VanRamblings’ Vancouver Park Board Endorsements may be found here.
VanRamblings’ Vancouver School Board Endorsements may be found here.

Polls open at 8am Saturday for the 2014 Vancouver municipal election.
Most voters will likely be taken aback at the 121 names on the civic ballot, the 29 contenders vying to fill nine slots on Vancouver School Board, the 31 contenders who want to fill one of seven vacant spots around the Park Board table, or the 48 Council candidates who fancy a job at City Hall.
As a service to readers, VanRamblings today will present a truncated Vancouver City Council Endorsements Rationale, the third and final in a series, that started out with VanRamblings’ choices for Park Board, and went on to explore VanRamblings’ choices for Vancouver School Board.
Vancouver City Council is the place where decisions will be taken over the next term of government at City Hall that will impact on the quality of life of every single citizen across every neighbourhood in our city, for whoever holds office and the seat of power in the upcoming four-year term of office.
For the past five months, VanRamblings has argued long and loud that Vision Vancouver has abrogated its right to a third consecutive term of office at City Hall (and Park Board), as perhaps the most developer-driven, dismissive of community concern, aggressively tyrannical civic administration since the hoary days of Mayor Tom Campbell, in the late ’60s & early ’70s.

Sign idea by Outdoor Pools advocate Margery Duda – sign construction by Andrew Schmitz

In it’s last-minute bid for a majority Council at City Hall, Vision Vancouver has ramped up their fear-based campaign against Kirk LaPointe, pointing out his non-existent ties to The Fraser Institute — the totality of the allegations so off-putting and egregious they hardly warrant a repeating in today’s VanRamblings endorsement post for Vancouver City Council.
Quite franky, VanRamblings finds Kirk LaPointe to be a gentleman of the old school, and a thoughtful man of integrity and character — traits that are sorely lacking in our current Mayor.
Vision Vancouver’s 2014 campaign of character assassination and their dedication to the politics of personal destruction are little short of despicable. Vote for Kirk LaPointe, if for no other reason than the discomfort you feel in the pit of your stomach when you hear terrible things being said about him, a decent person — as you’ve probably assessed for yourself — a loving husband and father, a well-educated man of great experience and accomplishment, who has in some great measure created his own success through hard work and determination, the love and support of those around him, and a dedication to making a difference.

When you go to the polls on Saturday, you will want to make sure that Gregor Robertson, and his Vision Vancouver team, hear the message loud and clear: enough is enough, we are not fools, we don’t believe your last-
minute mea culpa — so many crocodile tears those, a mean and dishonest tactic designed to create sympathy for an administration that has, more wholly than any civic administration in a generation, given itself over to the interests of greedy developers, than any reasonable person could possibly have thought imaginable. We want a City Hall that will govern for us.

BC Liberal Party Exec. Dir. Laura Miller tweets out about a night out with Vision Vancouver

Vision Vancouver has painted the Non-Partisan Association as the BC Liberal farm team, died-in-the wool right-wingers who will turn the city into some kind of romantic, Benzedrine-popping Ayn Rand, survival-of-the-fittest, dystopian nightmare. Thus the dozens of fear-mongering, we’re oh so sorry, we’re bad but they’re worse, telephone calls you’ve received this week that have invaded your home like so much acid rain.
Do you see the picture above? You’re looking at BC Liberals’ Executive Director Laura Miller’s tweet of Vision Vancouver’s very own Director of Communications, Marcella Munro, sitting right beside Laura’s good friend, Don Millar, Vision’s head of for-profit flack company FD Element, the guy who “manages and promotes” Mayor Gregor Robertson whenever he can.
And that @diamondisinger mentioned in the tweet? Could that be the very same Diamond Isinger who was Christy Clark’s key online strategist in the Premier’s bid for office last year who, don’tcha know, is now working for Clark’s best friends, Vision Vancouver, performing the very same function?
And wasn’t it former Non-Partisan Association President, Michael Davis, a spin doctor for big oil who was endorsing Gregor Robertson last week?
Let’s see if we can make sense of all this: almost the entirety of Vision Vancouver’s 2014 campaign strategist team are performing identical roles to the ones they played in Christy Clark’s bid for the Premier’s office in last year’s British Columbia provincial election. Strange “coincidence”, huh? Make no mistake, Vision Vancouver have painted themselves as the anti-tanker defenders of the environment. What utter nonsense: it’s Vision Vancouver who are the BC Liberal farm team, all dressed up in ‘green liberal’, progressive New Democrat Party clothing. Just look at the picture above.

