Environmentalism simply does not pay -- from the Vancouver Sun:
Brian Hutchinson: Vancouver's salad days die with bankrupt rooftop garden
Vancouver-based Alterrus Systems Inc. was just another penny stock outfit with an ugly bottom line. After years of losses, reorganizations, new directions and name changes, the company's principals - including former Lululemon yoga wear executives settled on a new line of business: Rooftop lettuce production.
Naturally, they turned to the urban farming enthusiasts at Vancouver City Hall, led by Gregor Robertson, perennial contender for World's Greenest Mayor. Alterrus obtained necessary permits and a cheap 10-year lease agreement, allowing it to operate a 6,000- square-foot hydroponic green leaf vegetable garden and packaging facility on top of a city-owned parking garage, for $2,400 per month.
The lease was signed in April 2012, when Alterrus was already stumbling towards insolvency. Last week, it filed for bankruptcy protection. So much for that idea.
One needed only to glance at financial documents it had previously filed with securities regulators in the U.S. and Canada to know this was a dog. The documents contained enough warnings and caveats to give the most reckless gambler pause. But not Vancouver officials; they were either unfazed or caught unawares.
Of course, everyone took voluntary pay cuts to help the company:
Its three top executives were well-compensated: The company's chief executive and chief operating officer were each paid salaries of $201,400 in fiscal 2012; not including bonuses and other considerations, including stock options. Both executives were paid $201,400 again the following fiscal year ending March 31, 2013, according to company filings. Their chief financial officer earned $120,000 before quitting in August, 2012. His replacement bailed out after just three months on the job.
But all of the other green programs are working out just fine:
The City of Vancouver wasn't badly exposed, financially. Its wholly-owned parking lot subsidiary is owed around $13,104 in unpaid rent. The real damage is to its reputation and its credibility. Alterrus was yet another in a string of goofy green initiatives embraced by Mayor Robertson and his Vision party.
There was the great downtown bike lane experiment, launched in in 2010, which went from 'temporary' to permanent boondoggle, with $3.2 million wasted on infrastructure. In 2011, the city estimated the new bike lanes had already cost local businesses $2.4 million, thanks to the removal of parking spaces and so on. City Hall's response? Pshaw. The hit to businesses was manageable.
Additional bike lanes were built, without consensus, for millions more tax dollars. And still more bike lanes are coming. In the most recent example, an entire city street has been closed to all but local traffic, so that bicyclists can be more generously accommodated by the mayor and council.
The city administration has also insisted on pursuing a public bicycle-sharing initiative, despite less-than-stellar experiences in other cities. Vancouver has committed $6 million to get the program moving, to the chagrin of local, unsubsidized bike rental companies. Last week, just as Alterrus the greenery supplier went under, Vancouver's putative bike-share infrastructure provider, PublicBike System Inc., filed for bankruptcy protection.
This is also the city of lane-way housing, street thinning, and a ludicrous cigarette butt recycling effort, which city smokers seem to have all but ignored. Vancouver has become a giant petri-dish; we're living in a state of perpetual experiment here. Its salad days are over, but with Mayor Robertson and his visionaries still in charge, there'll be more green gambits soon.
No mention of what the rest of British Columbia is saying about Vancouver's capricious spending habits -- after all, this is their tax dollars that are being squandered...
