Vancouver Park Board History + Commissioners’ Mandate & Compensation
Established by an 1889 amendment to the Vancouver Incorporation Act, 1886 (later the Vancouver Charter). The Vancouver Park Board is unique not just across Canada, but across North America, as well (and the globe, for that matter), as the sole elected body of its kind, and as British Columbia’s Attorney General, Niki Sharma — herself, a former celebrated Vancouver Park Board Commissioner — recently told VanRamblings, “the Vancouver Park Board is a cherished institution.”
Vancouver Park Board has seven elected commissioners who are charged with determining the policy direction of the institution. The Board’s mandate: “provide, preserve and advocate for Vancouver’s parks and recreation system … to the benefit of the citizens of Vancouver, the many neighbourhoods that comprise our beloved home, the City of Vancouver, and to advocate for the environment, as our parks represent the lungs of our city, contributing to the health of the community.”
Commissioners are elected at large every four years, with a chair and vice-chair elected by the Commissioners each December, their term to begin at the first meeting of Park Board Commissioners, in January, following the holiday break. At present the Vancouver Park Board Chairperson is Brennan Bastyovanszky, the Vice-Chairperson Scott Jensen, Park Board Committee Chairperson (the body which hears public presentations, and where all the “real” work of the Commissioners takes place), Laura Christensen, with Scott Jensen Vice-Chair.
Vancouver Park Board Commissioners | L-R: Jas Virdi (ABC), Marie-Claire Howard (ABC), Tom Digby (Green), Angela Haer (ABC), Independents: Scott Jensen, Brennan Bastyovanszky, Laura Christensen
Park Board Commissioners served without remuneration until a 1972 amendment to the Vancouver Charter allowed them an annual honorarium of $1000. At present, for a not unusual 45-hour work week (this apart from the Commissioners’ regular employment in their professions), the Park Board Chairperson earns $23,428.65 per annum, with Commissioners earning $18,743.38 annually, or about 12.5% of the compensation afforded the average City Councillor at Vancouver City Hall.
The Vancouver Park Board oversees 242 parks and gardens, including major park “attractions” such as the 1,000 acre / 406 hectare Stanley Park, the VanDusen Botanical Garden on Oak Street, and the Bloedel Conservatory atop Queen Elizabeth, 24 active community centres located in each neighbourhood across the city, the Park Board also responsible for Vancouver’s pools and water park system, and well-maintained skating rinks and playing fields, as well as three non-profit, well-used-and-enjoyed public golf courses, Langara, McCleery and Fraserview.
Today and tomorrow, we’re taking a break from the politics of Vancouver City Councillors making the horrendous, anti-democratic decision to eliminate the elected 133-year-old Vancouver Park Board, the last bastion of civic democracy in Metro Vancouver, where members of the public are listened to and respected, and have a direct impact on the setting of public parks and recreation policy.
On Wednesday, we’ll write about tender moments around the Park Board table — involving past Park Board Chairpersons John Coupar and Aaron Jasper, once on opposite sides of the political spectrum and avowed “enemies”, but who thanks to the shocking decision of the ABC Vancouver Councillors at Vancouver City Hall to attempt to abolish Vancouver’s elected Park Board have, in common cause, become new best friends, with John Coupar saying to VanRamblings recently ..
“I can’t believe how skilled Aaron is at organizing. Each and every time we get together I am more and more impressed with his intelligence, his dedication, and his love and commitment to Vancouver’s parks and recreation system, and the preservation of Vancouver’s elected Park Board. Working with Aaron is a joy!”
As you can see from the commentary above, some good is coming out of the Ken Sim-led fiasco to eliminate Vancouver’s elected Park Board. In addition to John Coupar and Aaron Jasper’s newfound friendship, former Vancouver Park Board Commissioners Sarah Blyth (a city hero, and founder of the Overdose Prevention Society) and Melissa De Genova, a two-term Vancouver City Councillor, have also now become new best friends, working together in common cause to ensure going forward, and long into the future, Vancouver will enjoy an elected Park Board.
