Transcript
Speaker: I'm Jane Williams. This is the Red Eye Podcast. You can hear our live broadcast on Saturday mornings from 10 till noon at 100.5 FM in the Lower Mainland.
Speaker: Coming up in this episode, Ian Mass joins us with CityBeat for April 25th.
Speaker: This week, Vancouver City Council heard directly from sex trade advocates about service cutbacks, a questionable unity agreement crafted by three progressive parties, lifeguards, community center renewals, baseball, and lots more. Ian Mass joins me today with his CityBeat report. Hello, Ian.
Speaker: Hello, Lorraine. Well, let's go for it. we We knew that the zero means zero property tax promise was going to mean cutbacks in service. That was pretty obvious. Last week, we heard about the elimination of one of its two sex worker safety planner positions. Tell us about that.
Speaker: Well, the city says that two people aren't needed because the work can be redistributed. And besides that, the city's already approved $1.1 million dollars in funding for these organizations in this sector in 2026. So that should do it.
Speaker: But advocates say that the two positions were key recommendations of the provincial inquiry into missing and murdered women, and that this reduction puts lives at risk, particularly since cutbacks and closings have eroded both services and trust.
Speaker: And that was especially true. PACE, which is a huge advocacy and service organization in the downtown Eastside, has permanently closed its twenty four seven Vancouver drop-in center after 30 years of operations due to a lack of funding. And that communication and community trust, which is already tenuous, especially with the Vancouver police, will be further threatened by these cuts.
Speaker: So the advocates suggest looking at a $50 million dollars budget raise the city gave the police and redirect some of it to community-led sex worker safety.
Speaker: Fat chance of that. I haven't seen any political response from ABC about this one. Now, after months of talking unity, the three Vancouver progressive municipal parties, COPE, Greens, and OneCity, have finally come up with a unity agreement.
Speaker: What are the details? Well, it's been a long time coming for sure, but here it is, and it's not much different than predicted except for the mayor. So we'll start with city council. Each party will nominate up to five candidates. So there's 15 candidates for 10 seats.
Speaker: The school board, COPAN the Vancouver Green Party will run up to four candidates. One city gets five, so that adds up to 13 for nine spots.
Speaker: Park Board, COPE, and the Green Party will run up to four. One city will run up to three candidates. So that's 11 for seven seats. The interesting part of this agreement stipulates that each party may field their own mayoral candidate, but that parties agree to engage in what's called a good faith effort to determine which progressive mayor is best suited to compete.
Speaker: Well, are are there any indications of for how they're going to deal with this issue of the mayor? It's the big mystery. It doesn't lay out any formal mechanism to rally around a single progressive candidate like the one proposed and quickly rejected in February by one city mayoral candidate, William Azaroff. That one was based on membership votes.
Speaker: Councillor Pete Fry says the math for the candidates doesn't make sense. 15 nominations for 10 council seats, for example. And that, and here I'm going to quote, by the end of the summer, The others will have gotten behind me or gotten out of his way. Pretty cocky by Pete.
Speaker: One city has already nominated William Ezzeroff for mayor, and COPE will announce a mayoral candidate or candidates in the coming weeks. So, COP and Green, you this isn't absolutely final. COP the Green Party must bring the agreements to their general membership for ratification in order for it to go into effect.
Speaker: And all three parties will be holding nomination conferences to establish their candidates with their memberships in the first half of may Okay, so last Thursday, Vancouver Council heard a motion from Councillor Pete Frye to restore lifeguard services at key Vancouver beaches. What's the background on this motion, Ian?
Speaker: Well, Councillor Frye calls safe, supervised beaches a core public service. But the park board budget has been cut so much that service cuts are coming fast and furious from them. And this cut is to lifeguard services at Spanish banks East and West, Sunset Beach, Third Beach, and Trout Lake. It's a $600,000 bill that Pete Fry wants the city to pick up this year.
Speaker: And did this motion get much support? Well, the city's been bailing out a whole number of organizations, including $2 million dollars for one night of fireworks. So, Councillor Sean Orr thought this would pass unanimously, but it's not to be. Despite overwhelming support from all kinds of unions and the community, he says abc has unnecessarily politicized this issue.
Speaker: And sure enough, with an all-in ABC, a six to four vote, council set the request back to the park board saying the decision is within their mandate and they didn't attach any money to sending it back.
Speaker: So council was also considering a motion about what park and recreation services could add to the capital plan we'll be voting on in October. Isn't that a park board mandate too?
Speaker: Well, the park board certainly thinks it's a core mandate and they've come up with $1.43 billion dollars plan to begin fixing the 72% of Vancouver community and recreation centers. which are in poor or very poor condition.
