About the Mississauga Muse
UPDATE: December 21, 2008. It’s taken me over two years to compile the necessary videotape to reach the point where I am finally able to crystalize my relationship with the City of Mississauga into five seminal minutes of citizen-disconnect.
I knew in preparing this video that I was also speaking for many of those citizens banned, charged with trespass and arrested by City of Mississauga Corporate Security guards while on City Property.
You will better understand this video when you know that despite Mississauga Corporate Security’s claims about being “professionals”, City of Mississauga’s “in-house” security guards (officially referred to as Mississauga Corporate Security) have neatly avoided the licensing, standards, Code of Conduct, and especially the independent Provincial complaints procedure introduced in Bill 159, the Private Security and Investigative Services Act, 2005.
In addition, Freedom of Information has confirmed that no entity or individual has ever looked into their conduct and operations, or analyzed Mississauga Corporate Security’s records of bans, trespasses and arrests to evaluate fairness in the treatment of citizens (and Youth in particular).
In this video, Mississauga City Manager, Janice Baker states, “Our values are universal”.
Freedom of Information has confirmed that indeed they are. As a consequence, Mississauga’s “universal” values will be the primary focus of MISSISSAUGAWATCH’s Freedom of Information research in 2009.
Does your municipality hire “in-house” security guards and therefore successfully avoid the oversight and accountability measures in Bill 159, the Private Security and Investigative Services Act, 2005?
And now (finally) the “About The Mississauga Muse” video—two years and seven months in the making.
Music “Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)” by Mickey Newbury. Album: Winter Winds
Just dropped in to see what Condition MISSISSAUGA CORPORATE SECURITY was in (4:47 min)
(HIGH QUALITY VIEWING)
(Click here to go directly to the clip on YouTube and Google Video)
(The original “About The Mississauga Muse” from June 29, 2008 at 9:01 am follows)
Hi, I’m the Mississauga Muse.
I originally started blogging at the Mississauga News blog site, but as things got more involved I needed a separate home for the Muse. This is it.
Rather than write a new introduction from scratch, I thought I’d be err umm “efficient”, so what follows is the original “About Me” that I did for the Mississauga News:
I’ve been asked to write an “ABOUT ME” for this Blog.
I was at a loss so I read the “ABOUT ME”s for Mississauga News Bloggers, Craig MacBride, Gary McCarthy and John Stewart –but that really didn’t help. Those three are professional writers and I’m just this –this citizen, you know?
Anyway, here goes –ABOUT ME.
I looked up “citizen” in an online dictionary:
Main Entry: cit·i·zen
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English citizein, from Anglo-French citezein, alteration of citeien, from cité city
and defines “citizen” as:1 : an inhabitant of a city or town; especially : one entitled to the rights and privileges of a freeman
I don’t like that definition that much because, while it contains the concepts of “rights” and “privileges”, it fails to mention “responsibilities”. Citizens have responsibilities.
I’m ashamed to admit that I ignored the “responsibilities” of a citizen for decades. Like many people, I pretty much limited my responsibilities to local government by voting for Hazel McCallion each election and making sure not to litter.
I’m also ashamed to admit that just three years ago, I didn’t even know who my Councillor was. I thought “Council” was made up of Mayor, some Councillors and that’s it. The holes in my municipal knowledge could not only rival the holes it takes to fill Albert Hall, they could –if combined, create their own massive Black Hole all by themselves.
I knew ZIP about Municipal Governance and didn’t feel I needed to. After all, the Good Hearts at City Hall were the experts and like so many of my fellow citizens, I’d entrust them to take care of our interests.
I had permanent front row seats on the La-Dee-Dah Oblivion Express –and I’m here to tell you, it was mighty-no-elbow-room-crowded up there with so many other Mississaugans on the same shuttle bus!
Then something happened.
The only thing I can equate “something happened” to is –you know that part in the Wizard of Oz where Dorothy, The Lion and The Tin Man quake at the sight of the Great Wizard of Oz? He’s all frightening and green-looking on the screen? Scowling countenance? Deep menacing voice? Spikes of fire bursting forth?
The Lion twisting his tail almost wetting himself in sheer terror?
*GULP*
And just when you think that the Great Wizard on the Wizard-Screen can’t get any more-scarier, he does? And you hide your eyes? Or hide behind your mom?
And then Toto pulls the curtain aside to reveal a harmless old man working the screen’s special effects –AND reveals, (best of all), that there’s really no Great Mega-Scary Mega-Malevolent Wizard?
Sure you do –EVERY one knows THAT part!
OK.
Now imagine The Opposite.
