All posts by Philippe de Montigny

Quebec City loses $170,000 on the National Institute of Digital Entertainment

March 19, 2014Access-to-information storyPhilippe de Montigny

Quebec City lost $170,000 in its business venture with a short-lived video game school, according to documents released under the Access to Information Act.

In the fall of 2012, after only four years of existence, the National Institute of Digital Entertainment shut down because of “economic conditions and a lower market demand for labour in the video game industry,” according to briefing notes obtained under the Act.

Part of the city’s funding was meant for the school to develop a sustainable business model. Most of that money was spent, but no financial roadmap had been created to sustain the program.

Quebec City’s mayor Régis Labeaume supported the opening of the National Institute of Digital Entertainment in 2008, when he was newly elected mayor. (PHOTO: Antoine Letarte, CC BY 3.0)

“The self-financing strategy was certainly an issue due to the context where such a school was no longer required,” said Quebec City Mayor Régis Labeaume, who firmly supported the initiative.

“The ENDI was not planned as a short-term solution but the context made it so,” Labeaume added.

Known in French as l’École nationale en divertissement interactif—or ENDI—the Institute received municipal and provincial funding to train 500 students within five years. Only 250 interns completed the program before it closed prematurely.

In 2008, the school was born in response to the lack of skilled video game designers in the province. Five Quebec City-based video game companies—Beenox, Frima Studio, Humagade, Sarbakan and Ubisoft—had come together to flesh out the concept.

The school was meant to provide students with a 12-week practical internship in a realistic studio setting after their formal education. With mentors from the five founding partners, the training was tailored to the needs of the province’s booming industry.

Mathieu Tremblay became director of the National Institute of Digital Entertainment in January 2012, was involved in the decision to shut down the school. (PHOTO: Jocelyn Bernier, Le Soleil)

“The ENDI was a great concept, very useful for the local industry and renowned for the quality of its students, but the financial model was its greatest challenge,” said Mathieu Tremblay, who became director of the school during its last year.

The type of employees sought after by Quebec City’s video game studios changed, he explained. The employers affiliated with the school were looking to hire junior-level designers in the mid-to-late 2000s.

“The demand had evolved however,” Tremblay said. “Now, these studios have attained a certain maturity level and mainly need senior staff, which is not what we provided.”

Université Laval business professor Yan Cimon said that, as in any technology-related venture, long-term forecasting is challenging at best because of the fast-changing environment.

“In a nutshell, the city and its partners may have made all the right moves, but the market decided otherwise,” Cimon said.

The city spent nearly $1 million over two “phases” to support the school. In June 2008, the city first approved a $775,000 subsidy over three years to help kickstart the Institute, after which another $242,540 was granted for the self-financing strategy.

Records obtained under the Act say the city was able to recover $74,704 from the second contribution, which limits the loss to $167,836.

Some former students expressed concern over the way the school handled its money. Caroline Pellerin said not charging tuition to the first group of students enrolled was probably not a good idea for the financially struggling institution.

Also, despite its close ties with industry leaders, one of its major selling points, the Institute did not help Pellerin and many of her classmates become employed.

“It was a good experience but ENDI didn’t really help me get a job,” she said. “The partner companies only hired about half of the cohort.”

Pellerin opted to get a bachelor’s degree in animation, after which she was able to find work. Her classmate David Therrien, however, interned at Ubisoft after the program and now works there as a 3D artist. He says the training gave him an “edge” over applicants who did not go through the school.

But after looking at financial information from the city’s briefing notes and his class’s placement rate, Therrien said he thinks it might not be worth it “for that kind of money.”

Access to Information requests and documents obtained under the Act

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Garbage grumble: Rideau-Vanier ranks number one

March 9, 2014Database AssignmentPhilippe de Montigny

Most garbage-related complaints last year came from the Rideau-Vanier ward and residents still face major problems because of trash.

The city received 581 service request calls from this ward alone in 2013, two of which came from Zach Gruber, who says curbside garbage collection in Ottawa leaves a lot to be desired.

“Last Thanksgiving, no one picked up my trash,” he says.

Gruber called the city’s service hotline to report the problem and the operator gave him two options: to wait two weeks until the next pick-up or to bring it directly to a landfill. He chose to wait.

“So it just stayed there for three weeks. Cats tipped over the garbage can and tore through my bags to get turkey bones,” he says. “They left quite a mess.”

Gruber says that two weeks can be a long time to wait between pick-ups, especially when collectors leave some bags behind.

The area’s councillor, Mathieu Fleury, notes that his ward calls most frequently across the board for many other reasons besides garbage, such as graffiti, parking and property standards.

Mathieu Fleury, councillor for Rideau-Vanier, encourages his constituents to keep reporting issues in the neighbourhood. Photo courtesy of Mathieu Fleury.

