ABUNDANCE OF CAUTION

Rod Mickleburgh published an article on the “Squeaky Clean” Mayor of Vancouver in today’s Metro newspaper in which he says:


“Local reporters have become so desperate for even a grain of dirt on Mayor Squeaky Clean, they’ve tried to spark a furor, anything, over Gregor’s decision to sell his $1.9-million family home and move to a smaller place, which, get this, is close to a planned bike lane! Oh, the conflict of interest. Oh, the humanity!

I guess the mayor shouldn’t really live anywhere, because some city hall decision might affect him, like sewage flow or garbage pickup.

*** Even though city staff told him there was no problem, the mayor nevertheless resorted to that good old 14th-century word “recuse” and opted to refrain from voting on any bike path that might pass within six miles, or whatever it is, from his brand-new residence.

Why? “Out of an abundance of caution,” His Worship intoned. Just no fun at all.”

 

It was not just an abundance of caution that dictated the Mayor’s position. It was the Vancouver Charter.  It made him act on the pain of disqualification from office. My guess is that the two wheeled Mayor is not a 14th century scholar. He used the word “recused” because that is what modern lawyers say. At some point in the process he got all lawyered up.

Section 145.2 of the Vancouver Charter SBC 1953, C. 55r requires that the Mayor, if he considers he has a “direct or indirect pecuniary interest in a matter, or another matter that constitutes a conflict of interest, he must declare this and state in general terms the reason why he considers this to be the case..

Section 145.3 says that if he has a direct or indirect pecuniary interest, whether he has declared it or not, he must not:

      (a) Remain or attend at any part of a meeting during which the matter is under consideration,

      (b) Participate in any discussion of the matter at such a meeting,

      (c) Vote on a question in respect of the matter at such a meeting, or

      (d) Attempt in any way, whether before, during or after such a meeting, to influence the voting on any question in respect of the matter.

    (3) A person who contravenes this section is disqualified from holding an office described in, and for the period established by section 141(2) l [disqualification], unless the contravention was done inadvertently or because4 of an error in judgment made in good faith.

There is no problem with the Mayor selling his house. There is a problem if he enters into a deal to buy a house, the value of which will be affected  by a decision that will change the character of the main street nearby. If he does any of the things listed in s. 145.3 he may be disqualified. It does not matter if the house is in his wife’s name, or is held by him in a corporation. He will have a “direct or indirect” pecuniary interest if it is reasonable to assume that its value will be affected. The value of properties on or near Pt. Grey Road has been front and center in discussions relating to this matter.

The Mayor has not disclosed the exact address of his house. His handlers say that this is to protect his privacy. Once his address is disclosed, and the title searched, the question will be: “When did he make his offer to purchase? Did he remain in any part of a meeting in which bikes and Point Grey Road was under consideration? Did he vote on it? Did he try to influence the vote? If so, he would have already been disqualified from holding office unless it was all an accident or an error in judgment made in good faith.

Conflicts of interest are serious business. Rob Ford was removed from office by a trial judge because of an alleged conflict. A voter accused him of using his position to raise money for a charity for children that he sponsored. The Court of Appeal held that he had no pecuniary interest. The Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear a further appeal.

Mr. Mickleburgh, who co-authored with the Mayor’s close colleague, Geoff Meggs, a book on former premier Dave Barrett, seems to distinguish the case of Rob Ford from that of the Mayor on the grounds that Gregor is the “The handsomest, smilingest, bike-ridingest, urban-orchardingest chief magistrate in the city’s history while Rob Ford is a fat slob. Ford won not because or in-spite of his prettiness or lack thereof but because there was no conflict. 

The test for conflict of interest was stated in the case of Old St. Boniface. Sopinka J. said this:

*that the interest might influence the exercise of that duty. This is commonly referred to as a conflict of interest (para**It is not part of the job description that municipal councillors be personally interested in matters that come before them beyond the interest that they have in common with the other citizens in the municipality. Where such an interest is found, both at common law and by statute, a member of Council is disqualified if the interest is so related to the exercise of public duty that a reasonably well-informed person would conclude that the interest might influence the exercise of that duty. This is commonly referred to as a conflict of interest (para. 55)



Once an enterprising reporter finds out where the Mayor's house is and when he bought it, we will find out whether there are any investigative journalists in town.

