Carnegie Renovations

Carnegie Centre has been undergoing extensive renovations over the past few months. I snapped this photo of workmen in the gym last week to test the quality of my new cell phone camera. Cell phone cameras have difficulty getting enough light so photos are often of poor quality.

$10,000 from Edgewater Casino to be given to Vision/COPE Friends Hosting an Under-the-Table Gambling Operation for Chinese Men at Carnegie Centre

The City of Vancouver took $10,000 from a licensed gambling operation and now plans to give it to their political allies hosting an unlicensed gambling operation.

On Feb. 17, City staff recommended that $10,000 from the "social responsibility" fund, money collected from the Edgewater Casino, be given to Carnegie Centre. It is not news to City staff and management that Carnegie has for years been the site of a gambling operation catering to Chinese men.

"The Chinese guys who sit on the first floor and in the basement playing cards and board games, are they ALL gambling?", a Carnegie member asked a Chinese elder who hangs out with the gamblers. The elder nodded, "All of them. They are all on welfare and they are all gambling."

The elder was asked what they called the board game they play for hours in the basement, the one where they move around pieces that look like white hockey pucks. "That's Chinese chess", he said, explaining that the gamblers sitting on the first floor at Carnegie are playing poker and those sitting in the basement are playing Chinese chess.

Don't get me wrong, this elder wasn't ratting out his pals. He had been listening to a group of us talking about the City of Vancouver's planned expansion of the Edgewater Casino -- "bad idea", he said -- when the topic turned to the fact that the City has been hosting a gambling operation for years at Carnegie. It was obvious to the Chinese elder that we were aware of the gambling at Carnegie 365 days a year, but that our knowledge needed fine-tuning.

This Chinese elder has no interest in the 'poverty services' at Carnegie such as the cafeteria -- "I can cook cheaper at home" -- or the Learning Centre, and is drawn to the Centre solely by the social life surrounding the gambling.

Some of the gamblers at Carnegie are addicted, namely those on Disability welfare, the highest level of welfare which gives them $800 a month. They qualify for Disability, the elder said, because they have "problems", mostly mental health issues. They gamble at both Carnegie and the Edgewater Casino. They make their bigger bets at the Edgewater and their small bets at Carnegie.

The elder says that although there can be $5 or $10 bets at the gambling tables at Carnegie, most of the bets made there are under $5. And because the gamblers are fairly evenly matched, they each win a few games and lose a few, and by the end of an evening of gambling, they may owe as little as $2, or they may have broken even.

Gamblers at Carnegie don't pay after each game, but keep track of what's owed on a small piece of paper on the table. After hours of gambling, money is passed under the table.

These gamblers, according to another Chinese elder, live "miserable" lives, partially as a result of becoming indebted to a loan shark. When they borrow from the loan shark, "they have to pay back double."

Carnegie used to provide in-house loan shark services, under former director Michael Clague. (Clague, who told a member that he had come to Carnegie to top up his pension, was awarded the Order of Canada for his work there and has now loaned his name to the 'Vancouver Not Vegas' campaign to stop the expansion of the Edgewater Casino.) W. Myles, an SFU graduate and volunteer tutor at the Carnegie Learning Centre, repeatedly complained to Clague, both verbally and in writing, that a security guard, Paul H., a City employee and CUPE member, was loan sharking. One of her students, Danny, was seriously in debt to this loan shark. She was frustrated by Clague's apparent disinterest in her complaint. Several bloggers, including myself, knew Danny too; he was a heavy smoker who was definitely relying on loan shark services to keep himself in tobacco. At the end of each month he would owe most of his welfare cheque to the loan shark before he had even cashed it.

"How come security guards like Ted Chaing who speak Chinese don't anything [about the gambling]?", a Chinese elder was asked. Chaing afterall spends hours standing at his security post at the front lobby reception desk -- where the loan shark used to stand -- just a few feet from the gambling tables, and he speaks Chinese. The elder said security doesn't catch them because people are gambling for about six hours, but spending only one minute exchanging money. "Compare six hours to one minute", he said.

An elder pointed out too that even if security sees one patron handing $5 to another, the patron can simply say that he had borrowed that money and was paying it back. Even if security thinks it's a gambling payment, "They can't prove it."

Since when though did Carnegie security need proof? They regularly bar people without proof, without due process. There are records of people being barred for months or years without proof. A person can even be barred if they anger the wrong people by getting elected to the Board of Directors. This blog has been devoted to covering this epidemic of baseless barrings.

The gambling operation at Carnegie contradicts the City's public relations spiel about eliminating activities in the Centre that could tempt people who "struggle" with addictions. There are Caucasian people at Carnegie who struggle with gambling addictions. A guy who wears a Jed Clampet style, old floppy hat, and and smokes on the patio just metres away from the gambling tables, used to regularly lose his entire welfare cheque in one night at the Edgewater.

The Carnegie pr spiel includes a claim about how they attempt to make the building a comfortable environment for women and children. Staff and management did nothing to make a three year old boy feel comfortable when his father was fixated on the gambling in the basement. Every evening for at least a year, the father would bring the boy, who spoke only Chinese, to the Carnegie basement where he would stand idle for at least four hours, maybe as many as six, waiting for the gambling to end. The guards would go down to the basement at 10 p.m. and close the gambling down; (they allow the poker on the first floor to go until 11 p.m.) On two occasions, I saw women who used the Centre, not staff, briefly occupying the boy with picture books. The boy was well dressed and fed, just idle, sometimes peering through the window of the Seniors' Lounge looking at the large television screen. (He wasn't allowed inside because he wasn't forty.) A middle-aged Chinese woman who frequents the Centre -- the only Chinese woman who I would say hangs out there -- eventually asked the boy in Chinese where his mother was. He said she had died.

Emotional abandonment of children is a routine part of a gambling addiction. I saw a documentary about gambling in Los Vegas, where they highlighted this type of neglect. They showed children wandering around the lobby of a casino waiting for hours for their parents. They reported that a newborn infant had been left for 12 hours in a casino childcare centre while the parents lost themselves in gambling. At least a childcare centre is organized to provide stimulation, for older children anyway, unlike Carnegie which does nothing to offset the effects of the gambling. Maybe the $10,000 social responsibility grant could be used to address that "community services" gap.

That boy may still be playing the waiting game at Carnegie every night. I don't know. Since Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty ordered the much-in-demand public computers removed from the basement, most of the people I would go down there to chat with stopped showing up, so I did too. More privacy for the gamblers.

The fact that Carnegie hosts a gambling operation is not a big problem for most people who go to Carnegie, including myself. But the City's priorities do irk some computer users. City management at Carnegie takes the position that they really don't have much room for public access computers, a service people line up for at Carnegie. Their Computer Room is tiny, tucked at the back of the third floor next to the washrooms, so close in fact that computer-users can hear people farting and peeing in the men's washroom. The room has no windows to the outside world and is so narrow that you cannot walk past computer-users without bumping their chairs, which causes friction between people. Yet one of the most spacious and pleasant areas in the Centre, with a row of tall, old windows, is the first floor sitting room where the gambling operation has run unchecked for years. It's right under the noses of security and just a few yards from the office of security boss, Skip Everall.