“People need to keep reporting these issues,” he insists. “I want to work closely to improve the quality of life in our community for both visitors and residents.”

Rideau-Vanier also gets a lot more visitors, Fleury says, which might factor in the high number of garbage complaints.

Most of the 8,753 garbage service calls recorded in 2013 are from missed pick-ups, according to a 311 operator in Ottawa. Other calls include complaints about how trash “looks bad, smells bad or attracts pests,” she says.

Requests to obtain city-subsidized garbage, recycling and compost bins as well as waste collection calendars are categorized separately. These requests alone account for 24,550 calls.

When counting all waste-related service calls—including recycling, organics, yard waste and Christmas tree pick-ups—the number rises to 56,060, which represents more than 29 per cent of Ottawa’s 311 calls recorded in 2013.

Every time someone calls the service hotline, their request or complaint is documented by type and by ward. The compiled information is made accessible the following year on Ottawa’s open data website, which currently includes years 2010 to 2013.

Kelsey Johnson used to live in the Capital ward, which registered 434 trash-related calls. Garbage at her former Old Ottawa South residence also attracted wildlife—a massive, vicious raccoon, she says.

Garbage left out too early before a scheduled pick-up can attract unwanted pests. Photo by Philippe de Montigny.

“Once he started tearing apart all the bags and making a mess, it didn’t look very nice, it smelled and it was attracting wasps,” Johnson says.

She is not surprised to see the Capital ward listed among the top five with the most 311 calls about garbage. The recent Carleton University graduate describes her former neighbourhood as a “student ghetto.”

Just like in the other four wards, there are more rental properties with students and lower-income individuals. Johnson suspects tenants might care less about the property’s appearance than if they owned it.

“You have a lot of students who are either too lazy to check the schedule and you also might have a few more parties, so you’re creating more waste,” she says.

Ripped-up garbage bags are a common sight in this Old Ottawa South alleyway. Photo by Philippe de Montigny.

The city’s waste management could better plan biweekly collection, Johnson says, especially at peak times like Labour Day weekend.

“They always seem to pick up plastic on big moving weekends when everybody’s got cardboard,” she says.

Johnson also thinks pest problems could be avoided if people bagged their trash properly and took it out only when necessary. The collection schedule can even be downloaded on a smartphone, she adds.

“It’s not rocket science.”

Kelsey Johnson recounts her encounter with a raccoon that visited the garbage cans at her former Old Ottawa South residence. Video by Philippe de Montigny.

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Edmonton mural sparks dialogue on residential schools

February 26, 2014Assignment 2, Whatever-Happened-To? AssignmentPhilippe de Montigny

A new project will help expose hidden stories about Alberta’s colonial history in March, after a three-year dispute over a mural in an Edmonton subway station.

A new project will complement the Grandin LRT station mural (left) in March. (Photo courtesy of Colin Keigher, under a Creative Commons license)

The 25-year-old mural is in the Grandin LRT station and depicts the legacy of the French-Canadian pioneer after which the station was named. Bishop Vital Grandin was instrumental in building Alberta, but he was also infamous for running the province’s residential schools.

Spearheaded by the Edmonton Arts Council and the city’s Aboriginal Relations Office, the soon-to-be-unveiled art project is still very much “on the hush,” according to Sylvie Nadeau, 61, the creator of the original mural and a proud Franco-Albertan.

Nadeau revealed she was involved on the new project but could not disclose its exact form or its expected location within the LRT station. She said however it would not be replacing her old work.

“I had created it with love, I had no idea,” the artist said about her first piece, adding that she was unaware of residential schools and their treatment of First Nations back when she completed her painting in 1989.

“It doesn’t change what happened but you can create something powerful with another perspective,” she said.

According to Nadeau, the leftmost panels of the original artwork were the “controversial ones” that drove some Edmontonians to react.

Artist Sylvie Nadeau poses with her work in October 1989, which was officially unveiled one year later. (Photo courtesy of Sylvie Nadeau)

Amidst the hues of blue, green, black and brown, a Caucasian woman with a crucifix around her neck is holding a Métis toddler. In the background, there is a small gathering of faceless aboriginal people and, further behind them, a four-story building with many windows that resembles a residential school.

For some passing through the high-traffic LRT station, the mural might only be part of the décor but, for others, it still triggers unbearable memories.

In February 2011, an article published in the Edmonton Journal brought survivors of the notorious schools to speak out, the artist said. The criticisms of Nadeau’s work spread like wildfire—to the point that aboriginal and francophone community leaders were compelled to sit together and find a solution.

“Nobody talked about that mural for almost 25 years. And then, it stirred up so much controversy,” said Nadeau, who was willing to have the panel with the woman and child taken down.

