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A bill that would effectively
create a ‘‘developers’ government’”’
at Whistler — and give developers a

* weighted vote according to the size

of their investment — has been de-
nounced as a ‘‘payoff’’ and
*‘sellout’’.

Fears have also been raised that
the new bill, part of a whole
development scheme for the
Whistler area, is linked to a 1988
Winter Olympics bid and would
add a hefty burden to both the pro-
vince and municipalities for roads,
services and other costs.

Bill 34, the Resort Municipality
of Whistler Amendment Act, was
given second reading in the

Whistler deal called sellout,
linked to bid for Olympics

Legislature last week. It would
create an association of developers,
purportedly to ‘‘promote, facilitate
and encourage the development”’ of
Whistler. a

But the association would have
the authority to assess its members
and votes in the association would
be weighted according to the size of
investment, thus giving large cor-
porations a significant — and
perhaps dominant — role.

Victoria NDP MLA Charles
Barber, who joined others in the
NDP caucus in denouncing the
legislation as a ‘‘payoff to Social
Credit friends’’ told the Legislature
Wednesday:

Skyscrapers grow on public subsidies

Huge office towers have
transformed every Canadian city in
the past 15 years. Vancouver is no
exception.

In almost every instance they
have been subsidized by public
funds, or to be more precise, by
subsidies and other financial con-
cessions from city councils. In most
instances perfectly good buildings
that could last for decades have
been destroyed to make way for the
developers’ skyscrapers.

I wonder how many people
remember the first big battle we had
in city council over such a project.
It was over Block 42-52 as it was
called then; now it is called Pacific
Centre and comprises the new
Eaton’s store at Georgia and Gran-
ville, two high office towers and a
shopping mall.

It is owned jointly by Cadillac-
Fairview (the biggest developer in
Canada in which the Bronfman li-
quor interests of Montreal hold
control), Eaton’s and Toronto-

Dominion Bank.
The land across Granville from

Hudson’s Bay (Block 42) was ex-
propriated from the merchants who
owned it by the NPA city council,
not for public use, but to hand it
over to the developers! The city
paid $10.9 million dollars for that
land, and then leased it to the
developers for $26,000 a year with
an option to buy it any time up to to
1982 for only $7 million and after
that for a few dollars extra. How’s
that for a public subsidy!

But that wasn’t the only subsidy.

City council agreed to build a
parking garage for them. When this
shamefaced give-away of public
funds was thrown out by the courts,
the developers went ahead and built
the garage and then leased it to the
city for $378,000 a year. They
charged the city 10 times more for
leasing the parking lot than the city
charged them for leasing all of
Block 42! The city lost $500,000 in
the first 16 months of operation of
this parking garage, which was
another subsidy to the developers.

Bill Rathie was the NPA major
when the project was started; Tom

Campbell was the mayor who
presided over the completion of the
deal.

Charlie Bronfman, when he came
to Vancouver to negotiate the deal
with Vancouver city council had
this to say about our mayor:

“Our first meeting with mayor
Rathie convinced me that we were
dealing with a man who talked our
language and walked on the same
side of the street.”

The merchants who had been
displaced when the city took over
Block 42 found that when they tried
to locate in the new mall, their rents
had been increased four times.

I mention this, which is now past
history, because the NPA city coun-
cil under mayor Jack Volrich is put-
ting over the same type of deals —
exempting the trade and convention
centre from a $600,000-a-year pro-
perty: tax, agreeing to pay the
operating losses of this
businessmen’s centre from the city
treasury, and supporting the
building of the multiplex at the

PNE which will cost the city not a
few million but I believe some tens
of millions in subsidies before it is
through.

With these kind of subsidies it is
no wonder that the developers have
become so rich so fast.

Almost overnight Cadillac-
Fairview has become a $1.4 billion
corporation. We’ve done our bit to
help. Daon Development Corpora-
tion hasn’t done so badly either,
building up its assets in a few years
to $464 million. Vancouver city
council has been kind to Daon too.