Dorothy, The Lion and The Tin Man see the face of a kindly old man on the screen. He smiles, reassures and smiles some more. All is well. They step closer. Then Toto pulls back the curtain and–
ACCCCKK!!
Now, you know “ABOUT ME”.
Ursula Bennett
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17 Responses to “About the Mississauga Muse”
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Hi, i’m a resident of Malton so I read with interest your blog about the sign posted at the entrance of the Malton Community Centre. The people of Malton have always felt separate from the rest of Mississauga. This sign is just another reminder that we are treated a little different from the rest of the city. Whether it’s plans for a needed police station, shelved due to bugetary constraints, or transit plans that never make it to here; we are treated different. As an aside Ms. Adams is the wrong person to ask about concerns in ward 5, my only question to her was answered by a terse question demanding to know what my address is, not provided of course. Thx.
Hey there Carlo,
Thanks so much for taking the time to write. Just a heads up for you to check out the Mississauga News. Currently there are two articles with special relevance to the Malton community.
Here ya go.
Murders have Hazel calling the police
and
Chief will hold sit down with mayor
Also, you might want to read my Blog from today. Seems a dude named Bob feels that you’re a tad negative… I sure vented my spleen but you might want a tender moment with him too.
Here ya go. Malton: On Matters of (in)Security
Signed,
The (I hear ya, Carlo) Mississauga Muse
Hi,
I think I saw you at the Mississauga South debate last night? I was sitting at the end of the second row and submitted a written question attacking the Conservatives, but they didn’t ask it.
Hey there, Peter.
Yeah, I was there. Wearing my citizen watchdog “uniform” –a red CANADA cap and a bright orange windbreaker.
I was the one who asked the politicians to define “accountable” for me. They all flunked.
Each Party sprinkled fairy B.S. dust around and that was all.
So. You got me curious. What was your question?
Signed,
The Mississauga Muse
Well, the Canada Elections Act was modified for elections to be on set dates, with the first one in October, 2009, this is still 2008. The only way that there can be an election is if there is a vote of non-confidence, which there wasn’t. This election is illegal.
My question was directed at Hugh Arrison, and was “How does the Conservative Party, as a party, not as a potential government, plan on repaying the 3.5 million dollar cost of this election to Canadians”.
*I also had the word “Illegal” between “this” and “Election” in my actual question
Hey again, Peter and thanks for writing back.
So you tried an accountability question on the neo-conservatives, huh? I tried something similar in the Provincial election.
Sent my question to mississauga.ca (even videotaped me doing it and YouTubing the whole thing as proof) asking each candidate’s position on Allowing the Ontario Ombudsman into the M.U.S.H. Sector.
I knew it’d never get picked because The City of Mississauga would “download” into its collective drawers at the spectre of legitimate accountability.
That’s the thing with government (all three levels and all parties). The Law doesn’t apply to them.
Just to us-proles.
Signed,
The (‘illegal’ was a nice touch…) Mississauga Muse
Even if you’re wrong I am on your side for your right to be different. Keep going on, this city has been sleeping for more than 30 years. No matter how GOOD or GOD someone is, no matter how gifted and skilled, it’s impossible and it’s crazy to keep the same mayor for 30 years. Change should be done as a sanitation measure inside City Hall and outside on our streets. We’ve came to this self sufficiency whithout realizing there’s so many things we can do.
Thank you!
Hi there xavier and thanks for writing. Being pretty much a lone voice, your words mean a lot. (We talked story at the February Mississauga Community Engagement Visioning Charrette, right?)
I especially appreciate you writing:
Easy to support people who you believe are right, huh? Even easier to support people who 90% of voters think is right.
You’re a Brother. I too am on the side of people who are different.
We live in such a hypocritical city. City politicians and bureacraps alike, make noises about how we should “Embrace Diversity” —and then they go to great lengths to squelch those with a Different Voice. (Donald Barber comes immediately to mind.)
You wrote:
Agreed. That’s the point I made repeatedly in my Toronto Star comments. We’d all knowingly smirk if we read about some Southern US town/city who had the same mayor for 30 years. We’d sniff and get all “Canadian” about our superior Canadian poltical system and yet look how many hail Hazel McCallion’s decades-long grip on Ontario (Yes. “Ontario”)
You wrote:
Actually, xavier, based on observation as well as mountains of Freedom of Information results, McCallion leaving will not make a difference to Mississauga. I’m convinced that this city has been a Company Town since The Streetsville Gang “Borg”ed Mississauga back in 1978.
