It’s as if the ”occupiers” have gone.
So many Vancouver residents I know are smiling again, happy to see the city in new hands… and the old ideological extremists … the commissars …. out of City Hall.
It all reminds me of the days when the Russians were sent scurrying with their tails between their legs from Hungary, Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia. The local residents had had enough and rebelled and threw the bums out.
Although many of the previous Council’s henchmen in the Vancouver City Hall bureaucracy remain… there is hope that they too will soon be gone as Mayor Ken Sim and the ABC majority put their own stamp on the new administration.
“ I luv the new mayor already” a friend wrote after news that the ABC-controlled Parks Board will be dismantling one of the ugly monuments erected by the old regime: the lane-blocking barriers in Stanley Park.
And how is this, there are also plans to reopen the parking lots on Beach Avenue so that not only nearby residents can enjoy the seawall.
And the new parks board has signaled it will start spending money to repair existing facilities, instead of so much on monopolized bicycle-encouraging projects.
Bravo!
Imagine that: a Parks Board doing things to improve those facilities actually used by families, the handicapped and seniors … not just mostly favoring the spandexed crowd!
And hopefully, the ugliest of all monuments that the old council is responsible for… the tents and shacks now blocking downtown sidewalks and doorways… will also soon be gone.
Lets keep it real: this was more than an election. This was voter repudiation of the fascist-style governance many felt had taken over at Vancouver City Hall and the Parks Board, where consultation, public input and public hearings changed little or nothing.
And now they’re gone!
Vancouver may actually be on its way back to being a normal city!
Where the interests of the local citizens, businesses and taxpayers take precedence over the pandering by the previous revolutionary regime to the homeless from afar, the druggies, the crazies and even violent criminals.
Someone should write a song celebrating Vancouver’s 2022 LIBERATION!
Harv Oberfeld