6 MILLION BUCKS FOR THE BIKE SHARE PROGRAM

 Vancouver City Hall is about to embark on a new adventure: the Bike Share program. An administrative report is to be presented on July 23rd. The report recommends that a company named Alta Bicycle Share, Inc. be the owner, operator, and financier of the Vancouver Public Bike Share  system.

The City will contribute  up to $6 million to Alta in potential foregone parking revenue. The report says that Legal services advised on the contract and business structure throughout this project.

I hope they release the legal opinion.

This matter is governed by Sections 203,  204 and 206  of the Vancouver Charter which deal with powers of Council relating to businesses. Section 204 deals with authorized expenditures. None of these sections seem to  authorize anything like what is proposed. That is not to say that it could not possibly be done. It just is that if it is legal, a battalion of city lawyers must have spent a lot of time getting around the,"no ones above the law" thing.  If they are grasping at straws, s. 206 of the Vancouver Charter might help:  (j) any organization deemed by the Council to be contributing to the culture, beautification, health, or welfare of the city;

Other municipalities in B.C. are governed by the Local Government Act and the Community Charter. Section 25 of the Community Charter prohibits municipal councils from providing any “grant benefit, advantage or other form of assistance to a business unless expressly authorized under this or another Act”. S. 182 of the Local Government Act, has a similar provision.

One reader has described the process as "the blind leading the sycophantic." That seems to be an apt description of everything this gang does. A June 2012 power point presentation from the Deputy Manager is found at  http://former.vancouver.ca/ctyclerk/cclerk/20120613/documents/ptec1presentation.pdf  The word "Legal" is listed under the heading "Risk Themes".  That is it. Helmets are also listed as a risk to the program. Paradoxically, a risk to the program is seen  as a trade off against the risk to the head.

It has been held that if a Council has received a legal opinion that an expenditure is unauthorized the Councillors may be personally liable.

Bloomberg Business Week supports the New York version of the  program but doubts it will make money.

see http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-05-30/nyc-bike-sharing-makes-sense-dot-it-probably-wont-make-money

The article notes that in France, the program is run by the French outdoor-advertising group JCDecaux, the world’s largest operator of urban bike-sharing systems. Decaux runs such programs in 66 cities worldwide, including Paris,***Decaux, though, has never made money from its bike-share programs. It operates them as part of broader contracts with city governments that allow Decaux–whose main business is outdoor advertising—to place ads on bus shelters, kiosks, and elsewhere. The money comes not from the rentals, but from the advertising. The economic model is to finance the bicycle service through urban advertising.

While on the topics of transportation, health, safety and infrastructure, did you know that the elevators in both Vancouver General Hospital and Saint Pauls Hospital don't work? A story in the Sun in the last couple of weeks said that patients were trapped in Vancouver General's elevators and the fire department had to help get them out.

In St Pauls 4 out of 8 elevators do not work. I have been told that they have had trouble getting funds to make repairs. Delays can be life threatening.

Although the City is not suppose to give assistance to business, it is given specific power to help hospitals. Section 206 of the Vancouver Charter provides:

206. (1) The Council may, by resolution passed by not less than two-thirds of all its members, provide for the making of money grants to ***(f) the Vancouver General Hospital or any other hospital which in the opinion of Council provides similar services;

We are all only young twice. If they could just get the patients in acute care who are young for the second time to ride bikes, the City would find the money.

EINSTEIN'S DEFINITION OF INSANITY

On May 23, 2012 I posted the story about how a traffic diverter was put up on 41st to prevent turns north onto Angus Drive. As intended, this caused traffic to be shunted on to Marguerite Street. The increase on Marguerite Street north of 41st was immediately apparent. The problem is that Marguerite is narrower than Angus.