The Corporation (Senior-Staff) already have their mayor-successor in mind. That person (whoever it is) will run things as Hazel McCallion did keeping citizens/media in the dark about the City’s true conduct and operations. (It is not in the interest of The Corporation to have a McCallion successor whose first action upon election would be to fling open the shutters, open the books and allow sunlight into Misissauga’s 30 years of “Trust, Quality, Excellence” doing things.
To be fair, this secretive, duplistic, contemptuous way that we are governed is not exclusive to Mississauga. It’s the blight of many an Ontario local government. I know this through my Freedom of Information requests “targeted” at several muniicipalities.
None of this can be changed because as I told a Freedom of Information official in another municipality just today, the sewage festering (as the result of the 2001 Municpal Act and absolute non-oversight) has made many a municipal government “morally beyond redemption”.
It would take courageous political will at the Provincial level to turn Ontario around and it’s just not there.
Bottomline, xavier, we’re frikkin’ doomed in Ontario. Especially the “Different” and DOUBLEPLUS-especially the Different who are also Poor. Freedom of Information hints that they’re the ones screwed over the most.
Me, last couple of months, it’s obvious now. This public-service-rot cannot be changed because it’s just so entrenched. And there’s no media —not even the Toronto Star, or CBC. They’re at best, champions of small causes.
As just this-citizen, all I can do is research, document, then research some more.
And commit to bearing witness.
Here’s why.
(Click here to go directly to the clip on YouTube or Google Video)
Peace, xavier and thanks Brother.
Great investigative work, great instincts, and good writing… except for all the informalities. That is simply annoying and leads to wandering eyes.
Drop the uber-casual verbiage and you will be taken much more seriously. And you deserve to be taken more seriously.
Hi Anon and thanks for your comments,
You wrote:
As I mentioned in the “About Me” part, something happened to this almost-60 year old female retired teacher and it’s like this miraculous transformation occurred. I see —as in “I get It”-see.
My husband and I are lay people who initially had to convince scientists to take our underwater observations of sea turtles seriously. One Honolulu-based researcher took us under his wing and mentored us. He taught us how to collect data, analyze, check, double and then triple-check.
His name is George Balazs and he’s with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).
“Do your homework” is his mantra.
Not only did he insist on us triple-checking everything, even after we sent him data that was triple-checked, he’d still ask us if we were “sure-sure”.
“Are you sure-sure?” “Do your homework”
Even while I’m here in Canada, he’s always inside my head whether I’m working on sea turtle stuff or chipping away at (Ontario) municipal Big Brother security operations.
Yes. I know —Hazel McCallion tells her Staff to “Do your homework” but Balazs conducts random checks on our data to make sure that we were doing our homework —even when we told him that we were “sure-sure”.
So yes, I try for “Great investigative work, great instincts”…” because more than anything that’s what Science is. And to educate citizens about their Ontario municipal evil empires will take Science.
You wrote:
I agree completely that my uber-casual verbiage results in people dismissing me —just as the way I dress must surely signal “60′s reject sh**-disturber”.
This website, mississaugawatc.ca is very much a mirror of our sea turtle website, Turtle Trax —informal and as much as possible we try to write at Grade 6 readability —approaching functional literacy. (We actually ran 100 word paragraphs into readability checkers just to make sure).
This Blog, Mississauga Musings is also a mirror of my husband’s Blog at Turtle Trax. Informally-informative, funny, sometimes off-the-wall.
That informality belies our more disciplined focussed side. We’ve authored and co-authored scientific papers as well as collaborated on numerous sea turtle research projects in the Hawaiian Islands.
Just so you know, my “uber-casual” venting-informality is also my therapeutic way of coping with the ultra-uber-doubleplus-pathological-contemptuous way that Ontario municipal governments treat us-citizens (especially those “at-risk” who need Government most).
Just so you and others know, all my current investigations into Ontario municipal government focus on the impact to the Poor, the Under-educated and at-risk Youth (aka: our Ontario screwed-over unter-class).
It has always been my goal to write up all observations/investigations (Mississauga Crime Prevention Association/Safe City Mississauga, Mississauga Youth Plan, Mississauga Corporate Security, Peel Youth Violence Prevention Network, Ontario Municipal Security operations, Video Surveillance —municipal, not Police, etc etc etc) and post all my Freedom of Information results online.
When all the data has been compiled, checked, double-triple checked and that I’m “sure-sure” —at that point my husband’s writing skills kick in. He’s a technical writer and primary author of our book, “A Book of Honu” published by University of Hawaii Press.
While we could write a book on Ontario municipal malgovernance, neither of us believe for a single minute that anyone would have the guts to publish it.
But we plan to write the equivalent of “scientific papers” (consolidated reports complete with video documentation) on our governance findings. I fully intend on delivering a few of these future reports personally to certain “Look the Other Way” politicians.