Why does the City of Vancouver continue to play host to a gaming operation? Because they're playing the diversity game. There's a lot of money riding on it. Part of Carnegie's funding schtick is that they encourage cultural diversity and harmony. They have hustled grants for such programs as native "cultural sharing" in the theater once a week, where the program's native leader's idea of cultural sharing was banging his white co-leader.

The value of a congregation of Chinese faces immediately visible to anybody walking in the front door of Carnegie, can't be underestimated. Politicians with media in tow come to look around. (Former Premier Glen Clarke, who incidentally faced resistance over his plan for slot machines, toured Carnegie.) When funders see the swarm of Chinese faces sitting at the tables, they're thinking, 'multicultural paradise'. Carnegie members are thinking, 'Edgewater Light'.

For 57 Days City Hall has Avoided Giving Barred Carnegie Member Reason "in writing"

A witness who has spoken up about the use of the City of Vancouver "security" database at Carnegie to make fraudulent entries about critics, has found herself barred from Carnegie Centre for 57 days now, with no end in sight. She is not allowed to enter the building, not even the Vancouver Public Library branch there. She was notified of the barring on April 25, 2010 and immediately asked to be given the reason "in writing". Her request was instantly refused by the security guard who informed her that she was "barred", a guard who identified himself as "Ty" only after she asked his name.

There is evidence that the ban was pre-meditated and politically-motivated. From the beginning of the process of being informed that she was barred, the fact that she had been one of the Carnegie members who made complaints to Penny Ballem was referred to by Ty as the "problem." [If I obtain a copy of the statement she submitted to police, I will quote Ty's alleged comments more completely.] A few minutes later, when Ballem's name came up again, Ty reportedly claimed he didn't know who she was. Toward the end of the barring, after he had followed the woman to the bathroom, Ty revealed that the barring was a result of pressure from Penny Ballem and Gregor Robertson to clear her out of the building. "I guess, they don't want witnesses around", says the barred woman.

Police have been made aware of everything from verbal abuse to assault experienced by this woman since coming forward as a witness to fraud and other abuses involving the City's "security" database at Carnegie. A male Carnegie member recalls eating dinner with this woman at Carnegie in the spring, when a volunteer took her photograph, using a flash, without her permission -- she would later be told that the photo had been taken on instructions from Tio, a City staff cashier on duty, a fact she says Tio did not deny when she asked him about it -- and then stood yelling insults at her at the top of his lungs, grabbing the attention of the crowd of diners in the cafeteria. "Why isn't security doing anything!" the witness demanded to know. A security guard stood beside the yelling man, just inches away.

She was also at Carnegie having dinner -- she had just finished -- on the evening in April when Ty told her she was now barred from the entire building and refused her request to "put it in writing". At a later point, she asked that he at least allow her to read the "Incident Report" so that she could counter false statements. He refused. He told her that he did not need input from her. She told him she wished to sit down and write her own incident report about what she was experiencing, but he refused, ordering her out of the building. Such biased practices -- including outright fraud -- had been previously brought to the attention of Penny Ballem, once during a meeting in January at City Hall. The Mayor was also made aware of these practices.

Shortly after being barred, the barred woman mailed a request to City Hall and requested, under the Freedom of Information & Protection of Privacy Act, a copy of the incident report and a copy of entries made in the City's electronic "security" database. She then telephoned the Freedom of Information office twice to see if they had received it. She spoke to a male assistant to manager Paul Hancock. The assistant told her on April 29th that he had finally received her letter. She explained that she needed a copy of the incident report quickly so that she could appeal the barring; she asked him to keep in mind that for every day that passed without this Incident Report, she was denied access to City Services in her neighbourhood, such as the public library at Carnegie. She told him that there should be no reason for extensive delay in getting the incident report to her, as it was easily retrievable from the Incident Report binder which sits on the front reception desk at Carnegie for all staff to review. The assistant reviewed her request letter and said it seemed straight forward to him and he didn't anticipate it taking long. He said he would "send it out" that day.

Shortly after speaking to the assistant, the banned woman received a letter dated April 30th from Paul Hancock, Manager, Corporate Information & Privacy, City Clerk's Office. Hancock wrote:

"This will acknowledge receipt of your request dated April 26, 2010. . . for a copy of an incident report written about you by Ty, a security person at Carnegie Centre at approximately 9:00 p.m. on Sunday, April 25, 2010."

"Under the Act, we have thirty (30) business days to respond to freedom of information requests. The City received your request on April 29, 2010 so we are required to respond by June 11. 2010 at the latest."

I ran into her on Sunday, June 20th, at Sunrise market and she said she had not received it. Even if the City had mailed the Incident Report on the last possible day, June 11th, she would have had it last week as Vancouver has over night delivery.

Hancock ended his April 30th letter to her with,

"We understand that this is an urgent matter for you so we will do our best to expedite this request for you."

That was 52 days ago, as of Sunday.

Vancouver Library Eliminates Public Computers for Seniors at Carnegie

A million dollars worth of City management staff put their heads together and decided that the popular public computers in the Carnegie Seniors Lounge that had been going full tilt 13 hours a day, 7 days a week, for the past 15 years, were best eliminated.

Those computers were one of the most in-demand services in the Centre. People would sign up and sit and wait for half an hour or more for their turn. Ever notice the crowd on the front steps of Carnegie in the morning when you drive by on your way to work? They're not all buying drugs; some are waiting for a security guard to swing the doors open at 9 a.m., so they can rush past him and dash downstairs to the basement Seniors Lounge and get onto a computer, ahead of the next guy. People use those computers to check email and to look for jobs on sites such as Craig's list.

But those computers had become a source of embarrassment to the million dollars worth of City Hall and Carnegie management staff, from Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty to City Manager Penny Ballem, who have been exposed for allowing security to block access to them as punishment for free speech. This harassment of people who speak up has been previously documented on this blog so I won't go over it again. But the VPL librarian, Beth Davies, and her supervisors in the VPL administration have colluded with this withholding of library services -- often it involves blocking access to the entire VPL branch at Carnegie for months or years -- and this removal of VPL computers looks like an extension of that collusion.

Now that the internet-surfing poor will have little reason to show up at the Lounge, the poor who operate more within the comfort zone of CUPE and City management will have the lounge to themselves. You can find them sitting in there any afternoon staring at the big tv, filling in the gaps between welfare cheques and staff pay cheques. Movies made available in this City government Lounge generally fall into the range of cowboys, gangsters, and that new federal government category, "busty hookers."

Now that VPL computer access in the Lounge has been eliminated in favor of allowing big screen TV access to predominate, it's important that the savings be passed on to taxpayers. The computers and the steady stream of people who came to the Centre to use them were under the supervision of Seniors Co-ordinator, Marlene Trick (formerly exposed for supervising the City's now defunct "Teddy Bear Picnics" for full grown functional adults.)

The computer program in the Seniors Lounge was also a rich source of make-work projects for Security guards who would be called to infantalize computer users who stood up to the belligerant coffee-seller, a ritual which involved security guards writing "incident reports" and executing barrings as punishments, and holding follow-up meetings. All of this will be gone now, meaning that less labour hours will be needed for the co-ordinator to co-ordinate and security guards to punish.

