Update, 3pm Friday: Munroe’s office now says the report will be released Monday. Later today, city auditor general Larry Munroe will release a scathing report detailing problems with the councillors’ District Capital Funds. I’ll post that report here as soon as I get it, but it’s worth previewing the issue. Officially titled the District Capital […]
Larry Munroe
Posted inNews + Opinion
Deal with Harold MacKay makes city look bad, weakens bargaining position with TCL
I was wrong: contrary to my earlier supposition, the payment from Harold MacKay to the city just before the Metallica show was in fact related to the concert loan scandal, and not simply pre-payment for Metallica costs. Council Tuesday released this statement: 13.3 Contractual Matter – Concert Update That Halifax Regional Council approve the settlement […]
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City officials contemplate suing Trade Centre Limited
Two city officials are implying there’s a simple solution to the $359,550 bill related to concerts scandal: Don’t pay it. That course of action, suggested by both city auditor Larry Munroe and city councillor Gloria McCluskey, threatens to create an epic legal battle between the city and Trade Centre Limited, a provincial crown corporation. But […]
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Concert report slams Peter Kelly, Wayne Anstey, Fred MacGillivray and Scott Ferguson
Halifax auditor general Larry Munroe released his report on the concert loan scandal Tuesday. Mayor Peter Kelly, the city’s former chief bureaucrat Wayne Anstey and former and current Trade Centre Limited presidents Fred MacGillivray and Scott Ferguson are particularly implicated. The report names names, assigns blame and provides explosive new details about how city and […]
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Who at City Hall knew what when?
[image-1] There are lots of questions in the concert loan scandal that remain unanswered. Here are three: Who in City Hall knew of the abysmally low ticket sales numbers for the Common concerts, When did they know it, and Why, with that knowledge in hand, did they keep booking shows on the Common? Some background: Scott Ferguson, president at Trade Centre Limited, tells me that he fully informed city officials about ticket sales figures for all the Common concerts. I believe him. But here’s the city’s policy on concerts, as adopted by council on March 6, 2007 (pg. 7): [image-2]
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Auditor general Larry Munroe says HRM is wasting $800,000 a year
[image-1] The city is wasting $800,000 a year administering grants to community organizations, says auditor general Larry Munroe, who is so alarmed that he wants council’s audit and finance committees to “immediately” find ways to cut the waste out of the annual budget council approved just last week. The $800,000 figure is Munroe’s back-of-the-envelope calculation of what a 15 percent reduction in the city’s total grants allocation would represent. “We didn’t have any trouble at all to support a 15 percent reduction,” he says. Munroe detailed the problems in a report released last week and in an interview with The