VanRamblings Enthusiastically Endorses Kirk LaPointe for Mayor

As Grandview-Woodland’s respected community activist Jak King wrote in his endorsement today, “Kirk LaPointe represents a return to the glory days of the NPA, the days in which the NPA introduced both CityPlan and the Four Pillars strategy. By his very public endorsement of the Principles & Goals planning document of the Coalition of Vancouver Neighbourhoods, LaPointe has grasped the future of collaborative planning. LaPointe’s demeanour and quick intelligence on the campaign trail and in smaller meetings leads many of us to believe that he is a man one can work with.”
VanRamblings could not agree more with Jak King’s expressed sentiment.
Kirk LaPointe could very well become the Vancouver Mayor of a generation. Meeting the needs and serving the interests of a broad cross-section of the community in every neighbourhood, addressing social issues like child hunger, focusing on the economy and a jobs strategy to strengthen Vancouver’s economy, restoring civic government based on openness, transparency and intent of purpose, consulting with the public and acting on the developed community consensus, a Kirk LaPointe-led administration would restore public confidence and lustre in Vancouver civic government.
Tomorrow, at the polls, vote Kirk LaPointe and a majority Non-Partisan Association Vancouver City Council and Park Board, as well as a significant contingent on School Board. Create the conditions to allow Kirk LaPointe and his Non-Partisan Association team to begin the transformation of our city in order that civic government be placed in the hands of the people.

VanRamblings’ 2014 Vancouver City Council Endorsements

Along with Adriane Carr, George Affleck is the conscience of Council, a tireless advocate for the people’s interest, a Councillor who puts in 60 hour weeks and still finds time for his beloved wife and the children he loves so much. George Affleck is a gift to our political landscape, devoted to public service and to furthering the interests of the community, in every neighbourhood across our city. In the 2014 civic election cycle, George Affleck was the star of the all-candidates meetings, and flat-out the most sympathetic and compelling presence on the dais, week-in and week-out. There’s a cynicism among some about politics and politicians — if you knew George as I and thousands of others have come to know George Affleck, the City Councillor, all doubt there exists a shining star in the maelstrom that is Vancouver politics would be erased, for George Affleck is a city councillor who knows in his bones what it is to be a democrat, to live it, to feel it, to practice it — and to do it all in service of the community, and for you.
Elizabeth Ball has, in two previous terms, gained the confidence of voters. First elected to Council in 2005, when she is re-elected to a four-year term on Saturday evening, she will embark on her seventh year of service to the people of Vancouver. I came to know Elizabeth Ball in the 1990s when I was an arts reporter and she was the Managing Director of the Carousel Theatre — which she had founded some 20 years earlier. Always ready with an open smile, Elizabeth was a fount of information — there wasn’t anyone, or anything, in the theatre world with which she wasn’t familiar. The same dedication to task that she brought to the management of the Carousel Theatre, and the mounting of my very favourite productions over the many, many years I visited Carousel, has been matched by Elizabeth Ball’s dogged work on Council, her ability to get to the heart of any matter, her peerless research skills, her advocacy for the public unmatched by anyone other than her NPA Council colleague, George Affleck. Chair of the NPA caucus, it was Elizabeth — working with Fraser Ballantyne and Rob McDowell — who spear-headed the expulsion of Ken Denike and Sophia Woo from the NPA caucus, and from any association with the Non-Partisan Association.
If you go to your dictionary and look up the word democracy, you will find Adriane Carr’s picture next to the word — because Adriane Carr has come to define responsive, always on your side, honest, sincere, fight for what is right, democratic engagement in Vancouver municipal politics, her time on Council in her first term (when she squeaked in — I predict that she’s going to top the polls in 2014) the most salutary manifestation of Abraham Lincoln’s precept, as applied to our little burgh (with just the slightest change in wording) that in Vancouver “civic government is of the people, it is by the people, and it must always be for the people.” Adriane Carr lived that axiom every single day of her first term of office, as she does each and every day of her life. You know it, I know it — Adriane Carr is the most beloved political figure in the Metro Vancouver region. How fortunate we all are to have Adriane Carr — a person of character, a person of integrity, a person of wit and intelligence and passion and reason, a tireless advocate always, representing each one of us, and … within our midst. Vote Adriane Carr.
Nicholas Chernen has the royal jelly. In the 2014 vortex that was the run to secure office on our city’s highest elected body, Vancouver City Council, onto our civic political scene there arrived a guileless, astute, sturdy and staunch, perceptive and charmingly innocent philosopher king, a dreamer who dreams as did Robert F. Kennedy that, kissed by the wind & good fortune, a boy who over the past twelve months was transformed into a formidably inspiring man of impossible grace and principle, looked around him & asked, “Why,” and dreamed a dream of a thing that never was with Vision Vancouver holding the seat of power in our municipal government, and asked himself another question, “Why not,” which, perhaps, in the fullness of time became less a question than an instruction, a call to duty, a re-awakening in him a long suppressed democratic commitment to the his family, and to our community. In 2014, Nicholas Chernen is one of two nascent political figures to emerge on the political scene whole (the other? the Greens’ must-elect, Pete Fry). Nicholas Chernen: a leader, a future Mayor and Premier (as is the case with Pete Fry), brother to Glen, who arrived on the political scene in Vancouver and wrote the story of Campaign 2014.
Over the course of the past three years, working with her Non-Partisan Association colleague, John Coupar, in her role as a Vancouver Park Board Commissioner, Melissa De Genova emerged as the hardest-working, most dedicated to democratic engagement and populist political figure to emerge on British Columbia’s tumultuous political scene in more the 40 years. If not for Melissa De Genova, there would be no Killarney Seniors Centre, if not for Melissa De Genova’s tireless advocacy for the public interest, the voice of the people would not have been heard at the Park Board table — and our city, and parks and recreation system in Vancouver would be worse for the lack of Melissa De Genova’s hourly, daily commitment to making our home the most livable city anywhere on this planet; which is not rhetoric, but rather a reflection on the efforts of a dogged and sincere public figure who aims to, and has, made a difference. Please, save a vote for Melissa De Genova at the polls.
The Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry has the best chance of any new candidate seeking the position of Vancouver City Councillor of any who have offered themselves for elected office in the 2014 Vancouver civic election. Pete Fry is the single most intelligent, pioneering, committed to democracy, engaged, generous, on your side political figure to emerge on Vancouver’s political scene since … well, since the emergence of his Green party running mate, Adriane Carr — what a duo they will make sitting on Vancouver City Council together, how fortunate we all will be to have two elected representatives in Pete Fry and Adriane Carr, whose dedication to our democracy is unparalleled in our city. Voting the Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry is not something you should just consider, voting for Pete Fry is an absolute imperative when you head to the polls in this, the most important civic election in more than 40 years. A vote for Pete Fry will be the single most important decision you will make in this election.

