Cease & Desist Order To Target Jacquie Forbes-Roberts at City Hall

If Jacquie Forbes-Roberts, the Mayor’s top woman in his Civil City initiative, can’t be civil, she is going to be slapped with a Cease & Desist order. “This is bullying!”, says Carnegie Centre Board member Grant Chauncey of the behaviour of Forbes-Roberts’, who is also General Manager of Community Services. Chauncey was speaking to a small group of Carnegie Centre Board members and the public at a Community Relations Meeting at Carnegie Centre last Thursday afternoon, July 26th .

A couple of Carnegie Board members are heading to Pivot Legal Society on the Downtown Eastside to ask about the possibility of a Cease & Desist order for Forbes-Roberts. The first step, explained Chauncey, would be to have a lawyer send Forbes-Roberts a letter telling her to cease and desist and that if she does not, we will go to the courts to ask that she stop. Chauncey and others would like Forbes-Roberts to stop blocking Carnegie Board member Bill Simpson from entering the Carnegie building until such time as mediation can be arranged between Simpson and herself. Chauncey, like numerous Carnegie members, insists that Forbes-Roberts has no evidence to support barring Simpson from the building.

The Cease & Desist would be a response to a letter Forbes-Roberts had delivered to Simpson on June 21st, just after he was elected to the Carnegie Board of Directors. She notified the homeless man in the letter that he was barred from entering the Carnegie Centre “indefinitely”. Simpson now stands outside on the sidewalk as Board meetings take place inside, with security guards instructed to prevent him from entering the building. Supporters of Simpson say they want Forbes-Roberts to adopt a more civil approach to an elected official.

Chauncey pointed out that Carnegie Centre members make rules and regulations governing behaviour in the Centre and that Forbes-Roberts is overriding them. “She obviously has no respect for any of our rules. Within the guidelines that we have regarding behaviour, Bill Simpson has not broken an iota, anything. He has not to my knowledge broken any rule or regulation and she, Jacquie Forbes-Roberts, has made no accusation of anything he did wrong. And so they’re making a decision on what? We don’t know. But as far as it being legal…she doesn’t have a leg to stand on. She’s doing it to usurp the community.

“People are in an uproar about this,” said Sophia Friegang, a Board member.

One criticism of Forbes-Roberts is that she was not precise enough in her letter about alleged wrongdoing that had resulted in Simpson being barred from the building, making it difficult for him to defend himself. Forbes-Roberts informed Simpson in her letter that he was barred because he operates a web site, Downtown Eastside Enquirer .ca, which “features links” to the Downtown Eastside Enquirer blogspot which she claims contains “inaccuracies”. Simpson asked the obvious question when Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty who is supervised by Forbes-Roberts delivered the letter to him: “What are the inaccuracies?” Whitty refused to identify any.

“Has the City come back after giving us that first letter, giving us any indication as to why this is occurring other than the vaguest of things?” Chauncey asked Whitty. Whitty responded, “No. Other than that letter.” “If you ask me there’s no proof of anything…And if there was at all, they’d take legal action.”

“Having a link to a site is not the same as publishing a site,” said Board member Rachel Davis.

Although the only reason given in Forbes-Roberts’ letter for barring Simpson was that he “links” to the blog, the City did come up with a second reason after the barring attracted media attention. The second reason, announced by Whitty, was that there had been a Work Safe [WCB] complaint against Simpson by a Carnegie staff person who claimed that the blog created an unsafe environment at work. Rachel D. wasn’t buying it. “There’s nothing in that letter saying that William Simpson can’t come in because of Work Safe …If it’s a Work Safe issue, why don’t they just say it’s a Work Safe issue.” Whitty interjected, “It was alluded to in the letter.” Maybe she means “eluded”, says Serg, one of several Downtown Eastsiders who can’t find any hint of a Work Safe issue in the letter. Indeed Simpson has yet to be informed in writing or verbally that he is barred due to a Work Safe issue -- even though Whitty has announced this reason to the public on behalf of her boss Forbes-Roberts at two public meetings at Carnegie.

