Roasting Goodman for a good cause

Ned Goodman got off easy as the butt of a recent charity “roast” that might better be described as a tribute to the chairman of Dundee Capital and the driving force behind Corona Corp. for the past half decade. But the $1,000-a-plate, black- tie affair at Toronto’s Four Seasons Hotel raised $300,000 for several children’s organizations, including the Hospital for Sick Children, Covenant House, Canadian Children’s Book Centre and the Cabbagetown Community Arts Centre.

The charity roast, the sixth annual such event sponsored by The Roasters’ Foundation, offered the opportunity to hear Goodman’s friends and associates relate some of their experiences over the years and poke fun at his foibles.

Goodman earned a reputation 0000,0600 during the 1980s of devising creative ways to fi9.25nance Corona and other companies. Corona, once a penny mining stock on the Vancouver Stock Exchange, became a major gold producer when it sued for and won ownership of the Williams gold mine in northern Ontario, Canada’s largest gold producer.

Murray Pezim, the Vancouver stock promoter and former honorary chairman of Corona, raised the biggest response from the crowd with some of his comments about working with Goodman. Pezim, who was prominent recently in a television expose of the Vancouver Stock Exchange, told the crowd that ABC television asked Goodman to star in a new situation comedy to be called Smoke and Mirrors.

Pezim also hailed Goodman’s charitable nature saying that he does show a great deal of compassion for his shareholders because “he thinks they’re all deaf, dumb and blind.”

The admission price for the evening aside, funds were raised through advertising in the sole edition of Factor, a 72-page magazine that chronicles Goodman’s achievements in a lighthearted way.