Thanks to generous subsidies
from municipal councils and to
rezoning laws that gave the
developers what they wanted, the
profits of Canadian developers in
1977 were just slightly over $1
billion. They cleared $180 million
from shopping centres, $33 million
from industrial parks, $508 million
from suburban land, $150 million
from office rentals and $180 million
from apartment rentals for a grand
total of $1,051,000,000,000.00.

i they’re likely to get short shrift
from a court which earlier dismissed defence
arguments and pronounced 30-day sentences,
the members of the Pacific Life Community are
nevertheless planning to present an impressive
array of evidence — and people to give it —
when they appear in U.S. Federal Court next
week.

The court appearances stem from charges laid -
against 10 Canadian members of the PLC for ~

trespassing on the Trident submarine base at
Bangor, Washington. Readers may remember
that the 10 took part in civil disobedience ac-
tions at the base June 9 and 10 as part of their
campaign against the ‘“‘first strike’? nuclear
weapons facility.

Significantly, they’ll be tried on August 6 —
the anniversary of the 1945 atomic bombing of
Hiroshima. And one of those to testify on their
behalf is Hiroshima survivor Toshiko
Yoshikawa who will tell the court of the linger-
ing afteraffects of the world’s first atomic at-
tack, which continues to claim victims a quarter
of a century later.

The same day, Mary Kaufmann, a member of
the team of prosecutors at the 1945 Nuremburg
trials of Nazi war criminals, will testify on the
responsibility of the individual to oppose illegal
preparations for war and the illegality under in-
ternational law of producing aggressive weapons

- such as Trident. At an earlier trial, Robert
Aldridge a former Trident missile designer, had
given evidence of the first strike capabilities of
the Trident system and his testimony will be
entered again to back up Kaufman’s contention.

Two Canadians will also present testimony
before the U.S. court: Coquitlam-Moody NDP
MLA Stuart Leggatt plans to testify about the
efforts of the PLC to alert the federal govern-
ment to the threat posed by Trident, while jour-
nalist Ben Metcalfe is to present evidence on in-
ternational politics and weapons policy.

Interestingly enough, the efforts by the

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—AUGUST 3, 1979—Page 2

“PEOPLE AND ISSUES

Pacific Life Community to make the trials a
forum to condemn the Trident system have
clearly embarrassed the U.S. administration —
only two days before the June 9 demonstrations,
a new law was passed making the protestors
liable to two counts of trespass instead of only
one. The charges carry a maximum sentence of
six months in prison and a $500 fine.

* * *
,

I another court case closer to home...
the resounding labor protest that greeted the
sentences passed last month on the Adams Labs
strikers — and the treatment meted out to them
by court officials — didn’t seem to fizz on
attorney-general Garde Gardom to whom the
protest was directed.

In response to a telegram from the Vancouver
and District Labor Council, the A-G sent a reply
— actually, it was signed by an assistant —
which managed to evade all the issues raised by
the labor council. The letter merely said that the
‘dispute was a private matter’’ and re-stated the
obvious, that ‘‘Justice Murray had found the
defendants in contempt of court.”’

As for the demand that the A-G review the
sentences, universally condemned as ‘‘excessive-
ly harsh’’ and investigate incidents in which
strikers were taken handcuffed from court, held
until fines were paid and, in one case, taken
directly to jail without any opportunity to pro-

vide for the care of her two children — Gardom |

said nothing.

The council unanimously declared his letter to
be ‘not good enough’’ and reiterated the de-
mand. We’ll wait for a further reply.

* * *

he secretary of the Veterans of the Mac-
kenzie-Papineau Battalion, Len Norris, was
in this week to tell us, sadly, that another gap
has been left in the ranks of the veterans with the
death July 15 of James Tait.
One of the many Scottish immigrants who
came to Canada on the eve of the Depression, he
was still in his teens when he joined scores of

others of his generation in the struggles of Ben-
nett’s relief camps. And it was the experience of
the relief camps Len tells us, that led him to
volunteer’ for~Spain where he was severely
wounded during the campaign at Teruel.

