Dec 212012
 

How Sir Ian Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Suz (with apologies)

T’was the night before Christmas in old Aberdeen
Or should I say Whoodville, yes, that’s what I mean
Every Whoodie in Whood-ville
Liked Christmas a lot…
But Sir Ian Grinch
Did not like it one jot!

The town settled down for a long winter’s nap
Except for this one crinkly, creaky old chap
Sir Grinch hated Christmas! It might be because
He didn’t believe in a Sanity Clause

The children were nestled all snug in their beds
But Sir Ian Grinch was pacing instead.
Perhaps Ian’s head wasn’t screwed on quite right.
It could also be he was simply just tight.
But I think that the most likely reason of all
Was the Whoodies in Whoodville said no to his mall.

Out on the lawn there arose such a clatter
When Grinch said the ancient great trees didn’t matter
“Let’s cut them down and let’s build some parking!”
But the Whoodies thought Grinch was really quite barking.
Now this Grinch wanted granite – a web of it really
With shopping and theatres and parking, ideally.
But the Whoodies said ‘No’ to his project ‘It’s crass!’
We want our trees and our wildlife and grass.

It was his way or no way, he’d not give an inch
So the web was abandoned; this angered the Grinch

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave Whoodville a vibrant and dynamic glow.
“If there’s no web for me then I’ll make very sure
“My money will go and help Africa’s poor”
“That will fill all the Whoodies with remorse
(“And I’ll avoid being taxed at the source”).

Ian was grouchy and grinchy, indeed
The size of his heart was no match for his greed
He stood there on Christmas Eve, hating the Whoodies,
And envied their happiness and all their goodies

On Christmas day all of the Whoodies would gather
Down in their Gardens for coffee and blather

Whoodies, young and old, would sit down to a feast.
And they’d feast! And they’d feast!
And they’d FEAST! FEAST! FEAST! FEAST!
They would start on Whood-pudding, and rare Whood-roast-beast
Which was something Sir Grinch couldn’t stand in the least!
And THEN
They’d do something he liked least of all!

Every Whoodie in Whoodville, the tall and the small,
Would stand close together, with Christmas bells ringing.
They’d stand hand-in-hand. And the Whoods would start singing!
They’d sing! And they’d sing!
AND they’d SING! SING! SING! SING!

The more that Sir Grinch thought of the Whood-Christmas-Sing
The more Ian thought, “I must stop this whole thing!
“Why, for seventy years I’ve put up with it now!
I MUST stop Christmas from coming!
…But HOW?”

Then he got an idea!
An awful idea!
THE GRINCH
GOT A WONDERFUL, ACSEF IDEA!

“I know just what to do!” Sir Grinch said with a sneer
“I’ll steal every trace of their Christmas this year.
“I’ll threaten to take my web money once more
“And threaten to give it to Africa’s poor.”

“And while I’m at it I’ll steal all their stuff”
(It seems being a billionaire wasn’t enough)
Sir Grinch owned most Whoodville it’s certainly true
His wealth would have satisfied both me and you
But when the old Grinch couldn’t get his own way
And get his Web built, then he vowed they would pay

He made a quick Santy Claus hat and a coat.
And he chuckled, and clucked, “Why you handsome old goat!”
“With this coat and this hat, I’ll look just like Saint Nick!”
“All I need are some reindeer…”
The Grinch looked around.
But since reindeer were scarce, there was none to be found.

(The reason that no deer were found in the town
Is Grinch’s friend Aileen had had them shot down
Her cruelty and greed caused a Whoodville petition
The people agreed there will be no repetition)

Did that stop the old Grinch…?
No! Not one little bit
“I’ll just need to call on a couple old gits
“If I can’t find some reindeer, I’ll make some instead!”
(I think the poor man must be oot of his head)
So he called lackeys Tommy and Colin to come
Which they quickly did, those poor dears were quite dumb.
And he tied great big horns on top of their heads.
(It seems that these lapdogs were easily led).

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
The old Grinch couldn’t wait ta get oot and aboot.
THEN
He loaded some bags
And some old empty sacks
On a ramshackle sleigh
And he hitched up dogs Tommy and Colin, whey hey!

Then the Grinch said, “Giddyap!”
And the sleigh started down
Toward the homes where the Whoodies
Lay asleep in their town.

All their windows were dark. Quiet snow filled the air.
All the Whoodies were dreaming sweet dreams without care
When he came to the first house near to Union Square.
“This is stop number one,” The old Grinchy was there.

His eyes-how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, probably had too much sherry.
And he climbed to the roof, empty bags in his fist.
Then he slid down the chimney. A rather tight pinch.
But if Santa could do it, then so could the Grinch.
He got stuck only once, for a moment or two.
Then he stuck his head out of the fireplace flue
Where wee Whoodie stockings all hung in a row.

He stole left, right and centre; he got on his knees
He swiped BrewDogs, Glenfiddich and Zeppelin CDs
And just to increase the Whoodies distress
He left unsold copies of Evening Express.
And he stuffed all their gifts in his sacks and then nimbly,
Stuffed all the bags, one by one, up the chimney!

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
Then he slunk to the icebox. He took the Whoods’ feast!
He took the Whood-pudding! He took the roast beast!
He cleaned out that icebox as quick as a flash.
Why, that Grinch even took their last can of Whood-hash!

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And stole all the stockings, he was such a jerk!
Then he stuffed all the food up the chimney with glee.
“And NOW!” grinned Sir Ian, “I will stuff up the tree!”
“I’ll have theatre seats carved from it, just wait and see
“Down with the trees, turn their wood into chip
“For my web and its theatre” (he was quite a dip)
Then he heard a small sound “This can’t be good!”
He turned around fast, and he saw a small Whood!

Twas Marie-Lou Whood, who was not more than two.
The Grinch had been caught by this little Whood daughter
Who’d got out of bed for a cup of cold water.
She stared at Sir Ian and said, “Santy, why,
“Why are you taking our Christmas tree? WHY?”

But, you know, that old Grinch was so smart and so slick
He thought up a Whood lie, and he thought it up quick!
In that he had practice, his cunning renown
A cunning which had torn Whood businesses down

“Why, my sweet little tot,” the fake Santy Claus lied,
“There’s a light on this tree that won’t light on one side.
“So I’m taking it home to my workshop, my dear.
“I’ll fix it up there. Then I’ll bring it back here.”

So he fobbed off the child with yet more of his lies
The master of false promises, spin, alibis
And he got her a drink and he sent her to bed.
And when Marie-Lou Whood went to bed with her cup,
He went to the chimney and stuffed the tree up!
Then the last thing he took was the fireplace wood.
His hatred of trees and his greed were no good.

He did the same thing
To the other Whoods’ houses
Leaving crumbs
Much too small
For the other Whoods’ mouses!

His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the hair of his head was as white as the snow.
When he packed up his sled he was most ecstatic,
(By this time the Grinch was extremely erratic)
He had all of their presents! The ribbons! The wrappings!
The tags! And the tinsel! The trimmings! The trappings!

“I’ll just head to the Gramps and on old Tullos Hill
“I’ll fly-tip these presents” (so much for good will)

“Pooh-pooh to the Whoodies!” the old Grinch was singing
“This year they’ll be no Christmas bells ringing.
“They’re finding out now that Christmas was snatched
“Oh what a brilliant idea I have hatched.
“They’re just waking up! I know just what they’ll do!
“Their mouths will hang open a minute or two
“The all the Whoods down in Whood-ville will all cry BOO-HOO!”
“They’ll say ‘Give us a web for we now need it more
“Then food, clothes and shelter would help Africa’s poor’.
“Give us more malls, and give us more shopping!
“They’ll beg for my web – oh those Whoods will be hopping!”

