Appliance Repair in Cressey, CA

Toronto City Councillor Joe Cressy is making a career change, leaving municipal politics for a new position at George Brown College.

Cressy, who currently serves as the chair of the Toronto Board of Health and as a city councillor, announced his resignation at a press conference on Tuesday.

He said his final city council meeting will be this week, and his final board of health meeting will be on Monday.

Cressy has served as a city councillor, representing the people of Spadina-Fort York, since 2014.

Cressy said he will be taking a new position at George Brown College as senior vice president for external relations, communications and real estate development.

Cressy said he believes in the “power of municipal government.”

“However, I also believe in entering politics effecting change and moving on to contribute elsewhere,” he said. “It’s time for a new councillor’s voice at City Hall, and this October residents of Spadina-Fort York will have a chance to elect their new representative.”

After nearly 8 incredible years at City Hall & on the Board of Health, I'm announcing my resignation. I've accepted a position as a Senior VP at George Brown College.

Serving at City Hall has been a privilege. Now, it's time for a new chapter. My letter: https://t.co/zSA47YEwFD

— Joe Cressy (@joe_cressy) April 5, 2022

Through the pandemic, serving as chair of the board of health, Cressy has overseen the work of Toronto Public Health, and worked alongside the medical officer of health and Toronto Mayor John Tory.

He was also a member of the Toronto COVID-19 strategic command team and immunization task force, which helped lead the city’s response to the pandemic.

Tory thanked Cressy for his work as a councillor and during the pandemic, saying he has been “very, very important” to the city’s COVID-19 response.

“He was one of the leaders and we didn’t let politics or ideology, get in the way of pandemic response,” Tory said. “We followed the public health advice together, we didn’t pick fights with other people, we took the all hands on deck approach and engaged a lot of people up there in the community at the community level, who were trusted (and) who were going to be more trusted than us as politicians.”

Tory said “a lot of that came from the leadership” of Cressy.

Last year, Cressy announced he would not seek re-election.

“In fact, I won’t be running for any election — for mayor, provincially or federally — I’m leaving elected office,” he told Global News in October.

At the time, Cressy said the COVID-19 pandemic had taken an “emotional toll” on him, and that he wanted to spend more time with his family.

“There was a time in my life when I did seriously contemplate whether I would run for mayor, but when [my wife and I] decided to start a family, that’s when it all changed,” he said. “And certainly the experience and the grind of the last two years of this pandemic has affirmed that decision for me.”

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Cressy thanked the people of Spadina-Fort York, but said that it’s “time for a new chapter.”

“It’s time for a grand adventure,” he said, adding that he “cannot wait” to join George Brown College.

Dr. Gervan Fearon, president of George Brown College, said Cressy will be a “powerful advocate for the unique and critical role the college can play and plays to serve local communities, promote regional economic development and opportunities, as well as to engage strategic partners in the future of the college as well as the City of Toronto.”

Fearon said in his new role, Cressy will focus on “building partnerships” and “supporting the strategic direction for advancing George Brown’s commitment to city building and community development.”

Kelowna native Isiah McDonald is heading for a career in professional baseball.

The 25-year-old accepted a job with the New York Yankees organization to be a strength and performance coach, specializing in on-field speed and agility.

During the start of the pandemic, McDonald used his passion for working out and training to start his own business called Instinctive Performance, which he ran privately online and in-person at a baseball facility in Kamloops. After a couple of months, McDonald was seeing some success as his clientele grew, working with local athletes in multiple sports. At the same time, he saw an internship opportunity to work with high-performance trainer Eric Cressey.

Throughout his college baseball career, McDonald followed Cressey on social media. Cressey is the director of player health and performance for the Yankees and the owner of Cressey Sports Performance.

McDonald applied and got accepted for the internship, heading to Cressey’s private training facility in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

“He’s the guru of baseball training,” said McDonald.

McDonald spent six months in Florida where Cressey took him under his wing. After the internship was over, Cressey offered McDonald a job at his facility, but he decided to take his new knowledge and teach Canadian athletes back at home.

At the start of this past winter, MLB went into a lockout and players weren’t allowed to train at their team facilities. More than 100 players went to Cressey’s gym for their off-season training, overwhelming the facility. That’s when Cressey gave McDonald another call to come back down and further his internship for another three months.

Over that time, McDonald got to work with major and minor league baseball players as well as athletes from other sports. In his last week in Florida, he was working with NFL quarterback Jacoby Brissett when Cressey walked up and joked with McDonald about getting him a job with the Yankees. Later that day, the joke quickly became serious and they got started on the paperwork.