The cramped computer room by the bathroom at the back of the third floor at Carnegie remains open. In fact the computers in there have been replaced with new ones. But Seniors have to compete with other age groups to get onto a computer there, increasing the number of people on the waiting list. People sitting in the waiting area for their name be called to get onto a computer can sometimes get frustrated and ask the monitor questions like, "How much longer do you think I'll have to wait?," and some monitors -- not all -- get annoyed at the ongoing pressure and if a disagreement ensues, security may be called.

This tension can be expected to increase with the elimination of Seniors' computers by the million dollar management, which of course includes CUPE's Dan Tetrault who is Assistant Manager at Carnegie and, like BP CEO Tony Hayward, has a yacht which can be helpful for clearing the head of the problems of the "small people".

Better Dead than in the Red

Last week, a longtime Carnegie Centre volunteer was eating a meal at the Carnegie cafeteria and began to choke on his food. The volunteer, who is paralyzed on one side, made his way to the counter where staff sell food, and collapsed.

A young metrosexual with long blond hair who operates the cash register, always with an undercurrent of resentment, acted quickly. He left his cash register and performed the Heimlich manoveur, putting his arms around the choking man and thrusting his rib cage upwards, twice. Then he went back to working the cash registrar. He didn't miss beat: the cash, the Heimlich manoveur, the cash. But the choking man wasn't improving, so a volunteer working alongside the cashier dishing up food, a huskier, physically stronger man, performed the Heimlich manoveur one more time, more forcefully. The food in the choking man's throat came gushing out onto the floor.

Life saved.

Roughly five minutes after the choking began, Skip Everall, head of Carnegie Security strides into the cafeteria, putting on his rubber gloves. Everall reprimanded the volunteer and the metrosexual multi-tasker. “You shouldn't have done that,” he scolded. “You're not qualified to do that.” Not qualified? To get hired at a City Community Centre cafeteria, an applicant has to have Basic First Aid.

“They don't want to get sued”, said a witness.

Carnegie Holding 30th Anniversary Celebrations

This week, Carnegie Centre is holding 30th anniversary celebrations all week.

The primary celebration will be this Wednesday. They're holding it on welfare cheque day, a day when the fewest possible poor people will show up.

Carnegie "Kangaroo" Election

Most Carnegie members didn't know their was an election last evening. And that was no accident.

The notice on the bulletin board was small enough that members could be counted on to miss it. "I had to take off my glasses and put my face right up to it to read it", said one member. He said the notice announced, "CCA AGM", letters that wouldn't catch the attention of most members. The election wasn't mentioned until the end of the notice, in fine print. I recall seeing this small notice myself but it was so small, I didn't stop to read it.

They should have announced the election in large print, said one member. "They hang banners over the steps out front all the time" when they want the poor to turn out for their povertarian projects and marches, but when there is an election, they produce only a teeny weeny poster.

Members of the Carnegie establishment such as paid anti-poverty activist Jean Swanson have worked to disenfranchise the poor ever since the poor's choice of Board members -- William Simpson, Rachel Davis -- didn't match their own. They stack elections with their friends and political allies. One member described last evening's election and the prior well-attended nomination meeting this way. "A bunch of strangers showed up, and they voted in their yes-people." He said the result is that longtime members who use Carnegie on an almost daily basis are finding decisions made by people they barely recognize, and at times don't recognize.

Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty, the City's representative at the meeting, left early, saying she was "busy". Very little Whitty says is believed by members, many of whom are aware of her well-documented record of lying. "Maybe she didn't want to be put on the spot and have to answer any questions," said one man. A woman said she saw Whitty leaving the building after the meeting in the theater had ended, supporting skeptics' view that she hadn't or shouldn't have been too busy to sit through the Carnegie AGM.

One member later sitting at a patio table at Waves coffee shop in the warm evening breeze, summed up the Carnegie election this way. "They pulled a fast one on us again".

Fire Whitty

Ethel Whitty is not delivering.  

This afternoon the poor were locked out of the City-funded computer room at Carnegie ...yet again. The door to the room was locked and the lights were out, as Whitty sat just a few metres away in her office.  Two low income people have confirmed that they were denied this "service" today. The funding for the computer room is simply not consistently reaching the poor.

As residential taxes are about to be hiked as much as 11% and City Manager Penny Ballem must create more efficient service delivery, it's time to fire Whitty.  

Giving the White Man Black Lung

There was a native smudge today in the Carnegie theater. Something was being burned, sage or sweet grass or something, but ventilation had clearly not been taken into consideration in the planning.

The 'cultural sharing' programme is run by a white woman, Diane, and a native man, at least the last time I looked.

When I dropped into the building at 11:50 a.m., the air was filled with smoke. I thought the smoke would just be on the first floor where the theater is located. But as I walked up the stairs, I couldn't breathe normally; it was like I couldn't get enough oxygen. I was trying to decide whether I should go back downstairs or keep going up. I got to the back of the third floor where the air was better, probably because the computer room nearby has it's own ventilation system. My lungs are normal, but there are occasionally people in Carnegie who are on ventilators or have health problems.

But you can't say anything about not being able to breathe because political correctness is as thick as smoke in the air. You're supposed to be grateful that you're even allowed into Carnegie as it is on "Coast Salish land". At the All Candidates meeting held at Carnegie prior to the civic election this month, an organizer from the Downtown Eastside Neighborhood House thanked the Coast Salish people as this even was taking place on their land. And candidate Andrea Reimer piped up to say she was glad that fact was acknowledged.

A further note on cultural sharing: natives who have made their way into the establishment at Carnegie, like Stephen Lytton and Marlene Trick George, are 'thick as thieves' with the white people operating it as a site where the poor are routinely denigrated and denied basic civil liberties. Some of the worst abuses have taken place in the Seniors Center where the supervisor is native activist and Carnegie staff person Marlene George. Stephen Lytton is a Carnegie Board member and after listening to public concerns about an elected Board member being blocked from entering the building for Board meetings, he suggested they allow "the man" back in. Other Board members ignored Lytton and he has never spoken out again on the issue.

Audrey Laferierre Watches Michael Geller Do a Back Flip

Photo: All Candidates meeting at Carnegie (left to right) Audrey Laferriere, R.H. Maxwell N Bur, Raj Hundal, Andrea Reimer, Michael Geller, Leanore Copeland

Creating shelters for Vancouver’s homeless population until permanent housing is built was a central theme of Monday’s All Candidates meeting at Carnegie Center in Vancouver’s low income Downtown Eastside neighborhood.

Getting Storyeum, a Gastown business that went belly up, turned into a shelter for the homeless is the prime reason Audrey Laferriere decided to run for Vancouver City Council as an Independent.

Wilf Reimer from the audience said he had decided to support Laferriere after emailing both mayoral candidates, Peter Lader and Gregor Robertson, to ask “why they didn’t support a shelter system” for the homeless while they work on permanent housing. “Audrey was the only one who seemed to have some sort of a germ of a concrete plan with Storyeum.”