“That’s a noise,” grinned the Grinch,
“That I simply must hear!”
So Sir Ian Grinch put his hand to his ear.
And he did hear a sound rising over the snow.
It started in low. Then it started to grow…
But the sound wasn’t sad!
Why, this sound sounded merry!
It couldn’t be so!
But it WAS merry! VERY!

He stared down at Whood-ville!
Ian could not believe
Despite all of his efforts to plunder and thieve
What met his eyes was a shocking surprise
Each Whoodie in Whood-ville, the rich and the poor
Was singing! He shook to the core.
He HADN’T stopped Christmas from coming!
IT CAME!

Somehow or other, Christmas survived!
In fact you could even say Christmas had thrived.
He stood puzzling and puzzling: “How could it be so?”

“It came without ribbons! It came without tags!
“It came without packages, boxes or bags!”
It was as if shopping was not the reason
For people to celebrate during this season.
Even without lots of designer gear
Somehow Christmas had still made it here.

And he puzzled three hours, `till his puzzler was sore.
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store.
“Maybe Christmas…perhaps…means a little bit more!”
And what happened then…?
Well…in Whood-ville some of them say
That the Grinch’s small heart
Grew three sizes that day!

And the minute his heart didn’t feel quite so tight,
He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light
He said “Look what I just found when passing through Torry
“Nicked presents, which fell off the back of a lorry”
And he brought back the toys! And the food for the feast!
And he…
…HE HIMSELF…!
Ian Grinch carved the roast beast!
Merry Christmas to All, and to All a good night!

Well if you are reading this dear Mr Wood
You still have a chance to make everything good
Why not help the poor both here and abroad?
Doing so would be the greatest reward.

We need our green space, clean water and air
Even the finest web could not compare.
We’ve things in this town nowhere else to be found
So lay off our gardens, our common good ground.

If you want gratitude you’d get it indeed
By helping the helpless, the people in need.
So many things you could do with your money
The difference you’d make – it’s not even funny.

Next time please ask us, don’t dictate your plan
People are asking what kind of a man
Would cause such division, pitting friend against friend
Ian your web plans have come to an end.

Give up the ghost, take up some other cause
That’s all I’m saying – goodnight –

– Santa Claus

 Comments enabled – see comments box below. Note, all comments will be moderated.

Aug 242012
 

By Bob Smith.

Faa’s at bawlin an greetin
Oot ower a UTG balustrade?
It’s Sir Ian an aa his cohorts
Faa hiv aa iss wailin made 

The cooncillors are aa numpties
The Freens o UTG are as weel
Fer nae littin the ACSEF lot
Git awa wi iss dodgy deal

Aiberdeen’s nae a bonnie place
Says yon Dutchman Leo Koot
He’ll be up stakes an leavin
An “TAQA” wi him nae doot

Wee Stewartie wis fair fizzin
His phizog wid hae turn’t milk soor
Tam Smith he’ll be jinin in
In  fair kickin up a stoor

Mike Shepherd o Freens o UTG
Wull be weerin a smile richt big
An aa the fowk faa helpit him
Wull be deein an Aiberdeen Jig

Noo we’ll hae tae git crackin
Wi  a  better scheme fer UTG
An bring the gairdens up tae scratch
So’s  the green oasis we’ll still see

©Bob Smith “The Poetry Mannie” 2012

Aug 212012
 

Suzanne Kelly, Chair of campaigning group ‘Democracy Watch’ called upon UK and EU regulatory agencies to investigate details of the proposed City Garden Project today. Citing both past invoices paid by the public worth hundreds of thousands of pounds and the revelation that leading businessmen plan to add £15 million towards the project’s estimated £140 million costs may have conflict of interest issues.  The project is subject to a vote of the Full Aberdeen City Council on Wednesday 22 August.

Sir Ian Wood will ‘give’ £50 million to the City if it agrees to borrow £92 million more via Tax Incremental Funding to build a ‘Granite Web’ over the existing Victorian Union Terrace Gardens.

The subject has been voted down in a previous consultation, but narrowly passed a non-binding referendum exercise.

Labour promised that it came to power it would end the scheme; Labour duly gained a majority in the May elections

In correspondence today to regulatory entities and leading political figures, Kelly writes:-

“I would ask for an investigation into the situation in Aberdeen concerning the potential development of Union Terrace Gardens with regard to procurement issues and potential conflict of interests.

“I am not a legal professional, but it certainly seems to me that people who have or had influential posts on publicly-funded quangos might have used their roles to further their own interests – this should be investigated before any moves to proceed with the ‘City Garden Project’ are approved.  The entire situation needs to be looked at in detail.

“Stewart Milne and Tom Smith have been actively pushing this scheme via their memberships and positions of influence in the publicly-funded Aberdeen City and Shire Economic Future quango, ACSEF.  Milne owns the ‘Triple Kirks’ site next to the proposed area of development.  His land at present would be hard to develop or even access.  If the development of UTG goes ahead, the Triple Kirks area could only increase in value; this is obvious. 

“Milne would therefore likely stand to gain financially.  How he has been permitted to act within his ACSEF role to further a scheme which seems set to enrich him – largely at the taxpayer’s cost – should be investigated.  I did ask ACSEF to comment and they replied it was a matter for his conscience.  When millions of pounds of public money and common good land are at stake, this is not nearly good enough.

“Tom Smith likewise has used his position in ACSEF to further the plan to build a ‘granite web’ over the gardens.  He and Colin Crosby were the original directors of an entity set up named Aberdeen City Gardens Trust.  The Trust would apparently wind up managing the garden development and be in a position to handle millions of pounds – yet Smith has been allowed to pursue a role in ACSEF which directly impacts on his ACGT entity. 

“For reasons unclear to me, this Trust has been granted automatic rights to perform these valuable services without any tender exercise whatsoever being done.  I cannot help but think this is against UK and EU procurement policies and laws.

“In the end, we have a situation where common good land, owned by the people of Aberdeen, is being considered for development simply because Sir Ian Wood will ‘give’ the city £50 million towards a building project there.  He will not let us use this ‘gift’ on another site (the now vacant St Nicholas House would be one alternative); he will not entertain alternatives of any kind. 

“This scheme will take a green park and its 250 year-old trees and turn it into a turfed-over concrete jungle – with an outdoor theatre directly in front of another theatre.  The Aberdeen taxpayer is already subsidising two entertainment venues; using public funds to create a third is unacceptable.  Wood may call this a ‘gift’’ I would personally call it ‘coercion.’

“I would also ask the relevant regulators to look at the various personnel overlaps between public and private sector groups influencing this scheme – a scheme which will still cost the taxpayer £92 million at current estimate – a scheme which does not yet have a timetable, actual budget or scope.”

Kelly campaigned as chair of ‘Democracy Watch’ in the local referendum, and had this to say:-

“Labour were sceptical over agreeing to a referendum; and having participated in the exercise, I see they were right.  There was an unofficial group campaigning for the City Garden Project; and they bombarded the public with literature which I personally found misleading.

“I did try to complain to the Electoral Commission and to Advertising Standards, but neither could intervene in a referendum.   There were glossy brochures, newspapers, print and radio advertising placed by this group which far exceeded the value that the official groups were allowed to spend.  There were problems with the official material as well; the Green Party’s statement was cut off in the paper brochures for instance. 

