December 7 2016
Posted by Carlos Obregon on Dec 07, 2016
At this Wednesday's meeting, we had 15 members present. We had three guests, Alan Reynolds, who is a charter member of our club and Anthony Kupferschmidt, who is the Executive Director of the West End Seniors Network and our guest speaker Jordan Bateman, from the Canadian Taxpayer Federation.
The 4-way test was read by all members in perfect sync ;)
Rotary Moment:
Matthew Lynam will be doing the Rotary moment this month. Today he told us about a program called Smile, from Amazon. With this program, you choose a charity of your choice, such as the Rotary Foundation, and Amazon will donate a portion of your purchases to that charity. For more details visit: https://smile.amazon.com/
Announcements:
- Lawrence and Bev hosted a wonderful Christmas party for all members. Those who attended report having had a blast and having enjoyed incredible food!
- We will be providing Eggnog and punch for the west end seniors on Sunday at 10am at the Coast hotel on Comox Street. 1763 Comox St, Vancouver, BC V6G 1P5
- Sheila will be travelling to Mexico next month to visit "Project Amigo". She requests that we donate children and young adult clothes that she can take there.
- We are celebrating our clubs' 30th anniversary next month. Our celebration party will be on Wednesday January 18th 2017. Stay tuned for more details!
Meeting - Our guest speakers today was Jordan Bateman, from the BC chapter of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. This is a citizens advocacy group dedicated to lower taxes, less waste and accountable government. They are a federally incorporated, non-profit organization that has 30,156 donors across the country and is governed by a five-person board of directors.
He spoke about the Teddy Awards. The "Teddies" are awarded to government entities and politicians wasteful spending or high taxes. Founded in 1999, The Teddies are named after Ted Weatherill, a former Chairman of the Canada Labour Relations Board who was terminated in 1998 for expenses incompatible with his position. The expenses included $150,000 in meals over eight years and over $700 for a lunch in Paris.
This year the Federal Government Teddy went to Canada’s delegation to the 2014 conference numbered 69 people – but the new Trudeau government quadrupled that figure to 283 for the 2015 event. The total bill for taxpayers has yet to be tallied, but the costs from one Ministerial office alone ran to $282,000.
The Provincial Government Teddy went to Prince Edward Island’s Department of Tourism and Culture. They printed 180,000 copies of their 2015 tourism guide. The cover features a man and a woman relaxing on a sandy PEI beach, with the woman reading a book and the man in shorts laying back and relaxing. Unfortunately, the department clearly failed to notice a significant “bulge” in his shorts that appears to be an erection.
The Municipal Teddy went to The City of Calgary spent an extra $246,000 on a project to embed LED lights on its new Forest Lawn Lift Station that change colour depending on how fast the station is pumping waste water.
The positive side of all of these awards is that they are almost never any repeat winners. Which would indicate that the wasteful entities actually change their ways after "winning" one of these awards.
Pics from the meeting:
The thought of the Day:
The best things in life are tax-free.
Anonymous
Next 3 Speakers:
14-Dec - Business Meeting
21-Dec - Nick Parker "The holiday season"
4- Jan - Ron Suzuki Classification Talk
Important Links:
Set up your Rotary foundation donation via credit card: Just click here