Mary Agnes Welch's Gripe Juice

with Mary Agnes Welch

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• Thanks, baby

  01/15/2012 6:10 PM

  Normally, I use this space to gripe about government types. This time, I am full of love.

  Saturday’s feature story on baby names wouldn’t have happened without the speed and forthrightness of the data geeks at Vital Statistics, and the forbearance of provincial media guy Glen Cassie. Last year, on a whim inspired by this, I asked for the top baby names broken down by postal code prefix. Glen rolled his eyes, said he would check, and a day later I got an Excel spreadsheet with exactly what I asked for.

  A day later. That’s service. That’s also transparency. Granted, we’re talking about baby names, not outstanding warrants or flood claims or the mess of other, more controversial data sets the province keeps. But still, that’s how open government is supposed to work.

  This was, like, a year ago that I got the baby name data. I then sat on it for months because we needed to figure out how to map it, which meant buying forward sortation area boundary files for crap I don’t even understand. That’s when my own data geek (and boss), Free Press Online Editor Wendy Sawatzky, started to work, creating this interactive map. Unfairly, she doesn’t get a byline in the paper, so she gets no love, except from me. ‘Twas ever thus for nerds. The Vital Stats folks probably don’t get many public pats on the back, either. I don’t even know their names – maybe it’s just one dude? But, along with Glen, they responded quickly and carefully to my endless string of questions, requests for updated numbers, fiddly problems and "one more thing..." emails. I thank them.

  This story was meant to be an experiment. We’re always trying to use databases to better guide our reporting and find trends we might have missed. This time, we wanted to practice overlaying data on postal code prefixes. Baby names were kind of a light-hearted test run in advance of the upcoming census release, which we can also map by postal code prefix (did you know there were 85 Japanese people living in West Broadway in 2006?). Those maps look easy. They are fussier than hell the first time. In a way, the process of creating the baby names story was more important to us than the actual product.

  At least it started out that way. To find some babies named Olivia and Liam and Ava, we did something we don’t normally do – we alerted readers (and our competition) to the upcoming story and asked for feedback, stories, photos, the works. We did this with a blurb on our website and a little Tweeting and Facebooking by social media reporter Lindsey Wiebe.

  The response was nuts. I received about 65 emails from readers, which shaped the story significantly. Instead of acres of text and data boxes – always the default plan of a data geek - we instead devoted most of the real estate to real parents with cute babies and good name stories. That made the feature way more fun and much more reflective of our readers. And it was so much easier than scrambling around for a "real Olivia" at the last minute like I normally do. I think we’ll do these kinds of shout-outs again, so keep your eyes peeled. And a huge thank you to all the proud parents who emailed us. You made the story miles better, and it was a total pleasure to read all your emails. I thank you.

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• Alice Taylor meets the preem

  10/23/2011 8:22 PM

  Alice Taylor (http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/no-running-water/degrading-third-world-conditions-one-more-hurdle-for-disabled-man-on-reserve-132369633.html), who is quickly becoming my favourite Manitoban, had an unexpected visit the week before the provincial election.

  Alice, who lives in remote St. Theresa Point, is battling to get running water for her home and proper services for her disabled son, Kevin. Alice and her husband Francis put a lie to the offensive idea that people on reserves don’t deserve the same stuff Winnipeggers take for granted, that somehow they don’t work hard enough or take enough responsibility for their lives. Alice is sprightly and outspoken and warm and determined. This province could use 1,000 more Alice Taylors, and any politician would be wise to make her house their first stop when they visit Island Lake.

  That’s exactly what Premier Greg Selinger and Aboriginal Affairs Minister Eric Robinson did a couple of weeks ago when they flew in to St. Theresa Point to campaign. It sounds like they had trouble finding Alice. She was staying at her dad’s house, taking care of him. She and her sisters trade weeks, each taking turns looking after the elder in his house, which also doesn’t have running water. Kevin, who has cerebral palsy, comes with Alice because there’s not really anyone else to look after him.

  Alice, who joked about the big entourage that arrived with the politicians, was pleased when Robinson asked her to itemize exactly what services she needed for Kevin. Those would include respite, physio and speech therapy and some kind of recreation or job skills program to get Kevin off the couch and doing something other than crosswords.

  After the visit, Alice says Selinger gave her a big hug – rather uncharacteristic for the cerebral premier.

  "I told them, ‘If I don’t hear from you guys, you’re going to hear from me’" she laughed.

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• Conservation speculation

  10/12/2011 2:41 PM

  The sexy speculation in political nerd circles seems to swirl around who might be finance minister and, like Dan, I’d put money on Theresa Oswald or Big Mac. Jennifer Howard used to be a health policy wonk, so she’s an obvious choice for health if Oswald moves.

  For me, though, the more interesting spec is about Conservation – a department that’s been troubled for years. One source familiar with its inner workings said senior and mid-level staff are obstructionist and old-school, and progress on files is glacial. The department’s climate change initiative is a failure and has completely fallen off the radar. The east side governance process seems to have ground to a halt. I’m still not sure what’s a Water Stewardship thing, what’s an Energy and Mines thing and what’s a Conservation thing. And there is no department slower with FOI requests, which is a little inside baseball but speaks volumes. That’s not to say there aren’t excellent people working in Conservation, but, on the climate change file alone, it’s rudderless.

  For much of the last few years, the department has had less-than-energetic ministers. The late Oscar Lathlin cared about many things, but I’m not sure septic field inspections was one of them. And, even admirers of Bill Blaikie say he was disengaged. Stan Struthers mucked in, worked hard and is among the best-liked MLAs at the legislature, but I don’t think he knocked heads much within the department. Kind of not his style.

  Selinger needs to promote two people from the backbenches and it’s fairly slim pickings for a party with such a big majority. There’s a bunch of promising newbies who need time to set up their voicemail, some rogues like Elmwood’s Jim Maloway, and that’s basically it, except for Rossmere’s Erna Braun and Kirkfield Park’s Sharon Blady, assuming the recount comes out in her favour.

  That brings us to Drew Caldwell. For years, he’s been seen as the disastrous former education minister, one of the few people former Premier Gary Doer ever demoted, a hippie lightweight. But he’s toiled in the backbenches and some say he’s matured a lot. He was willing to take on politically risky issues in education, and he’s apparently not scared to speak his mind.

  Folks in Brandon are acutely aware they’re left out of cabinet – not that it made a difference last week. Caldwell still won by 1,000 votes. So it’s not like the NDP need to woo the Wheat City. But maybe some guys deserve a second chance, and maybe Conservation could benefit from a minister with something to prove.

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