“But to tell the public that the web would create 6,500 new jobs as this literature did seems highly unlikely.  I am told that some of the people behind this ‘unofficial’ group are also members of ACSEF and/or Aberdeen City Gardens Trust – possibly people who stand to gain financially from the project proceeding.  This makes the entire referendum exercise a mere ‘he who spends the most wins’ exercise.  I would ask the authorities which might look into my other concerns to look into this as well.”

Kelly concludes:-

“The vast sums of public money spent on PR, consultants and advertising to push this scheme could have gone on education and community projects.  This city does not need to borrow £92 million to turn its green park into a construction zone and a potential ‘trams fiasco.’  This city does need its existing buildings occupied and unused brownfield put back into use.  Businesses continue to operate here because of our industry. 

“Unnecessary, grandiose building projects detrimental to the environment seem to me designed to enrich the rich at public expense:  this scheme must be scrapped and the roles and actions of its powerful supporters examined.”

  • Comments enabled – see comments box below. Note, all comments will be moderated.
Aug 172012
 

As crucial Aberdeen City  Council votes loom large for the future of Union Terrace Gardens, Mike Shepherd considers the TIF business case and finds it lacking.

Just imagine you are the managing director of a big business.  An opportunity has come up to build a new development.

Private investors have promised you £70 million, but it means that you have to borrow £92 million and the government have said they could find £20 million of grant to fund the rest.
Half the shareholders are revolting as they think the venture looks far too risky and the existing company debt is humongous.

The time comes to make a decision on the investment and submit a business case for borrowing to the board of directors.  It turns out that the private investors can only come up with £55 million and now the grant funding has fallen through because the funds never existed in the first place.  

Calamity – the project now has a shortfall of £35 million.  What do you do?  The sensible thing would be to walk away.

Not Aberdeen Council.  I refer of course to the TIF business case written by council officials recommending that the council borrow £92 million for the redevelopment of Union Terrace Gardens and other city centre projects.

The final business case for TIF has been made public and will be voted on at the finance committee on Friday 17th August.
(The agenda for this meeting can be seen at http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=146&MId=2668 )

A critical reading of the report makes one thing obvious – they haven’t got all the money!

Yet, it hasn’t stopped council officials from producing a business case where the critical points are buried in waffle and padded out to 187 pages.

Out of the badly argued case (with assumptions, inconsistencies and dodgy data) emerges this conclusion on page 141:

Underpinning the TIF business case is the requirement for £182 million of investment in enabling infrastructure.  At present the business case shows that there is a commitment for £90 million of investment from the private sector and the need for £92 million of public sector investment.

However, there is a shortfall of £35 million on the public sector funding required for the project.

£70 million is recognised as the private sector investment in the quote above, yet they are £15 million short.  As page 46 notes:

This includes £55 million that has already been pledged to the City Garden Project by private donors and a further £15 million still to be raised.”

So where is this extra £15 million supposed to come from?  Page 50 records that:

“Aberdeen City Garden Trust will provide capital funding, act as developer for the City Garden project …  ACGT have also undertaken to raise a further £15 million of philanthropic donations, to supplement the £55 million already pledged to this project from philanthropic donations.”

The begging bowl is going out for £15 million.  Chaps, you have less than a week to get the money.

The remaining £20 million of, “investment from the private sector” comprises “potentially £20 million of grant funding” for an Art Gallery extension.   But does this money exist?

Further reference to page 50 shows that:

The remaining £20 million of grants is attached to the Aberdeen Art Gallery Project.  Officers will pursue a variety of grants to secure the required funds.”

Note the use of the future tense, “will pursue” here.

Council reports show that officers have yet to apply for any funding and, with the exception of a possible £4 million of Scottish Heritage Lottery funding, no other sources of money appear to have been identified.

So what happens if they don’t get the £20 million grant funding for the Art Gallery?

To page 50 again:

Should there be a funding gap officers will need to consider how additional funds will be attracted, generated or secured via other fiscal arrangements.

Anybody fancy a Monet, Turner or a Cezanne?  Going cheap …

This isn’t a business case, it’s a bankruptcy case.

Last year, in a discussion with a council official, I mentioned the possibility of the City Garden Project proving a financial disaster and bankrupting the council.  I was cheerfully told that a public body can’t, technically, go bankrupt although it can end up in a state that closely resembles it (Greece comes to mind).

But make no mistake, Aberdeen Council are going to get burnt here.  Councillors are being asked to vote on borrowing £92 million for a project where there is a very large shortfall on external funding and no guarantee that any of this money will ever turn up.

It would of course be sensible to delay the vote until the money does actually appear.  Yet there is an insanely mad rush to progress with this project, even if it doesn’t make any sense to do so.

What is not discussed anywhere is the mechanism by which Aberdeen Council will guarantee the loan

Another problem with the report is that no detailed costings for the various projects are given.  For example, the £140 million cost for the City Garden Project is a nominal cost from the original technical feasibility study written over three years ago. It is certainly not the final costing.

This means that councillors could be committing to a multi-million basket of projects with no clear provision of accurate costs.  I find this situation alarming and hope for our sake that they do so too.

So who takes the risk on the borrowing?  This is made clear on page 50:

“Aberdeen City Council also recognise that the risk sits with them.”

The report mentions that the borrowing would be from the Public Works Loan Board.  What is not discussed anywhere is the mechanism by which Aberdeen Council will guarantee the loan.

The Scottish Futures Trust, operating on behalf of the Scottish Government, have provided guidance as to how a TIF business case should be submitted to them.
See http://www.facebook.com/l/QAQE16FGI/scottishfutures.ehclientsTIF

In Section 4.4 it is stated that:

“Economic assessments to be carried out:

  • By an objective economist with a recognised track-record of economic assessment for public bodies”

On page 72 we find that Aberdeen City Gardens Trust is identified as providing:

“Core expertise to assist in a robust TIF business case in order to support ACC’s efforts.”

Let’s remind ourselves who Aberdeen City Gardens Trust are again by referring to page 46:

“ACGT will provide capital funding, act as developer for the City Garden Project …”

An earlier draft makes it clear that the advisors to the ACGT were also involved in providing critical input on economic uplift that is supposed to result from building the City Garden Project and related schemes.

Thus a private company seeking to take over a lease and operatorship of council property have been allowed to influence a report justifying the case for Aberdeen Council borrowing £70 million to fund a project that the company has a direct interest in.

In a statement published by the Press and Journal last Monday I wrote:

“The Council would most certainly not allow developers to provide direct input into a report recommending planning acceptance; so why is it appropriate to allow developers to provide economic advice to councillors when the outcome could clearly act in their favour?”

I have complained vigorously to the Chief Executive of the Council on this matter.  It is very bad governance.  I have also drawn this matter to the attention of the Council Monitoring Officer and asked her to investigate this.

Councillors will vote on Friday as to whether this business case is approved or not.

It would be sensible to delay the vote until the business case can be proved to be robust.  Aberdeen Council also needs to find an objective economist, someone who is not directly involved in the project, to give advice.

Otherwise madness would lie in approving the business case and exposing Aberdeen Council to financial disaster.

  • Comments enabled – see comments box below. Note, all comments will be moderated.
Aug 172012
 

Old Susannah takes a look recent events in the ‘Deen, and tackles tricky terms with a locally topical taste. By Suzanne Kelly.

Tally Ho!  Once again future of our Union Terrace Gardens with its green field, 250-year-old elms, other trees, and wildlife is in the spotlight. The vote of the full council next week on 22 August will be significant to our getting our £140,000,000 granite web, which will fit in situ so naturally that we’ll think the Victorians built it in time.

Sadly, some anti-progress, anti-referendum, nimby tree-huggers are suggesting that the more suitable place for a public square is the St Nicholas site, and our only city centre park should be left as, well, a park. Three independent councillors will suggest an alternative to the web at the 22/8 meeting.

