I don’t think Ms. Anton is the right person for the job. Mayor Robertson has done a good job. Let’s give him three more years to keep making this city better! It will be a “Happy Planet” for us all if he continues to lead and set a sustainable example for other cities in the world.

@ Brenton:

The report of less than a month ago showed the units sitting empty. That was costing the taxpayers roughly $200K/month in lost revenue.

I am happy to learn they have been filled. It still should not have taken this long to do so.

The Thought of The Morning

‘Hey waiter, there is a fly in my Chow Chow!’

Adele Chow #51

I am not sure here, are you trying to promote the mixture of overly priced water and powder Juice or asking for a mandatory 3 -6 years mandatory terms in all cases of clear civic abuse?
BTW, send my regards to George.

We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.

Adele Chow

It’s interesting that you mention Happy Planet. The business model for many of this organization’s lines appears to be to import low price tropical fruit product picked for a pittance, and sell it with an implied organic / fair trade / recycling aura for premium prices, equivalent to up to $30 a litre, often with unprovable claims such as “boosts immune system”.

Things are not always as they seem, promises can be illusions in the worlds of both fruit juice and politics.

@ Adele Chow;

Seriously, the best ‘school board’?

After claiming they couldn’t balance their budget and having to have the province step into to help them along, they run the rant that 800 teachers will be laid off. But low and behold, they manage to find ‘$8M’ all of a sudden. They played politcs with children had them prading plackards and signs which is tantamount to child abuse.

That entire board should be fired and Patti Bacchus should be at the head of the list for incompentence.

Vancouver cannot financially afford another 3 years of Vision. They will bankrupt this city. but hey, according to Penny Ballam ‘ everything is just a drop in the bucket’. Well those ‘drops’ will add up to a tax increases for everyone if things are not changed.

But Adele, please do vote for the visionless Vision party again. Some people deserve what they get. And some of us don’t.

COPE with only 17% of voter support could be wiped out this go around.

Adele, you’re other a member of Vision, or delusional. You’re perfectly entitled to support whomever you like, but when you make statements of “Vision and COPE have also given us the best School Board we’ve ever had ” you prove you haven’t been paying any attention.

As a parent I can say that this is by far the most partisan, self interested, self focused school board we have ever had. Their actions, specifically those of Bacchus, have absolutely disgusted me as a parent, and I’d happily have the entire group replaced. Rather than focus on substantive change and initiatives, Bacchus has spent her time picking political fights and trying to polarize the entire debate.

Jamie Lee: “Just wondering if you define homelessness as not having a permanent home or would you classify it as a person who is living out on the street with no roof over their head?”

If you were living in a heat shelter Jamie, you would not feel that you have a home….or a permanent place to lay your hat. As I’ve already stated, I support the shelters, but it doesn’t do anything to solve the long term problem.

“I think a much more interesting question is, despite having the actual historical record pointed out to them time and time again, why certain people continue to claim their political opponents promised something they, you know, didn’t.”

Funny, I think the more interesting question is why you continue to defend a fact that you know to be untrue and then continue to claim that you aren’t saying anything about the politician in question.

“NPA councillor Suzanne Anton continues to have trouble with her one-person caucus at Vancouver city hall. You may remember Ms. Anton voted in favour of separate bike lanes on Hornby Street. That quickly prompted a caucus revolt, however, when work on the lanes actually started the next morning, and Ms. Anton tried to have her vote changed.

“Now, that feisty Anton caucus is quarrelling again. Moments after the lone NPA representative on city council supported Mayor Gregor Robertson’s motion that dealt a death blow to the proposed big gambling hall right next to BC Place, Ms. Anton was out with a press release criticizing the mayor for “voting against casino expansion” and jeopardizing a billion dollars worth of economic activity. Hello?

Ms. Anton is an accomplished veteran of Vancouver’s municipal wars, and it’s not easy being the single Non-Partisan on council. So I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for siding with the mayor, then blasting him with your next breath for the same motion you just voted for. I just can’t imagine what that explanation would be.”

@Agustin:

The NPA made more strides with the Provincial Government on secruing funding for social housing than the current Vision lead council.

ALL of the housing units you see coming on line now and in the near future are due to those negotiations. 2200 units in total.

