Casino Royale Running Wild....Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 6

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille

Inspired by the Document Dump Friday just past, the Marathon to resurrect the all that has been buried by Lotusland's lazy proMedia is now underway.....

(please see sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to the finish line)

*******

It's Mile Six of the Marathon, and we are doing our best to pass by the dejected punters pouring forth from BailOut Motors Place without incident as we saunter down Smithe thinking about that 2nd T. Richard Turner Letter.....

That's the one that PavCo's CEO, Warren Buckley wrote and sent to the Opposition's Mr. Spencer Chandra-Herbert that has gone unreported in essentially all of Lotusland's proMedia outlets, with the exception of PublicEye Online:

The following is just one key passage from said second letter:

"....In early January 2010, the negotiations between lawyers and owner's representatives reached a point where further progress could only be achieved by having the Paragon Principals participate to a greater degree. It was in this regard that BC Pavilion contacted Mr. Turner to see if he could faciliate that meeting....."


Three things:

1) Mr. Turner himself is himself a Principal in Paragon, both as a Director and as a financial investor. If Mr. Buckley is not aware of this fact (ie. Mr. Buckley misspoke in this regard in a similar, more explicit, fashion when he first spoke to Sean Holman about this matter more than two weeks ago) he is either clueless about the company that he has just done a huge deal with or, alternatively, he is being obfuscatory in the extreme.

2) Why couldn't PavCo get Paragon to pay attention in January 2010, more than six MONTHS after the former had chosen the latter to be it's preferred bidder to build the Casino Industrial Complex in a process that took only six WEEKs from start to finish? Is it posible that the latter thought that things were already a done deal?

3) Strangely, the actual person from PavCo whom Mr. Buckley previously said had contacted Mr. T. Richard Turner about arranging this meeting was not named in the letter. Who was that person? Well, according to what Mr. Buckley said, but did not write, it was PavCo's chairperson Mr. David Podmore. Which means that, if it did indeed happen, that one Gordon Campbell-appointed Chair of a government-controlled Crown Corporation (ie. PavCo) called the another Campbell-appointed Chair of a government-controlled Crown Corporation (ICBC) and asked that 2nd Chair to help grease the wheels for a deal that could, if all goes according to plan make him very, very rich indeed.


Next up....It's Mile Seven, in which we will be crossing the Cambie Street Bridge and heading back towards Vancouver City Hall, a place where Paragon first made its pitch to become the owner of a Lotusland Pleasure Palace almost four years ago....

Casino Royale Running Wild....Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 5

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille

Inspired by the Document Dump Friday just past, the Marathon to resurrect the all that has been buried by Lotusland's lazy proMedia is now underway.....

(please see the sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to the finish line)

*******

It's Mile 5, and we are now jogging along a strangely buzzing Pacific Boulevard in the weepy rain thinking about what that letter from PavCo's CEO Warren Buckley to Spencer Chandra-Herbert is really all about Alfie.

First some background....

When the Minister responsible for The Marshmallow first started babbling on about the phone call he received from Paragon Gaming Inc.'s Mr. T. Richard Turner sometime last fall to tell him that it would, according to the Minister, be a 'deal-breaker' if his government reneged on the now $563 million (and climbing) retractable roof, it soon thereafter came out that Mr. Turner had also been involved in arranging a meeting between the Crown Corporation PavCo and Paragon on matters pertaining to stalled negotiations regrding the construction of the Casino Industrial Complex next door.

Here is what PavCo's CEO, a fine fellow whose salary is paid by the people of British Columbia, had to say to Sean Holman of Public Eye the day before April's Fools:

"...(We) were expressing our frustration at getting these guys (from Paragon) to the table. And I know (PavCo chair David Podmore) sent an email to Rick (Turner) and said,'You're on the advisory board (for Paragon), give them some advice. We need to get to the table...."

This caused Mr. Chandra-Herbert to ask Mr. Buckley to explain, specifically, what went down between Mr. Turner, who is much, much more than a member of PavCo's 'advisory board' (ie. he is a member of the Board of Directors and he has a financial interest in the Canadian Division of the Company that has owned the Edgewater Casino since 2006 and whose license will be flipped into the Casino Industrial Complex).

The result?

Well, it took more than two weeks for Mr. Buckley's one page letter to reach Mr. Chandra-Herbert, which is ironic in the extreme given that it took only three weeks for PavCo to choose Paragon to be it's preferred bidder on a $450 million dollar project that will change the face, not to mention the culture, of downtown Vancouver forever.

So.....

What exactly did Mr. Buckley's letter to Chandra-Herbert reveal about the 'role' of Mr. Turner in arranging said meetings?

Well, we'll tell you all about it during Mile 6 of the Marathon.....