However, Sir Ian has much more money than they do, and will take his ball home if anyone suggests not doing the plan he wants.

We know he’ll give up as he’s said as much four or five times already (but failed to do so).  Sir Ian and Valerie Watts say without a web, we cannot be the City of Culture in 2017!  Well, that’s the argument for the web settled then.  What good are clean air, a healthy environment, heritage, common good land and existing culture when we can try to win an award?

Not surprisingly this issue of Aberdeen Voice will be filled with articles concerning our city’s future, and reasons to keep our common good land out of the hands of the usual suspects (Smith, Crosby, Milne, Wood of course, and the rest of the ACSEF acolytes).  Old Susannah is keen to redress the balance, and ensure that the selfless, apolitical philanthropists behind the £140,000,000 project get the consideration they deserve.

To that end, here are some relevant definitions.

Intellectual property: (modern English phrase) principle that the ownership of an original idea rests with the idea’s creators, and should be protected by law.

Peacock Visual Arts had come up with the original idea of building a new arts centre inside UTG; they were helped by Scottish Enterprise and ACSEF with their original scheme.  This help was kind of like the help that the Fox gave to Jemima Puddleduck.

Magically, the Peacock idea was hijacked (with Scottish Enterprise help) and transformed into the transformational 8th wonder of the world, The Granite Web.  After all their expense and groundwork, Peacock was left out in the cold, irrespective of their moral right to their intellectual property of putting a cultural venue in UTG.

Just as well this wasn’t going on in America; it would still be being fought in the courts now.

Thankfully, such hijackings of intellectual property concerning UTG are very rare, except for the most recent one.  Common Good Aberdeen, a group of people who simply want the gardens enhanced and protected from developers, recently came up with an original idea which they pitched to the City.

They proposed serving drinks and snacks from a temporary structure inside one of the disused central arches in UTG for a year. ALL profits, if the scheme survives a vote to be held today (17/08), are to be diverted to improving UTG.

Thus volunteers will take an unused space, encourage people to use the gardens, and generate money for the gardens’ improvement.  Obviously, we can’t have this kind of thing going on.

While some of the City’s administration and councillors are supporting this fresh, original scheme, other powers that be (one Mr Gordon McIntosh) has written a report saying that the Council must ensure that it gets ‘Value for Money’ for the disused arch if it is put to use.  Good man!  Mind the pennies, and the hundreds of millions of pounds will take care of themselves.

It is almost as if MacIntosh didn’t want the gardens used for social purposes

Gordon wants to take Common Good’s idea, clearly their intellectual property, and turn it into a commercial bidding exercise (which of course will cost the City money to put out to tender and evaluate incoming bids), and presumably charge whomever would want to rent the empty arch out.

If an organisation has to pay rent on the empty space, it is not that likely that they will plough 100% of their profits into fixing the gardens, which is what Common Good Aberdeen proposed.

It is almost as if MacIntosh didn’t want the gardens used for social purposes or for means to be found to generate UTG improvement funds at no cost to the City.  We have an empty space that is making no money, which volunteers want to use as a means of raising money to fix the gardens, while adding a social amenity to the area at no cost to the city.  If I were as clever as he, it would make sense I’m sure.

Much better that the City spend time and money on a bidding exercise to see if anyone wants to steal CGA’s idea for profit rather than any genuine philanthropy happening.  So, if after we spend taxpayer money on a bid to run a small café, some private company comes along to do so, then it’s profit to them and not the gardens.  Result!

That’s the kind of thinking that got us the city administration we’ve been enjoying these past several years.  If any of the councillors who have a chance to vote on the CGA proposal today are reading this column, I am sure they will do the right thing.

Let’s look at this principle Gordon wants to nobly uphold of ensuring Aberdeen City gets ‘Value for Money’.  Since we’ve seen that we can’t let people use a tiny arch for one year to sell snacks for generating improvement funds for the gardens without proper scrutiny, no doubt this important principle would have to apply to any and all schemes, great and small….

Value for Money:  (mod. English phrase) phrase used in public administration to describe the principle of ensuring that any services or products being sourced by government are obtained by the best qualified suppliers at the lowest possible prices.  European Law also dictates that any public services or goods contracts of substantial value be awarded by fair, open tender processes. 

They might even be expected to give the city a performance bond or guarantee

Let’s imagine just for one moment that a big city, somewhere has a park filled with trees, wildlife, and open spaces for people to enjoy.

Such a space might even be owned by the people outright.

Let’s imagine one step further that after years of mismanagement this hypothetical city wants to make a quick buck or two, and decides to develop this park, despite environmental concerns and public outcry.

The city in question would be expected tofirst write up a tender document, describing what it would want a management company to deliver in the gardens in question.  The tender document would describe in detail exactly what structures were to be created, what activities would take place, what everything would cost, and exactly what the management company’s role would be.

Advertisements asking for bidders with sufficient experience would be placed around the world, and the companies with sufficient experience of project management and venue operations would compete in a tender exercise.  If any would-be management companies had existing personal and business ties with any of the city’s officials or entities (maybe like ACSEF), these would have to be declared and scrutinised:  no one with power over the decision-making process would be permitted to be involved in evaluating tenders or giving work out.

Each bid would be evaluated by the city – without the name of the individual bidders being known – based on the company’s experience, financial health, submitted detailed operation and building budgets and so on.  A shortlist of the best companies would then be evaluated, and the best ‘Value for Money’ bidder would be awarded a contract.

They successful bidder might even be expected to give the city a performance bond or guarantee, and a parent company guarantee to ensure they would not simply disappear or sell the contract on to a third party.

Strict performance benchmarks would be drawn up, and the winning bidder would only be paid for each phase of the detailed project as they successfully delivered it.

Crucially, the entire process would be available for public scrutiny after the sensitive pricing and tendering exercise was completed – before any final contracts were signed.

OR, if the city was Aberdeen….

Members of various interlinked public and/or private entities such as ACSEF would talk to their pals, find out how to make money out of the public’s common good land, ‘transform’ an idea from an arts group into a money-spinner for friends in the construction and development sectors, and use their public and private muscle to get the city leaders to bend to their will.

Some of their number would set up a small private, limited ‘charity’ company, perhaps calling it Aberdeen City Gardens Trust.  This company would automatically be appointed by the city to run the multimillion pound construction scheme without any ‘value for money’ tendering exercise, scrutiny or competition.

Audit Scotland might wonder which companies were paid to carry out the expensive PR / advertising jobs

The newly formed Trust would actively influence decisions such as whether to build theatres next to theatres (Brilliant!),  chop down ancient trees and remove habit for protected EU species which live in said park and promise to plant fir trees (which can’t thrive in a city centre – even more brilliant!).

In the process taxpayer money would be spent to convince the city that building an unspecific project based on a few illogical, unworkable architectural flights of fancy was worth the taxpayer borrowing £90,000,000.

The project would be pushed ahead with this Trust at the head of delivering services, without a project scope defined, without a time frame for construction, and crucially without a budget open to public scrutiny.

It is a very good thing that the EU will never want to look into the manner in which the Granite Web is being foisted on the population or what procurement rules may be being ever so slightly bent.

Similarly, Audit Scotland would never decide to look at precisely how ACSEF and Scottish Enterprise ordered tens of thousands of pounds worth of PR, advertising, and ’stakeholder’ events’, then had the Chamber of Commerce submit invoices to the City Council to pay with public funds.