Tim Louis is the most important must vote in the 2014 Vancouver civic election, as the single candidate with the most wit, the candidate most committed to a fairer and more just city for all, the candidate who doesn’t just argue for a better city, better transit, the construction of more affordable housing (and he means, non-market affordable housing, which is our only way out of our present affordable housing morass), the candidate most committed to social justice, and the only 2014 Vancouver municipal election candidate for office with a well-thought-out plan on how to get us there, and the candidate who will best hold his Vancouver City Councillors’ colleagues feet to the fire — and always, always, a peerless advocate for the public good. Please, please save a vote for my friend, the most generous and thoughtful person of my acquaintance, the incomparable Tim Louis.
Involved in community services across the Metro Vancouver region for more than four decades, a now retired professional engineer who worked for the City of Vancouver, the senior city of Vancouver manager responsible for Chinatown’s innovative Millennium Gate project, and a key member of Vancouver’s Transportation Planning Team for the 2010 Olympics, Ken Low knows how things work and how to things done at City Hall. A husband and father dedicated to his two children, Ken Low is the legacy candidate in the 2014 Vancouver civic election, a reasoned, achingly intelligent and fit athletic figure who — more than any other candidate running for office in our current Vancouver civic election — possesses the skills and the ability to hit the ground running in the hours following his election to Vancouver City Council, to begin the process of change that will help to build a better Vancouver for you and for your family, and all your neighbours and friends.
Rob McDowell is, by far, my favourite new candidate for Vancouver City Council in the 2014 Vancouver civic election, the most articulate, generous, thoughtful, progressive new candidate on Vancouver’s civic scene — and endorsed everywhere, by every one, across the political spectrum — the one candidate for Vancouver City Council who has built a broad, public consensus for his election to Vancouver’s senior decision-making body, a person who would be a mediating force on Council who, having gained the confidence of his peers, would work to create the conditions necessary to move our city forward. A vote for Rob McDowell is a vote for change, a vote for reason and a vote for a better, and more equitable Vancouver. Vote Rob McDowell when you mark you ballot — and in doing so, you will have voted for the best new candidate seeking office as a Vancouver city council councillor, in the 2014 Vancouver civic election.
Ian Robertson is the most able new candidate running for office as a Vancouver city councillor, the smartest — going to get things done — political figure on Vancouver’s civic scene, the candidate most committed to our democracy and to a generous outreach to the community, and as is true of the candidates written about above, committed to a fairer and more just Vancouver, a Vancouver that will serve the needs of all. As a two-term Park Board Commissioner, Ian Robertson proved day in, day out that he was a tireless, hard-working, consensus-building advocate for the public good, who in his years of service to the people of Vancouver earned the respect of his peers, and a broad cross-section of our city’s always wise voting population. Along with the other new candidates for Vancouver city council written about above, Ian Robertson is the most important vote you will make when marking your ballot. Vote Ian Robertson for a better Vancouver.