Michael Geller of the NPA said he had opposed the shelter system because not only the Housing Department but people in the community had told him that what they wanted was permanent housing, not shelters. At this point Laferrierre shouted something at him that I didn’t catch and he responded in a placating tone, “Audrey, I was just about to say, ‘You’ve convinced me’.” He continued, ”She did convince me we should be looking at Storyeum as a shelter.” Geller cautioned Audrey not to be too quick to assume he was her enemy, that she just might find he could work with her as an “ally”.

But Lafrrierre’s real ally may prove to be Independent mayoral candidate, RH. Maxwell N Bur, who announced loudly, “If I’m sworn in as Mayor of Vancouver, you get the keys to Storyeum!”

Photo: (from left to right) Audrey Laferriere, RH. Maxwell N Bur, Raj Hundal, Andrea Reimer, Michael Geller, Leanore Copeland

Andrea Reimer of Vision said she also supported shelters as an interim solution, that her “first and highest priority is getting people off the streets.” She said more than once during the meeting that there isn’t “a” solution to most problems but multiple solutions.

Wilf Reimer — apparently no relation to Andrea – expressed amazement to the audience that neither the Vision or NPA mayoral candidate had shown up for this meeting. When he heard them debate at the Vancouver Public Library, ”Both said homelessness was “their #1 issue”, but they’re not here where homelessness is such a big issue.”

Puppet Board Members Not Showing Up for Meetings

Remember the puppet Board that Jean Swanson and Paul Taylor installed at Carnegie in June, as a strategy for ensuring that pro-democracy incumbent Rachel Davis would not get elected? At the Sept. 4th Board meeting at Carnegie, President Matthew Matthew announced that this new Board couldn’t get things done because too few of them were showing up at Committee meetings to get a quorum. The front page of both the August and September Board meeting hand-outs shows just how lax the new Board is:

September Board Meeting

Program Committee Report – No Report

Community Relations Report – No Report

Oppenheimer Park Committee Report – No Report

Seniors’ Support Group Report – No Report

Volunteer Committee Report – No Report

Education/Library Committee Report – No Report

Publications Committee Report – No Report

Finance Committee Report – No Report

Just two Committee Reports were available to members at the September Board meeting: the Program Committee Report, and Community Relations Committee Report.

August Board meeting

Program Committee Report – No Report

Community Relations Committee Report – No Report

Oppenheimer Park Committee Report – No Report

Seniors’ Support Group Report – No Report

Volunteer Committee Report – No Report

Education/Library Committee Report – No Report

Publications Committee Report – No Report

At the August Board meeting, only the Finance Committee had a report for members .

Not only Committee meetings but the monthly Board meetings have not proven to be magnets for the puppet Board. One onlooker reported that “quite a few of them” were no shows at the September 4th meeting.

At the September Board meeting, President Matthew asked for feedback on what to do about too few Board members showing up for committee meetings. He was described as "patient" by a witness. There was some discussion, with Board member Stephen Lytton stating that Board members had an obligation to the membership to make an effort to show up at committee meetings.

At one point during the discussion, the contentious issue of Roberts Rules surfaced. Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty noted that Matthew Matthew, in his role as Chair, was allowed to vote at meetings when a tie vote needed to be broken. As she spoke, Matthew Matthew offered to check a point in Roberts Rules. He put his hand on his copy of Roberts Rules and was about to open it when Whitty interjected, “No. No.” That elicited laughter from Board and audience members.

The laughter stemmed from the fact that it was well known that when Rachel Davis was on the Board, she wanted Roberts Rules followed. Wilf Reimer and other members also insisted that Roberts Rules be followed so that people could speak at meetings without being cut off. Jeff Sommers, a Board member at the time, did not agree. “Do you need a rule to piss?”, Sommers asked at two separate meetings. Finally, after a meeting in which Paul Taylor responded to a question by Rachel Davis with "Shut Up!" and to Wilf Reimer with, "Up your ass!", the City of Vancouver sent three copies of Roberts Rules to Carnegie. You can bet that Whitty, who is the City’s representative on the Board, has not mentioned to her bosses at the City that she is discouraging the Chair from opening that book.

Now that there aren't quorums at committee meetings, it seems that the committee process is simply being skipped. Despite the fact that there was “No Report” from the Volunteer Committee for August and September, a major decision to prohibit tipping of kitchen volunteers has been made. On Sept. 5th, I noticed a sign on the cash register in the cafeteria stating something to the effect, “Tipping of concession workers is prohibited. Management” The tip jar had been removed. “That’s why there’s no volunteer today,” a staff person said, referring to the fact that the cashier was working alone with no helper to dish up food and keep the line-up of hungry customers moving fast. The kitchen volunteers are dirt poor, usually getting welfare, and count on tips. But Whitty, who gets $104,000 salary -- and presumably she was included in the huge raise City managers got a few months back -- has stated openly to members that she does not believe volunteers should get tips.

The failure to get quorums at meetings is no doubt working out nicely for Whitty. She likes meetings to be short. At an important election recount meeting this summer, despite members being clearly upset, Whitty sneaked out early. She just disappeared. Poof!! Like 'I Dream of Jeannie'. Members also recall a Community Relations meeting last year when Whitty had to answer for the undemocratic barring of elected Board member William Simpson from Board meetings. Whitty was upset that she had been inconvenienced. "I can't do" long meetings, she insisted twice.

Rachel Davis Boycotts her Long Term Volunteer Position at Carnegie to Protest Ongoing "abuse of power" by City Management and Carnegie Board

Rachel Davis, a former Carnegie Board member and long time volunteer in the Carnegie Music Program, has tried everything from hiring a lawyer to giving radio interviews to get "abuse of power" by City management and the Board of Directors at Carnegie Centre to stop. It hasn't stopped. So she announced yesterday that she is boycotting her volunteer position until changes are made.

Davis outlined her reasons for boycotting her volunteer position in the following email sent to Carnegie management including Executive Director Ethel Whitty and Vancouver City Manager Judy Rogers; City Council including Mayor Sam Sullivan and Councillor Peter Ladner; Carnegie supervisory staff; Carnegie Board members including Secretary Rolph Auer, and media:

This is to inform you that I am boycotting my long-held position as a Volunteer Music Leader for the Carnegie Community Centre due to the following reasons:

1) Carnegie's City Staff employees failure to follow proper procedure in matters of Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy requests by Carnegie members. The Carnegie has been investigated for this before, and found wanting, but still the rules of FIPPA are not being complied with.

2) Carnegie's City Staff employees, namely the Executive Director, acting as tellers in the election of Carnegie board members, in contravention of the Carnegie constitution, and in obvious conflict of interest.

3) The failure of the Carnegie Community Centre Association Board of Directors to comply with the Carnegie constitution, and produce a teller's report at CCCA Board elections.

These last two failures in procedure have resulted in a call for a recount of Board of Director Election results due to the CCCA membership's mistrust of the proceedings. The recount was done in exactly the same manner as the first time, unfortunately, only further disregarding the membership's obvious desire for accountability, and thereby deepening the mistrust.

It is extremely distressing to me to feel I have to take this measure. I am a community volunteer, I have contributed to Carnegie since it's opening, and have always considered it a beacon of light in a dark place; but I having tried to remedy these problems with due process at Carnegie through many other means, and I find myself unable to continue to be officially involved in a volunteer program that contributes to a City-run establishment that systematically breaks the rule of law, land, and it's own constitution.