A draft 30-year plan calls for limiting growth in Vancouver, and pushing new residents to the suburbs
All development decisions within the City of Vancouver that are currently being made by senior staff employed within the city’s Planning Department — currently slated to add more than 100,000 new residents to Vancouver, over the course of the next 30 years — is predicated on a rate of population growth that many commentators, and the most recent figures published by Statistics Canada, don’t jibe with population growth projections that are being made at Vancouver City Hall.
“In recent years about 12,000 more people have been annually moving out of Metro Vancouver for other parts of B.C. than have been moving into the metropolis. The vast majority of new arrivals into Metro Vancouver are foreign-born immigrants.”
Todd goes on to quote former provincial NDP MLA and current two-term Nanaimo Mayor, Leonard Krog.
“We have had lots of people from Alberta and the East cashing out and moving to Nanaimo — to get away from the crush and the smoke,” says Krog. “People are also fleeing Vancouver, and the Lower Mainland. Now it’s more common for people to ask why would you stay in the Lower Mainland when you can cash out on your $2-million house on a crowded Burnaby street, or $3 million Vancouver home and get a great $1 million home in Nanaimo?”
Krog says newcomers are pouring into Nanaimo for several reasons — affordable housing, less density, and a higher-quality lifestyle. “The strong overall shift of residents from other provinces, and from Vancouver or Metro Vancouver, to smaller B.C. cities, which have more young adults, is unsurprising,” writes Douglas Todd.
“Nanaimo’s rapid growth of two per cent a year”, Krog says, “is a result of a ‘perfect storm’ of conditions, including the attractiveness of the region’s oceanfront, university, airport, nearby ski mountains, climate and a lower cost of living.”
“It has all been amplified by the pandemic,” he said. “COVID-19 is helping many across Canada and in other parts of B.C. realize they might be able to permanently work out of their homes. So why not do it in a place that is pleasant and somewhat more affordable?”
If as lawyer, writer, and and community organizer Daniel Oleksiuk writes on the Sightline Institute website that population growth in Metro Vancouver will occur in the Metro Vancouver suburbs, and not in Vancouver, and if Nanaimo Mayor Leonard Krog is correct in his assertion that rather than remain in Vancouver, families are instead opting to move to smaller, more affordable cities such as Nanaimo, how can the Vancouver Planning Department justify a growth strategy, population growth projections, and the consequent tower-driven densification projects they are currently presenting to the members of Vancouver City Council for approval?
At Issue: Form of Development, and the Livability of Vancouver
Artistic rendering of the Esso gas station site at 3205 Arbutus, redeveloped into a mixed-use building
A deep issue of concern that has arisen for many, as Vancouver’s Planning Department presents their plans to City Council, is “form of development”.
For the most part, if you take a look at many of the projects VanRamblings wrote about yesterday, they adhere to the ‘development at all cost’ ethos of the now discredited former Vision Vancouver civic administration, who were roundly and wholly turfed from office in the 2018 Vancouver municipal election: a plethora of greenhouse gas-emitting podium and tower-driven developments — whether they be in the northeast “forest of condos” False Creek neighbourhood, the newly-reimagined Oakridge Centre or nearby Heather Lands development, or in the southern sector of the Grandview Woodland neighbourhood’s ‘Safeway site’.
The question must be asked: whatever happened to the notion of ‘gentle density’?
Why is it that rather than construct high-rise condominum towers all along the Broadway Corridor, from Clark Drive all the way out to UBC, could we not opt instead for the kind of low-rise building illustrated directly above, in the proposed, neighbourhood friendly project located at West 16th Avenue and Arbutus Street?
Artistic rendering of a planned, environmentally-friendly wood construction building
Perhaps of even more importance to the stewards of our environment who sit on Vancouver City Council, why not mandate that future home construction be built employing sustainable, carbon-storing cross-laminated timber — glued at perpendicular angles to make thick beams, and clearly visible in columns, beams, walls and ceilings? Wood construction has proven popular across a broad section of our developer, architect and contractor communities, who see building with wood as a way to increase density at a lower cost, while reducing environmental impact.