Hopefully the fans pouring out of BailOut Motors Place after the game, drunk on either victory or cheap eight dollar beer, will not impede our progress.....

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Casino Royale Running Wild....Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 4

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille

Inspired by the Document Dump Friday just past, which appears to have been designed to bury all pro-Media stories about Paragon Gaming Inc., the Marathon to resurrect the buried, at least until Monday, is underway.....

(see sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to the finish line)

*******

It's Mile 4 and we're starting to settle into a groove while we lope along concentrating on that second letter that the Opposition's Spencer Chandra-Herbert received recently from PavCo.

Unlike the first letter to Chandra-Herbert from the Lobbyist Registrar, the second letter has essentially gone unreported in Lotusland's proMedia.

Luckily, PublicEye's Sean Holman was good enough to post it up for those of us who wish to know what is actually going in this province:

(click to enlarge)

Background and analysis coming soon

During Mile 5.....

Which we should hit as we pass by BailoutMotors Place des (non)Arts during the 1st period intermission of tonight's Kings-Canuckleheads game deux....

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Casino Royale Running Wild....Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 3

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille

Inspired by the most recent Document Dump Friday just past, which appears to have been designed to bury all pro-Media stories about the Purveyor of the Pleasure Palace, Paragon Gaming Inc. , the Marathon to do exactly the opposite has begun.....

(see sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to Monday's finish line)

*******

We're in the middle of mile 3, and the first burn is starting to kick in.

Which means that our mind is starting to wander....

Away from the letter that NDP Opposition critic Spencer Chandra-Herbert received from the Lobbyist registrar Mr. Paul Fraser that referred to Campbell government insider, BC Liberal Party monetary supporter, and Casino Builder, Mr. T. Richard Turner....

Towards a second letter that Mr. Chandra-Herbert recently received.....

This second letter also refers to the recent actions of Campbell government insider, BC Liberal Party monetary supporter, and Casino Builder, Mr. T. Richard Turner.....

This second letter, however, was not from Mr. Fraser. Instead, it was from the CEO of PavCo which is the Campbell government-controlled Crown Corporation that made the decision about both the Retractable Roof for BC Place Stadium and who will build the massive Casino Industrial Complex next door....

PavCo chose Mr. Turner's company.....

And, surprise!, this second letter is something you have heard essentially nothing about if you have only been paying attention to the big media monopolists that run the Lotuslandian pro-Media.

And we'll tell you all about it when after we have galloped past the four mile post....

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Casino Royale Running Wild....The Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 2

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille

Inspired by the most recent Document Dump Friday just past, which appears to have been designed to bury all pro-Media stories about the Purveyor of the Pleasure Palace, Paragon Gaming Inc. , the Marathon to do exactly the opposite has begun.....

(see sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to Monday's finish line)
*****

During Mile 1 of the Marathon we established a number of the non-reasons why Mr. Paul Fraser, the Province's erstwhile Lobbyist Registrar will NOT further investigate the Paragon Director's potential act of alleged lobbying for his company's proposed pleasure palace.....

So...

What is the actual reason?

Well, according to Mr. Fraser, in his letter to Mr. Spencer Chandra-Herbert of the NDP, dated yesterday, it is because he can't investigate anything done by anybody who had not, in point-of-fact, registered as a Lobbyist before April Fool's Day 2010.

In other words, because Mr. Turner had not registered before that date he is free and clear, no matter what he did, or did not, do......

Or some such codswallop (see below/click to expand and note, in particular, the passages outlined in red).



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Casino Royale Running Wild....Marathon To Promote Paragon, Mile 1

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille


So......

Inspired by the Document Dump Friday just past, which appears to have been designed to bury any and all stories about the Purveyor of the Pleasure Palace, Paragon Gaming Inc. , the Marathon to do exactly the opposite has just begun.....

(see sidebar for a mile-by-mile breakdown of the race to Monday's finish line)

*****

As we're sprinting as fast as we can't to get out in front of the non-existent proMedia pack, our thoughts have returned to.....

The decision of BC's Lobbyists Watchdog Paul Fraser to NOT investigate the actions of Paragon Director, current Chair of ICBC, and former Chair of the BC Lotteries Corporation, Mr. T. Richard Turner, when he called up the Minister Responsible for BC Place and, according to the Minister himself, but not Mr. Turner, said that the removal of the retractable roof from the gameplan would, allegedly, be a "deal breaker".

Which left us wondering, when we heard the breathless, if cryptic report, on the notsoGiant'98 yesterday afternoon, if Mr. Fraser's decision could possibly have based on any or all of the following possibilities:

1) Lobbying, schmobbying, there's money to be made here, and this is all good for everybody involved....