Following his return in 1939, he worked for
many years as a hospital orderly and later as a
graduate psychiatric nurse. The cancer which
developed in later years ultimately felled him at
age 64. - :

As Len relates, ‘‘Jimmy was a confirmed
socialist, an active member of the New
Democratic Party and a firm believer in the
necessity for unity. He had a deep feeling of
comradeship with the Mac Pap veterans, enjoy-
ing their companionship during reunions and
get-togethers, and no matter what the pain and
suffering of his last years, he never let it interfere
with whatever he could do to assist the organiza-
tion.”’ :

* * *
here was another sad note from Abbotsford
to tell us of the passing of a long time
Tribune reader and supporter Emil Andre in
Vernon. A native of Quebec, he was 91 when he
died in Vernon hospital July 23.

Emil had been one of the early homesteaders ~

in the Shuswap area where he settled in 1907
near what is now Cherryville. A decade later in
Vancouver, he joined the Socialist Party of
Canada and followed the lead of such people as
Jack Kavanagh and Ol’ Bill Bennett when the
Workers Party of Canada — later to become the
Communist Party — was founded in 1921.

An active member of the Sheet Metal Workers
Union for many years, he was also a delegate to
the Vancouver Labor Council and an activist in
he Workers’ International Relief and the Cana-
dian Labor Defence League.

In later years, together with his wife
Georgette, who died in 1963, he was a caretaker
at the Workers’ Children’s Summer Camp,

forerunner of the present Jubilee Children’s .

Summer Camp.

“The sole purpose of this bill 18 |
to promote the private interests of |
private developers. The public in |
terest, the public advantage and thé |
public good is utterly ignored. 2

“It is the single most dangerous, |
defective and mistaken bill that)
Social Credit has introduced in this | ~
session,” he charged. ‘‘It betray’
the public interest and sells it out 1
private interest, private benefit and 3
private profit.’” Bf

The bill is part of the Socreds’ ef]
forts, begun three years’ ago 10)
develop Whistler as a luxury SM
resort area. Several companies al |
expecting to be involved including |
one consortium made up of the)
Federal Business Developmet!|
Bank and Aspen Skiing Corp,
turn a wholly-owned subsidiary of
the movie multinational, 20th Cel”
tury Fox. — !

But the development deal, and
the enabling legislation to establish |
the association is so blatantly 4)
giveaway to developers that it has,
even caused cracks inside thé) —
Socred cabinet. a

At least two cabinet ministers |
have indicated opposition to thé)
legislation although so far, only)
labor minister Allan Williams ha)
indicated that he will oppose: one
feature, that giving a weighted vole
to developers. Williams has bee)
under considerable pressufe|
because he owns eight shares of on€
of the companies involved 1)
Whistler development. 4

The speed with which the Social |
Credit government has moved of}
the scheme following the May J@
‘election has given considerable
weight to charges that it is a payofl |
to corporate supporters who stan@ |”
to make immense profits from the}
development. .

Municipal affairs minister Bill |
Vander Zalm has talked of a facilitY |
to provide for 10,000 skiers a day bY
1980-81. |

Seen also is a possible deal to us®|
the expanded Whistler development.
as a basis for bidding on the 1988
Winter Olympics. Twice the al
has been touted as a possible S|
__but protest over the prohibitive ¢

has forced promoters to retreat.

But Vancouver mayor Ja
Volrich has again brought
feasibility study report to city cov
cil which, together with t
Whistler development, has rais :
the issue — and the prohibit!
costs — again. ~ :

Another concern among North
Vancouver residents results fro’
the need, if development go”
ahead, to upgrade the existing
Highway 99 which is already ina
quate. They fear a new highway
service the expanded facility may &
through the valuable Seym0
watershed.

marked Aug. 3

A candlelight march at Val
couver’s courthouse square
wind up the commemoration
Hiroshima Day in Vancouver t0
marked this year by a rally toget
with a photo display of the devas
tion of Hiroshima’ by the 1
atomic bomb. It is set for Frid”)
Aug. 3, 7 p.m.

Organized by the coalition
world Disarmament, the co”
memoration focusses this year 4
the International Year of the Chil’)
and the urgency or ratifying ™,
SALT II accords as the M4
positive contrivution to IYC. A

Hannah Polowy, director of a
ly childhood education at !
University of B.C. and a com
sioner for IYC, is the sched
speaker. :