MEDIA RELEASE – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – JANUARY 29, 2024
Green Commissioner Seeks Legal Advice to Preserve Elected Park Board
VANCOUVER, B.C. – Today, Green Park Board Commissioner Tom Digby announced he is bringing a motion to the February 5th Board meeting entitled “Independent Legal Advice for Judicial Review of Mayor’s Motion”. The motion is to authorize the Board to retain a leading municipal law firm to advise on steps available to preserve Vancouver’s elected Park Board.
“The elected Park Board is preparing to respond to the Mayor’s surprise attack,” said Digby.
Vancouver’s world famous parks and beaches, including the iconic Stanley Park, have been built with direct citizen input via the elected Park Board since it was first established in 1890. Hundreds of supporters of the elected Park Board have sent messages to Commissioners, to the Mayor and City Council, and to Premier David Eby and his cabinet demanding that every effort be made to oppose the Mayor’s December 13, 2023 motion to abolish the elected Park Board.
“I share Commissioner Digby’s concern” said Brennan Bastyovanszky, Chair of the Park Board, and one of three independent Commissioners who were formerly members of the Mayor’s ABC party. “This issue was not on the Mayor’s election platform, and Council has no democratic mandate to abolish another elected body,” continued Bastyovanszky.
One remarkable outcome of the Mayor’s anti-democratic motion is the coming together of 30 former Park Board Commissioners spanning 1972-2022 under the multi-partisan banner #SaveOurParkBoard to defend the value and mission of the elected Park Board.
In related news, City Councillors Adriane Carr, Christine Boyle and Pete Fry have announced a Town Hall meeting to hear from the public on the future of the Vancouver Park Board.
Town Hall | Opposition to ABC Vancouver’s Initiative to Dissolve the Vancouver Park Board
Advance registration to attend the Town Hall is required.
Tom Digby’s motion (see below) will be put to a vote at the February 5th meeting of the Park Board.
Commissioner Brennan Bastyovanszky pulled no punches on Mornings with Simi today, firing back at Mayor Ken Sim's "autocratic" decision to dismantle the Vancouver Park Board.
Despair reigns across our land, as the inexorable move towards the dissolution of an independent, elected Park Board proceeds relentlessly, calamitously forward.
In today’s VanRamblings post, we’ll attempt to reason why Mayor Ken Sim and his super majority ABC Vancouver team of City Councillors arrived at the decision to eliminate the 133-year-old Vancouver Park Board, the role the administration of the David Eby government will play, why the provincial government supports the seemingly arbitrary initiative of the Mayor, and why we believe that it is inevitable that in months, Vancouver’s beloved, elected Park Board will fade into history.
On an episode of the Air Quotes Media podcast, Hotel Pacifico, that aired just before Christmas, former Vancouver City Councillor / Chief of Staff to Premier John Horgan , Geoff Meggs, posited that the move to abolish the Vancouver Park Board was part of a dastardly plot by B.C. United Party leader Kevin Falcon.
Apparently, Mr. Falcon had convinced the Mayor and his ABC Vancouver Councillors — all of whom are members and supporters of B.C. United — that a move to eliminate the elected Park Board would create discord within David Eby’s New Democratic Party caucus, heading into this year’s October 19th provincial election.
Vancouver’s 9 duly-elected New Democrat Party Members of the Legislature in Victoria
Given the likelihood many in the NDP caucus would be opposed to the Mayor’s initiative to have the provincial government amend the Vancouver Charter to allow the dissolution of an elected Park Board — a move that could jeopardize the re-election chances of many of the New Democratic Party government’s Vancouver-based members of the legislature — working hand in hand, Kevin Falcon and Ken Sim devised a plan to turn the tables on the re-election chances of Vancouver’s NDP MLA’s, which very much includes Premier David Eby himself, who is in his 11th year as the elected representative in the riding of Vancouver Point Grey.
Geoff Meggs, Vancouver City Councillor 2008 – 2017 | Chief of Staff to Premier John Horgan, 2017 – 2022
Alas. As much as VanRamblings enjoys a good conspiracy theory, in point of fact, privately, Mr. Meggs was telling his intimates that he had proposed the Kevin Falcon “theory” arising from his concern that, given the polling that has the NDP riding high in the polls and seemingly undefeatable, he is concerned that NDP supporters very well may not volunteer at their MLA’s campaign offices once the writ is dropped this upcoming September, and further that New Democratic Party voters will stay home, and not vote at the advance polls or cast a ballot on election day.