2) Who cares, for all intents and purposes the deal was already done....

3) An unequivocal statement from Mr. Fraser that, like Pavel Bure ten years before him, Mr. Turner "didn't do anything wrong"....


Well.

It turns out that the real answer is a most emphatic 'None-Of-The-Above'.

And we'll give you that answer, straight from the horse's/lobbyist registrar's mouth/pen, in Mile Two of The Marathon.....

....Coming up soon.

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Casino Royale Gone Wild... Document Dump Friday Triggers Marathon 'Till Monday...

PurveyorsOfPublically-PromotedPleasurePalaces
MustBeScrutinizedVille


So.....

If you've been trying to do your duty as a good citizen AND get through your week so that you could enjoy Friday night with the kids, or at the club, or......whatever.....you probably noticed the small flurry of stories in the proMedia yesterday noting the fact that British Columbia's Registrar of Lobbyists, Mr. Paul Fraser, has decided that he will not investigate the ramifications of a phone call that Mr. T. Richard Turner placed to the Minister responsible for BC Place regarding the retractable roof and its importance to his company's then still-pending proposal to build the Casino Industrial Complex right next door.

And, being the good citizen you are, you may have even spent a millisecond or considering the ramifications of that decision before you started watching The Sid-The-Kid Show and/or popped the first top on your Lost Weekend to come.

But what you probably didn't know, then or now, is that another story broke yesterday involving Mr. Turner and the crown corporation, PavCo, that actually made the decision to go forward with company, Paragon's, proposal to build the largest pleasure palace this province has ever seen.....

More on that document dump-spiked story coming soon which will be revealed in the early miles of the "Marathon to Promote Paragon" as we move, at the slow and not-so steady pace of a tortured turtle suffering from spin-induced Turette's syndrome, towards Monday's finish line...


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OMG! OMG! OMG!....Kelly Kapoor Loves VanCity!.... For Money!

AllTheProductPlacement
ThatFitsVille


Well, whaddy'a know.

Bob Mackin, writing in 24 Hours, lets us know that the government of The Great Manager, Mr. Gordon Campbell, coughed-up more than $17 million dollars of our money, at least in part, to entice NBC to insert a snippet of dialogue about Lotusland into an episode of their almost-hit TeeVee show "The Office" during the Olympics just past.

Which is all fine and good as far as it goes I suppose.

But.

How world class can we really be given that, not long ago, Winnipeg got an entire freaking episode?

And just how much did that One Great City have to pay for their entire day in the sun anyway?



______
I actually remember that line in that episode....Essentially, Steve Carrell's character calls up a Vancouver hotel to cancel a reservation during The Circus....At the time I actually figured that NBC was just shilling for its own coverage...I mean, imagine making a sweetheart deal/kickback wherein you get paid to pimp your own programming....Sheesh....No wonder Brian Williams, US American version, loved us so much in the end.....
Original Link Source to the Mackin story.....FABula.

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Kash Heed's Campaign Manager Says The Mojitos Made Him Do It...

AreCubanRumDrinksTheNew
CricketsVille


....Seriously:

"The only information I had on that (now dismantled) Facebook page was I had mojitos up there. That's all there was - pictures of mojitos from around the world," he (Mr. Heed's formerly missing-in-action Campaign Manager, Barinder Sall) said.



I'm telling you......

If PublicEye's Sean Holman hadn't demonstrated his bonafides a thousand times over already I'd be tempted to say he just made that quote up.

As for Mr. Sall himself.....

Well, I think I'll wait for a Google-Cached screen-shot before I make any decisions about the veracity, or not, of his claim.



_____
Oh, and here's a tidbit that, to the absolute very best of my knowledge, has never come up in any of the RailGate pre-trial hearings.... It comes, ironically enough, from Mr. Holman's vast archives, and is titled "David Basi, Mark II"?......

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Casino Royale Remembered....All The Bingo That Fits

Don'tKnowMuchAboutHistory
ButIDoKnowOneAndOneIsTwoVille


Well, well, well.....

The Edgewater Casino, whose license will soon be flipped into the massive Casino Industrial Complex adjoining the re-roofed Marshmallow, was conceived way back in 2003.

And, as Sean Holman reported yesterday, one of the conditions of the Edgewater's birthing was that its owners would also build a Charitable Bingo Facility*.

****

Who knew that taking care not to damage the Bingo business which, even now, generates large sums of money for various charities, from sports groups to daycare centers, was once an important issue to regulatory bodies and/or municipalities bent on trying to do the right thing.

And from a provincial point of view, it was ultimately the job of the BC Lottery Corporation to oversee the process and approve the new license for the Edgewater.

