for handicapped protest

Socreds have no. time

HANDICAPPED ACTION SPOKESPERSON JOANNE NEU-
BAUER .. . leading a group of about 30 members of the Vic-
toria-based handicapped action group who demonstrated in
front of the legislature Monday. The handicapped group ask-
ed for meetings with Socred ministers to discuss inadequate
GAIN rates for handicapped people, integration of handicap-
ped transit into normal transit service, and housing. The group
was told that there was no time for meetings with ministers,
although Socred finance minister Hugh Curtis devoted a sec-
tion of the budget speech to expounding the virtues of a series
of relatively minor steps to be taken as the province's contri-
bution to the UN International Year of Disabled Persons.

TRIBUNE PHOTO—FRED WILSON

PEOPLE AND ISSUES

or Dave Fairey and Betty Griffin, the battle for fair property
taxation, dramatically brought to public attention by their ap-

peals of the property tax assessments of oil companies in Burnaby —

by Fairey and of chemical companies in North Vancouver by Grif-
fin, has been a tough grind. :

Faced with high power corporate lawyers acting for the compan-
ies, an assessment appeal process run by real estate men with an
open pro-industry bias, and seemingly unconcerned municipal gov-
ernments who would be the main benefiters of the appeal, they cer-
tainly fit the caricature of David and ‘“‘Betty vs. Goliath,’’ as the
North Shore News screamed across its front page.

But as if to show that justice always eventually triumphs, there
were small victories in both cases last week. In Burnaby, municipal
council decided to conduct an audit of the oil company holdings to
check out Fairey’s allegation of underassessments, and in North
Vancouver District, municipal council voted to approve a resolu-
tion seeking changes in the Assessment Act and the school financing
formula to prevent increasing shifts in the tax burden on to homes.

The decisions are important moral assists, and in Burnaby’s case
a potentially decisive one, as both cases head into the next round of
the battle before the assessment appeal board.

* * * be *
hen professor Louis Feldhammer arrives in Vancouver this
weekend he will be travelling light, after last week handing over
a petition to Ontario attorney general Roy McMurtry, heavy with
8,000 names, calling for the banning of the Ku Klux Klan in On-
tario.

Feldhammer will speak in Vancouver on the KKK and the subject
of racism in general when he opens the 1981 Norman Bethune
Marxist Forum, Sunday, March 15, 8 p.m. at the Ironworkers Hall.

Sunday, March 15, 11 a.m., the Vancouver-based Committee
Against Racism, uniting a broad section of community, ethnic and
labor organizations will demonstrate for federal legislation outlaw-
ing the activities of racist organizations like the Klan when federal
solicitor general Robert Kaplan is due to speak at the Coach House
Motel in North Vancouver.

* * * ae we

c or many years, municipal politics in the Lower Mainland has
been a topic that has captured national interest, in large part be-
cause of the reform movements that have grown up and because of
the forces against which those movements have been arrayed —
usually corporate developers. Surrey politics, with such pro-de-
veloper figures as Bill Vander Zalm and Ed McKitka has been par-
ticularly well known — and now it is the subject of a National Film

Board documentary entitled Some People Have to Suffer.

The filmmaker was Jim Sellers, an economics geography pro-
fessor at Douglas College and this Saturday, Surrey residents will
have an opportunity both to see the film and to hear Sellers. The
event is sponsored by the Surrey Alternative Movement (SAM) and
it’s slated for Saturday, 6:30 p.m. in the Cedar Hall, 96th Ave. and
128th St. Dinner is included in the $5 admission.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—MARCH 13, 1981—Page 2

BRITISH COLUMBIA
COPE presses for freeze —
on demolition of housing —

The Committe of Progressive
Electors has called on community
organizations and individuals to
appear before Vancouver city
council on March 17 to support a
motion by COPE alderman Bruce
Eriksen declaring ‘‘an emergency”
in the housing market and impos-
ing a one year moratorium on all
demolitions of affordable rental
housing.

Eriksen’s motion cites the action
of Victoria city council several
weeks ago which declared a one
year moratorium on demolition of
any building containing five or
more residential units.

Eriksen had placed motions in
January dealing with demolitions
and the related question of enforc-
ing standards of maintenance
bylaws, but those motions were
referred to Marguerite Ford’s plan-
ning and development committee
where they have been stalled. This
time COPE wants Eriksen’s mo-
tion debated and voted on.

Delegations in support of the
motion can be placed.on the agen-
da by phoning city clerk Bob Henry
at 873-7011. Delegations are also
advised to seek the permission of
CUPE and VMREU to cross the
union picket line around city hall.
Phone the VMREU office at
879-4671 to request a picket pass.

A campaign to stop demolition
of affordable housing in the city
and to counter the attack on the ci-
ty’s social housing policy will also
be the highlight of COPE’s annual
meeting, March 22, 2 p.m. in the

Ironworkers Hall, 8th Ave. and
Columbia St., Vancouver. The
meeting will also hear réports from
COPE’s elected representatives
and elect a new leadership.

Last week the city’s limited
social housing program came
under sharp attack from the right
wing NPA aldermen and then suf-
fered a setback when the TEAM
aldermen joined with the NPA to
cut the city’s proposed housing
fund in half,

In January council approved a
target of 2,500 units of non-profit
housing for 1981 proposed by
mayor Harcourt. According to
Harcourt’s plan the city would
facilitate the housing program in
two ways: by writing down the cost
of land for non-profit groups,
mostly city owned land, at a book
cost to the city of about $6 million
in 1981; and by establishing a hous-
ing fund which would help non-
profit groups acquire land and hold
it until funding arrangements with
Central Mortgage and Housing
Corporation are worked through.