Every vote counts. New Democratic Party supporters will have to work as hard as ever in the lead up to, and during the course of British Columbia’s 43rd provincial election, if we wish to ensure the re-election of the David Eby NDP government.
Mayor Ken Sim announces Park Board transition working group
The story of the decision of the Ken Sim-led majority ABC Vancouver administration to eliminate Vancouver’s independent, elected Park Board goes back to March of last year, when Premier David Eby made a proposal to Vancouver’s Mayor to move B.C. Place from its current home adjacent to Rogers Arena to Hastings Park.
While it is true that David Eby has stated that it is probable his government will spend between $300 and $400 million dollars on a renovation of B.C. Place to meet the requirements of the bodies bringing the Invictus Games to British Columbia in 2025, and the FIFA World Cup to Vancouver in 2026, in fact reliable sources have told VanRamblings that the long term plans for B.C. Place involves moving the aging stadium to Hastings Park, over which the City of Vancouver has jurisdiction.
As you might well expect, development and growth — and an expansion of our transit system — is at the heart of the decision by the Premier.
In addition, in eliminating the independent, elected Park Board, ABC Vancouver’s financial backers’ fondest wishes will be realized, as whole tracts of previous park / open green space will be available for development, to build, build, build …
And, of course, the mega-developer Aquilini family is very much involved, as well.
Here’s the plan: a David Eby government would work closely with the members of Vancouver City Council, and the Aquilini development corporation, to redevelop the B.C. Place site where, conceivably, the 7 hectare / 17-acre site would become home to three or more 70-to-95 storey towers in a newly designated “downtown village”, providing more than 3,000 residential condominium units in what will soon become, as planned, the heart of the downtown core of Vancouver.
The monies derived from the sale of the 3,000 luxury condominium units — in which the government would co-develop the B.C. Place site with the Aqualini family, where the completed condominium units would sell for up to $125 million on the top floors, many of the condominium units sold offshore, with the provincial government realizing billions of dollars in profit — would not only pay for the construction of a new stadium on the race track grounds at Hastings Park — a covenant prevents the construction of housing at Hastings Park, but not a sports facility — but for a new light rail system, as well, from Vancouver’s city core, along Hastings, down Renfrew to McGill / Hastings Park, and over to the North Shore.
Park Board transition working group: Catherine Evans, Gregor Young, Jordan Nijjar, Shauna Wilton, Jennifer Wood
The person on the left in the photo above is Catherine Evans, former Library Board Chair, Vision Vancouver Park Board Commissioner, most recently the senior constituency assistant in federal MP Joyce Murray’s Vancouver Quadra office, and although Ms. Evans is a card carrying member of the federal Liberal Party, provincially she is a staunch supporter of David Eby, and his NDP administration in Victoria.
In the past, Catherine Evans has worked on David’s Eby’s campaigns for office and, in fact, on E-Day, while working in Mr. Eby’s campaign office, has been VanRamblings’ no nonsense Get Out The Vote “boss”.
A story — a digression and and an aside — to help explain why Catherine Evans has joined Mayor Ken Sim’s Park Board Transition Working Group.
George Puil, 14 years as a Park Board Commissioner, then for 26 years, a Vancouver City Councillor
In 2001, B.C. Liberal leader Gordon Campbell won an overwhelming victory at the polls, securing 77 of 79 seats in the Legislature, leaving the NDP with two seats: Joy McPhail in Vancouver Hastings, and Jenny Kwan in Vancouver Mount Pleasant.
As is always the case with a change of government, there are 5,000 or more positions to be filled by the winning party’s supporters, with positions on college and university boards, regulatory authorities, as well as Crown agencies and commissions, and much more. Having retired from his job as an educator at Kitsilano Secondary School, and after 40 years in elected office, Mr. Puil — a man of experience, and a mentor to Gordon Campbell — following his ignominious defeat at the polls in the 2002 Vancouver municipal election, found himself at loose ends.
Within six months of taking office, Premier Gordon Campbell appointed his good friend George Puil to three regulatory bodies in his government, not requiring too much from Mr. Puil in respect of time, certainly much less time than had long been the case when Mr. Puil sat as a Vancouver City Councillor. Annual compensation for these “out of the public eye” regulatory bodies came in at $250,000, a pretty penny that came in addition to Mr. Puil’s healthy teachers’ pension.