One of the resident’s cars was sideswiped a couple of times. He blamed the increased traffic volume on the diverter and emailed City Hall to complain. In reply the City advised that it had already done a count and determined that there was no increase in traffic on Marguerite Street.

It was apparent to everyone that traffic had doubled when the barrier on Angus was installed. The neighbor, a crown prosecutor, called the engineering department, and said that he wanted to see the traffic survey.

He was told that --- well, er umm actually, they had never done a count but they had done studies of other areas.

To be polite, the first letter was a bald faced lie.

We all know about the massive increases in ridership of bikes and the great success of our separated lanes. Not since Paul Pot reported on the success of his population redistribution program have we heard of such success.

On July 19th, however, the Vancouver Province Newspaper's Ian Austin reported that ridership on the Burrard Street separated lane had actually declined! He wrote:

"Despite years of Mayor Gregor Robertson and his Vision Vancouver councillors peddling the merits of pedalling, ridership on the controversial Burrard Bridge separated bike lanes has declined in the past year.

Total bike trips compiled by the city for the 12 months ending April 2013 — the most recent statistics available — show that ridership is down by 16,000 compared to the previous 12-month period from May 2011 to April 2012.

On the Dunsmuir Street bike lane for the same periods, ridership fell by 30,000."

http://www.theprovince.com/travel/Bike+lane+ridership+stalled+Burrard+Bridge/8673951/story.html

So, why would the City now propose to build an expensive bike lane on Point Grey Road, which provides access for residents of Point Grey and Dunbar/ Southlands to and through the downtown, when to date there has been so little to show for it? There are three plausible explanations:

The first is that the City does not believe, let alone read its own reports. As when they shifted traffic intentionally from Angus Drive to Marguerite Street based on non-existent studies, maybe they have reason to doubt the accuracy let alone existence of their own traffic counts on the bridge.

The second is that it is all being done for the safety of bike riders. If that were the case, then they could save millions of dollars just designating one of the low volume parallel streets to the South as bike lanes. If Point Grey Road is dangerous, the simple solution is not to allow bike riders and skate boarders to use it.

The third possibility is that City Hall, collectively, is stark raving mad. Einstein's definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. (Donizetti portrayed madness in Lucia de Lammamoor somewhat more artistically than council but with great dramatic effect.)





Mad Scene from Lucia de Lammamoor

http://www.metoperafamily.org/video/interviews/watch/lucia-di-lammermoor-mad-scene-joan-sutherland/1498077323001#play

Recently, Simon Fraser University invited Prof. John Pucher of New Jersey's Rutgers University. Pucher is the Einstein of bike experts having published numerous works on the subject. In Cycling to work in 90 large American cities: new evidence on the role of bike paths and lanes [http://policy.rutgers.edu/faculty/pucher/bikepaths.pdf

Pucher concludes that Portland has the highest number of commuters by bike (4.7%) in North America. He also says that "the percentage of college students in the city population is a significant predictor of bike commuting....we did not find a significant relationship between bike commuting and precipitation...Inclusion of additional control variables in our study revealed that cities with safer cycling, less sprawl, and higher gasoline prices have more cycling.




                                                                Prof. Pucher

When it is raining one observes, at least in Vancouver, fewer bike riders. This intuitive result means that bike riders, unlike our local politicians, have enough sense to come in out of the rain.

Based on Prof. Pucher's studies one can conclude that the City is about to prohibit 95.3% of commuters (assuming that all days in Vancouver are without precipitation) in favour of at most 4.7% of the population. (Since it seems to rain at least half of the time here, the actual statistics would be closer to 98% to 2%.)

All of this also benefits some of the properties on Point Grey Road. When the established rights of 95.3 % of the population are sacrificed for a handful of multi-millionaire waterfront property owners (soon to include the Mayor) some political party is having its palms greased.

POINT GREY ROAD: WHAT'S GOING ON?

