All posts by Brian Hill

Ontario energy assistance fails to reach most vulnerable customers

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After more than a year, less than one-third of eligible customers have successfully enrolled in the Ontario Electricity Support Program, according to data obtained from the Ontario Energy Board.

An estimated 570,000 low-income customers are eligible for the province’s flagship energy assistance fund – a program the government has spent more than $12 million advertising – but only 163,000 of these customers were registered as of Nov. 30.

“We continue to receive approximately 3,000 applications per week,” said Karen Evans, a spokesperson for the OEB. “Once the completed application and signed consent form has been received from the applicant, it typically takes less than four weeks to confirm eligibility.”

But with only 258,000 total applications processed, it could take as long as two years before all eligible customers are registered – and that’s assuming everyone who applies is accepted.

“If everyone truly had the best interest of low-income customers at heart, they’d be working with community agencies to find a way to get the resource – the OESP grant – to the people who need it most,” said Francesca Dobbyn, executive director of the United Way of Bruce-Grey County.

“With no computer, Internet or printer, applicants rely on social agencies to assist them in applying, which can be difficult in rural communities with no transportation systems.”

Dobbyn says the application process itself can also be a barrier. For example, the Canada Revenue Agency, which assists the OEB in verifying an applicant’s income, requires all consent forms be completed by hand – meaning nothing can be faxed or emailed.

“The CRA requires a ‘wet’ signature,” said Dobbyn. “They [the OEB] tried to get around it, but the CRA insisted.”

Assistance hard to come by

Mel Kemp and Peter Burnette lived without electricity for more than three months after Hydro One cut off their power in August.

Following unusually heavy rains at the end of summer, the couple’s basement was flooded – thanks largely to having no electricity.

“With no working sump pump, the insurance won’t cover any of the water damage,” said Kemp, a 57-year-old school bus driver. “There are some agencies out there that are willing to help a bit, but you have to keep phoning around and finding other agencies because none of them will help totally.”

Despite having only one part-time job between the two of them, Kemp and Burnette are not currently registered with the OESP.

“Finding out about [assistance programs] was a challenge to begin with,” said Kemp. “It’s almost like too little too late. You know, like, with your bills they’ll give you $20 or $30 off.”

Less than 5% of disconnected customers registered

Nancy Taylor, vice president of Kingston Hydro, says less than five per cent of all customers disconnected by the utility provider last year are currently registered with the OESP.

“Of the about 600 disconnects that have taken place in 2015, only 31 accounts are on the Ontario Electricity Support Program,” said Taylor. “So it’s quite likely there are customers that could be eligible for that plan that haven’t signed up for it yet.”

For a municipally-owned and operated utility provider, disconnecting customers is an absolute last resort, said Taylor. That’s why programs like the OESP are so important.

“They’re our friends, neighbours and families, so we’re very conscious of the impact high electricity prices are having and we’re very empathetic.”

Unfortunately, Taylor, like Dobbyn, is not entirely confident in the OESP’s capacity to help those who require it most.

“The current process may not be getting the assistance to the people who really need it,” said Taylor, adding that of the utility’s roughly 24,000 residential customers, only one thousand are currently registered with the OESP.

Still, Taylor says her company is working hard to keep customers connected and address the broader needs of the community as a whole.

“When you’re in a situation where you have low ncome, often it’s associated with other thing as well,” said Taylor. “Mental illness, learning disabilities, addictions – and so it’s a much more complicated problem than we understand.”

Bytown: Ottawa’s capital of parking tickets

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Over the past five years, more than 200,000 parking tickets with fines totalling $7.3 million have been handed out along the streets of Ottawa’s Byward Market, according to documents obtained through an access to information request.

In fact, drivers parked alongside York and George streets alone, the city’s two most ticketed streets, and a popular parking destination for many bar and restaurant goers, shoppers and tourists alike, received more than 100,000 tickets during this period.

“There are quite a few people who complain about parking tickets,” said David Phillips, an Ottawa area farmer and the operator of a family owned fruit stand at the Byward outdoor market. “They’re here for just a minute, and, surprise, they got a ticket.”