“It’s hard to say no to the Yankees,” said McDonald.

Born in Vancouver, McDonald played his first baseball season when he was eight years old before he and his family moved to Grand Forks. He went on to play in Grand Forks, Trail before playing high school baseball in Kamloops. He later moved to Kelowna but returned to Kamloops as he recognized it as a better opportunity for playing ball. After high school, McDonald stayed in Kamloops as he was accepted to Thompson Rivers University as well as on its baseball team.

In his career at TRU, McDonald played under former major league pitcher Ray Chadwick, and batted .309 with seven doubles, three triples, one home run, 19 RBIs and nine stolen bases in 49 games and was named an all-conference outfielder in 2015. During that time, he also suffered a long list of injuries, including a torn hamstring, developing arthritis in four disks in his back and dislocating both shoulders in a two-week span.

McDonald would then move-on to UBC, graduating in 2019 with a Bachelor of Kinesiology degree and a minor in psychology.

He says has an addiction to baseball.

“Growing up, you always want to play as long as possible, and that was kind of always my goal,” said McDonald. “I just had some injuries and it’s almost like your strengths kind of find you. I think through those injuries, I really studied the body because I wanted to keep playing. I think it made me very passionate for working out and training and movement. Just the way my life has played out, it’s kind of the path I’m supposed to be in.”

He doesn’t know what level he’ll be at yet for this season, but he’ll be starting at the spring training complex in Tampa, Florida. He said he could be with one of the minor league teams or at the spring training facility all season long, as that is where injured players, rehab during the season. Two of the Yankees minor league teams also play in Tampa out of the spring training complex.

McDonald will continue his own business while working for the Yankees. He bought a training app online and created videos of hundreds of exercises that his clientele can watch and use and he’ll keep in communication with them when he can. He also co-hosts a Canadian baseball podcast called, The Battery Podcast.

READ MORE: NHLer’s coming to Kelowna as Homebase charity event returns

Benjamin Chou, President, Personable.

"Fraud is the daughter of greed."

Jonathan Gash, The Great California Game

When ordinary people turn to fraud in extraordinary circumstances, these are the accidental fraudsters, which I wrote about in a recent article. Perhaps more frightening, however, is the predator fraudster, someone who is always on the prowl for a dishonest buck.

Sociologist and criminologist Donald Cressey developed the fraud triangle, which explains that perceived pressure, opportunity and rationalization form the elements that drive the ordinary person—i.e., the accidental fraudster—to commit fraud. The predator fraudster, on the other hand, only requires the opportunity to defraud your organization.

While an accidental fraudster may turn into a predator fraudster after seeing positive results from fraud, a predator fraudster typically has a charming personality and is confident that their scheme is too clever to be detected. These fraudsters can be skilled at lying and can often converse easily.

The real danger is that predator fraudsters may be highly aware of the organization's vulnerabilities. They are often creative, intelligent people in higher-up positions who can devise intricate schemes to keep their fraud hidden. Large scams are usually not devised immediately after being hired. Fraudsters need time to understand the system and its weaknesses and to build the trust of others. These fraudsters, therefore, can be patient. They often strike only after gaining their superiors' confidence and when the right opportunity arises.

The Triangle Of Fraud

My previous article cited above considered "the fraud triangle," which provides the reasoning behind the scam, or the prefraud stage. When considering the predator fraudster, "the triangle of fraud action," becomes even more pertinent to understand. This triangle explains how an individual can commit fraud and identifies the activities undertaken during the fraud to form its three sides.

1. The Act. The act is how the fraud is perpetrated. For example, a former California Employment Development Department (EDD) employee was accused of taking advantage of the unemployment insurance benefits expanded under the CARES Act during the Covid-19 pandemic. She allegedly submitted fraudulent claims by obtaining names, social security numbers and other identifying information prior to the fraudulent act. Though we can't know her motivation, this example shows how a predator fraudster might devise and strategize their methodology.

2. Concealment. Predator fraudsters often find clever ways to keep their schemes hidden. For example, a Microsoft software engineer, who was a part of the testing of Microsoft's online retail sales platform, was sentenced for defrauding after he allegedly used the testing access to steal the currency stored value (CSV), such as digital gift cards. He reportedly attempted to mask digital evidence that could trace the fraud and the internet sales back to him by using a Bitcoin-mixing service. This example illustrates how the predator fraudsters could create a plan to conceal a scam.

3. Conversion. Conversion is where fraudsters transfer the assets from the victims to themselves. For example, a former Capital One has been sentenced for conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Along with her co-conspirators, she made fraudulent transfers and withdrawals amounting to $253,000 by posing as nine different actual bank account holders. They also obtained one $50,000 wire transfer using personal identifiers of an account holder that they purchased on the dark web. The conversion, in this case, was through withdrawals and wire transfers.

