City Hall will soon get its 2009 Christmas tree (which is somehow worthy of coverage in nearly all media, but whatever).

A suggestion for future years though, rather than placing the tree right in front of Sam’s Place, why not relocate it to Old Market Square?

It wouldn’t work this year due to continuing renos at the park, but I’d think the tree would be far more appreciated in the heart of the Exchange. Besides, aren’t they looking to transform Old Market Square into a skating rink in the winter? Skating rink + big Christmas tree…hmm…where have I seen that before?

Saskatchewan highways are better than Manitoba highways.

Alberta highways are better than Manitoba highways.

Two-lane mountain pass highways in BC that are already covered in snow are better than Manitoba highways.

The Calgary Sun is almost like a real newspaper.

Even the Regina Leader-Post is better designed than the Winnipeg Free Press.

Dear Saskatchewan, a few more distance signs wouldn’t kill you.

Despite the economic crisis, Western Canada’s tallest building is currently being built in downtown Calgary. When finished, The Bow will be the new corporate headquarters for Encana. The foot of the tower will feature two public art pieces by Jaume Plensa, who created the Crown Fountain in Chicago’s Millennium Park, which is awesome.

Another fantastic public space is Prince’s Island Park in Calgary. The highlight: the number of people using it for running, walking, soccer, etc. on a weekday. I so wish Winnipeg had a legitimate park adjacent to downtown. Let’s put that on the rebuild list if we ever get wiped out by a big tornado.

Kelowna (metro population 166,000) has high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes. People would seriously lose their shit if the City of Winnipeg ever attempted to do the same (even though it wouldn’t be a half-bad idea).

My grandfather was complaining about how the hospitals in Penticton get over-run by tourists in the summer. He recounted a tale of having to wait for 3.5 hours in the ER this past summer for his wife to get attention for a sore shoulder. I was thinking it might actually take less time to fly to Penticton for medical service than wait at HSC.

110 km/h speed limits are awesome. Sorry planet, they just are.

Regina has a Chili’s and an East Side Mario’s. Not only is its economy stronger, but Saskatchewan is even beating us in the chain restaurant race. [Sarcasm Alert!]

Speaking of which, how come our Starbucks aren’t serving those delightful little english muffin breakfast sandwiches?

And on a completely unrelated note:

Can we fire Mike Kelly now?

The WRHA’s handling of the H1N1 vaccinations would almost be amusing if it wasn’t a potential health crisis.

Apparently lineups at today’s clinics are so light that the WRHA has expanded its priority list and is publicly calling for more people to attend. Spokesperson Heidi Graham tells the CBC:

We really want to get the word out because we know there has been lots of media reports about long lineups and so people may be staying away because they fear long lineups.

Heidi, there weren’t just media reports of long lineups, there were actually some really damn long lineups! And I think the word of mouth about the situation was actually worse than the media reports. Seriously, how many times have you heard the words ridiculous, stupid or idiotic used to describe the clinic fiasco in the past week?

Which brings me to an observation about how short sighted the WRHA has been in this whole situation. In yesterday’s Freep, Dr. Sande Harlos said the health authority couldn’t have enforced priority lists during the first week of vaccinations because it would have required extra staff to do screenings.

Yet, the WRHA spends millions on PR staff like Ms. Graham, on its bimonthly magazine, and on trinkets like branded golf shirts and frisbees. This is done in an effort to create a positive image of the organization and foster goodwill with the public.

But all of that is easily undone when you force people to stand in four or five hour lineups (sometimes outside) with their children. Or when you tell them they’re a priority one week, but you might not have any vaccine for them the next. Or when you build up expectations that anyone can get vaccinated, only to backtrack a few days later.

You can spend all you want on PR, but unless you do your core job well then there’s not much point.

I don’t like to dump on the paper for making typos, because everyone is guilty of that from time to time. But I think it should at least try to use real words. From today’s Editor’s Bulletin email from the Freep:

Alumnist in space
Students at John Taylor get a chance to talk to astronaut and alumnist Dr. Bob Thirsk today, who is on the International Space Station.

Alumnist? The word does show up 56,800 times in Google, but mostly on message boards and blog posts, and not in any dictionaries I could find. In contrast, the word “alumnus” — the correct term in this case — shows up 4.2 million times.

Even the Freep’s own search engine only spits back one instance of “alumnist” versus 293 of alumnus and 104 of alumna.

Global’s Jeff Keele speaking to Dr. Sande Harlos of the WRHA last night.

Keele: Dr. Harlos, in hindsight was it a mistake not to screen people last week at the clinics?

Harlos: No I don’t think it was because at that time the vaccine supply was quite a bit higher than it is right now and our main goal was to get as much vaccine into people as quickly as we could.

Sorry Dr. Harlos, there’s spin and there’s bullshit, and that was a bullshit answer. Especially since Keele gave you the “in hindsight” save on the question.

This H1N1 fight might be unprecedented in terms of numbers and media hype, but that doesn’t excuse the poor decisions that have been made by health officials across the country. And blaming the feds or the vaccine supplier doesn’t help either.

The WRHA has had enough time to prepare plans for a dozen different contingencies. But rather than rolling out a well-conceived strategy to get the vaccine to those who need it most, it essentially went with the “come and get it!” approach.

Week one should have been restricted to those on the “Priority 1″ list. If you have vaccine left after that, then move to “Priority 2″, or open it to the general public following some sort of logical system — e.g. Monday for people with Jan-Mar birthdays, Tuesday for Apr-Jun, etc. — with even distribution of dosages for each day. By that point you’ve hopefully received enough additional vaccine that you can open it up completely.

That took me 30 seconds, and while it’s not a perfect plan, in hindsight it would have worked a hell of a lot better than what the WRHA came up with after months of work.