The type of violations handed out along these two streets, which run side-by-side for four blocks between Sussex Drive and King Edward Avenue, range from the benign, 57,000 tickets were issued for parking in a “paid parking zone,” presumably without paying, to the unusual, 60 drivers were ticketed for parking with their vehicles facing in the wrong direction.

Another 105 drivers received tickets for parking on the sidewalk, while 10 drivers were ticketed for stopping on the “roadway side” of a parked vehicle, meaning they were double parked.

Then there were the fines unique to Ottawa, or to a nation’s capital at least.

For example, 177 drivers were ticketed for parking on City of Ottawa property, while four drivers received $50 fines for parking in a diplomatic zone, no doubt parked out front of the American embassy on Sussex Drive.

But Ottawa city councillor for Rideau-Vanier, Mathieu Fleury, says the market’s parking woes are not as simple as a lack of capacity or the strict enforcement of regulations.

“We recognized that parking was an issue, particularly with so many 15-minute or 1-hour parking zones,” said Fleury. “So we took action and extended these times by creating more two-hour parking zones.”


Source: City of Ottawa parking data.

Fleury says these changes permit lunch-time visitors and tourists to enjoy the market, while still allowing for the high turnover in parking availability the market needs.

“What we wanted to avoid was making all day parking on the street favourable for government workers, the Chateau Laurier or people working on the Hill,” said Fleury. “And I think a lot of businesses support us in this.”

Big ticket fines

There are also the big ticket items, the violations with fines that go well beyond the $30 to $40 average.

For instance, unauthorized parking in a space reserved for persons with physical disabilities carries a fine of up to $350, though five of six violations of this type along York and George streets in the past five years resulted in fines of $175 or less.

Meanwhile, being caught parked in a designated fire route cost 23 drivers $100 each over the past five years, while stopping in a bus zone or interfering with highway sweeping – an offence that occurred twice at the same address on York Street since 2011, a location with no highway in sight – cost ticketed drivers $85 a piece.

List of parking violations and fines (p. 1)
A full list of all City of Ottawa parking violations and the associated fines.
View entire document on DocumentCloud

In total, Ottawa parking attendants handed out more than $92 million in fines over the past five years. The year with the highest amount in total violations, 2015, saw roughly $20.5 million in fines distributed among more than 390,000 tickets – an average of about $52 a ticket.

The overall increase in total fines between 2014 and 2015 was a little less than $3 million – a jump of roughly 16.2 per cent in a single year.

Hydro: Low-income families continue to struggle with rising energy costs

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Hydro One transmission lines near Kingston, Ont., July, 2016.
Hydro One transmission lines near Kingston, Ont., July, 2016.

Data released from the Ontario Energy Board, the organization responsible for regulating the province’s energy sector, shows that over the past two years, low-income customers in Ontario fell behind on their electricity bills at a rate more than twice the provincial average.

Over the past two years, the number of low-income customers in Ontario behind on their electricity bills climbed from roughly 14,000 at the end of 2013 to nearly 20,000 by the end of 2015 – an increase of 42 per cent. The overall number of customers behind on their bills during this same period went from 472,000 to more than 565,000 – an increase of 19 per cent.

“The OEB is committed to protecting Ontario’s energy consumers – especially low-income consumers,” said Karen Evans, a spokesperson for the OEB. “We understand that for some Ontarians, electricity prices are making it difficult to make ends meet. The data shows that low-income consumers are having difficulty paying their bills.”

Meanwhile, the same data shows the total dollar amount owed by low-income customers in Ontario during this period increased from $5.3 million to more than $13 million – a jump of 140 per cent. Overall, the amount consumers owed electricity distributors in Ontario went from $108 million in 2013 to more than $172 million by the end of 2015 – an increase of 59 per cent.

While Evans acknowledges that rising electricity costs have placed a growing strain upon the province’s families, she also says her organization works closely with local aid groups and social service providers to ensure low-income Ontarians have access to government assistance.