I have written emails, talked to the President of the Board of Directors and the Executive Director, held meetings, called the City, hired lawyers, filed FIPPA complaints, given radio interviews to CBC Radio One, and Co-op Radio, written articles, had articles written in the Sun and other publications, and many other members have also done many of these things as well, in an effort to resolve the situation of rampant disregard for the law of the CCCA Constitution and the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. Our earnest attempts at communicating our need for basic human rights are met with platitudes such as "We've always done it this way", and the abuse of power goes on. These abuses are many and varied, and well documented at Downtown Eastside Enquirer ,but I bring forward these three specific examples because they are so egregious, and so directly connected with the City of Vancouver, therefore, I am hoping, they are easily resolved.

If City employees begin complying with the rules of FIPPA, and stop putting themselves in conflict of interest by being tellers in Board elections, and if the elections tellers report is made a part of the proceedings at Board elections as it should be, I would be overjoyed to take up my volunteer position again. I have always have taken pride and enjoyed making a contribution to the lives of the CCCA membership, but I sadly must boycott my volunteer services in an yet another, but not final, effort to end the abuses the CCCA membership and I have tried so hard to resolve in a myriad of other ways.

Sincerely,

Rachel Davis
Senior Member of the CCCA

Ethel Whitty Abuses Woman for Eight Weeks

"Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." From Gustave Dore's illustration of Dante's Inferno, (Hell).

Remember the woman who was banned from the Carnegie Seniors' Center for daring to talk back to Devor, a notoriously abusive coffee seller? She remains banned. She said today that she has now been banned eight weeks....for daring to use her voice.

Since the Communist Bruce Erikson was influential at Carnegie, there has been a painting by Erikson of the Downtown Eastside and a wooden banner hanging on the wall in the theatre area. "To have no voice is to have no power", are the words carved in the wood of the banner. Yet there is no doubt that the City of Vancouver management at Carnegie, Director Ethel Whitty, Assistant Director Dan Tetrault, Security boss, Skip Everall, and Whitty's supervisor at the City, David McMillan, are punishing female assertiveness.

Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty does not deny that the woman was banned for using her voice. And Whitty explicitly acknowledged in a taped conversation in June that the banned woman had never posed a physical risk.

Not only have Carnegie staff banned the woman for using her voice, they continue to subject her to "mental cruelty" by evading telling her when the ban will expire. Two weeks ago, the woman dropped off a letter to Carnegie requesting written notification of when the ban would be lifted. She has not received a response to the letter. At the time she dropped off the letter to Carnegie, Tetrault and Everall even attempted to avoid giving the woman proof of receipt in the form of a signature and date stamp, but after ongoing insistence on her part and an impromptu private meeting on their part, Everall did sign for the letter, using his initials only.

This is the same pattern of mental cruelty to which Whitty, Tetrault, and Everall subjected duly elected Carnegie Board member William Simpson over the past year. It's a pattern, notes the boyfriend of Whitty's latest victim.

The woman herself describes Whitty's behaviour toward her as "sadistic". On two occasions when the woman gave Whitty detailed accounts of how the banning had stressed her, she says Whitty "smiled and she got this look in her eyes as if she was enjoying hearing about it." And then Whitty would -- the woman imitated her here -- turn down her lips and shrug her shoulders, the way people do when they're indicating they don't care about something. The woman didn't didn't know at the time that the meetings were being taped but she did find it odd that Whitty was "using gestures instead of words" to respond to things she was told.

Rumor has it that VanCity is going to be asked to cease providing grants to Carnegie until this human rights abuse case is resolved.

Election Recount Sham at Carnegie

The membership voted at a Special Meeting at Carnegie Center this evening to hold a recount of the June 5th election results for the Board of Directors. The vote was tight: 16 members voted "No" and 19 voted "Yes".

Even though those who wanted the recount won, they felt they were being denied procedures which would ensure fairness.

Brian B. wanted the Teller's Report from the last election released. The Teller's Report would reveal how many votes each candidate had received. Voting on a recount of the election results, he said, "presupposes that a count has already been published and to my knowledge that has not happened." And it was not going to happen, Board President Matthew Matthew responded: "We don't do a teller's report."

James Arkinstall requested that the recount "be scrutinized by uninvolved people, that means people who were not nominated." Matthew told him he was "out of order".

Ruth, another member who volunteers in the Carnegie Computer Room, took the microphone to say that she too wanted the ballots counted by "uninvolved people". Mathhew told her as well that she was "out of order". "You're not being fair to us", Ruth responded.

Tara, a woman who has in recent months begun to come to the neighbourhood to volunteer in the Carnegie Learning Center, asked Matthew to "read out the specific provision that says ballots cannot be counted by independent individuals."

Matthew responded that according to the Carnegie Voting Procedures he had in front of him, for 21 years the ballots have been "counted in a manner identified by the Chair." They are to be "counted by whoever the chair chooses", he explained.

Another member, a thirty-something man who did not identify himself, told the Board what the membership wanted. "They want a recount but they want it done out in the open. And if you can't figure that out.... What is this? The Bush administration you've got here?"

Matthew said that since the members had yet to vote on whether they wanted a recount, "I haven't identified any manner [of chosing who will count the ballots] 'cause that hasn't come up yet." After members voted for the recount though, Matthew laid down the law. "I'm the one who decides", he announced.

Matthew said there would be three tellers chosen by him to perform the recount, and that he favoured choosing people "from opposing sides". It would later become obvious that he ignored his own advice.

Member James Arkinstall said that Matthew's choice of tellers should be "not the same people who already counted the ballots or it's a breach of the Society's Act." More advice that Matthew ignored. Matthew chose two of the same people to count the ballots this time as had counted them at the election:

Ethel Whitty, Carnegie Director
Rolph Auer, Secretary of the Board

Neither Whitty or Auer were neutral tellers. Both have demonstrated antagonism in the past toward Rachel Davis, a popular Board member whose defeat in the last election prompted calls for a recount.

Actually, there couldn't have been a worse choice for teller than Whitty. She has been implicated in fraud against more than one Carnegie member. She blatantly lied on CBC Radio, claiming that Board member William Simpson had been banned from the Carnegie [and Board meetings held there] because he posed a Work Safe risk. As recently as this month, Whitty has been implicated in the manufacture of witnesses, fraud, and undemocratic processes in the banning of a female Carnegie senior for daring to talk back to a man with a ten year reputation for verbally abusing members. [We hope to get more details of that case so that we can report further on it.]

James Arkinstall insisted that a teller is "supposed to be somebody from amongst us...the audience". He would later add, "If you wanted to prove you were acting in good faith, you wouldn't get the same people to count them [the ballots]."

As a third teller, Matthew's first choice was Board member Stephen Lytton. Lytton declined based on the fact that, "I was one of the elected members". There was loud clapping in support of Lytton's decision.

Brian B.offered a suggestion for choosing the third teller, that "this mysterious third person be from those who didn't get elected." That advice was not taken by Matthew.