You screwed up folks. Now come clean and get on with the job.

————

In the WRHA’s defence, they’re not the only health authority to drop the needle on this one. While passing through Calgary the other day I noticed that headlines (and anger) there are nearly identical to those in Winnipeg.

And at least there’s no evidence in Winnipeg of professional athletes jumping the queue, or is there?

Just another indication of how much power has shifted from the political to the administrative side of the courtyard at City Hall:

For the second time in two working days, they (City Councillors) were asked to sign a confidentiality agreement before they attended the closed-door seminar with city officials. — Winnipeg Free Press

I understand that administration gets frustrated when Councillors blab the contents of closed-door discussions, but I’m wondering what authority the CAO has to force his own bosses to sign a confidentiality agreement? And what if some of them decided not to sign it? Would they be barred from the seminar?

While I think most Councillors would benefit from keeping their mouths shut a bit more, forcing a muzzle on them certainly doesn’t create the impression of a democratic and transparent government.

One of the priority groups for the first wave of H1N1 vaccinations is children from six months to five years.

In my observation, kids this age are not so great at standing or sitting still for long periods of time.

So why is the WRHA managing multi-hour waits at (some) vaccination clinics by forcing people to stand in line the entire time?

Would it be so difficult to adopt the “take a number” system that was perfected by butchers and bakers decades ago?

UPDATE: I’m told some locations are using the number system, while others are not. Also, some locations are sticking to the schedule posted on the WRHA website, while others are not. And no clinics are being held on the weekend, which seems like it might be a good time to reach people, no? I realize this effort has been thrown together quickly, but a little standardization and some common sense would help.

For those who are interested in this sort of thing, here’s the advertising info for the Freep’s new Sunday tab edition, On7. Below is some hype from the VP of Sales & Marketing. A couple of observations:

• A full-page ad in On7 will cost about half as much as one in Uptown, the Freep-owned entertainment weekly. Interesting.

• The initial print run will be about 35,000. I’m guessing within six weeks the number is half of that.

• They’re trying to appeal to the 18-35 year old demographic with a printed newspaper that’s distributed on Sunday mornings only through retail and newspaper boxes. *Genius.*

• If late sports scores from the west coast were really all that important to me, don’t you think I’d find them online, or on my phone or by watching TSN/SportsNet/The Score? Am I really going to wait until I walk down to 7/11 in the morning?

• From the sound of the content description, it seems they’re trying to produce a commuter paper in a non-commuter market on a non-commuting day. And this made enough sense to enough people for it to actually happen?

————

What type of editorial will On7 have?

The emphasis will be on breaking news, sports and entertainment; all areas that appeal to a younger 18 to 35 year old demographic. The features will be easy to read with the sports section being a pull-out section from the middle of the paper. As we will be printing this newspaper at 1:00 am on Sunday we will have the editorial edge to be able to include late scores, west coast sports as well as full concert coverage including the encore! This is something that no other newspaper in Winnipeg will be able to do.

Where will On7 be available?

On7 will be sold in all the regular retail outlets and convenience stores. Additionally, we will have over 100 bright orange vending boxes that will be in strategic locations throughout the city.   On7 will be available in the City of Winnipeg and other selected areas.

What will the circulation be?

We are quoting our advertisers a circulation figure of 25,000, even though our expectations are higher than that.  We will be printing and distributing over 35,000 copies in the early weeks to gage the popularity of the newspaper and the circulation hot spots. We will increase this print run if there is a greater demand.  By promising the advertiser a 25,000 circulation we are making a conservative estimate and avoid the risk of under delivering on our promises.

How will this launch be promoted to the readers?

In addition to the letters that have been sent out to our subscribers explaining the changes to our Weekend Edition and the launch of On7, we have also invested in a heavy weight media plan to tell new readers about the new newspaper that will be available from November 1st. In addition to radio and television advertisements, we have also invested in a billboard campaign and bus kings. Also, the installation of the bright orange vending boxes will not go unnoticed.

What target audience will On7 attract?

Our target readership will have a slight male bias, have children in the household and be between the ages of 18 to 35. The media kit attached gives a greater insight into what their buying habits are and their hobbies and interests. We have taken this data into consideration when we planned the content of this new newspaper as we are aware of how advertisers are always in need of a strong medium to talk to this important target group.

Why is this publication only available in retail stores and vending boxes? Why can’t it be delivered to my home?

The single most costly expense for a newspaper in Canada is the delivery of it to our readers’ doors.  The delivery costs far outstrip the cost of editorial, printing and production combined.  When we considered the changes to the Winnipeg Free Press newspaper, cost savings were very high on our agenda. Instead of following other Canadian newspapers by simply cutting out one publication day, we wanted to take a proactive approach and still serve our readers. We have made sure that the features that were important to them – such as Homes, Perspective and Books – are moved to our Saturday Weekend edition and this new compact newspaper reports on the latest news sports and entertainment.

CBC News reports the majority of Winnipeg’s City Councillors will get the H1N1 vaccine when it becomes available. The Mayor is still unsure.

?

Given that the City doesn’t play any official role in the H1N1 battle, and has absolutely nothing to do with the vaccination process, I have to wonder about the completely random nature of this story. It’s like a slightly more timely version of “What’s your favourite colour?”

Now someone correct me if I have the protocol wrong, but if Doer is stepping down at midnight tonight, and Selinger isn’t being sworn in until tomorrow morning, does that mean if a war/flood/tornado breaks out overnight we’ll be looking to the leadership of Premier Wowchuk to guide us through those troubling eight or nine hours?

And does this make her Manitoba’s first female Premier?

Or are we just sort of leaderless for a few hours?