Chauncey, a former union member and outspoken supporter of the current CUPE strikers, has the Work Safe manual at home. “It’s not a Work Safe issue,” he said. “It’s just not.” He pointed out that there were no threats on that blog. “And I’ve looked and I’ve looked and I’ve looked and I’ve looked.”

Chauncey, like many Carnegie members, sees the Work Safe angle as a ruse. He explained that if inaccurate statements had been made on the blog, if there was “defamation” -- a word Forbes-Roberts used in the letter but for five weeks has evaded supporting with examples -- legal recourse is available. “You do it legally; you don’t hide behind some veil.” He is convinced that the City did not pursue the defamation issue legally because, “They’ve got nothing.”

Despite his vigorous support for legal action against Forbes-Roberts whose behaviour he believes will get worse if a check is not put on it, Chauncey is actually not a supporter of the DTES Enquirer blog. He believes the blog, in which contributors don’t identify themselves with real names is “gutless and cowardly and that [Simpson] should come in and apologize.”

Wilf R., a new Carnegie member, told Whitty that he was concerned that barring Simpson from Carnegie -- particularly a previous barring from the Learning Centre when he claims he was told that it was because he was blogging on the DTES Enquirer -- has resulted in him being "tarred as the blogger". Wilf R. claimed he heard people at Carnegie talking about Simpson as though he was the blogger. Indeed Whitty herself had just spoken of Simpson minutes earlier as though she assumed he was the blogger, saying "He can write about me all he wants. . . ." And indeed the blogger does write about her, criticizing her failure to consistently provide services Carnegie is funded to provide.

Friegang asked Whitty, "Don't you have a concern . . . that Bill Simpson might be wrongly accused?" She added, "If I were Director, I would be doing something about this. I would be doing something."

“There’s no proof that [Simpson] writes that blog,” said Debbie Gosselin, a Carnegie member who attended the meeting, and indeed Forbes-Roberts did not accuse him in the letter of actually writing it, only linking to it. Gosselin asked Whitty, “Are you saying that anybody who links to the Downtown Eastside Enquirer blog will be barred from Carnegie?”

Whitty responded by explaining that in barring Simpson, City lawyers working with Jacquie Forbes-Roberts made their decision “based on probability”. Simpson operates a website with the same name as the blog, and links to the blog appear at the top of his website “so he probably intends for people to read that blog.”

Although the Community Relations Committee discussed the Cease & Desist order, they require approval of a majority of Board members before getting any legal ball rolling. They unanimously passed a motion at Thursday’s meeting to ask Pivot Legal Society on the Downtown Eastside to for help in wording what Friegang called “a legal motion” to be brought to the next Board meeting.

Simpson is not entirely optimistic about Pivot Legal Society helping him though. He went to Pivot on his own shortly after he was banned from Carnegie but was rebuffed. Pivot claims in their literature that their goal is to fight civil liberties abuses of marginalized people on the Downtown Eastside, creating a “trickle up” effect which strengthens the civil liberties of everyone in society. When Simpson asked a Pivot lawyer for help with the Carnegie case, she responded, “But they’re our friends.”

At this point, Simpson, who calls himself “home-free” and “welfare-free” seems to be lawyer-free. When interviewed on Co-op Radio on Monday, along with Rachel D. and other Carnegie members, Simpson was asked if he had a lawyer. He responded that any lawyer interested in helping him could contact him at his website.

Whether Jacquie Forbes-Roberts will be ordered to Cease & Desist is not yet certain. It remains, to use the language of City lawyers, a “probability”.

[It has become necessary for supporters of Bill Simpson to tape meetings due to the fact that Whitty and the City regularly revise their stories -- this meeting was no exception -- about the various barrings of Simpson. Copies of tapes often find their way to the DTES Enquirer. Quotes in this post are taken from a tape of the meeting.]

Ethel Whitty's Deaf Ears

Does the word "deaf" mean anything to you? That's the question several Carnegie patrons have for Carnegie Director Ethel Whitty, while they're still able to hear the answer.