Now, that would be an innovation for our Vancouver City Council to truly consider.
Rowhouses such as the ones above are common in many cities around the world, but not in Vancouver
And what of fee-simple row housing, which architect Michael Geller argues for in an interview conducted by Carlito Pablo, in the October 6, 2021 issue of The Straight?
“In a fee-simple rowhouse or townhouse, there’s nothing owned by the association. The owners own their roof, their windows, the land under and around their townhouse. That means the individual owners are responsible for taking care of any lawn, painting the outside, fixing leaks in the roof, and shoveling the snow.”
Whatever happened to the notion of human-scale, gentle density townhouse construction, all the rage 40 & 50 years ago? Why, in recent years, has townhouse construction fallen so out of favour, as podium and high-rise tower-driven plinth construction has become the greenhouse gas-emitting building forme de la journée?
Vancouver Co-Housing, located on 33rd Avenue between Victoria Drive and Knight Street
And what about co-housing in Vancouver, housing that is family-supportive, senior-friendly and energy-efficient? For instance, Vancouver Co-Housing consists of 29 privately owned, fully equipped homes plus 2 rental units, in addition to a large and beautiful common house and outdoor common areas. This vibrant community is located on East 33rd Avenue between Victoria Drive and Knight Street.
The homes range from studios to one-, two-, three- and four-bedroom units – all with their own kitchens. The common house has an area of 6,500 sq ft. and includes a community kitchen, dining room, and lounge; activity rooms for children and teens; office areas; two guest rooms; a yoga studio; and rooftop gardens. As well, there are ground-level gardens, workshops, plus a courtyard and play area that encourage year-round social contact. All parking is underground.
By working together, Vancouver Co-Housing members are able to share amenities common to a traditional home and reduce the size of their private dwelling.
A 2014 Global BC video, identifying Vancouver as one of the high-rise capitals of the world
On July 24, 2014, during the lead up to the Vancouver civic election that year, VanRamblings published a column titled At Issue: Form of Development, and the Livability of Vancouver, which quoted a 2012 study conducted by University of British Columbia Chair of Urban Design and Landscape Architecture, Patrick Condon, addressing the question of how Vancouver might reasonably approach the reduction of energy use and consequent greenhouse gas production in the city by at least 80 per cent by 2050, and how that goal might be accomplished.
The answer: the construction of compact, low-rise structures across the city, along its arterials and throughout its neighbourhoods, as a greener, more workable, more energy-efficient alternative to the present form of high-rise development that so captured the imagination of Vision Vancouver, as seems to be the case with our present Council. That 2014 VanRamblings column is well worth reading.
The indefatigable Patrick Condon, future — and absolutely necessary — Vancouver City Councillor
Again today, VanRamblings will leave you with the words of Patrick Condon …
“While it is true that high-rises, when combined in large numbers, create GHG-efficient districts, the buildings themselves are not as efficient as mid-rise buildings.
“High-rises are subject to the effects of too much sun and too much wind on their all-glass skins. And all-glass skins are, despite many improvements to the technology, inherently inefficient. Glass is simply not very good at keeping excessive heat out, or desirable heat in. High-rises, according to BC Hydro data, use almost twice as much energy per square metre as mid-rise structures.”
“High-rise buildings built largely of steel and concrete are less sustainable than low-rise and mid-rise buildings built largely of wood; steel and concrete produce a lot of GHG. Wood traps it. Concrete is 10 times more GHG-intensive than wood.”
Patrick Condon argued with heart and with purpose in 2014, as he does through until today, for the construction of thousands of primarily mid-rise wood frame mixed use commercial / residential buildings on Vancouver’s arterial streets.
