http://www.victoria.indymedia.org/news/2003/12/19592.php

CRD Ian Fraser & Thugz at your door Pound Articles - Monday Magazine

Could anything be more bizarre than the City of Victoria’s decision last week to hand a $1 ,000-a-day animal control contract to the man who’s been doing that same job on the public payroll?

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My dog goes so does a life
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Monday Magazine Issue 51 Vol 29, December 18 - 24, 2003

Could anything be more bizarre than the City of Victoria’s decision last week to hand a $1 ,000-a-day animal control contract to the man who’s been
doing that same job on the public payroll?

There are so many things wrong with the deal with Ian Fraser’s company, Victoria Animal Control Services Ltd.—which was incorporated only last
October 31—that it’s hard to know where to start.

First, while there’s nothing illegal about it, it’s simply wrong to allow a public employee to exploit his insider knowledge by taking on a lucrative private
contract to perform exactly the same work. The fact that Fraser has been suspended without pay by the Capital Regional District doesn’t alter that.

Fraser, a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees local 1978, won’t comment on whether he’s filed a grievance over his suspension.

Sadly, there are no conflict of interest rules governing post-employment activities for municipal employees, along the lines of those for ministers in the
provincial government—who are banned from taking on contracts in their areas of expertise for two years after leaving office.

But that doesn’t make the practice right. I don’t know what the city councillors were thinking when they handed this contract to an insider.

Fraser says he doesn’t see anything wrong with him doing the work, the idea for which came about after he was approached by Central Saanich, North
Saanich and Sidney to do animal control.

Another worry is that as the man previously employed to enforce Victoria’s leash and dog licence laws, Fraser—deservedly or not—has run up a less than
sterling reputation with dog owners.

Many of the comments about Fraser flying around the city over the last year are unprintable.

Suffice it to say that a number of people think that the man the city has chosen to head a high-profile operation involving considerable interaction with
the public leaves a little to be desired when it comes to his relations with animals, both two-legged and four-legged.

In his bid proposal, Fraser promised “pro-active street-level enforcement” of the dog bylaws.

Depending on the meaning of “pro-active,” that’s the very thing that has made him unpopular.

Fraser himself notes that being a bylaw enforcer is never a terribly popular role.

“I don’t think any bylaw officers are on people’s Christmas card lists,” he says. “It’s seen as: you’re enforcing the petty little laws from city hall. I
certainly didn’t get into this line of work because it’s a popularity contest.”

Some of the gossip flying around town about the contract is simply false.

As reporter Adrienne Mercer notes in this issue, Fraser does not own a pet store. His only connection with David Street’s Creatures Great and Small is that
he is buying the part of the pet store business that is operated as City Centre Kennels—which is not registered as a B.C. corporation—from owner Ken
Parton, and closing it down in order to use the kennels as a pound.

“The only association [with Creatures Great and Small] is, we have the same landlord,” says Fraser.

The Vancouver Island Better Business Bureau received unspecified complaints about the store and the kennels in September, 2002. Though the company
did respond, the complaints remain “unresolved,” according to the bureau’s website. The firm is not a member of the bureau.

But it gets stranger. Previously, a number of city pet supply stores were authorized to sell dog licences. Though I’ve questioned the need for the
licences—which don’t come close to covering the cost of animal control—for the minority of dog-owners who wanted to go along with the rules, it was a
convenience to be able to pick up the licences at their local stores.

In Fraser’s bid proposal, he said he expected that licences will be sold at city hall, Crystal Pool, and “seven or eight private vendors at convenient
locations.” The vendors would get a 10 percent commission. As well, Fraser promised to conduct a “door-to-door canvass to renew tardy licences and to
identify and license unknown, unlicensed dogs.”

Last Thursday, a CRD employee did the rounds of pet stores picking up all the unused licence tags and other records: The stores are no longer able to sell
the licences.

But this happened on Thursday during the day—hours before the city council formally approved the contract with Fraser’s company.

That raises the obvious question: Was this all a done deal?

The city has a lot of explaining to do about this situation.

The whole contract smells—a lot worse than what comes out of the rear end of a dog.

—Russ Francis
Fraser’s dog contract going ahead—with conditions

Ian Fraser’s Victoria Animal Control Services Ltd. will start dealing with dogs in the city on January 1, as long as the business
is able to satisfy requirements laid down by the city council.

On December 11, councillors voted to award Fraser a three-year contract with the city, subject to seven conditions, says
councillor Chris Coleman.

Fraser won the contract after his bid beat out the service that the Capital Regional District, which currently does animal control
in the city, was prepared to provide over the next three years.

The decision has angered plenty of dog owners, who say the process of awarding the animal control contract should have been
more transparent. Many also worry that Fraser, who was the CRD’s senior bylaw control officer, is too heavy-handed in his
enforcement.

But Coleman says he’s comfortable that Fraser will do a good job. “There’s some fairly rigorous ‘subject-to’s’—mostly
brought on by the requests made by some of the people who’ve contacted council about the contract,” says Coleman. “We’re
looking for [Fraser’s] philosophy and methodology regarding where euthanasia will be used, philosophy regarding adoption . . .
that kind of thing.”

Coleman says the council will be receiving staff reports on all seven conditions. If the council’s requirements have not been met
by the January 1 start date, he says, “the CRD may be kept on, on a month-to-month basis.”

Fraser says he wishes people would speak directly to him if they have concerns about his business. “I’m the most visible person
in animal control for the past five years in the city of Victoria,” he says. “I feel I can do a better job than the CRD . . . I want to
work with people, not against people.”

He says despite what some dog owners have claimed, his business is not linked to Creatures Great and Small pet store. Fraser is
buying City Centre Kennels from the owner of Creatures Great and Small, but he will be dissolving and renaming the business.
People who argue he is connected, he says, are “basing everything on assumption. I don’t mind people asking me questions,
but assumptions are unfair.”

Meanwhile, if you’re a Victoria resident trying to license a dog, prepare for things to get tricky. The CRD has collected all the
dog licences that were for sale at city pet stores, to avoid confusion when the animal control contract contract changes hands.
Terry Cieslak of Fairfield’s Chez Terry says he’s sold licences at his store for about a year, but CRD staff retrieved the unsold
ones last week.

“We took them all back, all the 2004 licences,” says Don Brown, head of animal control at the CRD. “The only place to buy
them now is here [at the CRD] but we suggest people wait [until the contract changes hands].”

Asked whether CRD animal control officers will work for the city on a temporary basis if Fraser’s contract gets held up, Brown
isn’t too encouraging. “We would do it, but [the city] would be at the bottom of our priority list,” he says.

—Adrienne Mercer