Audit Scotland will not wonder which companies were paid to carry out the expensive PR / advertising jobs – and why these companies did not get named on the Chamber of Commerce invoices, which cover several years. If that happened, then the elected councillors might start to question whether the entire proceedings were valid, examine the role of ACSEF and its members, and whether the EU, UK or Scottish regulatory agencies would come around asking questions.

Other firms with relevant project delivery experience might get slightly cross at the absence of a tender exercise for such a aluable public project; some of these companies might even know as much about multimillion pound schemes and public amenities as Tom Smith does.   It could all get just a little awkward, sticky, embarrassing and litigious.

I’d best keep these potential problems to myself.  I would hate it if any councillor having doubts about the project were to worry unduly about supporting the web on my account.

Final: (Eng adjective) The last of something; the end of something.

Old Susannah is so old that she went to The Who’s ‘farewell’ concert at Shea Stadium, NY, with the Clash as opening act (was it 1981?  Wish I could see The Clash again especially). The Who played, said it was their final tour, and that was that.  Since then, The Who have had about 57 other final tours.

ACGT were given custody of the ballot papers, even though the taxpayer had paid for the vote.

Sir Ian seems to be a fan of finality as well.  Those of us with memories longer than a goldfish’s will remember the first ‘consultation’ – you know, the one in which the voters rejected the garden scheme.  Sir Ian was going to go walk away then if the concept failed to win the public’s hearts and minds.

Well, we did say ‘no’ but as is often the case, ‘no’ must have really meant ‘yes’.  The official line was that those who were against the scheme simply didn’t understand it.  Fair enough.  So Ian didn’t say ‘farewell’ after all, and resurrected the scheme.

The public were going to be given a chance to vote against developing the gardens when the shortlisted 6 were on view.  This option was what councillors on some of the ‘City Garden Project’ committees had asked for.  However, in the end Gerry Brough is quoted in meeting minutes as saying this was not after all ‘appropriate’ during the design show after all.

People most definitely used the exhibition to write on the ballot papers they wanted no part of destroying UTG, which was very naughty of them indeed.

Thankfully, to avoid any embarrassment for Sir Ian, Tom Smith and Colin Crosby of ACGT were given custody of the ballot papers, even though the taxpayer had paid for the vote.

Campaign groups demanded sight of the papers; but brave ACGT held fast.  We will never know for certain what the real public vote was during the shortlist as to scrapping the scheme or not.  We do know however that the giant glass worm, the public’s choice, was turned down by Wood.

When things started looking bad for the scheme yet again, Wood churned out press releases saying he would draw a final line under the project, and walk away and give his £50,000,000 to the third world instead.

When the three independent councillors said they were working on an alternative idea, Wood said he would not compromise.  And that is his final word.  Well, for this week anyway.

Word arrives that early next week Sir Ian will AGAIN meet with individual councillors to make his ‘final’ plea.  Old Susannah is starting to get deja vu.  I do wonder though why Sir Ian gets to make continued visits to the councillors, sit in the ‘press’ box when he attends council meetings and so on.  Anyone would think he were rich or something.  Thankfully this is a democracy.  Word also reaches me that these continuous pleas from Sir Ian are beginning to grate on more than a few councillors’ patience.

What Woody will do if the vote goes against the scheme will be, of course, to make a final farewell, take his money and spend it in Africa….

And if you believe that….

Next week:  a look at who voted how, what’s next, and if common sense and Common Good Aberdeen prevail, lots of Champagne and lots of BrewDog.

  •  Comments enabled – see comments box below. Note, all comments will be moderated.
Jul 092012
 

Mike Shepherd has  lodged a complaint in a letter to Aberdeen City Council Chief Executive Valerie Watts regarding the recently published TIF business case. Mike shares the content of the letter with Aberdeen Voice readers.

To The Chief Executive, Aberdeen Council

I am lodging a complaint about the TIF Business Case “Aberdeen City Centre Regeneration Scheme” which has been written as a report to inform a council vote in August. This document should be a disinterested analysis of the case, or otherwise, for Aberdeen Council borrowing £92 million through Tax Incremental Financing (TIF).

It is not. The report is a constructed narrative that contains major factual mistakes, errors of omission, false statements and flawed data. It is not credible.

The key argument of the report is based on input by private developers and their advisors who have a clear interest in a positive outcome to the council vote.  The conclusions of the report are therefore incompetent.

I request that Aberdeen Council withdraw the TIF business case as unfit for purpose.
http://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/TIF_business_case

The details of my complaint are as follows:

  • The TIF business case contains a major factual mistake concerning funding for the Art Gallery:

On page 11 it is stated: 

It is expected that a further £20 million of funding will be secured via Grants and other funding mechanisms to enable the City Art Gallery Redevelopment.”

In a table on page 42, it is stated that:

“The City Art Gallery redevelopment:  Funding identified from existing sources – £20 million”

This is incorrect. There is no identified £20 million funding for the Art Gallery. Council minutes show that the appropriate figure is £4 million.

The £20 million figure stems from an unrealistic aspiration to apply for funding from the Scottish Heritage Lottery Fund (SHLF):

“Both the Art Gallery redevelopment and a Museums Collection Centre would be eligible to apply for Heritage Fund Lottery grants, although the value the City Council would wish is beyond the annual allocation, which for all of Scotland is currently £20 million.”
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=7314

The Council have yet to apply for funding from the SHLF and intend to do so later this year, in November. They have approached the SHLF:

“Officers have also discussed the current status of the project with the Scottish office of the Heritage Lottery Fund; the Fund advises that if matched funding can be raised within the City, then their Board would accept this as the Council’s contribution to the project within the application.

“The Art Gallery redevelopment is also included as one of the projects within the Tax Incremental Fund BID to the Scottish Government and if this is successful, that funding can be counted as part of the city’s contribution.”
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=18050

The Art Gallery component of the TIF application is for £4 million (Ref: Table on page 42).  Matched funding from the SLHF for the TIF sum would be £4 million, not £20 million.

In the table on page 42 it is also stated:  

“The TIF Scheme creates the opportunity to invest in the City Art Gallery and even if after this investment the City of Culture bid is unsuccessful, the City will still have a state of the art asset for future generations to enjoy, as a result of the TIF mechanism.”

This is misleading. The Art Gallery redevelopment costings are as follows:

“The Development Study was fully funded by the Marguerite McBey Trust. Gareth Hoskins Architects provided an options appraisal in 2010 outlining 5 schemes ranging in scale and costs from £15.7m to £24.3m [2010 prices].”

TIF plus matched funding from the SHLF would only account for £8 million of the total sum required. The conclusion that “the City will still have a state of the art asset for future generations to enjoy, as a result of the TIF mechanism” is false and incompetent.

  • The TIF business case is misleading about funding from the private sector:

On page 11 there is a statement concerning private funding for the City Garden Project:  

“This includes £55 million that has already been pledged to the City Garden Project by private donors and a further £15 million to be raised”.

It is also mentioned that Aberdeen Council are confident that the extra £15 million can be found even though that this has been an unfulfilled aspiration for the last two years. Although the full £70 million has not been pledged, this figure has been assumed as valid for the rest of the report.

By page 42 this has become “funding identified from existing sources: £70 million.” This is incorrect, only £55 million has been identified.

On page 89 the conclusion states:

“The estimated total cost of the assets and enabling infrastructure for the TIF Scheme is £182 million.

“Pledged donations towards the City Garden Project of £70 million and potential grants for the City Art Gallery of £20 million creates a public sector investment requirement of £92 million, or marginally over 50% of the total cost, which will be borrowed by ACC as part of the proposed TIF Scheme.”

This conclusion is incompetent. The sums are wrong.  A consequence of this blunder is that Aberdeen Council may be required to borrow more than £92 million to ensure that the ‘city centre regeneration project’ is enabled.