Catherine Evans, one of the loveliest persons of VanRamblings’ acquaintance
As Ms. Evans lives in VanRamblings neighbourhood, we run across one another frequently, and chat volubly and at length about the state of the world, and more often than not federal politics (as it happens, VanRamblings is a Justin Trudeau fan).
If you know David Eby, you know that he likes to have “his people” in place — thus, Ms. Evans’ placement on Mayor Sim’s Park Board transition working group. David Eby wants a close eye kept on the machinations of that contentious Park Board working group.
In our various conversations, Ms. Evans has made it clear — arising from a tragic personal circumstance — that she wants out of politics, has no interest in seeking political office, and would find solace and peace travelling with her husband to various locales across the globe, far away from the political maelstrom.
Why has Catherine Evans joined Mayor Ken Sim’s Park Board transition working group? Quite simply, because her good friend David Eby asked her to.
To know Catherine Evans — who is exceptionally bright, one of the strongest, most principled and hardest working women we know — is to know that her role as a low key change maker for the better is how she brings herself to the world.
Enter David Eby, who should he be re-elected to government in October, will set as a priority the appointment of his confidante Catherine Evans to the provincial bodies of her choice, where she can make a difference, out of the public eye, compensated fairly for her contribution, and for her many many gifts.
The word VanRamblings is hearing out of Victoria is that David Eby will not move forward this spring on the request of ABC Vancouver to amend the Vancouver Charter, to eliminate an independent, elected Vancouver Park Board.
Which means that those of us who love the Vancouver Park Board, live Park Board deep in our soul, and cherish Park Board, although we have our work cut out for us this next year, we may have an outside chance of moving the David Eby government away from making the fatal decision to dissolve the Vancouver Park Board.
The quite barking mad Dr. Penny Janet Drury Ballem, Vancouver City Manager, 2008 – 2015
In 2014, Dr. Penny Ballem, the power mad, often disagreeable and fiscally irresponsible City Manager — moving her office from City Hall’s 3rd floor, in favour of a multi-million dollar renovation of the “closed” 5th & 6th floors at The Hall, giving her mightily expanded staff a new home — Dr. Ballem, hired by the Vision Vancouver administration in 2008 to impose their political and administrative agenda, found herself “fed up” with the operation of the Vancouver Park Board, had enough with what she termed their “tomfoolery”, their inefficiency and “spendthrift ways”.
All this after Vision Vancouver slashed $30 million from the Park Board budget.
Dr. Ballem’s choleric rage about Park Board occurred even in spite of the fact that, in 2010, she had installed Malcolm Bromley as her Park Board General Manager, in unprecedented fashion making Bromley a “city employee”, with direct reporting responsibility to the Office of the City Manager. Read, to her: Dr. Penny Ballem.
Less than a year into her tenure, it was not enough that Dr. Ballem “retired” well-respected, longtime Park Board General Manager Susan Mundick, Dr. Ballem also “relieved” the employment of several other invaluable, longtime, senior city staff.
Dr. Ballem, however, wanted more, much more.
Dr. Ballem wanted complete and utter control of the Vancouver Park Board.
Sadly, people do not realize that the City took over operational responsibility under the Vision regime, perportedly for efficiency and cost saving. They wrongly blame the Park Board, who used to do a better job.
In late 2014, Dr. Ballem had the Park Board led by Chairperson Aaron Jasper move a motion at the Park Board table that would turn over operational responsibility for Park Board to the City, as a “necessary cost-saving measure and rationalization” of the operation of Park Board. From that day forward the City would be responsible for all Park Board facility maintenance, garbage collection and recycling.
“When I was first elected as a Park Board Commissioner in 2011,” John Coupar recently told VanRamblings, “if there was a maintenance issue that needed tending to, through the Chair I could have her or him raise the issue that needed remedy, which “repair” was always responded to quickly and efficiently.
John Coupar, former Vancouver Park Board Chairperson, and Park Board Commissioner
When I became Chairperson in late 2014, I was disappointed to learn that when requests for maintenance made through Board General Manager Malcolm Bromley were forwarded to the City, the City maintenance department often took weeks or months to remediate an issue, if that concern was ever remediated at all.”
Mayor Ken Sim announces pending elimination of an elected Vancouver Park Board (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Since it was created in 1889, the Vancouver Park Board has been a source of discussion and division. But the decision by Mayor Ken Sim to try and abolish the 133-year-old elected body could make its final chapter its most dramatic.