Every afternoon and evening, and on many mornings, Whitty allows Carnegie computer users in the Carnegie basement Lounge to be subjected to noise levels that could rival a rock concert. Both male and female patrons complain on a regular basis -- even people who have spent years sitting in bars where bands play loudly complain -- only to have their complaints fall on deaf ears. People use the basement lounge only because they don't have computers at home, or they have computers that are old and slow on the internet, and need to access the Vancouver Public Libary computers.

But they are running into Whitty's priorites.

And her priorities do not appear to be health standards or computer literacy. Yesterday unemployed Carnegie members were encouraged to veg out on a Flinestones movie in the middle of the afternoon, played at the sound level of a rock concert. One woman told a friend in an e-mail that she had to abandon her computer and go home. "The noise level was making me shake", she said in an e-mail to a friend, who passed it on to the DTES Enquirer.

This woman noted in her e-mail that she has complained about the noise level four times in the last two weeks. When she complained a little over a week ago to Devor, the coffee seller in the Lounge, he called Security as he has done in the past "to intimidate" her into shutting up. Security guards Trey and Myles arrived. She told them that her ears ring after she leaves the Lounge, which is a sign she is developing tinititus. She told Trey and Myles that this ongoing noise level has become a health and safety issue. She recalled Myles making a face that suggested that he thought she was being silly. Trey said getting the noise level turned down in the Lounge wasn't his jurisdiction.

I insisted that Trey and Myles deal with this issue, she said in the e-mail. They said they would write it up in the Security log and make certain management saw it. Guess what the result of that was? The television has been even louder since.

Others have complained too. Jim A., who is slow to anger, recalls using the computer in the basement and finding the noise level intolerable. "I flippped out," he says. "There was gunfire and glass smashing. It was nerve wracking."

Bill Simpson says he complained when he was using a computer and couldn't hear the sound through his headphones because it was drowned out by the television on the other side of the room. He complained to the coffee seller, Vivian, but met a hostile response.

The noise problem has been discussed on the internet by bloggers -- who Whitty has attempted to silence. One woman, Antonia, was reported as asking that it be turned down, saying, "We're all going to be deaf."

Health and Safety standards have not been taken seriously at Carnegie under the Whitty administration and, in fact, have been perverted for political ends. Whitty recently supported a politically motivated "Work Safe" complaint against a man accused of being associated with a blog which criticized work place performance of herself and her staff. Carnegie Board members confronted Whitty; both Grant C. and Rachel D. told her that there was no legitimate health and safety issue here. But when there are genuine health and safety issues at Carnegie that Whity has known about for at least a year, she continues to turn a deaf ear.

The DTES Enquirer will be providing updates on the performance of Director Ethel Whitty, Asst. Director Dan Tetrault, and Lounge supervisor Marlene Trick. Today, as guns were blazing in the basement, Whitty lounged in the front lobby. A patron says he saw her chatting with another male patron about a book called, "Yiddish", as a woman left the basement in tears because she asked the coffee seller to turn down the television and he wouldn't.

[There is no need for the City to pacify the unemployed with Finestones and war movies in the middle of the day. Don't just turn down the DVDs, turn them off. May, a Carnegie member, talked on Co-op radio last Monday about this pacifying of the poor by Carnegie management. They seem more interested she said in supporting DVD rental stores than the poor. The DTES Enquirer will be reporting on May's perspective in the future.]

Evidence-tampering in CUPE police complaint

CUPE members in Vancouver are on strike and a stench can be detected. It is not the stench of garbage left uncollected, it is the stench of CUPE's dirty laundry.

A former secretary to two CUPE Presidents is talking.

The secretary continues to talk about the police complaint CUPE lodged against her after she complained of the "non-union sweatshop" they were quietly operating at Local 116 at UBC. VPD Constables Megan Herrmann and Kevin Ng -- who don't have jurisdiction at UBC -- left voice mail and showed up at her home. Their message: muzzle yourself about unfair labour practices inside CUPE.

