Mayor’s not afraid to step on toes, even friendly ones

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This article was published 28/01/2015 (4082 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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The first lesson politicians are supposed to learn is to dance with the one who brought you. Brian Bowman doesn’t want to boogie with anybody.

Winnipeg’s new mayor spent much of Monday throwing rocks at a popular corporation headed up by a popular man who just so happened to be his biggest backer in 2014.

True North Sports & Entertainment achieved deity-like status in 2011 by bringing NHL hockey back to Winnipeg. True North soon became the only corporation on the planet to hear its name chanted during a national anthem.

Bowman scored the endorsement of last year’s mayoral race when he won the support of Mark Chipman, True North’s understated and affable chairman. Some in opposing camps questioned whether Bowman could operate independently of his powerful backer.

Any concerns about the new mayor’s autonomy, however, evaporated over the past 10 days when Bowman’s office spearheaded a campaign to complicate a True North plan to redevelop the former Carlton Inn site, north of the RBC Convention Centre.

Then on Monday, the mayor raised conflict-of-interest allegations by revealing Chipman served on the board of CentreVenture, Winnipeg’s downtown development agency, when a True North option on the Carlton Inn site took effect.

If this is how Bowman coddles his friends, no one should be eager to anger him. But it remains to be seen whether the ferocity of his recent actions will help the city in the long run.

In an effort to demonstrate how far he’ll go to rid city hall of the “get ‘er done” mentality that afflicted the scandal-plagued Sam Katz administration, Bowman has potentially alienated an ally and jeopardized a land assembly that may see more than $100 million eventually invested in downtown Winnipeg.

How did we get here? It started when the RBC Convention Centre brought forward a plan to release construction company Stuart Olson of its obligation to build a new hotel to serve the facility’s $180-million expansion.

Stuart Olson was obliged to build on the Carlton Inn site, but was stymied by the 2012 departure of hotel-building partner Matthews Southwest, which — in the words of CentreVenture board member Richard Olfert — “reneged on its deal” to buy the Carlton Inn and never spoke to the agency again.

Unfortunately, CentreVenture purchased the Carlton Inn for $6.6 million. Subsequent efforts to land a hotelier for the site went nowhere until April 2014, when — according to CentreVenture board chairman Curt Vossen — the president of Stuart Olson’s parent company told Katz and former CentreVenture president and CEO Ross McGowan he wanted out of the deal.

In May 2014, True North approached CentreVenture with a Carlton Inn plan of its own. They would build on this site as well as on the vacant Manitoba Public Insurance lot at 225 Carlton St. and connect the whole works to the convention centre with a series of skywalks.

An option on the Carlton Inn site was signed on Sept. 24, but dated effective June 12, Bowman said.

The problem is, Chipman was a CentreVenture board member and didn’t resign from that board until July. Nonetheless, Olfert insisted the True North chairman recused himself from any Carlton-site discussions at the board level and followed all CentreVenture conflict-of-interest guidelines.

Bowman is clearly disturbed by the appearance of conflict. This is on top of the mayor’s anger True North was awarded an option on land Stuart Olson is still contractually obliged to develop.

All of this combined to force Bowman to demand CentreVenture open up the Carlton Inn site to any and all bidders — even though the True North proposal is being touted as spectacular.

If that is in fact the case, the mayor said, then True North will easily win the bid for the land. Whether or not that happens, Winnipeg’s entire development community should be spooked.

Again, if Bowman is willing to put his allies through a meat grinder, imagine what will happen to his enemies.

bartley.kives@freepress.mb.ca