“We’ve created programs that are specifically designed to help vulnerable customers,” said Evans. “[We] also have special rules in place that utilities must follow when dealing with customers with limited finances, including waiving security deposits and allowing longer payment periods.”

Assistance not enough

Despite all the rules and regulations, many Ontarians say the rising cost of electricity is simply too great to keep up with.

Jason Ladouceur, a 37-year-old from Parry Sound, Ont., says rising electricity costs and the constant threat of disconnection have been a “absolute nightmare.”

“This summer was terrible,” said Ladouceur. “We thought we had everything under control, but then I was late on one payment and they were right back at my door ready to disconnect.”

Ladouceur owes more than $3,000 in overdue payments to Hydro One, the province’s largest electricity distributor. He says the bill dates back to when his home had two meters, and that he was essentially being charged twice for the same thing. Hydro One did eventually remove the second meter, but his electricity bill remains.

“It’s just insane to think we were responsible for covering bills on two separate meters,” said Ladouceur, whose family now lives in the downstairs in-law suit of their home as a way to conserve electricity. “It’s legalized extortion – that is what Hydro One has created.”

Aid groups struggle to keep up

Aid organizations across the province have also struggled to keep up.

Jared Zieroth, Executive director of the United Way of Thunder Bay, says his organization has seen a rush of low-income and impoverished families over the past few years requiring assistance with their electricity bills.

“For us, the ask just keeps getting bigger and bigger,” said Zieroth. “The gap between what we’re able to fund and the need continues to grow.”

Zieroth says his organization’s primary concern is poverty, but adds that energy costs – not just electricity, but also natural gas and propane – have made getting by just that much more difficult for low-income families.

“Thunder Bay has been a fantastic community,” said Zieroth. “They pitch in, but there’s really only so much they can do.”

Determined to fail: BC legal aid society admits self-imposed targets are “quite low”

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In it’s most recent annual report, BC’s Legal Services Society, the body responsible for providing legal aid in the province, set overall targets of pleasing just 62 per cent of lawyers and 66 per cent of clients.

The targets are “quite low,” says Cathryn Spracklin, manager of strategic planning and policy at LSS. “We are trying to be realistic about what we can achieve in terms of improving on that baseline, and set our targets accordingly.”

The report also included targets of just 35 and 52 per cent for lawyer and client satisfaction with respect to the level of support provided by LSS to assist clients in resolving related legal issues.

“People’s legal problems don’t occur in isolation,” says Spracklin. “They’re often co-related to issues with poverty, with mental health, [housing], all sorts of things.”

With current satisfaction rates either slightly below or equal to stated targets, achieving these objectives will produce only modest improvements in overall satisfaction, says Spracklin, noting that while funding of legal aid services in the province has declined substantially over recent decades, the number of low-income persons in need of such services has remained constant.

“You can be very poor and still get no assistance,” says Spracklin. “It’s a struggle to try and decide whether you provide a higher level of service to fewer clients, or greater access to service for a higher number.” 

Screen Shot 2016-03-26 at 8.03.14 AMSource: Legal Services Society BC, Legal Aid by the Numbers, 2013

Increased access to legal aid

Andrew Pilliar, a Vancouver lawyer and advocate for expanding access to legal aid, says surveys such as those conducted by the LSS are often flawed.

“You don’t get an adequate sample,” says Pilliar, “You get the people who are really pissed off or who are really happy.”

Pilliar also questions the wisdom of setting such low targets.

“I’m not convinced we’re being ambitious enough,” says Pilliar, who believes access to justice and legal aid services should be universal, noting that 45 per cent of all adult Canadians, or roughly 12 million people, have experienced some form of legal need in the past three years alone.

“Legal aid has become an afterthought for most people,” says Pilliar. “Something that they don’t think will apply to them because its only for poor people and criminals.”