Matthew then chose Diane Wood. Wood is not a neutral party. When Rachel Davis and William Simpson began speaking on Co-op radio about undemocratic processes at Carnegie that saw homeless Simpson banned from the Carnegie Center two weeks after being elected to the Board and then libelled in the Carnegie newsletter, Wood was part of attempts to offset such commentary, rather than addressing it directly. Carnegie arranged for Co-op radio to give them their own show on which they were never, of course, criticized. Diane Wood co-ordinated the show. When Matthew selected her as a teller this evening though, she declined.

Matthew's final choice for teller was Craig, a current Board member. Craig was not a neutral party either. Even before being elected, Craig had spoken at a Board meeting against efforts by Rachel Davis to change policies which had left a homeless Board member banned and libeled. Rather than taking a principled stand on the recount and supporting requests that a teller be chosen from members in the audience rather than from Board members who had benefited from the original ballot count and were therefore in a conflict of interest position, Craig stated that the membership must get to a point where they can exercise basic "trust".

The three selected tellers scurried out of the Carnegie Theatre to count the ballots from the last election in secret. Whitty never returned, even though she is paid by the City of Vancouver to sit on the Board and monitor procedures.

Craig did return to announce that the recount had been completed and the original results "confirmed". Even Craig's closing statement, though, hinted at bias against those who had called for a recount: "Hopefully, this will settle this matter and we can go on to some disputes about more substantial things."

It was surprising not that the recount was a sham that reinforced the disrespect the Board and staff seem to hold for the membership, but that a recount was even held. We have the Vancouver police to thank for the recount. As the meeting progressed, word came into the Carnegie theatre that police were confiscating belongings of homeless people in Oppenheimer Park. So Jean Swanson -- who calls herself a homeless advocate but has gained a reputation as an anti-democracy activist due to her history in relation to the banning of a homeless Board member from Carnegie -- and a few others including her husband and a Board member left the meeting before the vote on whether to hold a recount occurred. Had these people stayed, it is possible that the pro-recount forces would not have won. But it was ultimately Swanson and her ilk who won. The anti-democratic tendencies they have nurtured at Carnegie prevailed.


[Thanks to those present who recorded the proceedings for DTES Enquirer bloggers.]

More Theft of Service on Ethel Whitty's Watch

On Thursday afternoon, Carnegie closed the third floor computer room leaving scores of Downtown Eastsiders without public computers. Carnegie is funded to keep that service open and has staff on the payroll to ensure it is kept open.

Why was the computer room closed for at least four hours in the middle of a work day? Ethel Whitty's office is just metres from that computer room and she passes it when walking to the washroom. Ask her why it was closed?

Ethel Whitty Strips Woman of Civil Liberties at Carnegie and Takes Off for a 'Canada Day' Vacation Week

It is not the first time, Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty has grabbed the latest installment of her $104,000 pay cheque and taken off out the door, leaving Carnegie members stranded without key services. She did it during the coldest day of the winter in 2006. And she is doing it during this hot weekend.

It is the Canada Day weekend. Whitty disappeared a day earlier than most people -- her receptionist Lil initially thought she was out at a meeting on Friday but eventually figured out she had taken an early long weekend. And an extended long weekend too, as she won't be back for over a week.

The person who was asking Lil for Whitty's whereabouts was a senior who had been barred by Whitty and her Security Co-ordinator, Skip Everall, from the Seniors Center. Her crime? She had dared to talk back to a notorious abuser, Devor, in the Seniors Center where she regularly drops in to use the computer. Literally hundreds of men and women at Carnegie have lodged complaints, formally or informally, (one by punching him in the nose) about Devor, who sells coffee in the basement and rides rough shot over members. But complaints seem to make no difference to Ethel Whitty.

Whitty and Everall gave the abuser a special treat this time. They allowed Devor to be the one to announce the punishment for the woman who dared stand up to him. That punishment was that she would be barred from the Seniors Center for a minimum of four days. And that she would have to meet with Skip the following Wednesday to see if she would be allowed back in. There is no appeal process at Carnegie; a targeted individual must serve their sentence before they can appeal or, in many cases, even learn what exactly they have been accused of. The woman brought this lack of due process to the attention of Ethel Whitty who reportedly responded by shrugging her shoulders. (Appealing at Carnegie essentially means that your sentence won't be extended even further if you act sufficiently deferential to Skip and make this metrosexual feel like a man's man for a moment.) Everall and Whitty avoided notifying security guards that the woman was barred from the Seniors Center so that they could in turn notify the woman when she walked into the building; she repeatedly walked in and out of the building and was never told.

According to her friends, it's as though Whitty and Everall "set her up" to unwittingly walk into the Seniors Center and be kicked out again by Devor. She was "lucky" though, as Devor didn't see her and instead loudly announced to a close friend of hers that she was barred. This was a shocking breach of confidentiality legislation by City staff; Devor is a volunteer who is not on the City payroll and receives food vouchers. And it is a breach of confidentiality legislation that Whitty is showing signs of intending to cover up. She avoided speaking to the key witness who could confirm this breach of confidentiality.

The woman who was barred did meet with Everall after she had served her sentence. She demonstrated for Everall, as she had earlier done for security guard Richard, how Devor had repeatedly shoved his arms and hands within inches of her body to force her out the door of the Seniors Center. (Her boyfriend has repeatedly emphasized to us that Security guard Richard had no part in the illicit barring but simply gave her protection as she later walked into the basement of the Carnegie where the Seniors Center is located.)

Everall was not the right man to complain to about physical aggression though, as he had allowed his security guard, Ted Chaing, to act a little rough too. Chaing had shoved the glass door of Everall's office in her face as she walked into the office after being led to believe that Everall intended to meet with her about her barring (about the sentence she had arleady served). Everall had decided that he wanted her to wait outside for a moment before he met with her, but it had apparently not occurred to either of these security men to tell her that verbally.

Everall acknowledged to this woman that he recognized that she was at risk from Devor. He said he wanted to "caution" her that it wouldn't be in her best interests to go down to the basement (where the Seniors Center as well as other facilities such as washrooms and a weight lifting room are located) while Devor was there. But neither he or Whitty, whom the woman also told of Devor's behaviour, have done anything to ensure safety in the building.

It has now been 14 days that this woman has been denied access to the Vancouver Public Library computers in the Seniors Center. She told Whitty, according to her boyfriend, that she needed access to computers in the Seniors Center because the computer room on the third floor was crawling with bed bugs. (A complaint will be lodged about Whitty to the Health Dept. next week by several people fed up with the bugs she has left behind when she took off on vacation. Some say they're scabbies, some say fleas, some say bed bugs.) But the woman was so desperate for a computer one evening recently that she decided to check out the third floor computer room to see if there were any available.

When she looked in the window of the computer room which she found locked, she was yelled at and chased off the floor by a "nutty Nicaraguan". A male witness coming up the stairs saw this and asked, "What's going on?". The woman said, "I'm getting out of here. I don't want to talk to him." She knew Everall would bar her if she talked back. This Nicaraguan, who has a bullet hole in one eye, previously crossed the floor of the computer room and lunged at her with his hands going for her neck because he claimed she was too slow in closing down the windows on her computer when her time was up. (Usually computer users are given a five minute warning but she says he didn't give her one.) Both male and female members of Carnegie have complained about the craziness of this Nicaraguan. Learning Center staff won't allow him to volunteer there any longer. But he has been given the green light by Everall and Whitty -- after getting disappeared for a couple of weeks -- to return to take shifts in the 3rd floor computer room.

