Vancouver’s Non-Partisan Association sent out a notice late last week saying it plans to lower its membership fee from $20 to $10 a year, in an apparent move to compete with Vision Vancouver’s successful membership drive that brought in 17,000 new members last year at as low as $5 apiece.

This seems to be part of [...]

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The murder of Wendy Ladner-Beaudry last April touched so many people in this city. I was one of them. Even though I’ve written about her brother, Peter, for years in his role in civic politics, I never met Wendy.
But I felt compelled to try to tell her story in a little more depth, which I [...]

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Peter Ladner and Suzanne Anton are not impressed. That’s the politest way of putting their reaction to the news from the VPD this morning that no charges can be laid in the case of the missing Olympic village documents.
Ladner can’t believe the police need people to agree to polygraph tests in order to complete an [...]

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Police announced this morning that they won’t be laying any charges in connection with the Olympic village documents that went missing last fall. They say it’s partly because some councillors declined to take a polygraphy test.
As far as I can determine, that includes all the Vision councillors at the time — Raymond Louie, Tim Stevenson, [...]

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Our two-term councillor and recent mayoral candidate went to Cuba for the 50th anniversary of La Revolucion — a return trip after a visit in 1970, where Peter Ladner had the dubious pleasure of staying in the same hotel as FLQ refugees, if I’m recalling the story he told me correctly.
Always great to get postcards [...]

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For those following this story closely — and many are, feeling that it’s a turning point in the city’s sense of safety as well as a huge personal tragedy — Councillor Suzanne Anton plans to make a brief statement honouring Wendy and her contribution to the city at council today at 2. That should be [...]

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Many heavy hearts in the city today as people continue to learn more about the death of Wendy Ladner-Beaudry, the sister of former city councillor Peter Ladner. Her murder, on a running trail blocks from her west side home, seems beyond belief. My story — a difficult one to write — here.

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Okay, he put it in more lawyerly language than that, but essentially that’s what Richard Peck said about Vancouver’s “code of conduct,” its definition of “confidentiality” and its whole process for reporting on misconduct at the city. It’s in his eight-page report due out tomorrow on what to do about the city’s in-camera meetings, in [...]

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Not all the financial disclosures are in yet — still waiting for many of the Non-Partisan Association candidates — but there’s now enough in to show that the spending reached unbelievable new levels.
Vision Vancouver spent almost $2 million, as I report in the Globe this morning. (The documents will be filed with the city later [...]

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The judgment came down in the lawsuit between Downtown Eastside Residents Association guy Kim Kerr and former councillor Peter Ladner over Peter’s claim that Kim had made a threatening remark about Elizabeth Ball. I won’t repeat all the details — they’re here in the lawsuit, which you can read here.

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