  • An overlooked detail of critical importance to the business case: 

The report quotes extensively from the conditions voted through at the January 25th Council meeting. However, I have failed to find the following information mentioned.

From the report to Council of 25th January and voted through:

“Instructs officers to enter into negotiations with a view to putting in place a development agreement with Aberdeen City Garden Trust (ACGT) and/or their representatives, which sets out the terms upon which Aberdeen City Council (ACC) would be prepared to make necessary Council owned land available, to realise the proposed development described in Appendix 1 of this report after 1st March subject to;

“(x) Requires ACGT to confirm, in a legally binding form, that they have access to at least £70 million of private sector funds to invest in the CGP, prior to the signing of;

“a. An appropriate Development Agreement, and

“b. A TIF agreement confirming ACC’s ability to invest at least £70 million in enabling infrastructure related to the CGP. “

http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=18252

In other words, councillors have already decided that if the extra £15 million of private investment is not guaranteed, they are not going to apply for TIF funding. This should have been stated in the business case.

  • Flawed data:

Part of the justification for the City Garden Project is based on a questionnaire that was sent out to two selected groups in Aberdeen. This covers several pages of the report. One ‘cohort’ was a small group of 35 developers, landowners and agents in the City Centre area; the second comprised

“four hundred local private, public and third-sector organisations, representing a wide range of views.”

They got no replies from the first group (“a small response”), and later tried to phone them to get any views at all. Eventually seven people replied and several pages of analysis ensues in the report based on the comments of only seven individuals. There was a bit more interest from the second group, a group that included me.

I found that the questions were framed in such a way that it was virtually impossible to register any negative opinions about the City Garden Project. By dint of answering almost all the questions you ended up agreeing that the project was worthwhile.

This is typical:

“Considering each of the development schemes, which of the following benefits do you envisage they might deliver to the wider Aberdeen City economy?”

There is a clear intentional bias to the questionnaire that looks designed to elicit positive statements in favour of the City Garden Project. My opinion is that this is propaganda not data, and it should have no place in what should have been a dispassionate report informing councillors regarding the decision they have to make about the TIF business case.

  • Inappropriate input from the Aberdeen City Garden Trust:

The bottom line of the business case is that the City Garden Project will “will act as a catalyst for regeneration and economic growth” in Aberdeen and gives “The potential to unlock significant private sector investment and generate up to 8121 jobs and an average of £142.0 million per annum of economic growth over 25 years.”

The business justification is that take up of commercial space in two large business parks being built in the north of the city will be significantly under-subscribed unless the City Garden Project is built. An additional assumption concerns extra business activity in the city centre.

There is no discussion concerning how these assumptions have been made, yet this is the crux of the business case. We are being asked to trust that these assumptions are valid without any cogent analysis provided.

Yet, trust is a major issue concerning these assumptions. On page 74 under the section ASSESSMENT OF NEW DEVELOPMENT AND BUSINESS RATES UPLIFT” we read that:

In undertaking this assessment of development uplift ACC has received specialist research support from property advisors CB Richard Ellis as well as input from ACGT and PwC.”

(ACGT –Aberdeen City Garden Trust, PwC – Price Waterhouse Coopers, CBRE – CB Richard Ellis)

The relationship between CB Richard Ellis, PwC and the Aberdeen City Garden Trust is made clear on page 52:

 “ACC, with support from ACGT Enterprises and their advisers (PwC and CBRE)”

Thus it appears that major input has been provided to the critical argument in the business case by Aberdeen City Garden Trust and their advisors. A private company seeking to take over a lease and operatorship of council property, has been allowed to dictate input to a report recommending that  Aberdeen Council borrow £92 million for a project in which the company has a direct interest. This is entirely inappropriate.

The Aberdeen City Garden Trust has a clear interest in a positive outcome for the City Garden Project. They and their advisors should not have been allowed to have input into this report.

  • Conclusion:

Aberdeen Council operates at both a corporate and political level. Politicians make policy while key council officials provide a detailed examination of the background that commonly informs the decision making process.

In this regard, it is important that council officials provide a rigorous and dispassionate analysis, with any recommendations based on logic and a clear basis for the arguments that have been set out to justify these recommendations. In the report detailing the business case for the City Garden Project and other ancillary schemes, they have failed abysmally.

The most recent version of the business case is a travesty of synthesis and thesis. Rather than setting out a well argued case leading from careful marshalling of data towards a conclusion, the report appears to proceed from conclusion (the City Garden Project is a good thing) via a constructed narrative that includes mistakes, flawed data and wishful thinking.

Given that a consequence of this report is that Aberdeen Council could end up borrowing £92 million on the basis of ‘economic regeneration’, this may result in major reputational and financial damage for the council. The vote to approve submitting the business case to the Scottish Government is likely to take place in August this year.

  • The outcome I would like to see:

The TIF business case should be withdrawn immediately as incompetent and unfit for purpose.

  • Comments enabled. Note, All comments will be moderated.
Jan 272012
 

Aberdeen Youth Council’s former head Sean Press resigned because of ‘a conflict of interest’, citing his involvement with ACSEF the ‘pro-business and development body [which] is fully supportive of the City Garden Project’ per the Press & Journal.  Now Aberdeen City Youth Council, the official voice of young people in the city, has spoken out against the proposed development of Union Terrace Gardens, describing the plans as “unwanted” and “potentially devastating to young people”.

17 year-old office-bearer, Kenneth Watt, comments on the decision:
“It’s not normal for the Youth Council to speak out against the Council like we are doing. However, the decisions made have the potential to be devastating to our generation, and generations to come and we are genuinely worried about the prospect of the City Gardens Project going ahead.”

As a result, the group has registered to submit 300 words in the voter registration pack.

The group also criticised the City Council in its involvement of young people in the decision-making process, after they discovered that only 113 young people from just two schools were consulted with. In the Youth Council’s own consultation 98% of 14-25 year-olds were in favour of retaining the Gardens.

The financial security of the City Gardens Project (CGP) concerns the Youth Council. The Aberdeen City Youth Council (ACYC) are worried by the lack of a plan to cover the possible failure of the risky Tax Increment Funding scheme. After multiple requests for detailed financial information from councillors on the monitoring board were ignored, the group became very apprehensive over the CGP’s feasibility.

Kenneth Watt, an office-bearer in the ACYC says that:

“Young People have been hit hard by spending cuts to key services already; the prospect of facing more in the future is a risk the Council can’t afford to take.”

“Young people need to be listened to and have their questions answered. We’re the ones that will have to foot the bill when the £96million loan can’t be repaid.”

One of the main sufferers of cuts to public services is Aberdeen’s youth. Northfield has the highest rate of child poverty in the north-east of Scotland and the Council cannot commit to such a financially unstable project when they are closing key services to the youth in many areas.

“It is ridiculous for the Council to commit to a £96million loan when vital community services – such as the Mastrick Young People’s Project – are being cut left, right and centre.”

It was claimed that the CGP would reduce crime rates in the city, which young people are frequently blamed for. Both final designs for the CGP have direct access from Belmont Street and Union Street, home to many pubs and clubs. A £170million project of this nature will not cure the violence and crime that Aberdeen faces.

“Voters need to think seriously about the long-term aspect of the City Gardens Project and the financial burden it could easily leave for generations of Aberdonians to come.”

“Union Terrace Gardens is a space that is unique to our city. Our parents have loved the Gardens, we love the Gardens, and – if retained – our children will love the Gardens too.”

 

Jan 192012
 

Old Susannah tries to get to grips with the newspapers, the actual news, and council-speak.  By Suzanne Kelly.