This woman, who needs computer access, has been left stranded by Whitty who allows her barring to go on and on and on and on. Whitty had stated two weeks ago that she would be speaking to a key witness (who favored the woman's version of events) but coveniently never got around to it. The witness said Whitty chatted to him about his music but never questioned him about anything related to the woman. The woman had asked Whitty to suspend Everall for misconduct (and from what her boyfriend said yesterday, she has no intention of dropping that request).

So now Ms. Whitty is on vacation, enjoying a few lazy days in the sun. Lazy days for which she is well rehearsed.

Whitty's victim -- victim is the right word here -- is stranded without computer because Whitty and Everall have stripped her (and other Carnegie members) of civil liberties that are one of the many things about Canada to be celebrated on Canada Day.

Skip Skips Woman's Rights

The Security boss at Carnegie Center who wears a tag around his neck with the name "Skip" on it won't give anybody his last name, or tell anybody if Skip is his real first name. That's not suprising since his conduct as head of Security is too often illegal.

We have learned his last name, "Everall" from a commenter on this blog and confirmed from other internet posts that a "Skip Everall" does work at Carnegie. But is his first name really Skip? Some of the security guards who work under him don't believe it is. But Skip won't say.

The most recent incident in which Skip Everall acted in a legally questionable manner occurred on Saturday. Everall barred a woman after she spoke up about Devor, a coffee seller in the basement who has been shouting at her for years. Literally hundreds of people who go to Carnegie, both men and women, have stories of abuse by Devor. Many have lodged complaints only to be ignored.

When one man finally punched Devor in the nose a couple of years ago, leaving his nose bleeding, after being verbally abused by him over and over again, Downtown Eastside resident William Simpson pointed out in writing to members that staff had seen that coming for years. But staff at Carnegie, through their actions, have demonstrated that they essentially condone abuse.

The woman who was barred on Saturday had lodged her first complaint against Devor in writing ten years ago after he repeatedly hounded her to go home with him and watch pornography when she would try to buy a coffee or use a Vancouver Public Library computer in the basement of Carnegie. He also instructed her to loose weight and dye her hair so that she would be more attractive to men. Even though he had also asked a female Board member to go home and watch pornography, Carnegie staff made the complainant's life miserable. There is evidence that City Manager Judy Rogers resorted to a cover up, even fraud, in that case which she claimed in writing to be overseeing. Rogers is accused of essentially giving a green light to the denigration of this woman by Devor at Carnegie. (A separate post will be made when we get the paper trail on Rogers.)

On Saturday, the same woman was targeted again. Skip barred her without notifying her that she was barred. He wrote an "incident report" while making no attempt to get her side of the story. It's not as though Skip hadn't had an opportunity to speak to her; she had approached him outside his office immediately following Devor's abuse, saying, "This abuse has to stop". Skip simply brushed past her and went downstairs with Devor. He listened to Devor's rantings and based on that, wrote up a one-sided report. The woman remained in the building for the afternoon, raising questions about why Skip avoided getting her side. She even saw Skip outside the building when she left but he reportedly averted his eyes and took off on his bicycle.

The woman learned through hearsay that she was barred from Vancouver Public Library computers in the basement of Carnegie.

Today the woman asked a security guard, Richard, whether she was barred. Richard looked in a log book, found the incident report, and confirmed that she is in fact barred from Vancouver Public Library computers in the basement of Carnegie Center, a City of Vancouver community center. (She had actually spoken to Richard when she had wanted to buy a coffee in the basement of Carnegie and had asked Richard to accompany her as she was scared Devor would become abusive. Richard did accompany her.)

But here's the kicker. Skip is requiring that this woman serve her four day sentence BEFORE she can even speak to him to appeal on Wednesday. That is typical Carnegie policy: make a person serve their sentence before they can appeal, and often before they are even told why they are barred. She was told by the guard that even if she speaks to Skip, there is no guarantee he will grant her access to the VPL computers again.

Carnegie members want answers. Why is the Vancouver Public Libary allowing this harassment of a woman who speaks up about abuse? This is not the first case. Why is VanCity funding Carnegie while they engage in chronic civil liberties abuses? Why is Skip working at Carnegie when he has engaged in civil liberties abuses previously and even other security guards feel that he is performing poorly in the job? Why is Judy Rogers on the Olympic Organizing Committee when there is a paper trail indicating that she has condoned the denigration of this woman and other low income members of Carnegie?

More to come on this case. This woman is an acquaintance of Bill Simpson and we're hoping we can get an interview with her.

Woman Complains to Police of Criminal Harassment by Carnegie Coffee Seller, Devor

We heard this from Bill and one other person but we haven’t confirmed it yet. A Carnegie member is lodging a formal complaint of criminal harassment against Devor, the chronic abuser in the Carnegie Center Senior’s Lounge. We know that she called police this afternoon. But we are not clear on whether a formal report was written up yet. Her goal, we are told, is to start a file so that she can have every incident added to it and eventually get charges laid or at least get a no contact order.

The story we are getting second and third hand is that Devor has had it in for this woman for a long time. He told her that he didn’t want her back in the Senior’s Lounge after Board member Rachel Davis raised the issue of him playing the television at deafening levels – way beyond the safe level of 90 decibels – at a Board meeting. He is at least partially deaf and likes to crank up the television at about three times the WorkSafe level for a normal person. The Seniors Lounge is a multi-purpose room with people going in there to use the Vancouver Public Library computers and coming out with their ears ringing from the blazing gun fire and cussing, etc. from his DVDs. Anyway, we were told a few months ago, that this woman couldn’t even buy a coffee at the Senior’s Lounge take-out wicket without this guy literally yelling in her face about how he didn’t want her back because she was causing him trouble.

This woman had actually not been the one who asked Davis to raise the issue of sound levels at a Board meeting, although she and other Carnegie members expressed relief that Davis had raised the issue. But this woman appears to be the one Devor blames.

Now, every time this woman goes into the Senior’s Lounge, Devor cranks up the volume to deafening levels and looks right at her and tells her that if she doesn’t like it, she can "Go! Go!". (He speaks pigeon English.) He often, according to what we have learned from witnesses over the past year, takes it upon himself to evict her from a City facility: "You go! No come back!". She stopped going to the Seniors Lounge for months, but this week she went in a few times because she needed to use the computers and the third floor computer room is crawling with bed bugs. (Bed bugs are even crawling out of the CPUs.)

Today, we are told that Devor got angry with this woman, telling her that she had used the wrong wall clock when writing down her computer start time. He operates two wall clocks, a few minutes apart for some reason. Don’t ask us why. People who sign in on one clock, are then yelled at and told their time is "out" based on the other clock. This man is from Croatia and something happened to him there that we can only speculate about.