“I am deeply troubled by the Vancouver First School Trustee candidacies of Ken Denike and Sophia Woo, and their fear-based election campaign. I don’t want to give them more attention, but there is a real danger, particularly if voter turn-out is low, that they could be re-elected to School Board.

In 2005, I was targeted by homophobes because of my role in the development and implementation of the Vancouver School Board’s LGBTTQ+ Policy.

In 2011, I lost in my re-election bid for School Board.

I was targeted by homophobes and transphobes because I was working on early drafts of the updated Sexual Orientation and Gender Identities Policy. I lost because I am queer and proud. I will never stop standing up for LGBTTQ+ kids, and all of our children who face barriers in receiving the education that is their right.

My colleague, Gwen Giesbrecht of the Public Education Project, has been a vocal ally and stood alongside me, in this struggle.

The Vision Vancouver Board (especially Patti Bacchus and Allan Wong) have been vital and strong allies. Please take this into account when you are voting for School Board. Let your friends know — do not reward those who fan hate, or stand aside in silence.

Trustees have a duty to respect and uphold kids’ legal and human right to accommodation, and to not fan fear and spread misunderstanding.”

Gwen Giesbrecht, a parent & small business owner, is one of our city’s true treasures, her life-long activism in support of public education and strong communities, both community driven, and in her work in the Grandview-Woodland neighbourhood where she lives — and where she serves as President of the Britannia Community Services Centre board of management, and Chair of the Britannia Secondary Parent Advisory committee — and across the city, has proved throughout a lifetime of activism of invaluable service to the larger community that is Vancouver.

In her work with Britannia, Gwen has worked toward the creation of an integrated model for community service delivery, and works closely in partnership with the Vancouver School Board, the Vancouver Public Library and the City of Vancouver. Working across the city, Gwen is a past chairperson of the Vancouver District Parent Advisory Council (DPAC), the COPE Education Committee, and was a co-founder of the Justice Not Charity education forum, featured above in today’s VanRamblings’ post.

On this upcoming Saturday, November 15th, most of those who intend to vote will go to the voting stations in their neighbourhood.
While walking, riding your bike, or driving to your local polling station, ask yourself, “What kind of world do I want to create for my children, for my family, for my neighbours, my friends, my colleagues and myself? Do I want a world of where all are provided an equal opportunity for love and acceptance, and if that is so, for whom do I cast my ballot?”
Reading Jane’s discourse above, any person of principle is left with no other option than to cast their ballot, and place a checkmark beside the names of Jane Bouey, Gwen Giesbrecht, Patti Bacchus and Allan Wong — for there is the rock solid guarantee that in this too often confusing world that a vote for Jane, Gwen, Patti and Allan is a vote for a better world, a fairer and more just world, a more inclusive world where every boy and girl enrolled in the Vancouver school system will be afforded an equal opportunity to live the dream they dream for themselves to lead a productive, fulfilling life where love and acceptance for each and every one is the mantle they will carry throughout their lives. Vote Bacchus, Bouey, Giesbrecht, and Wong.

Were the above true of all the Non-Partisan Association candidates for office; it’s not. Make no mistake, there are no homophobes or transphobes in the NPA campaign for office. Rather, outside of the outstanding NPA candidacies of Christopher Richardson, Stacy Robertson and Fraser Ballantyne, the Non-Partisan Association candidates are weak tea, indeed.
Now, VanRamblings likes, nay adores, NPA candidate for School Board, Sandy Sharma. The Straight writes about Sandy yesterday, “a progressive parent activist for many years and is well-versed in education issues, including the board’s financial affairs.” Sad to say, such has not been VanRamblings experience. In respect of Sandy’s run for office, even her running mates have been concerned over Sandy’s focus on cutting out contract-negotiated Professional Days, and shortening the Christmas and spring breaks — when the former is unchangeable, and the latter is, although to some extent within the Board’s purview, provincially-mandated.
[Update: In response to the paragraph above, Sandy Sharma writes to say that she feels that the construction of her commentary, as written above, is “both misleading and inaccurate.” Ms. Sharma is clear that it is not Professional Days to which she refers — and insists that she has always been “a proponent of Professional Days, and the very important role they play in furthering the goals of a vibrant public education system.”