Dancing in the streets is assured today, for tomorrow we will be dancing on the concrete ramps!  (hopefully without falling off of them).  Rejoice!  Result!  The lovely ramp / Teletubbies design has been selected (just in the nick of time for the Referendum, mind) to ‘transform’ Union Terrace Gardens.

Old Susannah has been laid low by a cold/cough, so no outings of  late to Brewdog or anywhere really.  This has given me plenty of time to catch up on my leisure reading, so I’ve now read tons of minutes, board reports, registers of interest and so on.   But I’ll soon celebrate this good news with a brewdog or two.

I was so glad to have bought the Evening Express on the 17th; it had taken its own 50-person poll and guess what?  Yes, 59% of people polled want to ‘transform’ the gardens!  Fantastic!  Perhaps we should just knock the Referendum on the head now and go with those results.

To those few remaining NIMUTGs / NIMBYs / Luddites out there who think the vibrant and dynamic scheme to put concrete ramps over Union Terrace Gardens is nothing but the old boy network flexing its muscles to give some of the more hard-up members work, money and real estate, I say no.  There is no conspiracy.  There is nothing untoward going on.  (Can I have a directorship now?)

If anything looks funny, be it overlapping interests and board memberships, coincidental office block developments in the area, or what have you, here are some useful definitions to allay any fears.  Rest assured – in a few short years when you’re looking over your plastic hedge in the Monorail Café as the band plays in the Dr Bochel outdoor auditorium, you’ll look back and be glad that your tax money was well spent in convincing people what’s really important.

The Gardens dominate the news and the definitions this week as well.

City Garden Project Minutes: (compound noun) a series of documents charting the apolitical, beneficial, transparent proceedings of the Project team appointees.

We’ve already seen that there is no overlap between the City, Chamber of Commerce, BiD,  a couple of multi-millionaires and some council officials.  Here’s a little quote from the September City Gardens Project Implementation Team which shows as much:-

“Agreed that it would be helpful if ACSEF and Aberdeen Grampian Chamber of Commerce could provide supportive letters to the key decision makers within the Scottish Futures Trust.  The web link to the submission to be forwarded to ACSEF, the Chamber and BID”.

and now to illustrate the total independence of the Implementation Team, let’s put some names in brackets for the organisations listed above of people connected to the City Gardens Project as well:

“Agreed that it would be helpful if ACSEF(John Michie, Jennifer Craw, Colin Crosby, Tom Smith, Callum McCaig) and Aberdeen Grampian Chamber of Commerce (John Michie, Colin Crosby) could provide supportive letters to the key decision makers within the Scottish Futures Trust.  The web link to the submission to be forwarded to ACSEF, the Chamber and BID (Callum McCaig, John Michie – Chair)”.

It’s going to be a hard slog for these people to get themselves on side, don’t you agree?  Or perhaps that’s what’s meant by ‘having a word with yourself.’

For a more complete de-bunking of any lingering doubts, have a look at this little link, showing the members of some of our homegrown organisations.  http://oldsusannahsjournal.yolasite.com/

Overlap: Adjective – for two or more items to share similar components, area or characteristics.

If you have looked at the spread sheet on the above link, you will see there is just a touch of overlap.  Believe it or not, there are people who are involved in a quango here, a committee there – and all of them relating in some way to the desire to improve Union Terrace Gardens.

That nice Mr Michie gets around quite a bit, as do Messrs Collier and Crosby.  Never before have so few done so much in so many organisations against the wishes of so many.  Referendum or no, I think this lot are unstoppable.

Bad Timing: (Eng Phrase) events which in some way conflict with each other or subvert other events.

This will be a tough one to explain, so here is a wee example.  The deadline for registering a group for the Union Terrace Gardens Referendum was 13 January – so far, so good.  The deadline for these groups to submit a 300 word statement as to why people should vote for or against Teletubby land – sorry the dynamic ramp system which will turn Aberdeen into Barcelona– is 20th January at 5pm.  The Referendum is a month away.

Still so far, so good.  Then we come to next week. On 25th January the full council is going to vote on a report about the Gardens project – the report has various clauses which seem to indicate this thing might cost the City money after all – who would have guessed it??? But by then it will be too late for any of the statements going in the Referendum voting pack to be altered.

On 25 January it will also be too early to know what the referendum result will be – but the city is still going to vote on some very crucial items.  Why you might ask is this happening now? Why would the city want to do this before the referendum and before the new council is elected in May – only a few  months away?

It couldn’t possibly be so that any potential voters see the City voting to go ahead and decide that voting in the referendum (which is not binding of course) is pointless.  It is not to discourage, dispirit or mislead – obviously not.  I think this haste all just has to do with saving time.  I did ask this question of the council – and they’ve told me not to worry my old head about it.  Fair enough then.

PS ….

I am currently less than pleased that the City cannot (or will not) provide me with a list of property that the Mortification Board is responsible for – the FOI folk have told me to come down and look through the archives.  I still can’t believe Councillor West (leader of the Morticians – sorry Mortification Board) doesn’t have this info.

However – I am happy with him on this one score, and I thought  it worth sharing.  So, here are some extracts from old minutes from the City Garden Project Monitoring Board – cast your mind back to August – this is what was being said…

“Councillor Yuill asked Mr Brough to confirm whether there would be a ‘no action’ option on the card. Mr Brough replied that there would NOT be a ‘no action’ option at this stage because the feedback was part of a tendering process to select the best of six designs. Once the best design has been selected, other parties, such as the Council, may wish to determine whether the status quo was preferable to the chosen design. However the Project Management Board do not see this as their role. Their job is simply to come up with the best possible design for a proposed City Garden Project.

Councillor West asked that it be noted that every week the councillors of the Monitoring group have asked for the ‘no action’ option to be part of the public display and this has been passed on to the Management Board by Mr Brough. The Councillors stated that they were very disappointed that this was still not an option”.

You might ask yourself who is driving this project.  It’s not the citizens.  It’s not the councillors.  The answer just might lie on my spread sheet.

Next week – A Milne special issue, some Trump gossip, and more.

Jan 192012
 

By Mike Shepherd.

The final design for the City Garden Project was picked this week.  The proposed plan is to replace Union Terrace Gardens with a futuristic design of curving walkways and grass called the “Granite Web”.
The announcement stoked up even more controversy as it appears that the design was not the first choice amongst those that voted in the exhibition in October last year.

Favoured was the “Winter Garden”, the design with the big greenhouse resembling a giant glass worm.

A letter in the Scotsman gave a typical response to this ‘consultation’:

Pointless poll. Of the six designs submitted for the development of Aberdeen’s Union Terrace Gardens, one emerged as the clear favourite during a protracted public consultation in which the Aberdeen electorate took part.

Yet a panel of judges has selected one of the other designs, and the Aberdeen public is apparently to be given the choice between this one or nothing. What is the point of holding a public consultation and treating the result as if it didn’t exist?

Derrick McClure, Aberdeen
http://www.scotsman.com/news/letters/letter_pointless_poll_1_2061360

It is not the first time that a consultation on the fate of Union Terrace Gardens has been ignored. A public consultation run in 2010 saw a majority of the public rejecting the scheme.

The design itself is also controversial. John Glenday, the editor of the magazine for Scottish architects the Urban Realm, commented:

“Diller Scofidio & Renfro’s ‘granite web’ of interconnected walkways has been sold as a vision of the future for Aberdeen. However the seductive sixties sci-fi vision presented may be out of date before the journey from concept to reality has even begun. In their submission the architects have spun a tale of making Aberdeen “throb” again but the history of elevated walkways and underpasses, as anyone who has ever traversed any concrete New Town will attest, is often dystopian.