I keep reading your, “Drop the uber-casual verbiage and you will be taken much more seriously.”
You’re right. But…
Ever watch the Jon Stewart Show? Or the Stephen Colbert Report? Or Rick Mercer? THAT’S what I want this Blog to be like,
The Truth is in shows like Stewart, Colbert, Mercer, and not CP-frikkin’-24, 680-You-Call-That-News? and *chortle-snicker* Rogers Cable 10 Mississauga (which sadly, pathetically, people do take seriously).
Today’s media isn’t the Edward R. Murrow media. Today’s media have betrayed us. Today’s media are as tainted and contemptuous of us-citizens as our frikkin’ evil empire tainted and contemptuous governments.
My own Freedom of Information results confirm the Betrayal of Media. Why?
Because what Freedom of Information has documented as happening at the municipal level could not be happening if citizens were served by media with something resembling conscience (never mind the vigilant, courageous Edward R. Murrow kind of media)
I can promise you this, Anon. Next time I’m doubleplus p***ed-off enough to want to fling “uber-casual verbiage” into the fan, I’ll ponder your wise coaching.
It’s just so damn-depressing, Anon, to get pushed, shoved, lied to, then lied to some more, then lied to in an entirely new way, then have denials of being lied to, then be bullied some more by (excuse me, but this one is necessary) frikkin’ contemptuous-to-the-public, evil empire government KNOBS.
There’s only one thing worse, Anon and it makes me craaaaaaaaaazy.
Being forced to watch in silence as others get pushed, shoved, lied to, then lied to some more, then lied to in an entirely new way, then have denials of being lied to, then be bullied some more by frikkin’ contemptuous-to-the-public, evil empire government KNOBS.—whose mandate it is to serve them.
Hunnnnhhh…
It’s funny, Anon. All those years of coaching to keep my emotions in check from my sea turtle mentor and I reach this point writing to you about “being forced to watch in silence as others get pushed, shoved, lied to, then lied to some more, then lied to in an entirely new way, then have denials of being lied to, then be bullied some more” —all this rrrrrraaaaaage re-awakens…
Please believe when I say I have lived the Roots of Youth Violence…
Peace, friend. And above all, work Together for Truth.
To Anon who wrote me back on November 29th, 2008 9:44 am.
I hope that you still log on here every once in a while. I’ve been thinking about what you’ve said ever since I first read it. The part where you wrote:
I just want you to know that something happened just now that forced me to decide between easy-breezy “uber-casual verbiage” and being the best possible advocate that I can be for alienated at-risk youth.
I had to finally decide what was important to me. Simple.
And that means I have to “Drop the uber-casual verbiage”…
Thanks so much for taking the time to advise me,
Ursula
The Mississauga Muse
I hear you, nuf said. Affordable housing is a real kettle of smelly fish in Peel. 37 million plus for 200 senior units and a Brampton city parking lot when the project started out at 21 million really smells, especially when it was direct negotiated. The peel john street project is a propoganda machine that sucks up the taxpayer funds. With the “boyz” helping to secure approvals and Councillors son on the contractor payroll, it more insestual than cozy. On another point, Kolb sure knows how to lay the farmer thang on thick as he sucks up to developers for his hootenanny and carries the big stick with the police. No one wants to mees with him…he’s sure got him a sweet deal.
The City of Mississauga considering closing the Sheridan Branch Library. There will be a public meeting held on April 6th from 7 to 9 pm at the Sheridan Branch.
Thank you for attending the public meeting regarding the Sheridan Branch Library yesterday.
Mississauga Muse – after reading your blogs and efforts the past month I have to tell you how thankful I am for your efforts and how fortunate our community is that you would go to such lengths and expense.
There is a new book being wrapped up on the MFP inquiry and how difficult it was to get people to believe in the wrongdoing. Your book (push push) will have some wonderful tales to tell.
Thanks again.
I find that the city of Mississauga makes a huge effort to keep it’s residents mis-informed. And the media (i.e. Mississauga News) is not vigilant enough to ask the tough questions of our representatives. I’m so tired of the sense of entitlement some of these councillors have. Many of them don’t even need to fight for their seats since people just vote in whoever was there before.
Sorry for the 2 AM rant.
My question is, is there a way for us citizens to collectively list the issues at hand and report all the city meetings and issues for everyone? Especially with the election coming up in 2010, the public needs to be informed. One election issue that I can already think of is the fact that city council voted unanimously to stop citizens from questioning items being raised in council.
Sorry. Ranting again… Why did we give these guys 4 years instead of 3?