Rather, says Ms. Sharma, it is “District Days” to which she refers — a few years back, the Vision Vancouver School Board, to save money, extended Spring Break by 3 – 5 days, and closed schools on other days in the calendar school year, lengthening the school day for students in order that provincially-mandated hours / days of education would be met. Sandy Sharma believes that Vision Vancouver policy is the wrong way to go.
Sandy Sharma believes, and it is NPA policy she had a role in drafting, that to close schools for so many days each school year is wrong, and that an NPA School Board would look for cost savings elsewhere, restoring full school days, in support of the interests of children, and their beleaguered parents, whose pocketbooks are already strained, and who must arrange for childcare during the Vision Vancouver-imposed “District Closure” days.]

Me, I want a vocal advocate for public education. Even given the above, VanRamblings would not be concerned, and perhaps might experience some degree of joy for Sandy were she to be elected to School Board.
Were VanRamblings able to say that about NPA School Trustree Penny Noble’s candidacy — a walking disaster if we ever saw one. Migawd!

Last week, when returning from the Mayoral debate at SFU Harbour Centre, sitting in Christopher Richardson’s comfy SUV as he transported Penny to her car at the Vancouver Lawn Tennis & Badminton Club (don’t ask), we got to talking about the amount of time electeds often put into their jobs.
For instance, on School Board, I know that Patti Bacchus and Mike Lombardi often put in 40 – 60 hour weeks — they’re dedicated, there’s a job to be done, they’re passionate defenders of the public education system, the media come calling and there they are out front of the VSB offices, or out front of their homes, answering the question of the day.
At Park Board, although NPA Park Board Commissioner John Coupar is reluctant to reveal the number of hours he puts into his work as a Park Board Commissioner (he’s such a humble man), a 40+ hour a week is not uncommon for John, as is the case for fellow NPA Park Board Commissioner, and current NPA candidate for Council, Melissa De Genova.
While Christopher was transporting Penny and I over the Burrard Street bridge, the subject of committees at School Board came up, and a concern that had been expressed to me by one of the Vision Vancouver school trustees that Fraser Ballantyne didn’t like committee meetings, and never turned up for them, even the ones he was supposed to be chairing. There are six standing committees at School Board: Education and Student Services, Planning and Facilities, Finance & Legal, Personnel & Staff Services, Management Co-ordinating, and Education & Student Services.
As you might well imagine, it is at the committee level where the lion’s share of the Board’s work occurs, all the planning, development of policy, co-ordinating, resolution of personnel issues, etc. The VSB committees play a pivotal role at the Board, they’re time-consuming but productive, and all the Board members (save Fraser Ballantyne, apparently) attend.
Interjecting in the discussion Christopher Richardson and I were having about committees, and the certainty he felt that Fraser Ballantyne’s contribution to the Vancouver School Board, and certainly to the Non-Partisan Association School Board campaign, was without compare — who am I to disbelieve Christopher, I trust Christopher on every single word I have ever heard from him, and we talk together frequently and at length, usually when he’s riding his bike, and comes roaring up, at which point we engage in gregarious discourse — Penny Noble had his to say …

“Committees. We don’t need no damn committees. They’re time-consuming, they’re useless. The first thing I’ll do when elected to office is cancel all of those committees. I’m going to shake up School Board when I’m elected. Forty hours a week! I’ve got better things to do with my time than spend 40 hours a week at the School Board offices. I’ll spend ten, and no more!”

Gosh, one wonders if Penny is aware that School Board Trustees are also liaisons with the at least a dozen schools to which they’re assigned?
Probably not.
Penny exits Christopher’s vehicle, as Christopher rolls his eyes, assuring me that “we’ll take it slow and easy, get our feet, get a feel for things, meet people, talk with everyone we can, attend committee meetings, find out what the priorities are, and work together with the other electeds, one of whom I would imagine and hope would be Patti Bacchus, with whom I’m really looking forward to working with should I be given the opportunity.”

Patti Bacchus and NPA School Board candidate, Christopher Richardson, at Pride 2014

VanRamblings asks a question to which the answer is clear, but tests Christopher Richardson (it’s a good question to ask of any potential School Board Trustee candidate): First order of business upon being elected, Christopher? The answer, “With the resignation of Superintendent Steve Cardwell, who’s taking on the job as a Professor, teaching and a Director of Executive Educational leadership, at the University of British Columbia, the search for and appointment of a new Vancouver School Board Superintendent would have to a first priority for the incoming Board.”
You pass, Christopher. Like I knew you would.
As VSB Superintendent Steve Cardwell told The Courier’s Cheryl Rossi …

The Vancouver School Board oversees 92 elementary schools, 18 high schools, seven adult education centres and the largest distance education school in the province. Vancouver schools serve some of the most affluent neighbourhoods in Canada and some of the poorest. Fourteen per cent of students participate in a school meal programme.