PlaceSpeak is a program developed in Vancouver that enables people who are interested in identified community issues to participate in on-line discussions.

On June 8, 2013, former Councilor and candidate for Mayor, Peter Ladner, posted a comment in which he seemed to be saying that PlaceSpeak, which advocates nothing, should not even be providing a platform for what he considered the other side:

What's going on here? Why is Placespeak advocating for a certain outcome? Who is Placespeak representing with this (half-baked, I might say) opinion? *** I am strongly in favour of closing Pt. Grey Rd. to through commuter traffic (of which 37% is cars not even registered in Vancouver) and thereby opening it to pedestrians and cyclists from around the city who can appreciate the last link in the seawall/greenway around the entire Vancouver waterfront. This is a huge civic amenity. 4th Ave west of McDonald, which is where the biggest increase in traffic will be, has lots of space for more cars. No driver will have to drive an extra inch if PGR is closed to car traffic.

Ladner’s comments, like those coming from City Hall, are disturbing if not weird. All roads belong to the public including people driving to work. People traveling from Point A to Point B whether commuting to work, or to shop are entitled to use their roads. We all paid for them. Ladner favours restricting use by people in cars who originate from neighborhoods like UBC or Dunbar at the Western end of Point Grey. This is to be done in favour of pedestrians and cyclists, who, he notes, are capable of appreciating it. It would seem that bike riders as a class are more attuned to nature and the universe than the swine who ride in cars.




This is, “A huge civic amenity,” Ladner intones.

It is, in fact, a street through a low density very rich waterfront neighborhood. He concludes therefore that only the noble bike riders are qualified to enjoy it, while the rest of us trash can line up on 4th Avenue.

The situation on Point Grey Rd is not analogous to the street closures in the high density West End. Like South West Marine Drive, Point Grey Rd is an important connector for traffic that passes through a relatively low density area to connect with a high density one.

There are 30 or 40 times the number of people in cars (including passengers) on this street at any given time than bike riders. That doesn't matter because Mr. Ladner, who lives in the neighborhood, rides a bike and, as a locavore, grazes on locally grown foods. He will soon be joined by the Mayor who just bought a house there.

People in cars, even electric ones, are to be shunted off to 4th avenue at the whim of a gang of perennial adolescents who consider that they and they alone have the innate ability to commune with nature. Why should I listen to them when I have children of my own.

To be allowed to travel to or from downtown on this scenic drive requires that you be special.

PUBLIC INTEREST v. PRIVATE RIGHTS:

One thing politicians are paid to do is to balance interests. When the City constructs a bike lane, demolishes a viaduct, licenses a food cart, blocks off a street, holds a street party, or authorizes a next door chicken coop, to come to a decision it balances the public's interest in having the thing against the private interests of those who may be adversely affected by it.

Vancouver’s left wing party, VISION, has the advantage of being certain of its own infallibility. They make one controversial decision after another, secure in the belief that whatever they do is in the public interest by definition, because they did it. They know that to make an omelet they have to break eggs. The eggs have no say. The great do what they will and the rest suffer  what they must.

Not so fast

The Supreme Court of Canada has finally applied the brakes to the notion that the public interest always trumps private rights. In the unanimous decision of Antrim Truck Centre Ltd. v. Ontario (Transportation), the Supreme Court held that even where a thing is constructed for the public good, the government may have to pay those who are injuriously affected by it. It is treated as an expropriation even if no land has actually been taken. [Some things like property value changes brought about by zoning can not be the basis for compensation.] The court has put more balancing back in the required balancing of interests.

Antrim Trucking had a truck stop that was easily accessible by the road upon which it fronted. The Province of Ontario decided to widen the road and in doing so rerouted it. Antrim’s Truck Stop ended up far from the highway and was effectively put out of business.

Ontario has an Expropriation Act that provides that where the government builds something that it is expressly authorized to build, and the construction causes damage to another, the injured party can force the government to pay. Although there are subtle differences in our legislation including in our Transportation Act, British Columbia has the equivalent provision in s. 41 of its own Expropriation Act RSBC 1996, c. 125.  