“We are going to take the long overdue step that will ensure our parks and recreation facilities will serve our communities to their fullest potential, in the process saving taxpayers millions of dollars in Park Board operation costs” Sim told those gathered for a press conference Wednesday morning, December 6, 2023.
“I’m a lean-certified black belt, I understand workflow,” said Sim in response to a question about how much the city would save in costs, in a reference that left the media who’d gathered for the announcement flummoxed.
Mayor Ken Sim has yet to explain where the “millions of dollars in savings” by eliminating an elected Park Board will be derived.
In point of fact, top-voted ABC Vancouver City Councillor Sarah Kirby-Yung — a former Park Board Chairperson — could easily have informed the Mayor that his statement was so much codswallop, that the City had long ago assumed fiscal responsibility for the operation and maintenance of the Vancouver Park Board.
“Bad enough that the Mayor misled the public when, at his announcement proposing to abolish the elected Park Board, he stated that there would be millions in savings to be had. Clearly, an untruth,” former Vancouver City Councillor and Park Board Commissioner Michael Wiebe recently told VanRamblings.
Michael Wiebe, former Vancouver City Councillor, and Vancouver Park Board Commissioner
“When I met with Mayor-elect Ken Sim and ABC Vancouver founder Peter Armstrong in the Mayor’s office soon after the 2022 election, I was assured by both of their full and unadulterated support for an independent Park Board. Clearly, the commitment they made to me the day we met, and to a public who voted for them, was a lie.”
Ken Sim. “So yeah, whaddya want to make of it, eh? Don’t like what I’m doin’? Too effin bad.“
On the day Mayor Ken Sim made the announcement that it was his intention to eliminate an elected Park Board in the City of Vancouver, he was clear that amid concerns being voiced that getting rid of the Vancouver Park Board could mean a loss of prized park land in the city, on his watch that was not going to happen.
“I want to be very clear: as long as I’m mayor, parks will always be parks in the City of Vancouver,” Mayor Sim told CityNews in an interview on Friday, December 15, 2023.
Of course, Mayor Sim made no mention that of Vancouver’s 242 parks, only 142 are designated as parks, leaving the remaining “green space” open for development.
Under the current system, a two-thirds majority vote on Council and Park Board is required to remove any parks from the city’s inventory.
Sim told CityNews that he’s going to bring in new protections for green spaces.
“We’re going to change it so it has to be unanimous in the chamber, so all 10 Councillors and mayor of the day have to be in favour, plus it would go to referendum,” Sim said.
All of which begs several questions.
Given that ABC Vancouver candidate for office Ken Sim misled the voting public on a commitment he made during the 2022 Vancouver municipal election that …
A Ken Sim-led civic administration would strengthen and support an independent, elected Park Board;
Given that a newly-elected Mayor Sim employed as partial rationale for the 10.7% property tax increase he announced in December 2022, in stating that “we felt we had to restore funding to and support our Vancouver Park Board;”
Given that Mayor Sim misled the public when he stated that there were “millions to be saved” in eliminating an independent, elected Park Board, when such is clearly not the case; and …
Given that Ken Sim boldfacedly misled former Vancouver Park Board Commissioner and City Councillor Michael Wiebe — not to mention current Park Board Commissioners Scott Jensen, Brennan Bastyovanszky and Laura Christensen when they ran under the ABC Vancouver banner as Park Board candidates — when he stated to Mr. Wiebe and his own party’s candidates for Park Board his unvarnished and ongoing support for an independent, elected Vancouver Park Board …
Can Mayor Ken Sim be believed when he makes the pronouncement that park land will not be sold off on his watch?
And, further, that any talk of development of green spaces should such come to pass would require the unanimous consent of all 10 Vancouver City Councillors?
Tom ‘Not So Terrific’ Campbell, controversial Vancouver mayor, in office from 1966 to 1972
In 1966, running as an independent, a brash Tom Campbell defeated sitting Non-Partisan Association Mayor Bill Rathie to become Vancouver’s 31st mayor.
From the outset, Campbell’s ascension to the Mayor’s office heralded a pro-development ethos that would make even our current ABC Vancouver-dominated City Council blush, with Campbell — and his now ‘on board’ NPA colleagues — advocating for a freeway that would cut through a swath of the Downtown Eastside, require the demolition of the historic Carnegie Centre at Main and Hastings, and bring about the construction of a luxury hotel at the entrance to Stanley Park.