When the secretary got a copy of the police report, she was shocked to discover that letters she had sent to CUPE President Barry O'Neill and BC Federation of Labour President Jim Sinclair about unfair labor practices inside CUPE had been submitted as "evidence". Copies of these letters were enclosed with the police report. This fact has been discussed in a previous post, "CUPE Strike Haunted by Secretary Scandal". What is new is that the DTES Enquirer has learned that the police report pertaining to the CUPE complaint was retroactively altered roughly a year after the case had been labelled "CLOSED".

The alteration of the police report occurred after the whistleblowing secretary contacted CUPE President, Barry O'Neill, and BC Federation of Labour President, Jim Sinclair, in writing in 2003. She informed O'Neill and Sinclair that as long as the unfounded "WORKPLACE HARASSMENT" notation remained adjacent to her name in police records, she would ensure that it remained on their public records as union leaders. Speaking up about workplace conditions did not constitute "WORKPPLACE HARASSMENT", she reminded them. It was then that the term "WORKPLACE" disappeared from the police report -- even though the case had been labelled CLOSED by the VPD the previous year. The secretary doesn't know who changed the "offence" for which she was investigated but she can prove that it was changed in the police file long after the case had been closed.

It was quite by accident that the secretary stumbled upon the change. It was when she received documents from a second Freedom of Information request, that she noticed that the Vancouver Police had retroactively changed the offence for which she had been investigated. The offence was changed from "WORKPLACE HARASSMENT" to "HARASSMENT/ OBSCENE COMMUNICATION". She suspects that the term "WORKPLACE" was dropped as a form of damage control, to reduce potential embarrassment to union leaders -- but she can't prove it.

What she can prove is that there was nothing harassing or obscene about her communication with labor leaders. Her letters, which remain on file at the VPD Property Office, can be used to confirm this. "What was obscene about this situation was the way people who worked for CUPE were treated", she says.

The fact that the whistle blowing secretary had been investigated for the specific offence of “WORKPLACE HARASSMENT” and not "HARASSMENT/ OBSCENE COMMUNICATION cannot be disputed. "WORKPLACE HARASSMENT" is clearly typed at the top of the police report she obtained through Freedom of Information shortly after CUPE called police on her. And the fact that the case had been "CLOSED" in Dec. 2002 is also typed on the police report. Further, the DTES woman has preserved correspondence from the VPD informing her that the “WORKPLACE HARASSMENT” notation would remain on the police PRIME data base permanently. It did remain on the police data base until after she contacted O'Neill and Sinclair in 2003, after which time the "WORKPLACE" angle for which she had been investigated disappeared.

The whistle blowing secretary sees this retroactive alteration of an investigated "offence" in a closed police file as a form of evidence- tampering. She speculates that it may have been prompted by the fact that she was requesting a criminal investigation into labor leaders involved in this case. It was "no secret", she says, that she wanted union leaders criminally investigated for public mischief for lodging what she considered to be an unfounded police complaint. [Context: When CUPE lodged their complaint in Dec. 2002, the lodging of unfounded criminal complaints to silence vocal Downtown Eastside residents was an epidemic problem. Inspector John de Haas stated in one case involving the Vancouver School Board that bureaucrats lodging unfounded police complaints against political adversaries could justifiably face "public mischief" investigations, if a victims requested them. An advocate on the Downtown Eastside was advising residents to seek public mischief investigations in such cases.]

The whistleblowing secretary says CUPE and police were well aware that she had never visited or telephoned her CUPE "WORKPLACE" after leaving her job there. There was no workplace harassment and that fact was just too obvious so, in her view, somebody arranged for the "WORKPLACE" element to get retroactively disappeared. "I e-mailed Jim Sinclair in 2004 and I asked him if he had any idea who that somebody was," she says. He didn't respond. But she did preserve a copy of her e-mail to him.

There was no workplace harassment. There was no harassment, period. That's the position of the whistleblowing secretary."I have as much right as CUPE members [currently] on strike to protest about working conditions."