But, as Pilliar explains, being charged with a crime is just one reason why someone might require a lawyer. Simple contract disputes – like those related to a lease or mortgage agreement – divorce, and child custody battles are amongst the most common reasons why Canadians seek legal advice – the vast majority of which is paid for out of pocket.

Still, Pilliar says less than 10 per cent of Canadians with legal issues seek the advice of a lawyer – opting instead to represent themselves or resolve their legal issues through alternative, and invariably inferior, means.

 

Ontario lawyers confront similar problems

While access quality legal aid services has improved significantly in Ontario during the past two decades, the province’s lawyers and clients still face many of the same challenges as those found in BC.

Mark Ertel, a long-time criminal defense lawyer and past president of the Defense Counsel Association of Ottawa, says the costs of running an office, combined with a low hourly rate of pay, make it difficult for lawyers in Ontario to accept legal aid cases.

“We essentially were doing charity work,” says Ertel. “Lawyers were working for $20 an hour, really, and we were getting our cars fixed by guys charging $60 an hour.”

“We’ve done this to these people,” says Ertel, frustrated with the lack of support for legal aid services. “They feel like a welfare case. They’re treated like a welfare case. And so long as they get any kind of representation at all they think it’s great.”

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INFORMATION ON DUCUMENTS

1) What is the information?

A: The documents describe specific performance measures from the most recent Annual Service Plan Report of the Legal Services Society of British Columbia.

2) From which department did these pages come?

A: The pages were prepared by the BC Ministry of Justice for use by the Attorney General in recommending new appointees to the LSS board of directors.

3) Why was this information helpful?

A: I used this information to a) develop a story idea, b) develop specific and targeted questions for interview subjects, and c) to develop a list of possible sources for the production of my story.

LSSBC Performance Measures

Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) Online Request

Informal Request for ATI Records Previously Released _ Open Government

Access-to-information-request

FOI Request – Billing Records

FOI Request – Office of the Premier

FOI Request – Jim Sutherland’s emails

FOI Request FNR-2016-61351 – brihill9@gmail

FOI Request_ Our File No. 2016-090 – ack – brihill9@gmail

FOI Request OOP-2016-61352

How much is that doggy in the window? Ottawa spends hundreds of thousands on animal complaints

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The city of Ottawa spent nearly $700,000 last year responding to animal complaints, according to an email response from Roger Chapman, the city’s chief bylaw officer.

In total, officers responded to 11,697 calls, or roughly 30 calls a day.

Complaints about barking dogs and those without a license make up the largest portion of the calls, 4,700, says Chapman, while unattended pets left in vehicles and wandering livestock – yes, wandering livestock – are amongst the least complained about items.

“Data indicates that each one of these animal calls costs, on average, $57 to complete,” says Chapman, noting that while the time and number of officers needed to respond to any one particular complaint varies greatly, bylaw officers are nonetheless required to respond to each and every call.

Still, last year’s numbers are significantly better than previous years.  In 2010, for example, the city received almost 14,000 animal complaints. At an average of $57 a piece, that’s a difference of nearly $140,000 a year when compared to last year’s figures.

“The reduction in calls,” says Chapman, “can be directly attributed to additional public awareness and community outreach work that our officers have provided.”

This includes installing fenced-in areas at local parks, putting up better and more clearly labeled signs so that dog owners know exactly where, and where not, to remove their animal’s leach, as well as the city’s Stoop and Scoop campaign, an effort to encourage dog owners to either pick up after their pets or face stiff fines.

The city has also worked closely with the Ottawa Humane Society and local veterinarian clinics to ensure that as many animals as possible are fitted with microchip implants so that lost pets can be quickly identified and returned to their owners.

“We’ve seen a steady decline in the number of dogs and cats brought in over the last few years,” says Sarah Oswald, a senor manager and admissions specialist at the Humane Society. “Of course, we’d like to see even less animals have to be brought in by bylaws services, but we’re happy with any improvement.”

For Oswald, the most important thing dog and cat owners can do to reduces the number of complaints received each year is to make sure their pets are either spayed or neutered.

