Toronto Hydro Corp. is spending public money on consultants, including Bay Street lawyers, to help it keep a secret — how much public money it has spent on consultants. David Rider, the Star’s city hall bureau chief has been trying to find out. It’s a battle that has now been fought for more than a year — and there is no end in sight. January 2016 - Using anonymous sources, I revealed behind-the-scenes work to set the stage for a partial privatization of the century-old power distributor of which the City of Toronto is sole shareholder.Jan. 8, 2016 – My story “Toronto Hydro privatization plan in the works” is published.Jan. 22, 2016 - I then submitted two applications to hydro under Ontario’s freedom of information legislation. I asked for copies of internal hydro communications mentioning any possible privatization, and for the estimated cost of all work done by consultants, including lawyers and pollsters, related to a possible sale. To me it seemed basic information, albeit potentially controversial for an arm’s length agency that had no mandate from city council to explore a possible sale. I expected a fight, fueled by institutional aversion to lifting the hood on internal machinations, and maybe the grudging release of some pages mostly or fully blanked out.That would force me to appeal to Ontario’s Information and Privacy Commissioner (IPC) in hopes hydro would be ordered to fully live up to its responsibilities under the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act.Feb. 25, 2016 - I was wrong and, after decades of trying to pry information out of government, hopelessly naïve. Hydro has refused to even process my request. Fourteen months later, awaiting a final ruling by IPC, I have received nothing from hydro except, via lawyers the utility is paying to fight me, dozens of pages of arguments about why the utility cannot, and will not, acknowledge that such records ...
|