At that time, the fine folks from Vegas, Paragon Gaming Inc., together with the unknown investors hiding behind a Numbered Company and Mr. T. Richard Turner, did not yet own the Edgewater - they bought it in 2006 and promptly re-upped on the promise to build the Bingo Parlour as part of the license renewal process after the initial owners failed to follow through.

****

But here's the thing.

When the original deal went down and the BC Lottery Corporation approved the plan for the Edgewater, which included the then very controversial addition of slots as well as gaming tables (ie. it was a class '2' license), the man in charge was none other than Mr. T. Richard Turner.

Was there anything nefarious in that?

Of course not.

Especially given that the City, which was at that time being run by COPE/pre-Vision Vancouver, was also on board.

But here's something else kind of interesting that was also included in the City's Planning Document that Mr. Holman used as one of his primary sources for the Bingo post:

"....The casino proponents are seeking a permanent site for a new casino with a bingo facility. However, that project (site selection, programming, design, approvals, construction and occupancy) will take several years to accomplish. In the interim, the proponents wish to locate a temporary Casino - Class 2 at the Plaza of Nations....."


In other words, right from the beginning, the current Edgewater site was only meant to be a temporary home.

Which meant that whomever owned the Edgewater also owned a casino license that was built to move.

And that fundamental portability was as true in 2006, when Mr. T. Richard Turner bought into the then financially ailing Edgewater with Paragon and the Numbers, as it was back in 2003 when the very same Mr. Turner oversaw the deal in the first place.

Oh, and just in case you forgot, as Mr. Holman reported last week, Mr. Turner first bought into a separate, out-of-province casino project being run by Paragon way back in the year of.....

2003.

So.....

Is there anything nefarious in that?

Of course not.



______
*Andrea Woo, also noted this as well in her not-so-foolish April 1st VSun story on the Casino Industrial Complex announcement wherein she noted that the group involved, Planet Bingo, even now supports over 100 charities.....Clearly, the social safety net's dependence on this revenue stream is a lot more serious than being hooked on phonics.....

.

Casino Royale's Birth Pangs....Did Smilin' Sammy Ever Suffer From Morning Sickness?

AllTheAmendmentsThatFit
Sammy'sLastStandVille


Before we get going on the substance of today's post, let us first return to a portion of "A. Dave's" timeline, shown with bold headers below, that brackets many of the newly confirmed points that Sean Holman posted-up yesterday (in italics beginning with asterisks):

November, 2008: Province Treasury Board approves PavCo’s $365 million business case for all renovations noted above, with an estimate given by PavCo’s David Podmore that it will cost $200 million for the retractable roof alone – the approved business case is over $200 million higher than the original estimate of only 8 months prior.

* BC Pavilion Corporation (PavCo) issued by invitation, the RFP for 'General Contractor - Construction Management' of the BC Place Phase 2 Retractable Roof Construction project on November 3, 2008.

* The RFP closed November 17, 2008.

* PavCo signed a letter of intent to PCL on November 26, 2008.

* RFEI (Request For Expression of Interest) issued March 6, 2009 for Site 10A lands, based on renovations to BC Place, including a new retractable roof.

* RFEI closed March 27, 2009.

* Pre-qualified respondents to the Site 10a RFEI were short-listed and invited to respond to the RFP on April 20, 2009.

* On April 27, 2009 PCL completed pre-qualification reviews of the sub-trades for the retractable roof construction project.

* RFP for Site 10a development closed on May 22, 2009.

* June 29th, 2009, Paragon was notified of its selection as Preferred Proponent (subject to negotiation of an acceptable "Master Development Agreement").

October 23, 2009: Province reapproves PavCo’s revised business plan at $365 million, but only a month later a fixed-price contract to replace the roof (none of the other work is included) with Poole Construction is signed for $458 million – the roof work alone is suddenly $258 million more than Podmore’s $200 million estimate of only 11 months earlier.


Now......

Here's the thing - a close examination of the timeline above strongly suggests that the Casino always followed the Roof in it's conception (and thus the Casino always comes second so that it can help pay for the Roof.......yada, yada, yada).

But there is something missing in the timeline above.

Which is - when was the actual Casino itself first conceived of?

Well, in Municipal terms at least, it would appear that we can pinpoint that date to October of 2008, which would put it quite a bit higher up on the timeline.

Because that was when Sam Sullivan's soon-to-be-extinct Vancouver City Council approved an amendment to the North False Creek Official Development Plan, and inserted the following language into the section entitled: Land Use In False Creek North Generally; Cultural Recreational, and Institutional Uses Serving the City and Region (Section 3.5.2.2; pg 11; careful large pdf):

"...The proximity of the (BC Place) Stadium, General Motors Place, and Science World and their ready access to public transit, reinforces the role of the area as a centre for entertainment, sports, and cultural and public events, serving the City and region.