CUPE Strike Haunted by Secretary Scandal

photo: Barry O'Neill, President, CUPE - BC Division


A former secretary to two CUPE Presidents says she'll cross CUPE picket lines. CUPE, she says, expects rights and benefits for their members that they have denied their own secretaries. In Dec. 2002, CUPE arranged for Vancouver Police Constables Megan Herrmann and Kevin Ng to telephone and visit her at her home to demand that she muzzle herself about unfair labour practices inside CUPE.

The whistle blowing secretary, who will be identified here by her initials “R.M.”, had exposed CUPE for allegedly operating a "non-union sweatshop". She claims she saw two female co-workers fired after speaking up about issues such as an excessive workload, verbal abuse, and the reneging on a promise to provide a pension plan. She saw a third woman, a long time bookkeeper at Local 116, fired after she got cancer and became less efficient.

This scandal, says the former secretary who left CUPE with two glowing letters of reference, goes right to the top of the CUPE hierarchy. When she obtained a copy of the police report dated Dec. 17, 2002, she discovered that as "evidence", police had been given a copy of a letter she had sent to Barry O'Neill, President of CUPE - British Columbia Division, and a similar one she had sent to Jim Sinclair, President of the BC Federation of Labour. The polite letters outlined unfair labour practices to which secretaries working inside the non-unionized office of CUPE Local 116 had been subjected. The message was clear from the filing of these letters in the Police Property Office, she says: "CUPE and the BC Fed believe that a woman speaking up about working conditions is committing a crime."

The secretary asked both O'Neill and Sinclair in writing in 2003 to have these letters removed from the VPD Property Office. Speaking up about working conditions is not a crime, she reminded them. Neither O'Neill or Sinclair had the letters removed. Never once did either of these leaders ever speak to the secretary about this situation.

The whistleblowing secretary appealed to the Vancouver Police to expunge the notation of "Workplace Harassment" adjacent to her name on the police computer as a result of the CUPE complaint. Speaking up about unfair labour practices is a right, not workplace harassment, she pointed out, and in her case she had not even visited or telephoned Local 116 since leaving her job there. (The VPD does not even have jurisdiction at UBC. The RCMP does.) The VPD responded in writing that such notations remain on record for "99 years", even in cases such as hers in which the accused has been completely cleared.

The whistleblowing secretary also discovered from the police report that Ian Aikenhead, a former NDP President and CUPE lawyer, had provided information, albeit misleading, to police. It was information that was in his possession as a result of his wife, Catherine Aikenhead, being an NDP-appointed public representive to a dental regulatory College years earlier. He resorted to exaggeration and misrepresentation in an attempt to present her as a complainer to police, she says, "because he knew that CUPE did not have the facts on their side."

Indeed there is evidence that CUPE did not have the facts on their side. Other secretaries from Local 116 had previously taken coplaints to higher ups at CUPE. S.A., a woman who had put in 12 years as a secretary at Local 116, S.A., had spoken to Joe, a Regional Representative, after she was fired. He would not discuss the issue and simply told her to "Get a lawyer". She sued for the pension she claimed she had been promised. When another secretary, S.K., was fired after speaking up about excessive workload and being expected to absorb verbal abuse, she too took her case up the CUPE hierarchy. The Local 116 President and Vice President were summoned to the Burnaby office of CUPE to explain themselves. When S.K telephoned several members of Local 116 to request permission to attend the next union meeting to appeal the firing directly to the membership, CUPE sent her a letter ordering her to 'cease and desist' or she would lose overtime pay accumulated. Even the whistleblowing secretary says her pay stubs and other records can be used to verify her claims that she worked for long periods without benefits that every CUPE member enjoys.

It is not just top union leaders, though, who have acted in a manner which indicates that the tactics used against the whistleblowing secretary are within their comfort zone. In 2003, CUPE Locals in Vancouver -- including those currently on strike -- and the surrounding area were notified in writing of human rights issues raised by this case and asked to ensure that CUPE leaders resolved them. What did they do? Nothing.