“The more animals that are spayed and neutered, the less that will come in through our doors,” says Oswald. “Officers come in on a daily basis – it’s not that we don’t like to see them – but maybe we could see them less.”

Oswald also stresses the importance of having animals fitted with microchips.

“The sooner we can identify an animal, the sooner we can have it back to its home,” says Oswald. “That might mean one less night here, one less night of a family spent worrying, or one less night of a dog wondering, ‘Hey, why am I not going home?’”

Leach rules for dogs in Ottawa (p. 7)
The rules clearly indicate when a dog MUST be on a leach, and when it is accepted to remove an animal's leach.
View entire document on DocumentCloud

Problems persist

Kevin Smith, a graduate student at Carleton University, walks home through Brewer Park every night. Smith suffers from an acute fear of large dogs, and says that despite the city’s efforts to make improvements to signs and fences, enough has not yet been done to prevent dog owners from allowing their animals to run freely in undesignated areas.

“I’ve never called the city to complain about an animal, but I’ve thought about calling to complain about some of their signs,” says Smith. “They’re just not clear enough. There’s an arrow pointing this way, and an arrow pointing that way, it’s really not clear where they’re supposed to go.”

Disappearance of young boy still haunts parents and detectives 25 years on

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www.michaeldunahee.ca
www.michaeldunahee.ca

Police continue to hunt down new tips.

The name Michael Dunahee is etched in the mind of anyone who lived in Victoria at the time of his disappearance.

Twenty-five years ago this month, four-year-old Michael was abducted from a playground in the quiet Victoria neighbourhood of Esquimalt, while his mother, Crystal Dunahee, played touch football just yards away.

“It was an ordinary day. No different than any other,” says Crystal. “Michael asked if he could go to the park just beside, and I said yes.”

“I told him to wait for his dad, and not to go anywhere,” she says, adding that Michael knew not to speak with strangers.

The field where Crystal played football each weekend was less than 100 yards from the playground. According to Crystal, police believe Michael never made it that far.

“We think he was abducted in the parking lot,” she says, noting that the playground couldn’t have been more than 75 yards from where they parked their van.

Crystal and her Husband Bruce Dunahee say they’ll never forget the terror of searching for their son, or realizing his disappearance was more than just a child who walked away from a playground.

Yet, as difficult as it was, they realized then that they needed to remain strong, and allow police to conduct their investigation.

“We had another child at home, a daughter, that we needed to take care of,” says Crystal. “She needed us, and that was important.”

The investigation

Retired Insp. Det. Fred Mills of the Victoria Police Department was responsible for the initial investigation.

Still haunted by the case, Mills wonders if there’s anything he might have missed, anything he overlooked.

“It’s something you always ask yourself,” says Mills. “But you do the best you can with the knowledge you have, and eventually you need to move on.”

In addition to standard investigative practices, Mills deployed a team of officers to Quantico, Va to consult the FBI’s behavioral analysis unit – a first for Victoria police.

Disheartening as it was for Mills not find answers to Michael’s disappearance, he sees the passing of the investigation from one detective to the next as a positive development. He also recognizes the importance of keeping Michael’s story alive and in the public eye.

“You could have a breakthrough tomorrow,” says Mills. “Every time an anniversary comes up and it’s out there in the media they get more tips.”

Michael 1991Michael 2012
Michael in 1991, left. Age-enhanced depiction of what Michael might have looked like in 2012, right. www.michaeldunahee.ca

Still hunting

As with all unsolved cases involving missing children, Michael’s case remains an open investigation.

Const. Keith Lindner, now responsible for Michael’s file, says police continue to investigate new leads, and that he remains in close contact with Michael’s family.

He also stresses the significance of Michael’s disappearance to the community.

“You say the name Dunahee, and everyone knows,” says Lindner. “I’m in my 30th year and it’s hands down the most emotional file I’ve ever been involved in.”

Michael’s disappearance reverberates well beyond Victoria. News of his abduction was broadcast across North America on major news networks and on programs such as America’s Most Wanted.