To enhance this role, Council may allow sub-area zonings to include other cultural and recreational facilities, including a major art gallery and a major casino......"


Interestingly, the term 'major casino' was not mentioned in the actual amendment as it pertains specifically to the potential non-residential uses of Area 10 (Section 3.4.3, pg 9 of document linked to above), which, as you can see in the Holman portion of the timeline above, is the chunk of land directly adjacent to BC Place Stadium where the Casino Industrial Complex will now be built and operated by Paragon Gaming Inc.

However, the term casino was used when the potential Non-Residential uses of the land specifically surrounding the Stadium were described in a separate slightly earlier City of Vancouver document - which was the original planning document dated Sept 3rd 2008 (see Section 2.2; Non-residential Uses; pg 11, smaller pdf).

So.

Why the uncoupling of any mention of the casino, specifically, from Area 10, as one moves from the planning document in September of 2008 to the official, Council-approved ammendment one month later October of 2008?

Well, I suppose one could argue that it may have been that the super sharp council of Mr. Sullivan just wanted to keep all of North False Creek's geographic options open for said concern.

Then again, if one were cynical, one might alternatively suggest that the switcheroo was done to help keep the Roof out in front of the Big Casino.

Because here is what Premier Gordon Campbell told us a few months earlier in May 2008, when he first announced the BC Place Stadium improvement scheme:

"This is something we believe every British Columbian will benefit from," he said B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell this morning, inside the 25-year-old stadium.

The changes include:

- Upgrades to the existing roof, in time for the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Olympics. Opening ceremonies organizers are happy with their preparations to date.

- There will be new concessions, improvements to seating, and a B.C.-style wood look to the interior of B.C. Place, in time for the opening ceremonies.

- A new retractable roof installed by 2011. It will be based on the canvas roof used in Frankfurt Germany.

- A new home for the Vancouver Art Gallery on the old Plaza of Nations site, with 320,000 square feet of space, twice the size of its current home on West Georgia.

- Creation of a cultural and retail hub outside the stadium.

- Possible high-rise condo development, on the B.C. government-owned site.


Now - the new Art Gallery is there, which turns up in the Amendment five months later....But can you find the word Casino anywhere in that statement by the good Premier?

Of course not.

In fact, truth be told, I, myself, took that last phrase in blue to mean that there was a condo-jacking on the way, as did former, pre-Smilin' Sammy City Councillor Anne Roberts.

Which could, based purely on the currently known, publically available facts at hand, have been the true intention at the time, I suppose.

Unless.....

Someone can now move the Casino's Conception, immaculate or otherwise, even further up the timeline ......

OK?

_____
So, how did I get onto all this City ammendment stuff anyway?.....Well turns out that I came across the following statement in PavCo's publically available 'Capital Project Plan' dated Dec 27th, 2008 (I'm sure Lotusland's hard working proMedia were really on the ball that day, the day after Boxing Day during the Big Snowmaggedon, eh?), "....the City of Vancouver approved the Official Development Plan (ODP) for a gross buildable area of 1,400,000 square feet in late Oct 2008...." which made me go searching - and sure enough that figure is in the section of the Amendment specifically pertaining to Area 10 (although it is in square meters not feet)....I also got a couple of very explicit follow-on nudges from 'Ian' in the comment threads, and whose blog is now linked to in the sidebar (EastOfTheSun)....
One final thought.....Can't help but wonder, given their now fully-documented penchant for getting together and making and deciding to appoint one of their members to call decision makers prior to deals going down for good, if any of the fine folks from Paragon, who had already purchased the teeny-tiny Edgwater Casino back in 2006, ever spoke to Mr. Sullivan, or any of Mr. Sullivan's 'people', about the amendment before it was passed on that fateful day in the Fall of 2008.....


.

Casino Royale Timeline Building, Part Deux.....

AllTheSpadeworkThatFits
SeanNotSamVille


Mr. Holman has added some small, but important, bricks here.

(Please see my update to a previous post, where this timeline seriously impacts one aspect of my original analysis of Bruce Hutchinson's NaPo piece from last week, here)


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Casino Royale Reconnected....When Did Discussions With The City of Vancouver Actually Begin?

WhichCityManagerIs
WhichVille

Yesterday, Bob Mackin, writing in 24 Hours, had an interesting little tidbit that was culled from current city manager Penny Ballem's recent appointment book schedule that he gained access to by FOI:

Vancouver’s city manager spent three hours gabbing about gambling on Feb. 25 (2010).