A steamfitter gets muzzled by CUPE BC, under Barry O'Neill's administration

The secretary was not the only whistleblower CUPE Local 116 and CUPE BC played rough with. They had successfully muzzled a whistle blowing steam fitter just months earlier in a case that led to accusations against CUPE BC of practicing political psychiatry. The steam fitter,"S.J.", had worked for years in Plant Operations at the University of BC and was a dues-paying member of CUPE Local 116 (unlike the whistle blowing secretary who was directly employed by CUPE Local 116.)

The steam fitter got on the wrong side of CUPE when he was briefly off work on compensation. Compensation cheques were issued through the union office and the steam fitter claimed that he and others receiving cheques were being shortchanged. He did the math and took the figures to CUPE. He was ignored. But he persisted. He received a cheque for $1,500 in the mail, the amount he had claimed he was shortchanged, but CUPE wouldn’t tell him what the cheque was for. He didn’t shut up. He sent a letter to CUPE pressing them on this issue and, this being just after 9/11, he wrote, "God Bless America" at the bottom of the letter. "A week later," he says, "a cheque for $640 came through the door." The steamfitter says that the cheques were issued to him through the Back to Work office on the UBC campus which was run by Colleen Garbe, a member of the CUPE Local 116 Executive.

The steamfitter also spoke to CUPE BC and CUPE National. Just as the steam fitter was considering going to the RCMP to request an investigation, CUPE called the RCMP on him.

Leaders at CUPE Local 116 told the RCMP that the steam fitter had made a death threat against CUPE Vice President Paul Cooke. The steam fitter, an immigrant from Scotland, and Cooke, an immigrant from Ireland, worked together in Plant Operations and knew each other well. The pipe fitter claims that he had a few beers and sent Cooke an e-mail about the compensation cheque issue, telling him at one point, ‘I should take you out’. This expression, the steam fitter explained, is heard in pub culture in Britain; it means that the two of us should go outside and settle this with our fists. The RCMP spoke to the steam fitter. No charges were laid.

But CUPE was turning up the heat on the steam fitter. They sent a lawyer from their Burnaby headquarters to a meeting arranged with the steamfitter at UBC. She was “tough” the steam fitter said of the lawyer. She informed him that he would have to submit to a psychiatric assessment and take medication in order to keep his job. The steamfitter did not have a lawyer at the meeting and, wanting to keep his job, he succumbed.

CUPE ruined his chances of ever getting a promotion, he believes. When he later applied for better jobs in the workplace, he found he was being ignored.

The whistleblowing secretary knows the steam fitter but neither knew of one another’s problems with CUPE as they were occurring. The workplace harassment and psych record the steam fitter acquired will be attached to his name on the police computer system for life. Just as a similar smear* is going to remain on the whistleblowing secretary's record for life; the last she heard it would be "99 years".

If I encounter a CUPE picket line, the secretary says, I'll cross it and I'll tell them why. If they try to convince me to support their right to struggle for better working lives, I'll say, "Talk to me in 99 years."


*A year after the case of "WORKPLACE HARASSMENT" was closed by the VPD, the alleged offence for which she was investigated was fraudulently altered in police records. This occurred after the secretary told O'Neill and Sinclair in writing that as long as the WORKPLACE HARASSMENT notation remained on her record, she intended to ensure that it remained on their public record. She cannot prove that labor leaders had any involvement in the retroactive change to CUPE's police complaint. For more information see post, "Evidence Tampering in CUPE Police Complaint".

CUPE Strike Chatter at Downtown Eastside Cafeteria

[The following post was e-mailed to the Downtown Eastside Enquirer by a reader whom we know to be a credible person. Like many Downtown Eastside residents, this reader regularly eats at the City-funded cafeteria at the Evelyn Saller Center on Alexender St. You can eat a full course dinner there for roughly two dollars. Lunch and breakfast are even less.]