The Court said that interests are to be balanced by considering on one hand, interferences that constitute the give and take expected of everyone and, on the other, interferences that impose a disproportionate burden on individuals. The fact that council acted in the public interest and for the public good did not end the matter.  

The question is whether the interference is greater than the individual should be expected to bear in the public interest without compensation… the focus in nuisance is on whether the interference suffered is unreasonable, not on whether the nature of the defendant’s conduct is unreasonable.

It seems then that the legal meaning of the word  “unreasonableness” has been redefined. The court does not look into whether the interference was unreasonable in light of the community standard and duration. It says now that something is unreasonable if it would be unreasonable in all the circumstances to require a person to suffer the loss without compensation.

Plaintiffs will not in every case win a claim for injurious affection to their properties. When, however, our councilors demolish the viaducts or limit access with bike lanes, it may want to think about this: If a person can show that he has suffered more than he should be expected to bear he or she may very well force the city to pay. Councilors now need to make a realistic assessment of the City's exposure in carrying out their statutory mandate.


An action would be brought in the B.C. Supreme Court under the Expropriation Act. The appraisers would battle it out. Each case will be decided on its own facts. Lawyers will argue about whether the  facts in the Antrim case are the same as, or distinguishable from the law and facts in a Vancouver case, but the door is now open to a series of  successful claims.

POLITICS MAKES STRANGE DEVELOPERS

The NPA had its annual general meeting on Saturday. The celebrations were to include the excommunication of board member, Ken Charko, to be followed by a barbecue. Things did not work out as the directors hoped. Charko supporters forced a change in the agenda, defeated the motion to remove him and he was returned to the board along with one supporter. Judging by reports it had a grass roots Kazakhstan flavour to it.

There are those who feel that this could be the end of the NPA. Don't bet on it.Forget the crazy meeting. Many in the past were worse. Much worse! The NPA remains an extremely potent force and a threat to VISION Vancouver and the newly created TEAM.

THE NPA

To understand its future it helps to know something about the NPA' s past. Initially, the Non Partisan Association's main purpose was to protect Vancouver from the Socialist Hordes.

Established in 1937, its board of directors were the pillars of the community. They surfaced before the elections, anointed a slate of worthy candidates, and vanished. During the height of its powers few if anyone knew about or attended their board meetings.

                                                         Early NPA Board Meeting

City elections were held annually. The ballots listed all candidates in alphabetical order without party affiliation. Most candidates were unknown. They remained unknown after their election. The alphabetically advantaged like Atherton, Adams, Alsbury and now, Affleck enjoyed better odds at getting elected.

An NPA campaign consisted of a card mailed across the West side of the City listing its slate. Voters were asked to take their precious card to the poll booth and select the candidates on the list. The voters were comforted by the list. Candidates had been interviewed by the directors and were certified not to be one of the socialist hordes. Independents did not stand a chance unless they were rich or famous.

The NPA was not and did not purport to be a political party. It simply endorsed candidates. It imposed no party discipline. Once elected, aldermen could vote as they wished, provided they did not think about nationalizing a bank .


The NPA's campaign expenses were limited to the cost of printing and distributing the candidate list and advertising a picture of a candidate a week or two before the annual election. It was the perfect political system: simple, elegant and cheap.

THE SOCIALIST HORDES

Fear of the socialist hordes held the whole thing together. Who were the hordes?  At first they consisted of one lawyer- Harry Rankin. Harry ran for Council and lost at least 12 consecutive times. The WW II hero never gave up. On the 13th try he was elected as an independent. Rankin helped created a second electoral organization called COPE (the Committee of Progressive Electors). Harry, the one man socialist horde turned out to be the most popular alderman in the city. Everyone gave one vote to Harry, "To keep the rest of them honest." When Harry died the Council declined to lower the flag to half mast because if they did it for him they would have to do it for everyone. Miraculously, the flag lowered itself.