And, most importantly, Patrick Condon argues for the retention of existing neighbourhood quality, and the supply of sufficient units to house the burgeoning wave of our elderly population, housing for young families, housing equity, and neighbourhood preservation, through the gentle infill of existing residential streets.
The Magnitude of All Things, director Jennifer Abbott’s devastating NFB co-production about personal and planetary grief, premièred at VIFF’s Vancity Theatre, with Abbott and co-producers Shirley Vercruysse and Andrew Williamson in attendance. #VIFF2020.
The Magnitude of All Things (Canada). Truth telling, a call to action, and gorgeously filmed by cinematographer Vince Arvidson, Sundance and Genie award-winning director Jennifer Abbott (The Corporation) offers viewers an intimate and emotional punch-in-the-gut with her new documentary. The Magnitude of All Things draws intimate parallels between the experiences of grief — personal for the filmmaker in coming to terms with the passing of her sister, and planetary, as Magnitude takes us across the globe to witness planet Earth in crisis: from the catastrophic fires Australia suffered at the end of 2019, to the devastating role our current climate emergency has played in destroying a southern hemisphere eco-system, the bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef, the rising sea levels drowning the Pacific Island nation of Kiribati, to the destruction of the Amazon rain forest arising from the grievous policies of Brazilian and Ecuadorian presidents Jair Bolsonaro and Lénín Moreno, the struggles of the Indigenous peoples who are waging a desperate battle against oil and mining extraction and, at home, how the melting ice in the autonomous Newfoundland and Labrador Inuit community of Nunatsiavut has permanently altered the landscape.
Lest you believe The Magnitude of All Things to be a polemic, didactic filmmaking regurgitating what you’ve heard before, allow this writer to assure you that is not at all the case. Rather, Magnitude is a film about battles waged, lamentations of loss, and raw testimony that coalesces into an extraordinary tapestry, woven together with raw emotion and staggering beauty, a film that transform darkness into light, and grief into action.
The Magnitude of All Things. A film by Jennifer Abbott. An NFB & partners production.
John Ware Reclaimed (Canada). A genealogical exploration of the life of 19th century Alberta cowboy, John Ware, that seeks to reclaim the narrative of his life, filmmaker and historian Cheryl Foggo expands on the work she undertook in mounting her 2012 award winning play, John Ware Re-imagined, as she re-examines the history of Alberta’s famous early black folk hero and Prairie cowboy, who was rugged, independent & black.
From a story written by Omayra Issa for CBC Saskatchewan …
“It is a history that has been erased,” says Foggo. Both sets of her maternal grandparents came to Saskatchewan from the U.S. at the turn of the 20th century. Three generations lived in the province before moving to Alberta, the family eventually spanning across the 3 Prairie provinces.
Foggo’s ancestors were among the 1,500 to 2,000 African American farmers who came from the southern U.S. from 1905 to 1911 in search of a better life and a place that was less hostile and dangerous than Jim Crow America. They established five small pioneering communities: one in Saskatchewan and four in Alberta. Their story is steeped in slavery, racial segregation, and the fierce desire for emancipation.
Foggo has been reclaiming her family history for decades. More recently, she has been doing the same for an iconic Black figure on the Prairies, John Ware.
Ware proved himself to be a charismatic man and a highly skilled rancher. He owned two ranches, ultimately reaching one thousand head of cattle. He also pioneered irrigation in the region. Legends of his talents as a horseman were known in Indigenous communities on Treaty 7 territory, where he was close friends with chief Crowfoot of the Siksika First Nation.
John Ware’s story is a fundamental Prairie story and an indelible thread in the Canadian narrative. “It is important to connect John Ware to the Black history that was here in his time, carried on, and has been here from that time forward,” Foggo told CBC Saskatchewan journalist, Omayra Issa.
Fashion is today the second most polluting industry in the world, following only the oil business.
For altruistic and ecological reasons, the shopping attitude of Canadians towards second-hand clothes has been changing, and consignment stores are bustling with their newfound clientele, and consequent increased sales.
