COPE sees breakthrough in ‘78 election

Ward system
position set

The annual meeting of the
Committee of Progressive Elec-

tors (COPE) last Sunday appealed’

to supporters of a ward system for
Vancouver to hold off an initiative
on a plebiscite on area representa-
tion and to instead work for the
election of a new city council
“unreservedly committed to a full
ward system.”

The appeal was embodied in a
resolution submitted by the COPE
executive to give leadership in the
current discussions among ward
system supporters over how to
approach the issue in the upcoming
election.

“In our opinion,” the resolution
stated, ‘‘the election of a council,
the majority of whose members
are unreservedly committed to a
full ward system is the first, and
necessary, legislative step that
needs to be accomplished.”’

During the next civic election,
pressure should be brought to bear
on all candidates to declare them-
selves in favor of a full ward
system, the resolution suggested.

Leading up to the election this
year, ward system supporters will
be asked to participate in a ‘‘straw
vote’’ on the issue, the resolution
said, that would ask the question,
“Are you in favor_of a full ward
system for Vancouver?” The straw
vote would be an- educational

process and an opinion poll to’

provide information that COPE
feels is necessary to map out a
strategy to win the ward system.

Only after the 1978 election
should a plebiscite be considered,
it said, and then only if the ballot
asked the same simple question as
in the straw vote.

“COPE believes that there is
nothing to be gained and much to
be risked at this time in proposing
any initiative to the present City
Council for a plebiscite,’’ it
stressed. “It is a fact that a
majority on Council are opposed to
a full ward system. This fact is
bound to be reflected not only in the
wording of any possible plebiscite,
but also in the likely results of the
plebiscite itself.

“In our opinion more time is
needed to develop the good work
done by full ward supporters both

inside and outside Council, before -

the public as a whole are prepared
to demand a real change.”

COPE ANNUAL MEETING... launching the 1978 election campaign.

-—Tony Bjarnason photo

Chiselling on Family
Court ‘public disgrace’

By ALD. HARRY RANKIN

Conditions in the Family and
Juvenile Court building at 2625
Yale Street, Vancouver are a
public disgrace. Facilities in this
wretched place are completely
inadequate for both staff and in-
mates.

The city owns the building and
rents it to the provincial attorney-
general’s department, which
operates the court and is
responsible for renovations and
improvements.

For years the city has been after

the attorney-general to relocate
and reorganize the family and
juvenile court setup and in the
meantime to renovate the present
premises. As late as a year ago,
March 3, 1977 to be exact, the at-
torney-general gave a firm
commitment to do just that. But in
the meantime very little has
changed. .

It was recently reported to
Council that ‘‘the two existing cells
are unsanitary and dangerous for
the purpose-of holding juveniles.”

One juvenile had tried to commit
suicide there.

The heating system was so bad
that staff had to bring their own
electric heaters. A skylight was
broken and remained unrepaired.
The corridors are often crowded
with bodies waiting to be brought
into court. The washrooms have
been infested with fleas.

What was the response of the.

attorney-general’s department
when these conditions were
brought to his attention?

The regional court adminis-
trator, J. Bird, replied that
“conditions at the present location
are certainly not ideal, but were
exaggerated in the media‘ re-
ports.”

The deputy attorney-general, R.

H. Vogel, replied that “we are
reluctant, as formerly was the city,
to invest substantial sums when
replacement is so far advanced,”

and he stated further that for the

city to suggest termination of the
See COURTHOUSE, pg. 11

PEOPLE AND ISSUES :

Annual meeting puts
candidates in field

The Committee of Progressive
Electors launched the 1978 civic
election campaign last Sunday
with the nomination of. 15
prospective COPE candidates:

About 200 COPE members at-
tended the’ annual meeting at
Vancouver’s Iron Workers’ Hall to
hear the first round of nominations
and to adopt an election strategy
and budget and a campaign time-
table. Nominations will be
finalized at a special nominating
convention in September.

‘COPE president Bruce Yorke
and former VRB manager David
Schreck were nominated to contest
the mayoralty spot on COPE’s
slate. Yorke was the COPE

-mayoralty candidate in the last

election and ran a strong third,
polling 14 per cent of the vote.

-Seven candidates declared
themselves in the race for COPE
aldermanic nominations. Down-
town Eastside Residents’
Association organizers Bruce
Eriksen, Libby Davies and Jean
Swanson were nominated, along
with West End activists Joe Ar-
naud, Paul Murphy and Debra
Lewis. Kitsilano law student
Connie Fogal was the other can-
didate for the aldermanic slate.

On the school board slate, six .

candidates declared themselves,
headed by COPE education
committee chairwoman Polly
Weinstein. Irene Foulks, who
narrowly missed election in 1976,
Betty Greenwell and Helen
O’Shaughnessy all intend to run
again. Wes Knapp, a functionary of
the British Columbia Teachers’
Federation, put his name forward
for the school board slate for the
first time, and Fred Lowther, a
candidate in 1974, has decided to
try again. |

The early nomination of can-
didates was planned to allow
prospective candidates time to
begin campaigning on issues and
become well known before the

" election campaign actually begins.

In the report from the outgoing
executive Yorke predicted a
breakthrough for COPE in the 1978
elections. ‘‘We will emerge as the
centre-left reform party and
challenge TEAM for the right to
run this city,’ he declared. As
TEAM shifts more to the right,

reform minded voters who have
supported TEAM will switch their
allegiance to COPE, Yorke said.

In the coming election, the report
stressed, COPE will place its
emphasis on basic economic
questions and the standard of
living within the city. The need for
a light rapid transit system in
Vancouver needs to be linked with
the need for jobs, and similarly
with the need for housing, it said.