Anyway, if this woman speaks up about anything in the Senior’s Lounge, Devor allegedly incites the men in the room – many of whom have done jail time for violent crimes – to become very aggressive toward her. She told Devor today -- and this was confirmed by a witness who was standing at the take-out window -- that he should talk to her directly instead of calling on the other men in the room to deal with her. Usually he starts – we have heard this story so many times -- by yelling insulting comments at her, then calling on the whole room of guys to deal with her, making it impossible for the guys to keep watching their television show. And he invariably tells the guys that if they don’t deal with her, their television show will be turned off. “Do you want me to turn off television?” he taunts them in his Croatian accent and pigeon English. (He has been in Canada for a reported 35 years and this is as the only complete sentence he seems to know.) He gets the guys riled up. And then, if they only yell at her a bit, he will go to them one by one and say things individually in their ears, apparently encouraging them to have a go at her.

Today she apparently gave Devor what wanted. She yelled back at him, even though she’s not known for yelling or blowing up at people at Carnegie. She was screaming at him that she was fed up with his abuse. “Find another woman to abuse!!!”, she told him. He was telling her to "Get out!!" etc. etc. This is all happening on your tax dollars by the way.

This is also all happening on the watch of Carnegie Director, Ethel Whitty. It's as if Whitty has put yellow tape around the cesspool of the Senior's Lounge and never ventures down to actually deal with what goes on. Whitty has been seen at the Senior's Loung only once since she started working at Carnegie a year and a half ago; she was seen standing outside the Lounge at the take-out window buying herself a tea.

It is noteworthy that Whitty went on CBC Radio a few months ago and accused a non-violent man, Bill Simpson, of being a WorkSafe issue at Carnegie, as a means of covering her ass and that of her boss Jacquie Forbes-Roberts when they were criticized for banning Simpson from the building two weeks after he was elected to the Board. There is no question that Whitty lied outright to the public while on the radio, as the letter Forbes-Roberts sent to Simpson made no mention of a WorkSafe issue. Forbes-Roberts stated in the letter that Simpson was banned from Carnegie because he had operated a website which "features links" to a blog which criticizes Carnegie staff. Carnegie members, both those who like and dislike Simpson, consistently say that he was never violent, never physically aggressive, never threatening. When there is a real risk from an abuser in the basement at Carnegie, costing taxpayers money on a regular basis as security guards are constantly having to sprint to the basement to break up fights because Devor has launched into a power-tripping rage at yet another member. What has become obvious is that Whitty cares little about safety in the building. She will falsely blame a man for being a safety risk when in fact he was nothing but a political critic, but she will do nothing about a real safety risk. (Whitty has performed better on the issue of hearing damage in the Seniors Lounge. Some of the coffee sellers do now keep the sound lower, we are told. But Devor is not one of them and he seems to have more shifts than anyone else.)

From what we’re hearing, Devor's abuse will now be a police matter. There is little doubt that his constant targeting of this woman, yelling at her, threatening, inciting anger and hostility toward her, has reached the level of criminal harassment.

One member said, "I hope she gets the f*cker deported." Most members don't say much though, they only smile.

City Staff Lock Out Poor on Welfare Day

Who is on welfare? Wednesday was welfare day and City staff at the Carnegie Center locked the poor out of the building all morning, claiming they were having a staff meeting.

Then they closed the cafeteria early in the afternoon, claiming "It's a staffing issue." One Carnegie member dropped in to buy some soup and found the cafeteria closed at 3:40 p.m. Another guy had dropped by earlier and was irritated to find the cafeteria closed, pointing out that there were two full time staff walking around inside the cafeteria. And the kitchen supervisor, Catriona Moore, was in the building too.

This is an ongoing problem. CUPE members who staff Carnegie, as well as City management Ethel Whitty and Assistant Director Dan Tetrault, act like welfare day isn't a regular work day. But you'd be surprised how many low income people in the neighborhood want to use Carnegie Center on welfare day.

It doesn't have to be welfare day for Carnegie staff to slack off though. On Tuesday morning, the day before Welfare Wednesday, the line up in the cafeteria was so long it snaked out of the cafeteria and well into the seating area. There was one inexperienced volunteer doing all of the serving and working the cash. Carnegie members reported that staff were standing around chatting with one another. Catriona Moore, the kitchen supervisor was there. Colleen Gorrie, the Volunteer Co-ordinator was there putting her hands on an older man in the line up and joking with him. "There's staff everywhere," a guy with a French accent called out. "They don't see." Another man said he stood in line for 20 minutes just to buy a bowl of cereal.

The problem of the kitchen closing early is certainly not restricted to welfare day. When Anthony -- who members say is friendly and a pretty good cook -- is supervising, it is not uncommon for the kitchen to close ten, fifteen, even twenty minutes early. This is irritating to people who make a point of going over to Carnegie to get a cheap bowl of soup before closing.

There is one thing that can be counted on to get CUPE members moving: bloggers tipping off taxpayers. The topic even dominated one of their welfare day staff meetings. Some CUPE members are worse than others though: Catriona and Anthony haven't been instigators in the witch hunt for bloggers. But Colleen Gorrie was. She would like to, as George Bush says, "Smoke 'em out."

Carnegie Election on June 5th

It's a better deal than the Dollar Store just around the corner. Pay a dollar for a membership to Carnegie Centre and you can come to the general meeting on June 5th to vote for a new Board of Directors.

But hurry up. You need to have had a membership card for two weeks to be eligible to vote in the Board election. According to a poster at Carnegie, the last day you can purchase a membership card and still be eligible to vote is May 21st.

If you want to run for the Board you need to have had a membership card for 60 days.

To register to vote, you have to be at the theatre on the first floor of Carnegie at 5 p.m. If you come late, you won't be allowed to vote. The actual meeting starts at 5:30 p.m.

After you register, you can run upstairs to the cafeteria and get a seafood dinner for three dollars. They serve seafood every Thursday. Or you can get a bowl of soup for 75 cents.

Free coffee is provided at the meeting.

Rachel Davis -- many Carnegie members know her as Rosetta from the music program -- was new on the Board this past year and wrote about it: The Year I Spent a Decade on the Carnegie Board. Lou Anne, a Carnegie member who has overcome a brain injury, praised Rachel at a Board meeting a couple of months ago and said we need more "new blood" on the Board. Some people have spent too many years on the Board, Lou Anne pointed out.

You have to wonder if it is time to vote Jeff Sommers off the island. He spoke against a motion by Davis to hold a review of the barring of William Simpson, a duly elected Board member, from the building and Board meetings. The fact that Downtown Eastsiders, whose interests Sommers claims to represent, had voted for Simpson and were being denied representation while he was relegated to the sidewalk outside during meetings, didn't seem to phase Sommers. He argued that if Simpson's barring was reviewed, everybody who was upset about being barred would want their case reviewed.

But Sommers will probably get re-elected. At this very moment, he may be burning up cell phone minutes rounding up people to come out and vote. And Jean Swanson -- that would be the homeless advocate who didn't speak up when a homeless Board member, Simpson, was denied entry to Board meetings -- will no doubt be using her e-mail list of reliable comrades to get the vote out for Sommers and others who avoided speaking up for the right of an elected Board member to come to meetings.