We have 55,000 students. We’ve got over 100,000 parents that have a real stake in our education system and fewer than 40 per cent voted. They need to exercise their democratic right to vote and have influence on our education system by voting for school trustees and voting for the city, for the mayor and council, as well, as part of this, and when provincial elections come around, of course, for them, too.”

I know that Christopher Richardson has ridden his bike to every school in the district, introducing himself to the administration at each of those schools, and as many teachers as he could, not to get votes — although, he’s good at that — but to get a feel for the depth and breadth of the Vancouver school district, and to hear from administrators, teachers — and when he runs across them, the parents — concerns that each would like to see addressed in this next term of the Vancouver School Board.
Christopher Richardson is, quite simply, one of the best people I know — I am over-the-moon about Christopher’s candidacy for School Board.
Patti Bacchus has told me that she would look forward to working with Christopher — a progressive of the first order, who was enthusiastically endorsed by The Straight yesterday, and several other School Board candidates running for other parties have said the same thing about Stacy Robertson, with affection expressed for Fraser Ballantyne, as well.
Penny Noble? NPA candidate for School Board? In a word: disaster.

Continue reading Decision 2014: Vancouver School Board Endorsements Rationale →

VanRamblings’ Vancouver City Council Endorsements may be found here.
VanRamblings’ Vancouver School Board Endorsements may be found here.

If you haven’t read Part 1 of VanRamblings’ Vancouver Park Board Endorsements List Rationale, you’ll want to read it first, the post focusing mainly on VanRamblings’ favourite candidate for Park Board, John Coupar.
Arriving at the conclusions I have in respect of identifying those candidates I believe possess both the gravitas to become true defenders of the public interest and, pragmatically, have a decent chance of gaining the trust of Vancouver voters and defeating what is for many the worst Park Board in the 128-year-young history of that august body was not an easy task.
Vancouver’s Park Board Commissioners have — up until this past six years, when a Vision Vancouver-led majority Park Board slate was elected to office — acted as stewards of our parks and recreation system.
Let’s have a look at the remaining Vancouver Park Board candidates endorsed by VanRamblings earlier in the week.

Stuart Mackinnon, a MUST-ELECT Green Party of Vancouver candidate for Park Board

Following John Coupar on my list of must-elects to Park Board, my next favourite must-elect is the Green Party of Vancouver’s one-term Vancouver Park Board Commissioner (2008 – 2011) Stuart Mackinnon who, as he says on his blog, “has fought for the preservation of our foreshore and our natural beaches, who believes in our Park Board’s community services system,” and who has always been a staunch defender of the independence of our neighbourhood community centre associations.
In addition, as a well-respected educator for some 26 years, central to Stuart’s campaign platform is his belief that “every child should be able to play in their own neighbourhood,” which means parks nearby and playgrounds, and a livable city for all of us who live across the vast expanse of our metropolitan city by the sea, is central to Stuart’s belief system.
Earlier today, I received the following e-mail from my friend Margery Duda, an advocate for the restoration of community outdoor pools, who writes …

Stuart Mackinnon advocated for outdoor pools when he was on Park Board, 2008 to 2011, and as a Green Party of Vancouver candidate for Park Board in 2011 was instrumental in having the Greens adopt a plan to replace outdoor pools fallen into disrepair, and build new ones.

Outdoor pools have gained a lot of traction in this election campaign, and that is music to the ears of pool advocates.

With the Coalition of Progressive Electors (COPE) being on the record supporting outdoor pools via past Park Board Chairperson and current Park Board candidate, Anita Romaniuk, thanks to Stuart and Anita, the Non-Partisan Association’s game-changing commitment to build three outdoor pools if elected, and now with the Greens making it official, too, outdoor swimming pools are sure to return as a part of Vancouver’s recreation network, a development for which we are glad, indeed.

Note should be made, as well, that the smaller parties such as the Vancouver Cedar Party and IDEA have also committed to outdoor pools, as have some of the independents.

Those of us who have advocated for outdoor pools believe that it is unfortunate that six years were wasted under Vision Vancouver, when we could have been replacing our outdoor pools. When Vision Vancouver Park Board Commissioners first ran for office in 2008, a central tenet of their platform was a replacement of our outdoor pools network — since their election, they have reversed themselves on that very important commitment made to many of us who live in neighbourhoods across our city. We’ve continued our fight, in the community and at Park Board.

The Mount Pleasant Outdoor Pool could have been completed as early as 2010, when Mount Pleasant Park was re-developed following a public consultation that rated the pool as the community’s top priority. During the six years of Vision Vancouver governance at Park Board, opportunities for green technology grants and federal infrastructure funding were passed over by Vision in favour of building expensive indoor destination pools only.