COPE plans to spend $30,000 in
the election, $13,000 of which is
already on hand. In March or early
April an election headquarters will
be opened in the city and can-
vassing is set to begin in June.

From September on, five cam- |

paign organizers will be hired to
co-ordinate the campaign.

In other business before the
annual meeting, a new executive

board was returned to lead COPE’Ss:

work in 1978. Bruce Yorke was re-
elected president; Libby Davies
was re-elected vice-president;
Paul Murphy was elected second
vice-president; Bruce Eriksen was
elected third vice-president; Atiba
Gordon was re-elected secretary
and Jack Nichol was re-elected
treasurer.

_ Elected to the general executive
board were Jim Quail, Jonnie
Rankin, Jim Duval, Jean Swanson,
Dave Stone, Debra Lewis, Shawn

Hatch, Doug Laalo, Ben Swankey, —

Pat Wilson, Susan Dahlen and

Tony Bjarnason. Each of COPE’s

eight area committees will name 4
representative to the executive at a
later date.

AREA meet

Jack Webb, chairman of the San
Franciscans for District Elections,
will be the keynote, speaker at
“Towards Area Representation”’,
a conference sponsored jointly by
the Area Representation Electors

‘Alliance and Vancouver Com-

munity College, Langara on
Saturday, February 25, beginning
at 9:30 a.m.

The-conference, to be held in the
Main Theatre, A130, at Vancouver
Community College, Langara, 100
West 49th Ave., will bethaired by
Province columnist Chuck Davis
and Vancouver Sun writer Mary
McAlpine.

lsewhere in our issue, there is a review of the new book

by poet Dorothy Livesay who, as the reviewer notes,
‘iuncurred the wrath of the literary establishment” by
attending, together with four other writers, the second
world meeting of Writers for Peace in Sofia, Bulgaria.

Angered by the Canadian press blackout of the historic
conference, Livesay published an article in the Toronto
Globe and Mail explaining the conference, and appealing
to the social conscience of other writers. But although the
conference was held last June, and Livesay’s article
published in July, the “wrath” of the more vocal mem-
bers of the literary establishment has still not abated.

On the Toronto Star, staff writer Robert Nielson took the
opening shot at the five Canadians who attended the
conference, noting that they were the recipients of ‘‘a
Communist free lunch’ for which they were returning the
compliment by “‘cosying up to the officially approved
authors of totalitarian Communist. states.” On the
magazine Saturday Night, editor Robert Fulford
bemoaned the fact that Canadians were not prone to the
same anti-Communist excesses as Americans. He added
that Livesay’s article in the Globe and Mail was “a huge,
unintentional joke.’”’ But when Gavin Grant wrote an
article in the Canadian Tribune Nov. 14, criticizing the
column for its ‘‘strong McCarthyist tone”’ and its attempt
to “discredit by innuendo,” Fulford fired back a reply,
this time making it perfectly clear that, if most Canadians
weren’t given to anti-Communist excesses, he certainly

» was. Here is his letter:

“In the issue of Nov. 14 you write: “‘. ..the columns
(those by Nielson and Fulford) have a strong McCarthyist
tone, including attempts to discredit by innuendo.

“T enclose (in case you discarded yours) a copy of our

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FEBRUARY 24, 1978—Page 2

issue, containing the Notebook column to which you refer.
Would you, if you can, underline in my column those
words, phrases or sentences that you categorize as ‘in-
nuendo.’ ,

“¥ don’t think you can. I don’t think there was any in-
nuendo (in the usual sense of sly half-statement or near-
statement) in my column. I think it was absolutely direct.
But if you can show me where I was indirect or oblique
(other meanings of innuendo) then I will rewrite that
section of that column and republish it. I want to be as
direct as I can in these matters. I think communism is a
poison and you who support it are poisoning the waters of
public discourse, and I don’t want anyone to be misled by
innuendo, etc.

“As for ‘McCarthyist,’ I assume you, in the normal way
of communists, are misusing this term. In proper usage
McCarthyism means the practice of accusing someone of
being a communist who is not. You, however, probably

think that McCarthyism means expressing dislike of ~

communism. Senator Joseph McCarthy did a great favor

_ for you people when he handed you a stick with which to

flail those who see you for what you are.”
* * *

ronically, we note from recent press reports from

Switzerland that Alexander Solzhenitsyn about whom
the same Robert Fulford said, ‘‘. . .it’s impossible to deny
the truth of his indictment against communism and all
those who actively or passively support it,” is again in
trouble with the local tax authorities. This time they’re
investigating vast sums that he deposited in Swiss banks
between 1974 and 1976, before he moved secretly from
Zurich to the U.S.

Readers may remember that in July of last year, Swiss
taxmen seized “‘sizeable assets’ belonging to the Soviet
dissident for non-payment of taxes and later, in
December, announced that they were seeking $240,000 in
unpaid taxes from him. ;

It seems that was only part of it. On January 30, the tax
administration of Canton Zurich said that it was claiming
nearly $2 million in outstanding taxes from Solzhenitsyn.
The taxes are apparently due on “contributions” made by

Solzhenitsyn to a so-called “social fund for the political ”
~ persecuted in the Soviet Union.”

The tax scandal has raised a number of intriguing
questions as to where all the money came from, and how
much is really involved, given that the taxes alone amount
to $2 million.

Fulford may find it “impossible to deny the truth of
Solzhenitsyn’s indictment against communism”’ but Swiss
tax accountants may very well find, in fact, that it was
CIA money that was doing the talking.

Editor — SEAN GRIFFIN
‘Business and Circulation Manager — PAT O'CONNOR

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