TEAM- I

In the early 1970s the election of Mayor Arthur Phillips under the TEAM banner brought about a further change. The provincial government amended the legislation so that party affiliations could be listed on the ballot. The NPA's poll sheet, by which its power was assured, was no longer necessary or effective.

From the 1970s onward a primordial soup of political groups burbbled away, evolved, merged, transmogrified died and were born again. These included COPE, NPA, TEAM, VOICE, NSV, RHINOS, COMMUNISTS and others.  Through it all the NPA won some, lost some but remained a power to be reckoned with. Its annual general meetings always seemed scripted by Saturday Night Live.

The attempted excommunication of Mr. Charko was nothing compared to earlier events. In 1962, Tom Campbell was elected as an NPA alderman. Then he split from his party and running as an independent, beat out NPA Mayor Bill Rathie in the 1966 election. In 1970, he returned to the the NPA and again won as mayor.

                                                       MAYOR TOM CAMPBELL 1969

Team and Art Phillips defeated NPA candidate, Bill Street, but TEAM dissolved after a couple of years. Jack Volrich was elected under the TEAM banner and then split from the party and ran as an independent. TEAM morphed into Mayor Harcourt's independent civic electors and formed an alliance with COPE. Harry Rankin in the 90's split from COPE and supported VOICE. Gordon Campbell, whose career began as Art Phillips assistant led the NPA to victory in 1986.

Estranged from Rankin, COPE seemed headed for the dustbin. Instead it was miraculously resurrected. It came to power under Mayor Larry Campbell, re-branded as VISION which metamorphosed into the new developers party replacing the NPA.

And so it goes. Fractious events do not always lead to  adverse results for a party.

TEAM II

A group of people, many of whom were associated with the original TEAM, now hope to see its rebirth  as a centrist party to replace both VISION and the NPA.  Because VISION and NPA are both funded by developers they see the choice as between Tweedledum and Tweedledee.

Politics makes strange developers.  Land Use Planning and zoning is the responsibility of Local Governments and when those who are regulated fund the regulators, huge towers coincidentally result. Sometimes they are even  named after the City Planner who approved them.

TEAM will not win by moral virtue alone. It must develop a machine and select good candidates. As long as the process encourages packing party meetings with new members to select candidates life  will be full of surprises.

To succeed, TEAM must not sell the NPA short. The split on the NPA's Board was less embarrassing then it could have been. Sure, they did not seem to be able to get many members out to an important meeting but at least they didn't make a martyr out of anybody. People can joke about  the latest neo- Borgia colour scheme for its coat of arms, but none of that matters. The fact remains that the NPA is a formidable political institution with a significant history. It has been able to raise awesome amounts of money from a relatively few donors.  For most of its history it has not depended on huge membership lists.

Local Elections are won by the comparative strength of political machines. The pollsters don't measure this and that is why they got it wrong in the recent provincial election. The NPA has exceptional connections to the Provincial Liberals. Those Liberals will be operating phone banks and knocking on doors to identify the vote in the next election. Even with all of the interest that is expressed in TEAM, it has a lot of catching up to do.

SHALL WE PLAN OR SHALL WE DANCE?

A thrilling event happened yesterday. I received  a little green Louis Vuitton plastic box from the City. It was to recycle my food scraps and to carry bones, egg shells and stuff like that  to the Green Bin all of which could ultimately be recycled into musical instruments. 

A planner published in the  Georgia Straight has criticized our Mayor for diverting attention from important, long term planning issues to Street Parties which she suggests are used to raise money for VISION. There are two sides to the issue: Shall we plan or shall we dance?

As a planner and a musician it is a tough choice. Planning has its moments but I have a higher dream. It is to play a tuba and flute duet.  There is only one piece composed for  that combination. It is the  Titl  serenade. Titl was a composer determined to bring together, the Tuba, an Ill Wind that no one blows good,  and the sublime flute. I would love to have a city wide festival. The Titl serenade could be played at any intersection in Dunbar. The Mayor plays the tuba. I play the flute. We could both play on recycled instruments as they do in Paraguay.

