council hopefuls for eight council seats are two former mayoral candidates, Ron Matechuk, who lost to Johnston by only 208 votes, in 2010, and Colleen Smook, owner of McCreedy Campground, who lagged well behind in early balloting last time out and finished third in the mayor’s race with a total vote count of 681. Also running are Christa Herkert, after school program director at the Boys & Girls Club of Thompson, who is also a member of the Thompson Lion’s Club, Communities in Bloom and Operation Red Nose; Blake Ellis, who began his studies last week at the University of Manitoba’s Faculty of Social Work, where he is working towards a bachelor’s degree, but is undoubtedly better known for his previous employment roles as housing co-ordinator for the Thompson Neighbourhood Renewal Program (TNRC)  Our Home Kikinaw program; spokesperson for the former Burntwood Regional Health Authority (BRHA); and as a long-time reporter and later editor with the Thompson Citizen and Nickel Belt News, primarily when the Wright family owned it, but also for six months in 2007 after GVIC Communications Corp. of Vancouver’s Glacier Media Group bought it as part of their Prairie Newspaper Group. Ellis, who has lived here for 17 years and is from the farm country of southwestern Ontario originally, has two children and has also been involved in  Thompson Youth Bowling Council, Thompson Tumblers, Hope North Flag Football and Thompson Junior Soccer.

Also running are Julyda Lagimodiere, minister of justice and vice-president of the Manitoba Metis Federation here, who ran against Brady in the school board byelection in 2011, and also worked previously as the learners assistance centre co-ordinator at University College of the North’s Thompson campus from 1987 to 2012; Paullette Simkins, executive director of the Canadian Mental Health Association (CMHA) Thompson and the Thompson Homeless Shelter; Erika McCarthy, owner of McCarthy Mobile Technology, who recently returned to Thompson after a 10-year hiatus living elsewhere and for a time contemplated running for mayor right out of the gate; Malanie Bercier Cutler; Dave Erickson, a plumber who owns Thompson Plumbing & Heating on Centennial Drive East; Rob Chuckrey; Audrey Dufour, originally from Dolbeau-Mistassini  in the Lac-Saint-Jean region of northern Quebec, who has worked as a substitute teacher for the SDML since 2012; Dennis Foley, a service writer at McKay GM but  best known these days as a mud bog impessario with the  Northern Manitoba Off Road Association , Kathy Valentino; Lydia Blais co-ordinator for Boys & Girls Club of Thompson’s inter-agency Youth At Risk North (YARN), and Duncan Wong, of Baffin Crescent, owner of Wong’s Asian Bistro in Southwood Plaza.

Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) Grand Chief David Harper survives non-confidence vote

Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) Grand Chief David Harper survived a non-confidence vote by his fellow chiefs Sept. 10 at the organization’s 33rd annual general assembly at Opaskwayak Cree Nation (OCN) adjacent to The Pas. Sixteen chiefs voted against the non-confidence motion, nine supported it and one abstained. MKO still faces two forensic audits amid allegations of misspending by the grand chief, which Harper denies.

In July, chiefs had voted to ask Harper to take a voluntary leave pending the outcome of the two forensic audit  investigations, but he refused. That refusal triggered Wednesday’s vote at OCN.
MKO, a non-profit, political advocacy organization founded in 1981, represents 30 First Nation communities in Northern Manitoba, many of which are remote and economically impoverished. MKO First Nations are signatories to Treaties 4, 5, 6 and 10.

Harper, then chief of Garden Hill First Nation, was first elected as MKO grand chief at the 28th annual general assembly at Opaskwayak Cree Nation on Sept. 2, 2009.  Harper succeeded Sydney Garrioch of Cross Lake, who served two terms as MKO grand chief between 2003 and 2009, but stepped down to seek the federal Liberal nomination for Churchill riding, which he got, but later ran unsuccessfully against NDP incumbent Niki Ashton in the May 2011 federal election.

Harper beat out three other candidates for the grand chief’s job in 2009 and was re-elected for a second three-year term after winning on the second ballot Aug. 29, 2012  at the 31st MKO annual general assembly on Norway House Cree Nation. Garden Hill First Nation is situated on Island Lake and adheres to Treaty No. 5. The reserve covers about 18,180 acres and is only accessible by winter road or air. The language in the community is Oji-Cree, often referred to as the Island Lake dialect. Garden Hill has more than 4,000 band members.

Harper was raised in Garden Hill First Nation by his grandparents and attended school there. He later obtained his commercial pilot’s licence and worked as both a corporate pilot and public relations manager for a regional airline before returning to Garden Hill in the mid-1990s.

The push to removed Harper was led by Chief Arlen Dumas of the Mathias Colomb Cree Nation at Pukatawagan. Dumas has been one of the leading local players in Idle No More – Northern Manitoba since early last year, and squared off with Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Co., Ltd. over mining issues in Northern Manitoba.

More than two-thirds of the current MKO chiefs have been in office less than two years.

MKO’s executive council called in Winnipeg-based forensic auditor Lazer Grant in August 2013 to look at $1.1 million paid to former director of finance Glen Buchko from 2005 to 2011 and and contracts issued by the organization. Buchko was paid about $250,000 annually. The chiefs on the executive council later asked the auditor to expand the investigation to include Harper’s expenses. They questioned a number of items, such as guitars purchased as gifts at a Christmas party, payments for Harper’s girlfriend to travel and repairs to his car. Harper has said he paid back all his personal expenses.

Last month, the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada’s assessment and investigations branch, in an Aug. 12 letter, signed by Sylvie Lecompte, director of the branch, told MKO that it had hired KPMG to audit the books in a separate investigation of its own. KPMG was formed in 1987 with the merger of Peat Marwick International (PMI) and Klynveld Main Goerdeler (KMG) and their individual member firms. The auditors want to looking at how MKO used funds from Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada. The organization received around $25 million from the federal government between 2009 and 2012, the latest financial documents available on the AANDC website show.

Harper has said auditors will find no problems with the books.

MKO is awash in red ink. Just in the last year, MKO’s accumulated deficit has increased by more than 30 per cent to about $1.298 million, according to its consolidated financial statement for the fiscal year ending March 31, from about $965,000 the previous fiscal year. MKO had also accumulated an operating deficit of $609,058 by March 31, 2013, which was a 71 per cent increase over the previous year’s operating deficit of $356,108.

Winnipeg-based accountant Bernie Shore, who recently reviewed MKO’s books, told the organization in an Aug. 24 letter he could not audit the organization’s consolidated financial statements for the 2014 and 2013 fiscal years. “I have not been able to obtain sufficient appropriate audit evidence to provide a basis for an audit opinion,” wrote Shore. “I do not express an opinion on these consolidated statements.”

Shore also said in the letter he could not review MKO’s federally-funded aboriginal skills and employment training program (ASETS) for the 2013-2014 fiscal year because the money lacked a paper trail. “I was unable to verify recorded or unrecorded amounts related to assets, liabilities, net debt, accumulated deficit and expenditure.”