Charities & non-profits

Second legislative warrant to be issued for ORNGE founder

Topics:
0

Tanya Talaga – May 17, 2012

A second warrant will be issued to try to force ORNGE founder Dr. Chris Mazza to testify before the committee investigating the air ambulance scandal. And he isn’t the only one the legislative probe is recalling.

Former Liberal Party of Canada president Alfred Apps; Don Guy, the mastermind behind Premier Dalton McGuinty’s last four election campaigns; and Saad Rafi, the deputy health minister, will be asked to testify again.

Budget signals attack on charities' advocacy work

Topics:
3

Tim Naumetz – March 29, 2012

Opposition MPs say a surprise allegation in the federal budget that Canadian charities are violating federal rules limiting their political advocacy is retribution for widespread opposition from environmental groups to the massive Northern Gateway oil sands pipeline across British Columbia.

The obscure provision in the budget Thursday to beef up the Canada Revenue Agency’s “enforcement tools” to monitor political activities of charities demonstrates the partisan nature of the Conservative government, opposition MPs said.

Former ORNGE execs refused to co-operate with AG, source says

Topics:
3

Maria Babbage – March 20, 2012

A long-awaited report on Ornge by Ontario's auditor general won't be able to tell the whole story behind the scandal at the province's troubled air ambulance service, The Canadian Press has learned.

The former management and board of directors at Ornge refused to co-operate with auditor general Jim McCarter, denying him key documents that would have revealed what a source familiar with Ornge characterized as "the truth" about the agency's web of for-profit subsidiaries.

Conservative call centre company has chequered legal history in U.S.

Topics:
0

Glen McGregor and Stephen Maher – March 1, 2012

The company that handles the Conservative Party’s computerized voter-identification system and powerful fundraising machine has a chequered legal history in the United States, where it operates call centres that have repeatedly been the subject of lawsuits and complaints over its telemarketing practices.

Media reports say Elections Canada is broadening its investigation of harassing telephone calls in Guelph to include former employees of Responsive Marketing Group in Thunder Bay, who called the RCMP to report concerns about calls they were making to direct voters to the wrong polling stations.

$25M in ORNGE money unaccounted for

Topics:
3

Kevin Donovan – February 24, 2012

Roughly $25 million dollars raised by ORNGE with Ontario taxpayers’ help cannot be accounted for. Investigators, financial and criminal, are digging into the case to see if the money was blown on a spending spree, bad business decisions or if some of it lined executives’ pockets.

The money comes from $275 million that ORNGE raised from Canadian investors in 2009 to purchase new airplanes, helicopters and an office building. Ontario taxpayer money is repaying the investors.

ORNGE scandal: Tougher legislation, but whistleblowers muzzled

Topics:
3

Kevin Donovan and Tanya Talaga – February 18, 2012

The whistleblowers of ORNGE, who brought serious patient safety and financial concerns forward, are being warned they may go to jail if they keep talking.  If you leak information you can be held criminally liable for obstructing a criminal investigation,” interim ORNGE boss Ron McKerlie warned ORNGE’s 400 employees Thursday at a town-hall meeting. “You can go to jail,” he said.

The stiff warning appears to be directed at the many ORNGE employees who helped the public learn just how troubled the air ambulance service was. It came just before Friday’s announcement that the province hopes to tighten its grip on the service, which the Star found was riddled with problems.

Whistleblower warned Ministry about ORNGE in 2008

Topics:
3

Kevin Donovan – February 3, 2012

Ontario’s Health Ministry and the province’s financial investigations team were warned of serious problems at Ornge three years ago, documents reveal. An Ornge accountant blew the whistle in 2008, telling the province that the publicly funded Ornge was “handing out money like water.”

In an interview audiotaped in 2008 by Ministry of Finance investigators, Keith Walmsley said former Ornge boss Dr. Chris Mazza, who was fired Thursday, and other executives were paying themselves whopping bonuses and had set up a spiderweb of for-profit companies. Walmsley went on to provide detailed allegations of numerous abuses of taxpayers money and said Ornge was deceiving the cash-strapped Health Ministry, hiding a $5-million annual surplus in taxpayers funds by using a double set of books.

Air Ambulance service ORNGE fires top executives

Topics:
0

Postmedia News – February 2, 2012

Amid charges of financial mismanagement and poor safety standards, the two most senior executives at Ornge Global, which is responsible for Ontario’s air ambulance service, have been fired.

Founder and CEO Chris Mazza and chief operating officer Maria Renzella were dismissed without severance pay on Thursday, the same day the company was placed in receivership and a newly appointed board appointed to handle bankruptcy proceedings. A forensic audit of the firm’s books continues.

Environmental charity backs up whistleblower's claims of government intimidation

Topics:
4

Marketwire – January 26, 2012

ForestEthics has sent a statement to supporters confirming the veracity of Andrew Frank's claims that the Government of Canada targeted the environmental group.

In an email sent to supporters yesterday afternoon (January 25), ForestEthics co-founder, Valerie Langer confirms the veracity of Andrew Frank's claims: "While a spokesman for the Prime Minister's Office denied using this language (An Enemy of the Government of Canada), he refused to comment when asked whether ForestEthics was targeted by the government. ForestEthics was targeted by the government. There's a good reason they wouldn't comment: it's true."

A Whistleblower’s Open Letter to the Citizens of Canada

Topics:
4
Andrew Frank

A Whistleblower’s Open Letter to the Citizens of Canada: Prime Minister’s Office Tries to Silence Pipeline Critics; Labels Environmental Group “Enemy of the Government of Canada” and “Enemy of the people of Canada.”

by Andrew Frank

Today, I am taking the extraordinary step of risking my career, my reputation and my personal friendships, to act as a whistleblower and expose the undemocratic and potentially illegal pressure the Harper government has apparently applied to silence critics of the Enbridge Northern Gateway oil tanker/pipeline plan.

As I have detailed in a sworn affidavit, no less than three senior managers with TidesCanada and ForestEthics (a charitable project of Tides Canada), have informed me, as the Senior Communications Manager for ForestEthics, that Tides Canada CEO, Ross McMillan,was informed by the Prime Minister’s Office, that ForestEthics is considered an “Enemy of the Government of Canada,” and an “Enemy of the people of Canada.”

Syndicate content