“Health and Safety officials are also likely to have a field day with the walkways and platforms as presented, inevitably leading to a compromised design with fencing, signage and other clutter once the demands of building regulations are met.”
http://www.scotsman.com/news/cartoon/analysisagrandschemebutitmayjustbealittletoolate

Others have been more  sceptical. It has been variously likened to a Teletubbies TV set, a skatepark and even  ‘Mounthooly Roundabout on steroids’. The City Garden Project have however reached for their dictionaries to praise the ‘vision’, with press releases abounding with words such as ‘transformative’, ‘vibrant’ and ‘dazzling’. Despite the hype there are very few facts being presented. We still do not know how much it will cost or how long it will take to build.

In another development, Aberdeen City Council are to hold a special council meeting next Wednesday to discuss the City Garden Project.
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=18252

The report for the meeting asks councillors to approve the final City Garden Project design , expects the private sector to commit at least £70 million towards the project and discusses some of the land ownership issues.

There is no discussion in the report as to what happens if the City Garden Project goes into massive cost over-run. In 2009 the then Chief Executive, Sue Bruce,  decreed the private sector would be responsible for any cost over-run. Since then, no procedure has been discussed on ensuring agreement about this. In my opinion, Aberdeen City council are being grossly negligent here.

Councillors are effectively being asked to approve the final City Garden Project design ahead of February’s public referendum.

Yet the report mentions that:

ACGT has produced initial draft proposals in respect of the likely uses of any internal and external space to be created by the proposed development and are currently redrafting these proposals to reflect the space provision within the design recently selected by the Design Competition Jury.”

It is difficult to see how councillors can approve a project when there is no clear statement as to what the scheme is going to be used for.

The requests to councillors to spend up to £300,000 on legal costs from Council funds will be very controversial. We have been repeatedly told that the City Garden Project will have no impact on Council budgets, yet this is clearly not the case here. Some will ask how such costs can be justified when services and amenities are being drastically cut elsewhere.

Polling cards for the referendum are to be issued to Aberdeen residents on or around the 16th February. We will be asked for a third time – what do we want our city centre to look like?

The public are being treated with disrespect on this issue. Nevertheless, Aberdonians should ensure that they vote in the referendum.  This one counts.

Dec 092011
 

The Council will be voting on Wednesday on proceeding with either a referendum or an opinion poll in an attempt to resolve the controversy over the fate of Union Terrace Gardens. Mike Shepherd reports that the outcome of the issue on a referendum question has already turned into a total mess.

One of the issues that has been recognised is the need to ensure that the wording of any question asked is fair and acceptable to both sides.

On this basis, both the Friends of Union Terrace Gardens and the Aberdeen City Garden Trust were asked to concur on a suitable question for councillors to agree on at the full Council meeting on the 14th of December.

In practice, this would involve a council officials acting as a mediator.

In good faith, I submitted a group suggestion for the question to the Council as follows:

You are being to ask to choose between either retaining Union Terrace Gardens or replacing them with the proposed City Garden Project design

Which option do you support?

A) Retaining Union Terrace Gardens
B) Building the City Garden Project

Very simple, clear and nothing controversial, you would have thought.

The Council Officer replied with this:

“For your information, based on the responses I have received, the proposed question that I will now be recommending to Council on 14 December (subject to final, last minute consultation with other Council Officers), is as follows:

You are being to ask to choose between either retaining Union Terrace Gardens or replacing them with the proposed City Garden Project design (please read the voter information pack to make sure you understand what is meant by “retaining Union Terrace Gardens ” and “the proposed City Garden Project”).

Which option do you support? (please place a cross in the appropriate box)

A) Retaining Union Terrace Gardens
B) Building the City Garden Project

“I feel that this is a reasonable compromise and trust the FOUTG agree that this represents a fair and balanced position. Kind regards, Gerry Brough.”

I agreed to this. So what happens next?

The Aberdeen City Garden Trust left it to the last possible moment to object to this, allowing no time to be made for any compromise. This was at about 5pm on Monday night this week, when the final wording was needed for the Council report first thing Tuesday.

“Dear Mike,

“Further to my earlier note, I can confirm that ACGT have replied this afternoon asking for some changes to be made to the proposed question, so that it reads as follows:

You are being asked to choose between either retaining Union Terrace Gardens or replacing them with the proposed City Garden Project design which includes Union Terrace Gardens and the covering of the adjacent dual carriageway and railway line.
[please read the voter information pack to make sure you understand what is meant by retaining Union Terrace Gardens and the proposed City Garden Project]

Which option do you support ? (please place a cross in the appropriate box)

A) The proposed City Garden Project
B) Retaining Union Terrace Gardens

“ACGT feel that the previous suggested compromise question makes it appear that the City Garden Project is restricted to Union Terrace gardens, when in fact UTG is only part of the City Garden Project development area.

“They also feel that since retention of the gardens is placed at the beginning of the introductory paragraph, it is only fair that the option for supporting the proposed City Garden project should be the first option on the ballot paper.

“Can you please indicate whether these changes are acceptable to FOUTG.

“Regards, Gerry Brough”

I replied that the proposed wording was highly ambiguous, confusing and gives far more wordage to one side than the other. The Council official then decided that as the two sides could not agree on the referendum question, the councillors should decide at the full Council meeting next Wednesday instead.

“Since it was not possible to obtain complete agreement prior to the submission of this Council paper, Council are therefore asked to take a view as to whether they would prefer to endorse the question in 5.3 d), 5.3 e) or 5.3 f) or, indeed, whether they wish to propose a further compromise between these three positions.”
http://committees.aberdeencity.gov.uk/mgConvert2PDF.aspx?ID=17676

I complained bitterly about this as what had happened here was highly irregular.

“Gerry.

“We participated in good faith last week. The ACGT only replied last night, too late. This has stalled the process of mediation as recommended by councillors. This is unacceptable.

“We are not at fault and should not be penalised for this. We insist that our question should stand. This does not bode well for a fairly conducted referendum and we may have to reconsider our options. – Mike”

I received this reply from Mr Brough (this is the last bit of the email):

“Nobody is being penalised.

“As you can see from the attached 5.3 that I sent to you, the process for determining the question is set out clearly up to the final submission received before the paper needed to be submitted. Council members are then being asked to either choose between these latest proposals, or come up with an alternative of their own that they consider to be fair and balanced for both parties.

“I understand your desire to undermine process, as a means of campaigning against any development of UTG. However, in this case, I believe that you are stretching a point to suggest that you have been in any way treated unfairly

“Also, although you “insist” that the FOUTG question should stand, FOUTG need to accept the fact that any referendum will be run by the City Council and that it is ultimately for the Counting Officer to decide, after consultation with Campaign Groups, on a suggested question.

“At a statutory referendum, the question is set by parliament, through consultation and, although there are no rules for the Council to follow, best practice suggests this should be done by the Counting Officer. This is the view expressed by the Electoral Commission.

“The Council are therefore putting in place a process to test various proposed options in advance of the Council Meeting, so that both Council and the Counting Officer can have some comfort concerning the appropriateness of the question.

“Regards, Gerry”

I now have a series of meetings with Councillors and the Council Executive to discuss what has happened. I will make it clear that the ongoing participation in a referendum depends on both sides being treated fairly. However, this is not a good start.

STOP PRESS – Council seeks views of the public re referendum question.
Consultation closes Monday 12th December.

http://www.aberdeencity.gov.uk/CouncilNews/ci_cns/pr_referendumoptions_081211.asp