Aside from the HEAT shelters, which the Province is also funding, Vision has secured zero new dollars for social housing units. Nothing, zero, zilch.

So if you ask I believe Ladner and the NPA could have done better on homelessness – the answer is: They all ready have.

Yes, better, much better.

here we have Vision talking homelessness and yet, they could not come up with the $95K the United Church needed to provide lockers for the property of street persons. 2009/2010 was the first year the city pulled funding. It left the Church running having to find that money elsewhere. Remember them running in a Pepsi contest? I would have hoped that the Mayor could have forgone renovating his offices again (2X since he got in) and given that money to those that truly needed it rather than having a plush place to plop his butt.

Actions are louder than words and he has yet to walk the walk. But he sure talks the talk.

Thanks, Max, appreciate your thoughts.

TBH I know little about homelessness in Vancouver, even though it is an important subject. I will definitely get more educated before the election.

In your mind, what useful things have the current Vancouver government done on homelessness?

What do you think Anton would be able to accomplish? (I’m assuming you believe she would also do better than Robertson.)

@Agustin:

She is a smart person, but she also is the only ‘opposition’ member on council. Decsions could have been made without her knowledge.

It would not be the first time that she was let out. She and both COPE councillors were not informed of recent issues surrounding the Oly Village.

When called out on it by the media, Robertson blamed staff for not sending the information to correct e-mail addresses.

The NPA is not anti-bike lanes. But they do believe in proper public in-put.

“I’ve grown a bit confused. Which “fact” am I “defending” that is untrue, Jason?”

Your ridiculous defense of Gregor that he always said & meant “street homelessness” rather than “Homelessness”. “Street” was conveniently added after the fact.

I’m perfectly fine having a discussion about the complexities of homelessness and the difficulties of dealing with the underlying issues, but I’d appreciate it if you’d respect our intelligence enough not to defend the mayor’s “word play”.

As I’ve already stated, I’m more than willing to give the mayor credit for the HEAT shelters, but that doesn’t mean he gets to play games with how he defines homelessness.

Your ridiculous defense of Gregor that he always said & meant “street homelessness” rather than “Homelessness”. “Street” was conveniently added after the fact.

Speaking of dishonesty. Wow, just wow.

In my #24 I linked to a previous comment of mine on the same subject. Here it is again.

Did you miss that?

In it I showed 3 articles from 2008 – including one by the blog owner – that clearly said “street homelessness”. As our friend Max had specifically mentioned Go back to any of the youtube video clips, or news articles with Robertson first campaigning in 2008 and even when he got in in 2009, and it was ‘ending homelessness’ – full stop”, in #26 I linked to the first Youtube clip from 2008 I found on the subject, one where the first thing out of Gregor Robertson’s lips is “We will end street homelessness by 2015…”

Must have missed that one too, eh?

Please point out to me where “street homelessness” is mentioned once or how a voter would take anything stated in this letter to suggest anything other than the fact he was planning on tackling homelessness.

Given we are talking about the claim “street” was inserted into a promise to “end homelessness by 2015“, I’m not sure what you think your citation is proving. One can promise to tackle homelessness and promise to end street homelessness by a certain date and not contradict yourself. You and your friends are trying to conflate the two different statements to score some sort of pathetic partisan point.

I know the NPA candidates are trying to be constructive [mostly] and offer something different, but their online supporters I encounter seemingly offer only dishonest arguments and rage over a perceived loss of privilege that is completely out of proportion to the reality.

Ms. Chow,

You are sounding a bit like a “message bot”.

Are you in fact a carbon-based life-form—or a timed, Twitter-styled mechanism?

I haven’t seen you give any substantial answers, or provide data yet to questions posed by others on this thread. Just a lot of pleasant sloganeering.

Come on, woman, get in the game! Give us something we can use!

I think you’re right 4th Horse. If Gregor wants to put forward his position why doesn’t he do so in person. Sean Bickerton, Mike Klassen, myself and other candidates for office do. Wouldn’t that be his claimed “open and transparent” communication with voters?

The Thought of The Night

“When I found Adele Chow’s insert #51 I stopped for a second to read it. I suspected she might be sitting in front of her computer, in complete darkness, biting her nails, her fingers ready to type positioned above the keyboard, and waiting, waiting with hope and excitement and salivating with anticipation … and I was right!”