Speaker: And back in 2022, Park Board had an extensive public consultation, which led to the Park Board priorizing the renewal of three community centers, Hastings, Kensington, and Renfrew, all on the east side.
Speaker: Now, I recall Ken Sim making a statement about money for recreation centers recently. So is ABC on side with the Park Board on this? Sure. Oh, ABC naturally sees things differently. They've been feuding with the park board for the last four years. So using a study, ABC that is, not released to the public, they think $400 million dollars will actually renew five community centers. Dunbar, Carersdale, Hastings, the Roundhouse, and Kensington community centers.
Speaker: with a different funding model for Britannia. In addition, they have big plans for South Vancouver, a 50-meter pool, likely at the Sunset Community Center, the Sun Yat-sen Classical Chinese Garden Pond upgrade. That water there is pretty rancid, and they're actually probably hoping to make it otter-safe to save those koi. They got washroom upgrades at Kitts and Second Beach, a Broadview Spray Park.
Speaker: Beacons Hill Park turf upgrade, planning for a Vietnamese cultural center, which I just heard about, and even a new Collingwood branch library. And Park Board has many of these same priorities.
Speaker: But since the mayor and council have the final say over the Park Board's capital plans and spending, ABC closed ranks and voted 6-3 for their plan.
Speaker: Counselors Maloney, Orr, and Bly, Pete Fry, was absent. They all abstained, I suppose not wanting to vote against them, positive financial attention to deteriorating public assets.
Speaker: In our last City Beat, we had fun speculating about what Mayor Sim was up to when he told council he had a motion called Enabling a Process for a Major Sports Initiative. And over the last couple of weeks, he let us in on a secret and he wants a major league baseball team in Vancouver. Tell us about this.
Speaker: Well, Mayor Sims hot on this one. He's calling this a generational opportunity, but critics say it's a pipe dream that will just cost taxpayers lots of money. But the mayor says he has had approaches by serious and money people talking about a major league team here, not just a team, it's a stadium too,
Speaker: likely somewhere on public land. Because without owning a stadium, as we're seeing with the Whitecaps soccer now and saw with Grizzlies basketball, teams don't stick around if they don't own the stadium.
Speaker: So there's a motion that wants to open an expression of interest process to identify a qualified proponent and potential ownership group and report back to council in 60 days. He was giving no indication of who this ownership group or groups might be.
Speaker: Anyways, the baseball jargon then broke out in council with Mayor Sim urging council to step up to the plate and hit a home run. And Councillor Orr responded by calling the whole politically charged process Nothing more than a pop fly with no runs scored. But Sims team won this one 7-2 with only counselors Maloney supporting Counselor Orr.
Speaker: Okay. Well, with all those sports references, we'll stay with sports. Let's do that. Yeah. It wouldn't be a council meeting if there wasn't a motion trying to ensure that residents, especially the most vulnerable, are protected from the intense security that the rapidly approaching FIFA World Cup is going to bring to Vancouver.
Speaker: What's this motion about? Well, it's called No Penalties for Vehicle Shelter during FIFA, and it was submitted by COPE Councillor Orr. And it makes the case that there's an opportunity to implement targeted time-limited measures that reduce harm for people sheltering in vehicles while maintaining public safety and operational requirements. That's a quote. He wants to identify feasible locations for temporary safe parking pilots, with access to basic services for people during FIFA.
Speaker: That would include washrooms and water and sanitation and waste disposal. And at the same time, let's explore some long-term options. Living in vehicles is kind of the last chance before you're on the street. So it's important to support rather than condemn those folks.
Speaker: He thought it was perfectly reasonable, but like all of the motions over the past couple of months that tried to strengthen the city human rights planning around FIFA, it was defeated with the only support coming from Councilors Orr and Maloney.
Speaker: Well, Ian, the last motion you wanted to tell us about is actually about us. Apparently, we are firmly known as older persons. What do they want to do for us?
Speaker: Well, the City of Vancouver Older Persons and Elder Advisory Committee wants Council to formally recognize the International Day of Older Persons on October 1st. They want it to be a day of official celebration and observance.
Speaker: As you would expect, As an official older lu person, we now have an official international day to celebrate our oldness. I can't wait for the party.
Speaker: And with that, the council wrapped up the meeting. They started at 9.30 in the morning with this oldness resolution and didn't finish until after midnight. And that was way past my older person's bedtime. So I watched it the next morning. So there you go.
Speaker: All the news that fits. That's great. Thank you, Ian. It's ah great always to talk to you ah during CityBeat. Yeah, thanks, Laurie. I've been speaking with Red Eye Collective member Ian Mass with his CityBeat report, and he'll be back next week with another edition of CityBeat.
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Speaker: I'm Jane Williams. Thanks for listening.