It is only the latter aspect of the
program which requires a direct
cash outlay and at the March 3
meeting of council Harcourt pro-
posed a $2 million fund to be in-
cluded in the city’s supplementary
budget. Harcourt acknowledged
the inadequacy of that amount, but
insisted that it would be a basis on
which to approach senior govern-
ments for additional money for the
fund. —

In the bitter debate that follow-.

ed, the NPA and TEAM first jour"
ed to limit the entire supplementaly »
budget to $8.5 million and the
counterposed the need for housiNé —
against other pressing needs such@ |
12,000 citizen petitions to have |
streets and lands improved,
upgrading of parks, a semio!
citizens centre in Marpole, and 5°
on.
The NPA’s George Puil argued
that money for housing would be
“like peeing millions of dollars”
down the drain” and Nathan
Divinski claimed boldly that “the
public doesn’t want us to spene |
money on housing.”’ |

The NPA and TEAM voted
against the $2 million fund, with |
only COPE and Harcourt in favol- |
The TEAM’s May Brown, reveal: |
ing herself to be a conservative 00
social issues, moved to include $! |
million for housing which pass |
with COPE, Harcourt and TEAM
forming a six to five majority.

The setback for Harcourt’s pr”
gram underscored its major short
coming: its extremely limited ob- .
jective of attempting to assist nom |
profit and co-op groups solve the
housing crisis, which they. a
unable to do, without the city
vigorously entering the marke
itself, As the half measures in thal
program flounder, without any
sign of making a real impact on the
housing crisis, a serious public non
profit housing program will be see?
increasingly as the only realistic
solution. |

|
|
|

An opposition of two to NPA |
policy on Van. parks board

By PAT WILSON
and LIBBY DAVIES

When the current municipal
strike ends and people begin using
Vancouver’s parks board facilities
again, they will immediately be hit
by at least one change they won’t
like — almost all admission fees
will have raised.

If these increased fees come as a
Surprise, it isn’t because they
sneaked past us. We fought as hard
as we could against the increases.

- However we are the only two

COPE parks commissioners,
against five NPA parks commis-
sioners.

The fee increases were not the
only issue over which we have
fought with the NPA majority, but
with the dismal amount of inform-
ation on parks board issues provid-
ed in the daily media, we doubt that
many people are aware of what the
NPA is doing, or if they heard
about a decision of the parks board
they may not know that Pat Wilson
and Libby Davies were opposed.
That is why we asked alderman
Rankin to lend us his column this
week so that we can pass on this
brief report on some of the main
issues we have faced over the past
two months.

First, about those admission fee
increases: the NPA forced fees up
by 12 percent on the average, with
general admission fees for outdoor
pools going up by 13 percent, and:
for children at these pools up by
16.7 percent. We opposed these in-
creases on the grounds that they
will create hardship for single par-
ents, seniors and people on fixed

incomes in particular, and for
everyone else as well who are feel-

ing the pinch of inflation. We also -

pointed out that higher fees will
mean fewer users, and hence less
money for the parks board.

It just happens that the $450,000

which the NPA expects the higher

fees to generate this year is the same
amount we subsidize VanDusen

Rankin

Gardens to cover its operating
losses. It has always been our opin-
ion that VanDusen primarily serves
tourists, and that the subsidy is too
large in relation to the needs of
neighborhood parks. and _ local
facilities. But when we attempted
to double fees at VanDusen, the
NPA defeated our -motion on
grounds that higher fees‘would cur-
tail attendance. How to turn an
argument on its head!

Another characteristic NPA ac-
tion is the way they have attempted
to ram through the controversial
Jericho development plan without
publicinput. Wetried twice to have
the plan sent to public hearing and
to have a citizen advisory commit-
tee established. Each time the NPA
voted no. The NPA wouldn’t even
hear delegations until city council
refused to discuss funding for Jeri-
cho until the citizen groups were
heard.

There is every reason to be sus-
picious of the plan to spend almost

-portant natural areas. Last week;

$1 million dollars developing Jeri |
cho Park. It could destroy its im-

250 citizens held their own meeting
to express concern over the Jerich0
plan. Not unexpectedly, we were |
the only parks commissioners to al
tend. Speaking for the COPE al-
dermen, Harry Rankin pledged
that they will not vote for any de-
velopment money for Jericho unt? —
citizen concerns have been heard by
the entire parks board in a prope
public hearing.

You can say one thing for the
NPA, they are consistent. And
once again they are giving a con
tract for hot dog and hamburgé!
buns to a Seattle bakery, at the cost
of local jobs for bakery workers.
Once: again they are placing the
needs of ordinary citizens second
and third best. The NPA will sacri-
fice Vancouver jobs for a saving of
one cent per bun — yet they are
more than willing to subsidize each -
tourist who enters VanDuset
Gardens by $3.75. That is a clear |
statement of where their sym-
pathies lie.

We don’t want to leave the im- °
pression that the NPA have it all -
just as they want it. We fight every _
issue to the end, and the last word |
hasn’t been heard on either Jericho
or the buns contract. Nor will we
give up our efforts to make the |
board more accessible to people by _
holding meetings in local commun |
ities at a convenient time and loca- |
tion.

If you have concerns about our —
parks and recreation system, we
would be pleased to hear from you. ©