I always suspected that in Kevin Quinlan’s job description… scope of work… deliverables , there has to be a clause which states that any post, on friendly blogs must always end with a praising comment, hail the Gregor, hail the Penny, hail the Vision…and I was right!

In all fairness, I have to say that after reading all her comments, and when put together, Adele’s are by far the best piece of satire I’ve read in a long time.

Thank you, Adele!

When I tried my Portable Defibrillator on this tread @ #55 I suspected I might be able to get a pulse…and I was right!

Thank you, Adele!

Your Happy Planet jokes, your Gregor shtick and your Penny humour was top dollar. I would pay mucho dineros to see you perform.

But what about Aufochs? Not a word about his manly ties and his walking shoes made for walking? How about Magee, or Meggs, or reimer, or Deal or Stevenson, or Louie…?
Tell you what, their celebrity status entitles them for a group wax diorama at Madam Tussaud and as soon as Andrea is back from New York, bringing with her the good news, and the promi$$ory notes, I’ll book an appointment for you all.

And if you’re still inclined to spread happy gossip, here’s the latest:

‘It was confirmed that Mayor Robbie has his eyes on one of the Green Men’s one piece suits and jobs. He has already approached Ballem the Kindest, in his quest to try finding a way to retire one of them for cause or… no cause. Penny, as per your comment, will have no problem with that, she is a very efficient manager, as a matter of fact just the other day, she managed to watch the investigative TV show ’60 minutes’ in less than half an hour.
See what I mean?

We live in Vancouver and this keeps us busy.

Adele,

You might want to check out your own party’s membership list. Lots of Westsiders, and definitely many who belong to the Arbutus Club, too, as well as other such bastions of decadent capitalism. Now, don’t go insulting “those people”—they may take umbrage and not renew their memberships.

You might also want to look at where party donations are coming from as well. Look at the donations from developers, both corporate (say it ain’t so!) and individuals. Many, again, who live on the West Side! And some who live Downtown in big shiny buildings. Why, fancy that—giving money to Vision and building all those buildings and things like that. Wow, how the heck did that happen?!

Your statement that ‘the NPA allowed developers to run amuck’ is as amusing as it is jejuene. Go ask someone like Randy Helton from WEN, a Vision supporter, about how he feels this council has taken care of the West End when it comes to developers. Vision really, really likes developers, Adele.

Yes, alternative transportation. You mean, like the bike lanes? Because you can’t claim any new transit initiatives. Those came in before the current council. And what we do have is funded through TransLink. It’s kinda like the whole region has to pay into a system that richly serve Vancouverites. And we know how Surrey and Delta and the Tri-Cities feel about that. By the way, you are paying your fare, right? ‘Cause the system doesn’t run for free, y’know. Unless you think it should? I know—let’s get the West Side to pay! *clap*!

As for Jennifer Clarke, don’t know that she is an an NPA member any longer. But I do appreciate that, as an NPA councillor, she had the integrity to chase some casino people out of town in ’94, way before it became politically expedient for Vision to do it this year (after they heard from many pissed off Vision supporters—and NPA—and COPE—and Liberal—and Conservative (!!) supporters). Why, she even went up against other Westsiders—some who were developers!!!— on that one.

A for parties that are good for cities, nice to see that Vision is able to work with…the BC Liberals.
See what strange bedfellows politics makes, Adele? I know, it’s way more complicated that you could ever imagine.

Your class wars stuff is pure gold, though. Keep up the empty rhetoric!

Sorry this is off topic:

But it is well worth spending the 15 min to watch:

FightFightHST – A letter to Bill VanderZalm

oooo, the haters;

Vision lacking

By Rick Angus, The Province May 20, 2011

Any prudent observer of Vancouver city hall knows that the Vision council has achieved little in the past three years.

While many may believe Gregor Robertson is an attractive mayor, he has shown himself to possess little substance.

Aside from the lunatic diversions of bike lanes and their overall incompetence in handling the Olympic Village, Vision has done little to improve the city’s economic prospects.

The NPA may have lost touch with voters, but at least they tried to enact policies that benefited taxpayers, not just the freeloaders and indigents who take from the public purse, including city bureaucrats.

Rick Angus, Vancouver