According to Penny Ballem’s calendar, obtained via Freedom of Information, she met with Housing and Social Development minister Rich Coleman about Hastings Racecourse before discussing the racino’s operating agreement with unnamed Great Canadian Gaming officials. She also had a conference call with Edgewater Casino president Scott Menke.....

Interesting that, no?

Especially when you recall that the good Mr. Menke is also the man from Las Vegas' Paragon Gaming Inc. that was present when Gordon Campbell and the fine folks from PavCo made the big announcement about the Casino Industrial Complex that will be built next to the BC Place Stadium and will ultimately use Edgewater's gaming license to operate.

But, given that the Casino Industrial Complex deal was essentially done by February of this year, one can only wonder if there were any discussions or contacts between the fine folks from Paragon and even finer folks from the City earlier than that?

After all, some pretty interesting, and important, decisions regarding where and how any and all Casino Industrial Complexes could be built next to the marshmallow were made a long time ago - well before Dr. Ballem became the City Manager.

OK?

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Casino Royale Report Card....Rating The Wretches, Ink-Stained And Otherwise, So Far

LetterGradesAren'tJustForHockeyPlayers
AnymoreVille


Jonathan Fowlie, VSun: D-
We would have given him an F for swiping all of Sean Holman's stuff, unattributed, but he moved up to supplemental status for being the first to get Mr. T. Richard Turner to quasi-contradict the Minister Responsible for the Marshmallow, Kevin Krueger, on the record.

Sean Holman, Public Eye Online: A
Mr. Holman has done essentially, ALL the digging on this deal....It was he who first revealed that Mr. T. Richard Turner is connected to the Las Vegas Casino Builder that 'won' the big bid to build the massive Casino Industrial Complex next to the Marshmallow that will soon be getting a new skin....It was also Mr Holman who first revealed that Mr. Turner has been involved with The Builder since 2003, at which time he, Mr. Turner, was still the Campbell Government-appointed Chair of the BC Lotteries Corporation....It was also Mr. Holman who first revealed that Mr. Turner, the Builders from Vegas, and, ultimately, a group of unknown folks hiding behind a Numbered Company all got together and bought the failing Edgewater Casino, whose license will be flipped into the new Casino next to the Marsmallow, back in 2006, a process that began (less than) seven months after Mr. Turner stepped-down as Chair of the BC Lottery Corporation... It was also Mr. Holman who first revealed that one of Mr. Turner's other companies (ie. not the one formed to buy the Edgewater) had given Mr. Gordon Campbell's BC Liberal Party $50,000 on, or just prior to, the day of the last provincial election......It was also Mr. Holman who confirmed, after it came up in the legislature during estimates debates, that Mr. Turner had arranged meetings between representatives of the fine folks representing the Builders from Vegas with the even finer folks that work for Mr. Warren Buckley, the current CEO of PavCo, which is the Campbell government-controlled CrownCo that a short time later awarded the winning bid to Mr. Turner, the fine folks from Vegas, and the unknown folks behind the Numbered Company. This all happened after the last provincial election and after the $50K was given to Mr. Campbell's political party and after Mr. Turner and friends had been identified as the 'preferred bidder' by PavCo but before the deal had actually gone down that was announced two weeks ago....Interestingly, it was not Mr. Holman who was first able to get Mr. Turner on the record contradicting Mr. Krueger because, unlike Mr. Fowlie of the VSun, whose soon to be previous parent company also once gave Mr. Gordon Campbell's BC Liberal Party $50,000, Mr. Holman's initial request for an interiew was spurned by Mr. Turner's people.*

Vaughn Palmer, VSun: B-
Mr. Palmer was caught, on the audio portion of a videotape, shot by, surprise!, Mr. Holman, going after Minister Krueger, hard, on this matter on the afternoon of the Thursday before the Good Friday just past....Mr. Palmer then stayed up late on the Eve of the long, long weekend and wrote a solid column in which he first credited Mr. Holman for breaking the story and then laid out a number of the possible conflicts associated with this matter.....So, why didn't we give Mr. Palmer a better grade?....Well, unfortunately, Mr. Palmer pulled back at the end of the column and he has since, especially in his statements on the (notso)Giant'98, lapsed into a non-committal, and some might say coquettish, 'this kind of thing happens all the time'-type mode.

Keith Baldrey, Global TeeVee: F-
Not only did Mr. Baldrey not weigh in on this matter at all initially, he actually did a wee bit of out-front water carrying for the Casino Industrial Complex in the days just prior to the breaking of the story.....Then, a week after the fact, he told Michael Smyth on the (ns)G'98 that the NDP did this kind of thing too way back when, so it doesn't really matter now anyway....