Hi again. I thought I would write you about the Saller Centre after this morning's display at the center. I couldn't listen to anymore and had to leave without eating, I was that upset. First of all, on a regular basis, we are always made to wait for an extra 10 minutes before the staff gets things ready for us. This means that when they say that the cafeteria opens at 10:00am, it may open then but don't expect the staff to start work for at least another 10 minutes. This is also extended for the afternoon opening of 3:30pm. We also have to wait for an extra 10 minutes then. Sometimes like this morning it was getting closer to the 15 minute mark. Add this up in dollar and cents to see how much money is squandered on a yearly basis. Let's say $20 an hour for 8 employees. 10 minutes twice a day is almost $7 a day per person, times 8 people is $56 a day. Add that up for a year and I figure that the taxpayers waste at least $20,000 a year on cafeteria staff at this one centre alone. AMAZING and nothing is ever said about it.

One of the waitresses started talking union propaganda this morning and telling her coworkers that if anyone should say anything about it, to slow the work down to a crawl. I had to bite my tongue not to say that they couldn't work much slower than they do on a regular basis. Another man asked if they were going to strike and in a very loud voice so that the whole room could hear, she stated that, " you're damn right we are going on strike. Don't forget to recycle your garbage folks!" Clientele were guaranteed by Ernie, the centre's manager that all staff would continue to work through any work stoppage by the union and we would not be affected at all. Finally when one of the men asked her a question that I couldn't hear, but quite civilly I might add, she got angry and told him that he shouldn't listen to the media, that it is always biased and stupid. Gee, I hope that it doesn't include blogging, I didn't think that telling the truth where others won't is stupid, or is it just me that sees this!

This particular waitress has been put on the table for losing control with the clientele before on a couple of different occasions. She has even been forced to take anger management workshops in the past, yet continues to handle herself with the usual union arrogance.

I must be fair here too, saying that the kitchen staff seems to work as they should, but we don't see them as much being behind the scenes in their daily work assignments. The food for the most part is quite adequate and preparing that amount of food on a daily basis can't be a very easy task at any rate.

Finally, when it comes to the statement from the union head himself on the news last night, there will be no overtime work performed by union personnel. Well, I guess that means it depends if you are classified as an essential service or not, (which the center and Carnegie for that matter have not been classified one way or the other, just let slip through without mention one way or the other). My favourite waitress, who also doubles as a washer woman, worked overtime in the Health Services this week doing laundry. She often does this for extra days just about every week. Another waitress doubles as a worker for BC Liquors and uses the centre for extra money. Both of these women said the strike is not about the money.. They always say it's not about the money but sure are fast as hell to scoop it up when it's placed on the table. Greed, that's what it's all about! Our friendly waitress from BC Liquors also has a thing for one of the security men at the centre, pawing at him at every chance when they happen to be on the same shift. Too bad they are both married and not to each other. ;-)

Do Judge Judy [Rogers] or Jackie [Forbes-Roberts] need to know of these people and the rest that I haven't mentioned yet? The centre's management knows of all of the antics that go on there and turns a blind eye to most of it. One day, not long ago the mayor actually showed up to tour the facility and I thought that maybe it might be a little tree shaking but even with him there, we were made to wait the usual 10 minutes.

I'll leave this with you today. I only started taking notes yesterday and you can see what's come up in such a short time. I'll continue taking notes there and if anything drastic comes up, I'll let you know. If you want to post this, by all means do so and I'll leave comments with any new details there. Feel free to contact me any time. See ya later.

Carnegie Locks Low Income Residents Out of Computer Room -- Again!

Patrons coming to Carnegie Center to get an hour of computer internet time this evening found themselves locked out of the computer room.

The Learning Center was also locked all day. Even though the teacher is off for the summer, a poster on the door announces that the Center will be open from 1 p.m - 5 p.m. as long as there is a volunteer. But staff don't seem to bother arranging for a volunteer to sit in the room. A couple of weeks ago, the DTES Enquirer got a report from an eye witness that it was closed as well. There are computers in there that Downtown Eastside residents want access too but can't get through the door.

The only services on the 3red floor of the Carnegie are the Computer Room and the Learning Centre. So you would think that with roughly $500,000 worth of City management and supervisory staff on that floor, including Director Ethel Whitty, they could manage to keep the basic services open. Whitty was there today, wearing a navy blue suit.

At one point, Whitty was seen standing with the head of Security and other staff talking about the strike. If you ask me, they're already on strike.