Lets work together to help improve our City and Province and if needed use Formal Complaints, FIPPA, LERA, Auditors, Ombudsman and more

Posted on August 29, 2016 by Kevin Yaworski
Lets work together to help improve our City and Province and if needed use FIPPA, LERA, Auditors, Ombudsman and more
Aug 28 2016 – Kevin Yaworski – WiseUpWinnipeg

Lets work together to help improve our City and Province and make our police, elected officials and the people they appoint accountable for their actions.  Learn more about many tools taxpayers are paying for that are available to the general public to help accomplish this when it is not happening on its own like FIPPA, WPS complaints, LERA, Ombudsman, City Auditor, OAG and more.

Are you fed up with OUR elected and appointed officials at the City, WPS, WPA or the Province ignoring you, WiseUpWinnipeg, the media and others regarding important matters like public safety, public service accountability and other important matters?

There has been lots of informal complaining in this group and elsewhere about WPS or Officers and their 3rd party partner ACS / Xerox or their Operators (“designated” peace officers and emergency vehicles) or WPA and their 3rd party for profit partner G4S Tech as well as the City and Province relating to traffic enforcement, traffic court, the use of our valuable police and justice system resources, parking, taxes and other public funds.  We should all know this informal complaining usually doesn’t accomplish much.If you have an issue at the City or Province that is not getting the attention it should you can contact 311, your City Councillor, MLA and appointed officials (see “Contact info” section below)

To see which Councillors and City Staff or on what committees check:

It might be a bit early to say we need positive change in the Provincial government but time is running out for them on several serious issues they have promised to respond to.
The recent articles in the Metro by  and Winnipeg Free Press by Gordon Sinclair Jr. and others in the media and elsewhere make it pretty clear the deliberate abuse of motorists and others in the public by City Hall, WPS, ACS, WPA, G4S and even the Province.
It is more than upsetting to hear the verified facts and then more claimed ignorance, deliberate lies or misleading statements by people at the City and Province like OUR Mayor Brian Bowman, COO Michael Jack, Deputy Mayor Public Works chair Counc. Janice Lukes, City Transportation Dept Manager Luis Escobar, Justice Minister Heather Stefanson and others.  Many of them have been on City Council or Parliament or in the city and government for long enough now and know plain as day what is going on.

One of the few things that has worked is court action but this is costly and should not be necessary for us to make those we elect or that they appoint and that we pay to honestly and responsibly lead our City and Province.

So what can we do other than informal complaining?

We do not need to wait till the next election to help bring positive change in the City or Province.  We can contact our elected or appointed representatives any time and it helps to have facts to prevent being ignored, mislead or outright lied to.
When we don’t get the facts from those in power that have them they maybe trying to hide deliberate abuse of the public.  They will often not give you them directly or when they do it is often partial or misleading information.

If you are not getting the answers you need regarding information pertaining only to yourself with the City or Province or suspect something that should be made available to the public is being withheld you can use Freedom of Information and Privacy Protection Act (FIPPA) requests to the City or Province to ask for this to be disclosed.
Be sure to share your responses with the group.

More info below.

There is also some options to make formal complaints including online forms and who to escalate to if you feel you did not get an adequate response.If specific traffic control signs are missing or inadequate or other specific traffic engineering deficiencies in speed limits or amber time etc… you can contact 311 to request it be corrected.
311@winnipeg.caComplaints about Police behaviour (criminal or not), Policy or Administration: http://www.winnipeg.ca/police/professionalstandards/default.stmWPS Online complaints form:
http://www.winnipeg.ca/police/ProfessionalStandards/mailform.asp

If you prefer your police related complaint about non criminal behaviour or policy / administration can be made with LERA.

Law Enforcement Review Agency
http://www.gov.mb.ca/justice/lera
http://www.gov.mb.ca/justice/lera/complaint/index.html

You may also want to contact the Winnipeg Police Board wpb@winnipeg.ca about police policy or administration issues or if your complaint is not being addressed.

For non police related complaints to the City or Province:
If relating to the City you can contact 311 or look a specific complaint process for specific departments at http://www.winnipeg.ca or see MB Ombudsman below.

For Provincial complaints there is different process for different departments.  More info here:
http://www.gov.mb.ca/ or see MB Ombudsman below.

For complaints about fraud or misuse of public funds you can report this to the City or Province Auditor:
http://winnipeg.ca/audit/

MB Office of the Auditor General (OAG)
http://www.oag.mb.ca/, (204) 945-3351, citizens.concerns@oag.mb.ca,

For City public safety concerns contact
WpgCommitteeForSafety (WCFS)
http://www.winnipeg.ca/clerks/boards/WpgCommitteeForSafety/

The Manitoba Ombudsman
Can investigates complaints from anyone who feels they have been treated unfairly by the provincial government or a municipal government, including the City of Winnipeg. The complaint must relate to a matter of administration.  Their Privacy and Access section can investigate things like FIPPA requests that are rejected or redacted or cost estimates not being waived if it a matter of public interest, like public safety or health or you are have low income.  There Ombudsman section can’t investigate legislative / political decisions but can investigate how these decisions implemented (i.e. not as intended by legislators or city council etc… and there is several cases where this is occurring)
https://www.ombudsman.mb.ca/
ombudsma@ombudsman.mb.ca

We already have at least one formal complaint about a WPS officer repeatedly doing illegal u-turn onto a one way street to get back to a traffic enforcement location (non emergency).  Video of the officers behaviour as well as a audio recording of the attempted complaint is available.  WPS were initially going to accept the complaint until they heard it was an officer and not a member of the public and then changed their tune.  This story including the double standard was covered in the metro.  This will be escalated and will post more info when available.

We can submit Freedom of Information Act (FIPPA) requests to the City and Province to get try and get the answers.

