No person should be surprised when Community Living British Columbia next puts its large insensitive foot into another sticky situation. Friday, after the CLBC tossed CEO Rick Mowles, Board Chair Denise Turner said about the firing,
There’s no connection at all between ‘outside noise‘ and our decision.
Hope Taylor, mother of a CLBC client, took great offence to that characterization:
CLBC is here to serve us, the families and the self-advocates. We are not outside noise.
Turner’s statement demonstrates her lack of respect for the dignity of citizens served by CLBC. Then, what else should we expect from a super-rich socialite who spends more each month on Mr. Reg, her hair stylist, than some agency clients receive in benefits. CLBC is mostly a plaything while Turner pursues other business activities. One company she and T. Richard Turner share an interest in is TitanStar Properties Inc (formerly DPVC Inc.) According to its information, the corporation’s aim is to create a portfolio of real estate assets in the United States and to:
Use the combined contact base of the partners to purchase “stressed” assets from banks, private lenders and brokers prior to these assets being offered at auction or generally to the public.
T. Richard Turner, readers might recall, was the major BC Liberal donor involved with the Paragon Gaming proposal that was a fundamental part of early BC Liberal plans for a renovated BC Place. It too was one of those deals not “offered at auction or generally to the public.” Political blogger Ian Reid gave the real story:
“It’s also a proposal that resembles BC Rail in more ways than you can count – a deal constructed in the backrooms that benefits a major Liberal Party funder using a process that appears to have been fixed from the get go.”
Reid points out that Mr. Turner did not register as an appointee to the Lottery Corp. board as required and his interest in Paragon was kept secret for a year and a half after it was acquired:
Between 2003 and 2005 T. Richard Turner held an undisclosed interest in Paragon Gaming’s Canadian Arm. Sometime in 2005 Paragon decided to make a bid for the financially troubled Edgewater Casino. As a casino operator, Edgewater would have been obligated to provide the Lottery Corporation with its financial information from it’s inception in 2004. Turner, as Corporation chair, would have had access to at least some of that information.
It’s a classic material conflict of interest. In Ontario it’s illegal – Lottery Board appointees are specifically prohibited from such conflicts. In BC that pattern gets you appointed Chair of ICBC after you resign as Chair of BC Lottery Corporation in December 2005, a month after your company initiates its takeover of Vancouver’s major casino.
There is of course no logical reason for non-elected part-timer Denise Turner to be overseeing an important public function. CLBC exists to shield the Liberal government, adding layers to absorb blame before politicians and departmental managers feel the heat for service failures. It achieves a secondary purpose for the BC Liberal Party by allowing rewards to be channelled from public funds to loyal party supporters, many of whom return part as political contributions.
We’ve looked here at the extraordinary payments made to BC Ferries directors and the BC Hydro board has been a subject of discussion for similar reasons. Throughout this provincial government there are many agencies spreading cash to party supporters under various pretexts. The head spins.
Here is an example of the 2011 report of payments made to CLBC board members. You might note that payments are made for expenses, retainers and meetings.
These were salaries of the six highest paid CLBC executives in 2011:
| Rick Mowles | $ 210,393 |
| Ian Scott | $ 159,865 |
| Carol Goozh | $ 156,826 |
| D.R. Woolard | $ 155,311 |
| Richard Hunter | $ 153,947 |
| Paul Sibley | $ 152,552 |
Categories: BC Liberals, Gambling
in-sights.ca 
Yes, a low-life comment that reeks of insensitivity. But, put that together with the even more egregious statement explaining a Turner strategy of doing business. They promised investors in their company they would “Use the combined contact base [the insiders' benefit] of the partners to purchase “stressed” assets… prior to these assets being offered… to the public.”
Revealed is a strategy of political insiders: use your contacts to make advantageous deals not available to people without the attachment influences.
This has been the way business is done in the Campbell/Clark Liberal governments. It has been a bonanza for promoters and asset flippers who make their money on insider deals, then walk away leaving someone else to worry about whether the business works or not. For example, many Liberal friends scored major dollars setting up IPP deals but, they walk away rich, BC Hydro will have to make the operations work.
The Turners and Paragon Gaming might have gained very large at BC Place except for the work of online journalists who made the attempted corruption so clear it could not be ignored.
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what a low-life comment to make. Another Marie Antoinette
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It sure does seem as if the BC Liberals are not only incompetent, but also incontinent as well.
No other organiztion I have heard of, has ever come close to fouling it's own nest like the BC Liberal government does – and does it very well.
Thanks
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Yet again, another good reason to drive the Campbell/Clark BC Liberals out of our province. Everything they touch, they foul.
Ms. Taylor comment on the radio, reminds me of Christy on the radio.
The people from this province count for nothing. BC citizens are just to thieve from. Problem is, there are not enough BC people in work, to pay for all of the Campbell/Clark BC Liberals corruption.
The governing officials obscene salary's, gold plated pensions, CEO, white collar crimes and Campbell's thefts of our assets and resources, the BC citizens have been taxed and thieved to death. NOR, will we forget Harper's part in the theft of the HST from the BC citizens either. Harper is another great dictator.
While the BC Liberals are thieving from us…The services we pay through the nose for are slashed.
Harper and Campbell's forcing the HST on us is criminal. They used to call this extortion. Harper and Campbell made it legal to steal from the people.
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Well done….Time to make alot more “Outside noise”
Cheers
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Norm, thanks for a very important piece. Especially revealing the despicable “business” that the CLBC chair Taylor and her husband engage in surreptitiously. The work you do on your Blog is very important.
I too heard the comment by Ms. Taylor on the radio. I was appalled at the derogatory reference to “outside noise”. Notice how the mainstream news media made nothing of these remarks, just reported them? Shame on them once again. Mouth-pieces.
Does this Marie Antoinette wanna-be (chair Denise Turner) not get the fact that those people “outside” making the “noise” are members of the public, whom she is paid to serve???
And great thanks to Hope Taylor for raising the point on behalf of all people who unfortunately need the support of this PUBLIC agency.
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One year ago, the BC Rail Political Corruption trial in BC Supreme Court, Vancouver, was shut down, whammo! just like that.
Our best response to that brutal act of BC Liberal self-preservation would be to launch a Public Inquiry into how BC Rail slid from public ownership into private pockets.
Write, telephone, discuss, OCCUPY — whatever you can do, now is the time to do it. Even if it's one year later.
Thanks, Norm.
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