What was once a $12 billion North American market only a few short years ago is now a thriving $24 billion consignment clothing market, with the marketplace expected to top $50 billion by the middle of the next decade.
In other words, the ‘second hand economy’ is thriving.
Consignment stores are not what they used to be, offering quality like never before, carefully curated collections, and an elevated shopping experience for their burgeoning customer base.
A recent published study shows that in 2018, 64% of women and men were willing to buy pre-owned consignment store clothing — clothing which often has never been worn, and acquired from businesses which have gone bankrupt — up from 45% in 2016. The clothing retail industry believes that by 2028, up to half of the clothes in women’s and men’s wardrobes are likely to be ‘secondhand’. Fashion circularity, a new term referring to the recycled life of a garment, as indicated above is projected to reach $51 billion in five years, up from the current $24 billion.
In discussion with consignment store operators across Vancouver, proprietors told VanRamblings that where there was once “a stigma attached” to purchasing consignment store clothing — conjuring images of the yellow sweat patches, clothes strewn casually and confusingly hung (if at all) and emotional baggage people often associate with used clothing …
“Now, thankfully, purchasing clothing from consignment stores is not just acceptable — it’s cool and has completely captured the fashion zeitgeist,” one consignment clothing proprietor recently told us.
A recent study published by the Raymond James Financial Centre reports that 56% of women and men aged 18-29 prefer the consignment second hand market over conventional retailers of new clothing. Shopping in a thrifty manner guarantees shoppers the uniqueness of their own style. Most of the pieces in a consignment clothing shop are one of a kind, and allow endless possibilities of matching and styling in a creative and unique way.
All of which is to say, no longer is there a taboo about consignment clothes shopping. The rise of the sharing economy has also helped — it’s taken the stigma out of resale and removed the need to own something forever.
In September, fast fashion chain Forever 21 announced it was closing all its international locations, including 44 stores in Canada, amid flagging sales.
According to a recent interview conducted with the CBC finance guru Diane Buckner, British Columbia retail consultant Bruce Winder told her fast fashion’s target market — young, style-conscious shoppers on a budget — are also among those most concerned about the health of the planet.
“The younger millennial specifically, along with Gen Z, are incredibly environmentally conscious,” he said. “And they look at every brand and every product in terms of what is the impact on society, but also what is the impact on the employees and the environment.”
Not only do consignment stores benefit from the fact that the city’s stylish set are clearing out their closets like never before, a return to quality over quantity in the minds of most shoppers means visits to consignment stores for quality designer goods that will last (i.e. not end up in a landfill) and not break the bank will only continue to rise.
How does consignment clothing store shopping save the environment while also saving you money? Thrift shopping at consignment stores offers a viable solution for anyone looking to help out the environment.
Saving Money. Thrifted clothing is far more affordable than new clothes of comparable quality.
Smarter Buys. You tend to spend more time looking over each item instead of buying it outright.
Unique Finds. It’s highly unlikely that anyone else is walking around in the same clothes as you.
Creative Potential. You might be inspired to try new combinations, or even some DIY reconstruction!
If that isn’t enough incentive, as promised above, here are seven ways Erich Lawson writes thrifting helps the environment …
1. Consignment clothing shopping lowers your carbon footprint. A great deal of energy goes into clothing manufacture, right from the transportation of raw materials to the production process. Then, there’s the energy required to transport clothing to stores, and dispose of unwanted pieces. When shoppers buy from consignment stores, we prevent wastage of energy & resources on production of new clothes.
2. Aiding in Water Preservation. In addition to energy, water consumption is extremely high at every stage of clothing production. For instance, growing one kilogram of cotton requires 5,300 gallons of water, while wet processing and printing use 18 and 21.6 gallons respectively, per pound of cotton. Manufacturing, packaging and transportation processes add to this cost as well.
3. Reducing Chemical Pollution. The production of cotton is highly pesticide-intensive, causing soil acidification and water contamination. Textile manufacturing processes also involve the use of harmful dyes, caustic soda and crude oil by-products. These chemicals are generally dumped into areas around manufacturing units, contaminating surface and ground water through soil runoff.