There is similar process available for other levels of government.
This is another tool the public can use to get information from the different levels of government to help make them accountable.  It should NOT be necessary but unfortunately it is.
As an example and so Winnipeggers and many Manitobans understands some of the things that are being done behind the scenes mostly on their behalf.
Todd Dube and Chris S have submitted hundreds of FIPPA’s over several years now to the City and Province to get information from WPS, ACS, Public Works, City Legal department and others to try get the answers we need.  They do this to force positive change regarding traffic engineering deficiencies, unfair or illegal traffic enforcement by WPS, and ACS, abuse in traffic court and related abuse of motorists, the public and public funds.  These tools are often used by the media and others to get information they need for stories or other matters.
Sometimes they have received redacted (blacked out) sections or complete pages or documents redacted as they have several reasons they are allowed to use for this in the legislation.
They have had to contact the Ombudsmen who gets a copy of the redacted information and decides if any of it “can” be un-redacted.
Unfortunately their powers are currently limited in some cases by the legislation and we must request our MLA’s table a bill to strengthen them as well as the
In some case FIPPA’s have been returned with important information redacted and when the Ombudsmen contacted they have actually said this information needs to get out to the public but my hands are tied in hopes you will try and use other means to get the information.
The legislation which needs to be reformed to give the Ombudsmen more power.  Similar is needed for the Manitoba Auditor General and OAG.
If you agree write the appropriate ministers and you MLA and tell them this and why.
For those of you that want to help by submitting your own FIPPA’s to try and get some of the answers we are being denied or lied to or ignored here is more info.  Please share any the info and experience you others and the the WUW group.
When more of the public do this and share the results they will have no choice but to listen and stop the abuse that is taking place.
Submitting FIPPA requests to the City and Province:
—————————————————————————–
There is similar process available for other levels of government.
I was concerned that Todd and Chris have had issues with submitting FIPPA requests to the City Clerks office who handles them by email and that they used technology as an excuse for things to disappear etc…  They had to go in person to submit and get their copy stamped.
I asked the City Clerks office what the policy was and got a clear response that for all FIPPA’s they receive by email get printed, date stamped, submit and then reply confirming this done.
I submitted one for some information we needed but I had to ask for confirmation even though they told me earlier they do it automatically but at least still got it.
The current FIPPA application form (pdf) from the City website is fillable electronically.
You can sign and date the completed pdf electronically by adding comment for signature and comment text box for date and then prevent editing when printing or you can just complete normally, scan and email.
I used Bullzip PDF printer to set an owner password and restrict editing the pdf.
Then anyone can only view and print it unless they have the pswd.
To do this you specify an owner pswd when printing and select restrict permissions.  I confirmed after that it opens and prints ok without prompting for pswd and properties show it can only be viewed and printed.
If you want this pdf printer driver you can download the free community version here which does not have spyware or malware in it.
http://cdn.bullzip.com/download/pdf_free/Setup_BullzipPDFPrinter_10_24_0_2543_FREE.exe
For more info and to file a FIPPA to the CIty or Province:
City:
http://www.winnipeg.ca/clerks/fippa/
Province (Public):
http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/fippa/public_portal_home.html
Province (Public Body):
http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/fippa/index.html
MB FIPPA Legislation:
http://web2.gov.mb.ca/laws/statutes/ccsm/f175e.php
Contact info:

Specific complaint or report missing SIGNS, obscured signs, short amber, artificially lowered speed limit and other traffic engineering or parking sign deficiencies etc…
311@winnipeg.ca

OUR elected or appointed officials
COO Michael Jack
MJack@winnipeg.ca

Deputy Mayor, public Works Chair, EPC, Counc. Janice Lukes
JLukes@winnipeg.ca;

CAO
…

Councillor

http://winnipeg.ca/clerks/council/committees.stm
[FirstNameLastName]@winnipeg.ca
Or
[FirstInitialLastName]@winnipeg.ca
MLA
[FirstName.LastName]@leg.gov.mb.ca

Mayor Brian Bowmam
myo-mayor@winnipeg.ca;  mayor@winnipeg.ca;

Attourney General / Minister of Justice
Heather Stefanson
minjus@leg.gov.mb.ca;

Minister of Finance
minfin@leg.gov.mb.ca;

Minister of Infrastructure and Transportation
minmit@leg.gov.mb.ca

If above ignoring or since we already know they ignoring then include

Premier
Brian Pallister
premier@leg.gov.mb.ca

Report misuse of public funds
Auditor General
citizens.concerns@oag.mb.ca;

Norman Ricard
norman.ricard@oag.mb.ca;

Because the abuse we seeing and documenting is being allowed or ignored by so many people and departments to make it easier here is all of them except Ombudsman and LERA and other Councillors.

norman.ricard@oag.mb.ca; citizens.concerns@oag.mb.ca; premier@leg.gov.mb.ca; minmit@leg.gov.mb.ca; minfin@leg.gov.mb.ca; minjus@leg.gov.mb.ca;
myo-mayor@winnipeg.ca;  mayor@winnipeg.ca;
JLukes@winnipeg.ca;
MJack@winnipeg.ca; [FirstNameLastName]@winnipeg.ca; [FirstName.LastName]@leg.gov.mb.ca

Ignored then open formal complaint with
ombudsman@ombudsman.mb.ca

Other options if formal complaint needed against a police or peace officer or you ignored:

Lets work together to help improve our City and Province and if needed use FIPPA, LERA, Winnipeg Police Board, Auditors, Ombudsman, LERA and more

Aug 28 2016 – Kevin Yaworski

http://wp.me/p1fJaD-nr

About Kevin Yaworski

I use my blog to write about things that I think are a matter of public interest or that I think others will be interested in
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