                                TITL SERENADE FOR FLUTE AND HORN

Just after we got our Louis Vuitton hand held recycling box,  my wife, by a strange coincidence,  received a personal email from the Mayor bringing truly glad tidings!

He said that VISION  was at the half way mark and they had another half term to do even more good to us. He explained that street homelessness had declined over 61%.

That's not all. 

They have delivered loads of rental housing much of which will become occupied when they get the landlords to get over their aversion to tenants and actually rent some of it.

He noted that "Vancouver is getting greener every day, but we must work with our partners to invest in rapid transit, including on the Broadway corridor --scope of our cycling and pedestrian transportation networks. We also need to build on VISION Vancouver's record of unprecedented support for the arts and Vancouver's vibrant world-class creative sector...To keep Vancouver moving forward, we're counting on your support, ideas and engagement****HELP US BUILD A PROGRESSIVE VANCOUVER - DONATE HERE."

As I continued my reverie about playing the Titl Serenade duet with the Mayor, on a recycled plastic water-main flute and  the Mayor on an exhaust pipe tuba, all of which was triggered by my green Louis Vuitton   garbage carrier, I was distracted  by a poisonous posting from the  Georgia Straight.

http://www.straight.com/news/388006/vancouvers-new-official-development-plan-lacks-public-input-while-vision-engages-city-wide-block-parties

That ankle biter paper had  the effrontery to run a critical article. The author, a planner, criticised the Council because they were not consulting enough on this or that 30 year official plan or anything else. They were also guilty of turning things over to Metro Vancouver in a "regional context" statement.  (As if there is something wrong with taxation without representation.)  

And then the author even attacked our Mayor because he wants to get everyone out in the street and dance! Not just a neighbourhood dance. A full frontal entire city dance, neighbourhood by neighbourhood. 

For a good example of a neighborhood dance in Paris that we could do here:

Well the planner is wrong. These  stressful times demand release:

•  We all fought for the right to recycle our food scraps in our green bins. 

• For years we have cried out for well designed person-hole covers. Now we have them.

•  We have demanded urban forest removal by means of adorable lane- way houses.  We have 500 already and more trees to go.

• There will be lots more stress on the way to an underground subway to Paradise.  

• And if that is not enough we must Increase the population to 10 million so we can support high speed trains like the French TGV  that could allow the newcomers  to commute to Kelowna in 45 minutes. 

Check out this to appreciate a train that moves at  578 kph 

  

What  the Nabobs of Negativism (to coin a phrase)  forget is that there are solid historical precedents for what our Mayor wants to do. In ancient Rome they offered bread and circuses. More recently, in the Middle Ages after the black plague, the surviving Villagers held what were referred to as "dancing manias." 

They  jerked around in the streets like zombies until they dropped.  Michael  Jackson's, “Thriller” and Harry Bellafontes “Zombie Jamboree” had their roots in Europe's dancing manias of the middle ages. So well choreographed street parties are exactly what  I would expect of a city that leads the world in the arts on top of which happens to be the greenest city in the world. 

The Mayor does not need my advice, but here is my prediction. The Mayor will invite Chris Christie, Governor of ”, New Jersey, (the“Garden State) to the Street Dance.  Christie would choreograph and dance a street version of   George Gershwin's  “Lets build a stairway to paradise”  Christie  could take all the  streets he wanted.  (Gershwin was a New Jersey Lad.)

After that Gregor and Governor Christie, with their invited constituents  would start at opposite ends of the City and join in a chorus line of  our cities' respective songs: “In the Boardwalk in Atlantic City” and the far superior Vancouver Song by local composer Mike Sims.

                                    New Jersey Governor Christie

I would sure rather see all that then sit through another jargon laden, insufferable planning or zoning meeting in which flocks of planners, who don't think because they already  know, tell me how I ought to live. The Mayor is right: Lets Dance.