But the city has rules against taking down—or even altering—public art, she said. The project’s committee was left with a daunting task: to complement the perspective in the original mural with a new set of ideas, giving aboriginal people agency in expressing their version of history.

For University of Alberta professor Roger Parent, an expert in semiotics who looks at how culture is represented through signs and symbols, the project will allow long buried narratives to resurface.

“We can see how now the varnish is starting to crack,” he said. “I think it’s bringing to light the wider issue of the representation of First Nations and their history in white mainstream society.”

Parent explained that, what the artist saw as an act to protect Métis children “disowned” by First Nations, the latter interpret as a benevolent portrayal of residential schools. The meaning of an art piece, he said, is mostly constructed in the heads of those watching.

“You’re dealing with an extremely significant cultural space and, at the same time, that painting has evoked so many different stories that have never been fully told, that have never been fully understood,” he said.

By the end of March, Nadeau said, passengers can expect to see some of these different stories as they ride through Grandin station.

“It’s not just about two ethnic groups,” the artist said.

“We’re all in this together.”

This Neighbors article, dating from October 1989, provides context for the creation of the mural for the Grandin LRT station.

DOCUMENTATION

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TransCanada shares drop in 2012, CEO still makes more

January 31, 2014Business AssignmentPhilippe de Montigny

By Philippe de Montigny

TransCanada Corp., an energy infrastructure company, saw a 14 per cent dip in profits in 2012 while its top leader got a lofty raise.

The company’s net income dropped by $238 million during the last fiscal year. While TransCanada stocks lost value for shareholders, president and chief executive officer Russ Girling took home an annual paycheque of $8.7 million, a 26 per cent increase over his 2011 compensation.

TransCanada Income 2010-2012 | Create Infographics

Carleton University professor André Plourde, an expert in energy economics, said the decline is largely due to delays in restarting Bruce A, a nuclear power plant in Ontario in which TransCanada invested.

“They lost $149 million on Bruce A alone in 2012,” Plourde said. “I would expect that this was an unusual situation.”

Also unusual is the CEO’s salary hike during that lower-income year.

“It may be a complete happenstance,” Plourde said. “There’s no doubt that performance will matter in terms of what the salary of the CEO is.”

While the year’s financial targets were not met, a TransCanada circular reports that Girling “secured significant projects that support future growth.” Executives’ compensation breaks into a base salary as well as short-term and long-term monetary incentives. These incentives usually consist of company stocks and options.

This management information circular released on Feb. 27, 2013 clarifies the compensation structure for TransCanada executives including CEO Russ Girling.

The increase in long-term compensation for these growth-generating projects outweighed the decline in short-term compensation for the poor performance in 2012.

Revamping Bruce A, for instance, was an investment for long-term growth that cut into the year’s profitability.

Parts of the power plant were offline for maintenance throughout the fiscal year, so less power could be generated for revenue and the company paid out to fix its facility, according to the 2012 annual report.

Plourde said the company expected the nuclear power plant to resume its operations in late November 2012, but another shutdown had to be sustained.

The planned outage of another power plant—the coal-fired Sundance A west of Edmonton—also pulled down the company’s income, he explained.

Natural gas a finicky business

Low energy prices also slashed TransCanada’s revenues from its natural gas pipelines in 2012.

The company is responsible for nearly 11,800 megawatts of electricity, which is enough to power close to 12 million of homes. More than a third of this energy is from natural gas, the fuel source also responsible for powering massive oil sands operations.

Market conditions however have made it more difficult for TransCanada and other companies producing and distributing natural gas to get the biggest bang for their buck.

“The $1.89 per share we earned in 2012 was impacted by cyclically low gas and power prices,” CEO Russ Girling wrote in the annual report. He also outlined the decreases in the volumes of gas pushed through the pipelines.

Expert André Plourde questions TransCanada’s future in the natural gas business.

“Natural gas production in Western Canada is falling,” he said. “You fix infrastructure to keep it safe and now you’re not filling it at capacity.”

He said that TransCanada kept a good track record in terms of safety, but maintaining age-old pipelines is costly. With more frequent spills and occasional explosions, increasing regulatory pressures are bound to choke profitability, he predicts.

Though it lies outside the 2012 fiscal year, incidents like the recent explosion in southern Manitoba are drawing attention to the “old pipes,” as Plourde puts it.

“It’s coming at a bad time in the sense that TransCanada has to reevaluate its business model,” he said.

The natural gas challenges faced in 2012 could resurface in future fiscal years, he said, but TransCanada hopes that expanding oil infrastructure—namely with the Keystone XL project on the line—will generate long-term income growth.

More public scrutiny on gas pipelines usually means tighter regulation, Plourde said. And tighter regulation increases costs, eating into the company’s profits.

“They’re going to have trouble with natural gas.”

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