Organizational Controls For Fraud Prevention

In a 2012 paper, "The Evolution of Fraud Theory," Jack Wayne Dorminey, A. Scott Fleming, Mary-Jo Kranacher and Richard A. Riley, Jr. combined the fraud triangle and the triangle of fraud action to create a meta-model of fraud.

The meta-model highlights the role of the antifraud measures. Between the fraud triangle and the triangle of fraud action are the antifraud interventions like corporate governance, internal controls, laws and regulations for fraud detection and prevention. A predator fraudster considers these antifraud measures while designing the scheme, and the meta-model asserts that the fraud literature fails to recognize that predators scam others deliberately.

The median duration of fraud—i.e., the typical time when a scam begins till its detection—is 14 months. In the meta-model of fraud, the authors consider the fraud prevention and detection measures that a predator fraudster tries to circumvent. Every organization needs to have several internal controls to detect fraud as early as possible and reduce the damage.

With this in mind, here are three of the types of controls every organization should have in place.

1. Preventative Control. Some preventative controls include installing CCTVs as well as electronic check-in and check-out methods for entry and exit of employees. For online protection, consider providing office laptops with included security and preventive software to prevent sharing of sensitive data.

2. Detective Controls. These controls allow you to detect irregular activity and give the organization the opportunity to take action earlier. There are specific software and digital tools available, such as data automation tools, that can allow organizations to see any transactions or activities that do not align with their practices. These tools can also provide analysis of irregular transactions and audit trails for quick detection of the movement of funds.

3. Corrective Controls. Corrective controls, such as employee theft insurance, can help the organization recover embezzled funds. Other necessary controls include having a system and best practices in place to report employees who may have committed fraud to the authorities, which can deter the predator fraudster from committing further crimes.

Of course, it's always better to detect fraud before it happens, but having a holistic plan in place is essential to correct what you can't prevent.

Forbes Technology Council is an invitation-only community for world-class CIOs, CTOs and technology executives. Do I qualify?

Memora Health announced Tuesday that the San Francisco-based digital health platform has raised $40 million in financing to scale its operations and meet growing demand.

Transformation Capital led the financing with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Frist Cressey Ventures, Edward Elmhurst Health, AlleyCorp, among others. Todd Cozzens, managing Partner at Transformation Capital, will join Memora’s board, the company said.

The new financing enables Memora to meet commercial demand and drive new partnerships with health systems and payers, and further improve the care delivery experience for patients and their health providers, said Manav Sevak, co-founder and CEO at Memora.

The company continues to grow rapidly and digitizes clinical workflows in partnership with a number of leading healthcare organizations, including the Mayo Clinic and Penn Medicine.

“At a time when the healthcare workforce is under so much strain, we must invest in tech-enabled solutions that augment, extend and ease our ability to deliver world class healthcare at scale,” said Dr. Justin Bekelman, director of the Penn Center for Cancer Care Innovation and professor of radiation oncology at University of Pennsylvania, in an email.

He noted that Penn Medicine is testing ways to help patients with cancer manage side effects and adhere to treatment. In one initiative with Memora, Penn has a conversational AI texting tool that acts as a virtual care team member. The patient- and clinician-friendly platform is available day and night, supporting patients through complex cancer treatment and alerting clinicians when symptoms advance, Bekelman explained.

The rising cost of employer-sponsored healthcare makes it difficult for American businesses to compete globally. That doesn’t have to be the reality. Learn how one company changed its trajectory.

Supporting patients after an in-person or virtual appointment is taxing since much of that is done manually and patients often end up taking a lot of the burden on themselves, Sevak said. When patients reach out through their portals, it’s usually health providers who are the first point of contact, he added.

“By helping to digitize, automate and track all of those steps for the care teams, we’ve actually been able to reduce care team burden and notifications by nearly 40% so clinicians are spending less time sifting through messages and more time practicing at the top of their license,” he said.

Other organizations also help patients stay connected, reduce the burden on health providers and bridge care gaps, using artificial intelligence and other sophisticated approaches, such as Ada Health and Docent Health.

Memora tries to distinguish itself with a cohesive, easy-to-access, fluid approach that makes the optimal way of caring for patients the easy way, according to the company.

For patients: “Changing the process from reactive to proactive by allowing them to receive real-time guidance and proactive education significantly impacts their healthcare outcome,” Sevak said.

Photo: Getty Images, pixelliebe