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A second issue: in 2013, David Keith (now at Harvard) was interviewed by CBC about the management of a university institute. He expressed concern that Enbridge had too much influence over the operation. CBC reporter Kyle Bakx revisited the story and obtained 1,200 pages of documents, including emails between the university and Enbridge, as well as among several lower-level administrators at the Haskayne School of Business.

The contents indicate that, in exchange for a 10-year pledge of a mere $225,000 a year, the U of C would establish the Enbridge Centre for Corporate Sustainability, in partnership with Central Michigan University (CMU). Why them? Because CMU was close to a 3.8-million-litre bitumen spill from an Enbridge pipe into the Kalamazoo River. U of C president Elizabeth Cannon said the CMU partnership made sense because “there’s a lot of learning that can be done” about the spill, “and what better place to have those learnings … than our business school?”

CBC also indicated that Enbridge showed an interest in staffing positions, student awards and membership on the advisory council. Bonnie DuPont was “critical” in obtaining the Enbridge commitment, according to Kim Kadatz, a fundraiser at the business school. Before becoming chair of the U of C board, DuPont was a senior Enbridge vice-president and a member of the centre’s advisory council.

Meanwhile, Joe Arvai, director of the centre, had the “impression” that Enbridge saw it as a “PR machine,” not a centre for academic research. Cannon, a member of the Enbridge Income Fund board, emailed Arvai’s boss, dean Leonard Waverman, informing him that “he needs to do his job,” because Enbridge was “not seeing your leadership on this file,” which was “not good for you or the university.” When Cannon wrote this “simple reminder,” she said, she was “absolutely wearing my university hat.”