November 22, 2011
Mayor Robertson,
I wish you and your team great success in making Vancouver the greenest city in the world and ending homelessness. I support many of your initiatives, in particular, your promise to put a moratorium on the expansion of gambling in downtown Vancouver.
As before, I am writing to you as a member of the public. I am not part of any campaign or any political party.
Yesterday, in your CKNW interview with Bill Good, you referred to my questions about your campaign funding as "baseless allegations." I find this comment difficult to reconcile with your own statements to the editorial board of the Vancouver Sun, on November 10, 2011.
According to the blog of your Vancouver Sun editorial board meeting, one of the questions asked by columnist Harvey Enchin, was about Interdependent Investments Ltd. (II Ltd.), a low-profile "investment firm" that made two modest donations to Vision Vancouver for a total of $6,000 between 2008 and 2010.
Mr. Enchin drew your attention to the fact that II Ltd. doesn't appear to have any revenue streams other than the Endswell Foundation ("Endswell"). "Ergo, a registered charity donated to Vision Vancouver," Mr. Enchin surmised.
The Vancouver Sun's blog reports that you responded by saying that corporations are allowed to donate to political parties. Mr. Echin then asked, "Do you know what the company does?" "I don't drill down to the details and the operating backgrounds of all our donors," you replied, according to the Vancouver Sun's blog.
Of all the donors to Vision Vancouver, I would think that II Ltd. would be one of the easiest donors for you to find out about. After all, Joel Solomon, your biggest financial backer in the previous election, is the president of II Ltd. One of Joel Solomon's "investment firms," Renewal Partners, is supposedly the big investor behind your company, Happy Planet. Furthermore, the treasurer of Vision Vancouver, Martha Burton, is the long-time secretary of II Ltd., and is the vice-president of Renewal Partners.
Incidentally, I have noticed that according to company records, Ms. Burton's long-standing involvement with II Ltd. was quietly discontinued in April of 2011 - one week after I sent you an open letter asking questions about II Ltd.
U.S. tax returns show that over the years, the Endswell Foundation paid staff at Renewal Partners a total of $2.3 million in salaries. Endswell also paid $1.4 million to Interdependent Investments Ltd. That's a total of $3.7 million that went from Mr. Solomon's charity to Mr. Solomon's two "investment firms," and towards the payment of staff salaries at at least one of those firms. That included $979,529 for Mr. Solomon himself, U.S. tax returns say.
If you don't "drill down to the details and the operating backgrounds of donors," as you told the Vancouver Sun, how do you know that $194,000 from Mr. Solomon's "investment firms" and Strategic Communications did not originate from the millions of dollars that Mr. Solomon's charity paid to these firms?
If II Ltd. has no sources of revenue other than Endswell, it follows that campaign donations that were attributed to II Ltd. must have originated from Endswell. In my opinion, this would then call into question all of the campaign finance reporting by the treasurer of Vision Vancouver as she was closely involved in both "investment firms," the charity, and your political party.
I have no doubt that Vision Vancouver has not received money directly from a registered charity. That would be too obvious. My question is whether Vision Vancouver indirectly received campaign donations (a total of $339,265, according to my calculations) that originated from Endswell or Tides Canada. In other words, was a substantial amount of money passed through these so-called "investment firms" and P.R. firms that were used, for lack of a better term, as a front?
I also hope that you will help to bring about some answers with regards to Tides Canada's "strategic plan to address the development of oil and gas in British Columbia," and whether campaign donations to pave your path to power in B.C. politics is any part of that.
Sincerely,
Vivian Krause
I wonder if Tides Canada is for or against the Keystone pipeline. Maybe they like cheap oil.
Posted by: Ross Johnson | 12/01/2011 at 03:52 PM