4. North Americans throw out anywhere from 60 to over 80 pounds of textile waste annually, and only about 10% of this makes it to consignment stores. If more people start shopping for consignment clothes, less fabric ends up being dumped in landfills. That’s not all. Packaging material is also reduced, keeping plastic, paper and metal out of the waste stream.
5. Inspiring Green Living. Thrifting is an essential part of green living, in more ways than one. When you buy consignment clothing, you keep them from being sent to a landfill and reduce manufacturing demand as well. Also, by donating consigning clothes you no longer wish to wear, you encourage others simply by giving them something they can use.
6. Boosting Community Development. Shopping at consignment stores means support for local business instead of multinational corporations. Consignment stores provide employment in retail outlets, creating more jobs and boosting the local economy. Many hire disabled workers and support local community programming projects as well.
7. Encourages Recycling. Did you know that recycled cotton clothing uses less than 3% of the energy that would have gone into producing new clothes? When you reuse or recycle clothes, you’re decreasing the demand for production & encouraging sustainabity. It may not seem like much, but every item that doesn’t end up in a landfill counts as a win!
In the 1990s, when VanRamblings was charged with training Statistics Canada employees on how to conduct the annual Survey of Household Spending, during the role play portion of the training exercise, in answer to the question as to how much we spent on clothing and shoes each year, we responded with: $500. Senior staff at Statistics Canada guffawed loudly when VanRamblings offered this bit of information, saying to us at days’ end, “Raymond, suggesting that you spend only $500 a year on clothing and shoes is the funniest thing I think I’ll ever hear. How clever of you. Good for you. It brought lightness to the day’s proceedings.”
Little did senior staff know that, in fact, VanRamblings was acquiring most of our clothing from Arthur’s for Men on West 1st Avenue just west of Burrard Street, where fashionable wool sweaters could be had for $15, shirts and pants for $10, and jackets and shoes for $25, or less.
VanRamblings’ children had long encouraged shopping at consignment stores.
“Dad, not only are you colour blind, you have no fashion sense. In the past, you’ve bought your clothing at The Bay, and you’ve tended to shop for the store brands. You are much better off shopping for name label clothing at a consignment store: those clothing items are priced less expensively than what you’re buying now, the clothes are of invariably better quality — and will hold their nap in a way your current shirts, sweaters and pants will never do, meaning the clothing will last longer.”
“Buying name label consignment clothing assures quality, assures — at least in most cases — proper colour and design that will match the remaining items in your wardrobe, and as long as you shop at Arthur’s for Men, the owners will know what clothing items you have in your wardrobe at home, because they have a list of what you’ve purchased, so will be able to recommend complementary items.”
And now to the present.
Recently, we purchased an Italian suede jacket we’d seen at a neighbourhood Italian clothing boutique that had now gone out of business.
The jacket was retailing for $380.
When Turnabout (our consignment clothing shop of choice, these days) purchased almost the entire stock of the bankrupt Italian clothing boutique, that $380 suede jacket was put on sale for $40!
When walking into the store the morning the jacket was put on sale, staff approached me to say, “Mr. Tomlin, we’ve just put a jacket out on the floor that we think you’ll love,” directing me to the suede jacket. “You’d better buy it now, or it’ll be gone by noon.”
So, we did — and enjoy wearing it today!
Now, it may be a lark that our former employers at Statistics Canada thought our voiced annual clothing expenditure to be a laugh, but in our current scarce and uncertain economy, if sales at the consignment store we most often attend is any indication — where only a decade ago, we could wait for an item to drop 80% in price were we to wait six to eight weeks — when an item we like now appears in the shop, we purchase it immediately, because if we don’t, it’s almost a certainty that it’ll be gone the next day.
Click / tap on the graphic above to sign the Save Our Park Board Petition started by Sarah Blyth