Michael Smyth, The Province and Goodship Watercarrier Fill-In: D+
Mr. Smyth just barely passes for telling us, repeatedly, that 'this story has legs'.....But he does not get to move up a grade until he, himself, actually starts digging and stops lapsing into faux populism wherein he makes mountains out of molehills, not to mention backyard chicken coops.

Justine Hunter, Globe and Mail: C
Had one decent story, based on her own interview with the good Mr. Turner, in which she got him to confirm that he likely called the Minister Responsible for the Marshmallow before the deal was finalized in the Fall of 2009....Now she, and her entire bureau, need to get down to brass-tacks and do some follow-up that will require spending a little time on their homework if they want to make the Principal's list at the end of the year.

Bruce Hutchinson, NaPo: B
Did no actual digging of his own, but did drop a big stinky one on much of the local Lotuslandian punditry with just one column... Most importantly, he actually followed the timeline all the way back to 2005/2006 and noted Mr. Turner's involvement with BCLC, the Builders from Vegas, and the Edgewater...Also noted that all this activity did, indeed, bracket, at least in terms of timing, that $50K donation to Mr. Campbell's political party...Lost marks for giving too much credit to Mr. Fowlie's allegedly awesome investigatory powers (possibly because they are in the same stable?).

Jill Bennett, nsG'98: F
Clearly spent too much time not paying attention in class.....After all, how else can one explain the fact that she got the basic facts wrong when, even as late as a week after the fact, she was still writing in her notebook that Mr. Turner is the Director of a company 'linked' to the casino development.....'Linked', Ms. Bennett?...Really?....We think, perhaps, that that word does not actually mean what you think it means....

Harvey Oberfeld, nolonger-proBloggodome: B+
Came back from holidays (he'd sent the teachers a note before he left, so it was OK for him to leave while school was in - barely) and immediately saw this matter for what it really is....As such, he boldly and unequivocally called for a full inquiry.

David Berner, nolonger-proBloggodome: B
Showed a little too much the world-weariness and cynicism that often besets the trouble-maker who fires off spit-balls from the back of the class but, still, like Mr. Oberfeld was willing to call a spade a spade and that counts - a lot.

Frances Bula, quasi-proBloggodome: B-
Her head has been somewhere else lately, and she has been spending way too much time on her French homework....But, still, she raised her hand a couple of times and helped get the kids in the class talking about this matter in earnest.....Also had the good graces to give her classmate Mr. Holman his due.

The Tyee, proBloggodome: DNW
DNW stands for 'Did Not Write' .....Unfortunately, there has has not been one story from this collective on the matter at hand so far....The only excuse that will be accepted is if it turns out that Mr. Beers et al. signed a non-aggression pact with Mr. Holman ahead of time....Otherwise, this will become a failing grade for all involved if the situation is not rectified, and soon.

City Caucus, b&pfBloggodome: Home Schooled
Like so many whose parents, guardians and protectors pull them out of the rough-and-tumble of the real world, Smilin' Sammy's former Spam-A-Lotteers are averting their eyes, plugging their ears, and covering their mouths on this one hoping, no doubt, that no one will notice that it was actually their former(?) boss who ammended the City of Vancouver's Official Development Plan for 'Area 10' of the North False Creek area in Oct of 2008 such that it cleared the decks for the building of the Casino Industrial Complex itself.....(you'll read more on that matter later, but not likely at City Caucus we reckon).



_____
*So.....Why didn't we give Mr. Holman an A+?.....Well, this is only the end of the first term, and we don't want him to stop digging now.....

Did we get something wrong?....Or....Did we miss one of the pupils?.....Let us know in the comments....Or.....You can always send us an Email to pacificgazette at yahoo dot ca if you are worried about being bullied by one of your classmates....

Already made one correction (Monday morning)....Changed the 'revealed', which was written originally, to 'confirmed' regarding Mr. Holman's role in establishing that Mr. Turner did, indeed, help arrange meetings between Paragon and PavCo.....

.

Casino Royale Reconnected....Mr. Turner Did Not Phone Alone

WhenIsAConferenceCall
NotVille

(Tues Apr 13, 2010: Please see Update at the Bottom of Thread)

It turns out, according to an interview he gave to the NaPo's Bruce Hutchinson recently, that the idea to call up the Minister Responsible for the Marshmallow, Mr. Kevin Krueger, was not actually Mr. T. Richard Turner's alone.

Instead, Mr. Turner first got together with his good friends from Paragon Gaming Inc. and they made a collective (hey! isn't that something socialists do?) decision to call up Mr. Krueger and tell him that, according to Mr. Krueger, but not quite according to Mr. Turner, it would be a 'deal breaker' for the Casino builders if the people of British Columbia didn't pony up and build them a $500 million (and climbing) retractable roof

He (Mr. Turner) raised the matter with his fellow directors at Paragon. "It was decided that I should call the minister responsible [for gambling in B.C., Kevin Krueger]. We decided it was my role, this time," Mr. Turner said yesterday.