Vancouver’s West End neighbourhood, 1960, pre-high-rise construction. Photo, Fred Herzog.
In the West End, where Campbell owned substantial property — a wealthy, successful developer, Campbell was reputed to own one-third of the land located between (south to north) Davie and Georgia streets, and east to west, Denman Street and Stanley Park — the newly-elected Mayor all but ordered the demolition of almost the entirety of the well-populated West End residential neighbourhood — housing mostly senior citizens in their single detached homes — as he set about to make way for the rapid construction of more than 200 concrete high-rise towers.
In six short years, Mayor Tom Campbell and the Non-Partisan Association transformed a single family dwelling West End neighbourhood, irrevocably and forever.
That all of these “changes” augered controversy among large portions of the populace was a given, leading to regular, vocal and sometimes even violent protests throughout Campbell’s treacherous tenure as Mayor, finally lead to his overwhelming defeat at the polls in the November 1972 Vancouver “change” civic election.
Oct. 22, 2022 | Newly-formed civic party, ABC Vancouver, wins an overwhelming victory at the polls
Why raise ancient history now?
Not since the late 1960s / early 70s have Vancouver voters — seemingly, unknowingly — elected a more greed-inspired (this, on behalf of their financial backers), and wildly pro-development slate of lock step Vancouver City Councillors to office, at the heart of our city’s seat of municipal government at 12th and Cambie.
In early 2024, Vancouver sits on the wary edge of massive tower development, as promulgated by the “super majority” ABC Vancouver civic administration installed by Vancouverites at City Hall only 15 short months ago today. If Tom Campbell’s greed was able to destroy a single family-oriented West End neighbourhood 50+ years ago over six short years in power, imagine what the current ABC Vancouver-led municipal government can achieve over the course of the next 32 months?
Vancouver Park Board Commissioner at Vancouver City Hall, holding her new, month old baby
Click on this link to hear (former, and now independent) ABC Vancouver Park Board Commissioner Laura Christensen address the whole of Vancouver City Council on December 13, 2023 — including her ABC Council running mates — on the initiative of the political party she ran with to eliminate the elected Vancouver Park Board.
It was difficult to distill my thoughts on this into a 3-minute speech. Incredibly disappointed in the mayor and ABC councillors for turning their back on their campaign promises and completely ignoring the electorate in this decision. https://t.co/W0we9exUHT
In her address to Council, Ms. Christensen pointed out to her now former ABC Vancouver City Council colleagues that there are 242 parks in the City of Vancouver, only 142 of which are designated as parks — leaving these latter non-designated “parks” open for development, including such beloved parks as Burrard Inlet’s Sunset Beach, Locarno Park, and Spanish Banks East and West.
Fans enjoy the Vancouver Canadians at Nat Bailey Stadium. Could the city-owned stadium be put up for sale? A report suggests sport & cultural venues should be shed by the city. Photo: Jason Payne /PNG
“… budget task force assembled last year by ABC Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim delivered its report with 17 recommendations on how the city could improve its financial health while reducing pressure to increase on property taxes.
One recommendation suggests the city look at divesting some of its “non-core assets.”
When Fumano asked ABC Vancouver Councillor Brian Montague, one of two ABC Councillors who served on the task force’s advisory panel, if the “non-core assets” in the report would include include community centres, libraries, civic theatres, and sports facilities, Montague replied …
“I think it’s something we need to talk about, because there might be assets where divestment is the best approach.”
Former Vancouver Park Board Chairperson John Coupar clarified the matter on X:
Former Vancouver City Councillor Colleen Hardwick, and 2022 TEAM Mayoral candidate writes …
@elviralount the land is at the heart of the matter. Removing the separate fiduciary responsibility of the elected Park Board for control of land disposition is existential. It was never about 'efficiencies' and saving millions of $. It is about the control of the land.
A cynical and egregious land grab, a decision demanded by ABC Vancouver’s avaricious financial backers, who fancy adding billions of dollars more to their already ungainly wealth, all at the cost of: environmental devastation and climate change unchecked, a degraded quality of life in Vancouver for decades to come, reduced access to our public beaches — or, in some cases, no access at all to what were once but would no longer be “public beaches”— and long dark corridors of black towers lining the arterials and Vancouver’s beach fronts, all across the city.
Mike Howell’s Town Hall report may be found here.