Although Vision voted against a proposal to fund an outdoor pool in the current Capital Plan presented to voters, with the great support that has been forthcoming from the Green Party’s outstanding candidate for Park Board, Stuart Mackinnon, and support from our good friend, COPE’s Anita Romaniuk, we believe that should a mixed Park Board slate of Green Party of Vancouver, the Non-Partisan Association, COPE and perhaps one or two independents — such as IDEA’s Jamie Lee Hamilton or James Buckshon — outdoor pools are attainable within the current Capital Plan.

Outdoor pool advocates: Sharpen your pencils and get out to vote between Wednesday November 12th and Saturday November 15th.”

With a Green Party of Vancouver platform that advocates for community-driven planning — that regards community centre associations as partners, not adversaries — replacement of outdoor pools, zero waste, local food systems and access to nature, and a revitalization of Park Board facilities and our parks’ infrastructure, the Greens’ Stuart Mackinnon and Michael Wiebe, are two absolute must-elects for Vancouver Park Board.

Erin Shum, running with the Non-Partisan Association, is — far and away — VanRamblings’ favourite new candidate seeking office for Park Board.
For the past year, Erin has regularly attended the bi-weekly Park Board meetings, and on several occasions has spoken at the Park Board table advocating for the community interest on a range of issues of concern to residents living in neighbourhoods across our city. Erin’s is a strong, reasoned and clarion voice, a welcome advocate for the public interest.
Having spoken, and worked, with Erin for the past year, VanRamblings can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that the woman you see pictured above is one tough cookie, a candidate who possesses a clear, informed understanding of the issues at play before Park Board; it was John Coupar and Erin who argued for the inclusion of a plank in the NPA platform calling for the restoration of our outdoor pools system; it is Erin Shum — working with John Coupar and fellow NPA candidate for Park Board, Casey Crawford — who have vowed to restore $10.2 million in funding for the redevelopment of the Marpole-Oakridge Community Centre, monies that were approved in the 2011 City of Vancouver capital plan, but never spent.
In respect of the NPA’s outdoors pools initiative, at the announcement of the NPA’s Park Board platform, it was Erin Shum who told the media that were gathered, “Vancouver is dramatically underserved when it comes to outdoor pools. Going forward, we make this commitment to the people of Vancouver that we will consult with the community on where the new outdoor facilities should be located, and in our first term of office, we will commit to the construction of three new, or replacement, outdoor pools.”
Make no mistake, Erin Shum is a person of sage wisdom well beyond her years, an advocate for the Gen-Y voters of her generation and for all of us, and for the burgeoning community of citizens of Chinese descent who have come to regard Erin Shum as a champion of the community interest.
VanRamblings is in complete accord with the belief that Erin Shum is a voice for the people, an activist and an advocate of the first order for the public interest, one of the brightest and strongest political figures to emerge out of Vancouver’s increasingly buoyant municipal political scene in years.
In a world where too often those in elected political office simply dedicate themselves to serving the interests of the political parties that got them elected, while remaining mute on the issues of the day, Erin Shum has emerged as a vocal champion of the public interest, a partner for fellow Non-Partisan Association candidates John Coupar and Casey Crawford — and a candidate for Park Board who has vowed to restore $10.2 million in funding allocated in the failed Vision Vancouver 2011 capital plan for the necessary re-development of the Marpole-Oakridge Community Centre.

Mount Pleasant Park, where Erin Shum is committed to seeing a new outdoor pool built

Erin Shum, along with her NPA running mates John Coupar and Casey Crawford, Green Party of Vancouver Park Board candidates Stuart Mackinnon and Michael Wiebe, and COPE’s Anita Romaniuk — should voters place their confidence in them — are the candidates for Park Board who, commencing on December 1st, 2014, when the newly-elected Park Board Commissioners will be sworn into office, will transform governance at Park Board, and restore our desecrated parks to their former, natural beauty, and end once and for all the hostile, Dr. Penny Ballem-driven — endorsed by the Vision Vancouver caucus — heartbreakingly contentious Vancouver City Hall relationship with our beleaguered community centre associations.