Hmmmmm......

'this time'?

Does that mean that it happened before?

And if so, what was the role, or what were the roles, the previous times?

And who carried them out?

And when did they happen?

And who did they who carried out these roles call and/or meet with?

Perhaps Mr. Turner was referring to those 'meetings' that he set-up between the fine folks from Paragon and the guy charged with taking care of BC Place for the people of British Columbia, PavCo's CEO Mr. Warren Buckley?

Or was he referring to something else?

****

I do have to hand it to Mr. Hutchinson because, unlike the vast majority of the local Lotuslandian pro-Media types round here, he momentarily makes like Sean Holman and actually takes the timeline back to 2005/6 when he points out that Mr. Turner was the Campbell government-appointed chair of the BC Lottery Corporation shortly before he bought into the ailing Edgewater Casino with the fine folks from Paragon.

And Mr. Hutchinson even asked Mr. Turner about that too.....

....In 2006, ICBC chairman Turner joined the board of ParagonCanadaHoldingsULC, a division of Las Vegas-based Paragon Development Ltd. The company had just bought a failing casino in downtown Vancouver. Mr. Turner's "role," he said in his interview, was explaining to Paragon local perspectives and matters of community interest. He saw no conflict doing that while serving the province as ICBC chairman. No rules were broken, no code of conduct guidelines were crossed, he said. "I was not [made a Paragon director] to do government relations," he said yesterday.....


So, there's that word 'role' again.....

And how, exactly did Mr. Turner inform the folks from Vegas (ie. Paragon) about "local perspectives and matters of community interest" without explaining and/or relating matters of government, given that such matters were all important to fixing the failing casino?

After all, at that time, 2006, neither the City, nor the Province would allow for an expansion of the Edgewater to make it more profitable and, as we have already established, one of Paragon's specialties as casino turn-around artists is to "takeover and build".

However, there was one thing that Mr. Hutchinson missed, which is also based on the reporting of Mr. Holman.

And that is the fact that Mr. Turner was also involved with the fine folks from Vegas on a casino project in Alberta starting in 2003 at a time when Mr. Turner, as Chair of the BC Lotteries Corporation, essentially was THE lead government representative on all matters pertaining to the running gambling houses in this province.

*****

There is one more kicker in Mr. Hutchinson's NaPo piece that I did not know, or had missed, in all the previous reportage on this matter....

According to Mr. Hutchinson, it turns out that Mr. Turner and the fine folks from Vegas (ie. Paragon) and, presumably the fine, yet still shadowy, folks we can't quite see hiding behind a numbered company that were also involved in the purchase of the Edgewater in 2006 were actually 'invited' to bid on the massive Casino Industrial Complex in early 2009.

.....Early last year, Paragon was invited to bid on a new casino and hotel project proposal, to be built on Crown land next to provincially owned B.C. Place stadium. The province had determined its domed stadium needs a half-billion dollar retractable roof; lease payments and gambling revenues from an entertainment complex next door are to help cover the enormous cost

The casino plan was not made public until last month.....


So.

Who, exactly, did that inviting* I wonder?


_____
As promised, the post on how Smilin' Sammy Sullivan and his Merry Band of Sycophants 'ammended' the North False Creek Official Development Plan so that 'Area 10' (eg. the land surrounding BC Place Stadium) could become the site of a massive Casino Industrial Complex back in the Fall of 2008 is coming soon....Interesting the timing that, no?, given the 'invitation' mentioned directly above....And what have we heard from Sammy's former Spam-A-Lotteers on this matter?.....Still Crickets.....Although, of course, they are out their full court wurlitizering for Sammy's alleged slam dunk shot at the GG slot and they are outraged, like Michael Smyth apparently, about the prospect of backyard chicken coops in Lotusland...
*Sean Holman, in the comments, points out that despite the fact that Mr. Hutchinson actually used the word 'invited' it is possible that this could actually just mean that the fine folks from Paragon, which included Mr. Turner just may have taken the official call for proposals from PavCo as an indication of an 'invite'......I responded with a tongue-in-cheek rejoinder, but without further clarification (ie. how about if somebody were to ask the good Mr. Buckley?), it is a fair enough point.
Update, (Tues Apr 13, 2010): Regarding the "invite", it turns out that Mr. Hutchinson may have been referring to the second stage of the application process wherein the groups that originally responded to a request for proposals in a first stage were wittled down by PavCo....Sean Holman has a timeline up that includes the open and closing dates of each stage, which are all incredibly close together for such a complex and costly project here.

.