As the grounds on which the 2018 Vancouver municipal election will be fought come into clearer focus, as the five municipal parties in Vancouver set about to nominate their candidates — with COPE having chosen its candidates this past Sunday, and OneCity Vancouver set to nominate its candidates this upcoming Sunday, the Green Party of Vancouver planning to hold their nominating meeting on June 27th, and Vision Vancouver doing the same thing on July 8th, with the nominally right-of-centre Vancouver Non-Partisan Association set to announce their Council, School Board and Park Board candidates at an as yet undetermined date, but no later than early July for sure — Vancouver’s 2018 civic election is about to get underway in full force, beguiling the public with promises, and change.
Five-term City Councillor Raymond Louie announces his retirement from political life
VanRamblings was saddened to learn yesterday that five-term Vancouver City Councillor, Raymond Louie, has chosen not to seek another term in office. During his celebrated career of service on behalf of the citizens of Vancouver, Councillor Louie’s contributions have been innumerable, and the positions he has held on local and national governmental bodies of significant importance to the best interests of our democracy, including …
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Current Vice-Chair of the Metro Vancouver Board, a position he has held since December 2011;
- Metro Vancouver Board Chairman of the Intergovernmental Relations and Finance Committee, since December 2011;
- Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Pacific National Exhibition Board, since July 2009;
- President of the Canadian Federation of Canadian Municipalities, June 2015 – June 2016, and …
- Chairman of the City Finance and Services Committee, November 2008 to December 2014.
Councillor Raymond Louie’s presence in the governmental structure of our city, our region and our nation will be greatly missed. We trust that there is much good in store for this titan of governance in our city, and as will all the citizens of conscience in Vancouver who give a good galldarn about how we are governed, we wish him well in his future endeavours, and thank him from the bottom of our heart, and the depth of our soul, for his unrivaled contribution to improving life in Vancouver for all of its grateful citizens.
The story of the non-partisan community action group, the Metro Vancouver Alliance
VanRamblings is a delegate to the Metro Vancouver Alliance, a broad-based alliance of community groups, labour, faith and educational institutions working together and organizing for the common good.
Founded in 2009, at present more than 50 organizations hold membership in the alliance, as this critically important social justice institution continues to grow its membership each and every week.
Recently, the good folks involved in the Metro Vancouver Alliance brought forward a proposal to the British Columbia government, recommending the elimination of transit fares for children 12 years of age and under, reducing the current cost of the $45 monthly student bus pass to $22.50 for students aged 12 to 18, and reducing fares and the cost of monthly bus passes, to as little as half, for persons who earn less than $35,000 annually.
Not surprisingly and much to the satisfaction of MVA delegates, British Columbia Minister Responsible for Poverty Reduction, Shane Simpson — at a May meeting of the Alliance that he attended — looked favourably on the MVA proposal, telling delegates he would recommend implementation of the MVA plan to his governmental colleagues, and Cabinet.
At this past Tuesday evening’s Annual General Meeting of the Metro Vancouver Alliance, one of the delegates read out a poem by Judy Chicago, an artist, author, feminist and educator whose career spans five decades, and who in 1989 wrote the Merger Poem, a Jewish Ritual, that has particular resonance in our current Vancouver municipal election.
VanRamblings would like to dedicate Ms. Chicago’s moving Merger Poem to all the candidates seeking office in the 2018 Vancouver municipal election, and to those affiliated and working on the various civic election campaigns, most particularly OneCity Vancouver City Council candidate Christine Boyle, who we believe embodies the soul and purpose of Ms. Chicago’s poem and lives it daily, and to Peter Armstrong, the veteran Vancouver Non-Partisan Association organizer and past President who we believe, as well, will work with his party’s candidates for office to realize the goals set out in Ms. Chicago’s stirring instruction to all the good and kind citizens of Vancouver.