“I’ve heard people describe it as a loss of innocence,” says Lindner. “And I’ve yet to come up with a better description than that.”

Today, investigators use social media, Amber alerts and age-enhanced photography to solve crimes. Though none of these tools existed at the time of Michael’s disappearance, they are now being used to spread awareness of Michael’s case in the hope that someone, somewhere, knows something.

“Unfortunately, we don’t know what happened to Michael,” says Lindner. “But what I can tell you is that we’re not going to give up.”

The CBC’s Jean Paetkau has produced an excellent radio documentary including the voices of Crystal Dunahee and retired Insp. Det. Fred Mills. To listen, click here.

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Screen Shot 2016-02-29 at 9.23.34 PMScreen Shot 2016-02-29 at 9.37.19 PM

World’s largest 3D print manufacturer pulls the plug on consumer printing

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Courtesy of 3D Printing Industry
Courtesy of 3D Printing Industry

If only they could print customers…

Amid rising costs and declining profits, 3D Systems has announced it will put an end to its once revered consumer printing division. Effective midnight tonight, the global leader in 3D-print technology will no longer operate its online hub providing customers with design ideas, do-it-yourself kits and other retail items. The company has also announced it will end production of its consumer-targeted, desktop printer – the Cube.

In a benign and perhaps overly optimistic statement released late last month, 3D System’s interim-CEO and chief legal officer Andrew Johnson, said the company intends to shift its focus away from consumer products, and toward a more business oriented strategy. “We believe that the most meaningful opportunities today are in professional and industrial settings, from the product design shop to the operating room to the factory floor.”



3D Systems Stock Price by bhill9 on TradingView.com

What Johnson’s pillowy-soft statement fails to mention, however, is that the company has continually struggled to attract new customers – to put it mildly – and will likely continue to do so far into the foreseeable future.

According to its most recent financial reports, 3D Systems recorded a stunning US$32.4 million loss in the third quarter of 2015. This compares to a US$3.1 million net profit in the third quarter of 2014, and a US$17.6 million net profit in the third quarter a year earlier. Overall, profits at 3D Systems are down by an astounding 285 per cent over the past two years; while the company’s operating costs have risen by an equally impressive one and a half times – or roughly US$20 million a month.

In technical terms, the company is losing money faster than a 3D-printer can print it!

(Joking: 3D-printers are slow. That’s part of the problem.)

Misjudging the marketplace

Innovation specialist and head of entrepreneurship at the University of Ottawa, Luc Lalonde, believes companies such as 3D Systems may have overestimated public appetite for a machine that essentially does very little for the average consumer.

“They were probably just hopeful,” said Lalonde. “That somehow this would be just like personal computers were back in the 1980s. Where people were willing to put down two, or three or even four thousand dollars for a really crappy personal computer.”

But 3D-printers are nothing like personal computers, added Lalonde.

Sure, if you’re an expert in 3D-design, or stay up nights learning to use AutoCAD (whatever that is) then 3D-printing might be for you. But for us average folk, the technology offers next to nothing in terms of practical applications; and at US$999, the Cube was simply too costly.

“I just look around my own friends, and there’s no desire,” said Lalonde. “Why would you get a 3D printer?”

And many people aren’t.

Before the decision was made to cut consumer printing, inventories of unsold products at 3D Systems had risen to an all-time high of US$73 million – nearly double what it had been two years earlier.

Enter Geordi Laforge

Although the technology involved in 3D-printing is by no means comparable to that of Star Trek – where one could literally reproduce anything they so desired – 3D-printing does possess a particular, fantasy-like, attractiveness.


Source: www.youtube.com

For scientists, manufacturers and medical researchers, this means possibilities never before imagined – like printing ultra-strong materials, designing 3D-legs for dogs, or producing a real, fully-functioning, human heart.

For others, like Michael McLaren, a student of mechanical engineering at Carleton University, 3D-printing is a learning opportunity. A chance to develop skills and knowledge for the twenty-first century.

Even if that means designing a 3D-printed bicycle that collapses underneath your own weight.