Park Board MUST-ELECTS: Anita Romaniuk, Casey Crawford, and Michael Wiebe

Make no mistake, VanRamblings’ loves John Coupar, Stuart Mackinnon and Erin Shum, but as complementary must-elects to Vancouver Park Board, I am just as over the moon about COPE’s Anita Romaniuk, the NPA’s Casey Crawford, and the Green Party of Vancouver’s Michael Wiebe.
Vancouver’s School Board and Vancouver City Council candidate endorsement lists cost me sleepless nights, and hours on the phone, responding to e-mails and online explaining myself — it’s been a tough slog, let me tell you. The VanRamblings’ Park Board endorsements — well, they were a no-brainer, the choices so obvious, the quality of the candidates so high, there was no other direction VanRamblings could go.
Anita Romaniuk, Chair of the Vancouver Park Board in 2004 and Chair of the Park Board Finance Committee from 2003 to 2005, Anita has …

• Served six years on the Board of the Douglas Park Community Association;
• Six more years as a member of the Douglas Park Arts Committee and the Park Improvement and Heather Park Committees;
• Since 2006, Anita has worked with Margery Duda, and others, as a member of the Mount Pleasant Community Association’s Pool Committee, where she’s still advocating for the replacement of their outdoor pool;
• In 2009, Anita became a founding member of the Vancouver Society for Preservation of Outdoor Pools;
• In 2008, Anita joined the Board of Directors for the Save Our Parklands Association, and has served as its President since November 2011.

As VanRamblings has written elsewhere, Anita and I served on COPE’s Parks & Recreation Committee, and together with Jamie Lee Hamilton drafted much of COPE’s Park Board platform.
John Coupar, VanRamblings’ very favourite candidate for Park Board, has said that he hopes Vancouver voters elect Anita to Park Board, that her institutional Park Board memory, and the likelihood that she’d hold his feet to the fire — John is nothing, if not a humble man — were he to become the next Chairperson of the Park Board
For the purposes of reference, all Park Board Commissioners vote on who the Chair will be, each year of their term in office.
In 2014, there is general consensus among all the serious candidates VanRamblings has endorsed that, given all of his good work this past three years and his commitment to our parks and recreation system, John has earned the right to become the next Park Board Chairperson, and thus they will vote that way when the time comes.
For VanRamblings, a vote for the candidates on VanRamblings’ endorsement list is mandatory for anyone who cares about the welfare of our parks, our recreation system, restoration of our outdoor pools system, a return of Hastings Park to Park Board jurisdiction, implementation of the gender-variant policy, and all of the myriad issues — some known, some not yet known — that Park Board will face over the next four years.
VanRamblings urges you to save a vote for Anita Romaniuk for Park Board.

Casey Crawford is the unsung hero of the 2014 Vancouver civic election, the under-the-radar candidate for Park Board who has more knowledge in his little finger about the state of our playing fields across Vancouver — in a word, dreadful — and how that impacts on the boys and girls who play soccer, rugby, baseball or field hockey, and the jeopardy into which the children have been placed by a politicized, out-of-touch Vision Vancouver majority Park Board, than all of the other Park Board candidates combined.
VanRamblings looks at the NPA’s campaign website for Casey Crawford, and believes most who would surf to the site would say, “What? Who’s this Casey Crawford fella, and what kind of Park Board Commissioner would he make?” Without wishing to become profane, VanRamblings would suggest the answer to that question is, “Casey Crawford would be a damn fine Park Board Commissioner, an advocate for our children, an advocate for children’s sports, and during his term of office, there is little doubt in my mind that the media would identify Casey Crawford as the go-to guy on amateur sport in our city, and on any issue related to our playing fields.”
Vote for Casey Crawford? Your darn tootin’ you should – you MUST!

Last, but certainly not least, there’s the Green Party of Vancouver’s Michael Wiebe, the new kid on the block, so to speak, business owner and community leader who, when he was 16 became a Park Board lifeguard (and later co-founded the Vancouver Lifeguard Association), who earned his Bachelor’s in Business Administration, worked for the B.C. government administering public board appointments — and is, to boot, a charter member of the Mount Pleasant Implementation Committee.

Kitsilano Park Board All-Party Candidates Meeting, Nov. 3, 2014 | Video by Elvira Lount

Michael says that as a Park Board Commissioner he’s committed to …

Building more natural parks — under Vision Vancouver there’s been only one new park built in the past six years, the neglected pocket poodle park and 18th and Main — working towards the creations of a healthier, sustainable food system, fostering grassroots community initiatives in every neighbourhood across our city; and working to create a sustainable waste management programme that meets the needs of all of the citizens of Vancouver.

Truth-to-tell, it’ll probably take Michael a few months to get up to speed — which is the case for every new member of Park Board — but according to my friend Gena Kolson, Michael’s Grade 12 teacher …

“Michael is extremely bright and a hard worker, picks things up faster than any student I ever worked with, is dedicated, passionate, a democrat to his core, someone people turn to, and a natural born leader. There’s no question about whether I’ll cast a vote for Michael; of course, I would. Michael will be a real asset on Park Board — voters won’t be sorry they voted for Michael.”

Well, there you go, VanRamblings’ top six candidates for Vancouver Park Board, each one of whom we endorse enthusiastically.

Continue reading Decision 2014: Vancouver Park Board Endorsements Rationale →