NI" THE BOOK IS RATHER DULL... NOWHERE DOES IT VENTURE INTO SIMULTANEOUS FERRY-; INSURANCE AND TAX HIKES... LYiy ty f{llit ZY we Gz. Pi eettttlllllds VANCOUVER fhutualtd Hearing unanimously favors tunnel on Commercial Drive Continued from page 1 “And you still have a discrepan- cy and you haven’t explained it,”’ Rankin shot back. Alderman Bruce Yorke discom- fitted the officials further. When he questioned them about the possibility of a driven tunnel as op- posed to the cut and cover method, they told him they had examined this, but ‘‘only in a broad, general way.’ They would need to make a detailed study, complete with soil tests, but this would take three or four months and cost ‘‘a con- siderable amount of money.”’ Then it was the turn of the au- dience and of the 35 residents of the Grandview-Woodlands area who spoke, not one favored an elevated - line. Their views reflected their determination not to accept an elevated line. : “We're having this expensive system rammed down our throats and then told we can’t have a tun- nel because it’s too costly unless we pay for it ourselves.”’ “T view this as an unmitigated disaster, as you would if you were faced with the prospect of an elevated line so close that the passengers will be able to read the lettering on the cornflakes box.” “This is tunnel vision that eliminates the tunnel.”’ “What and who’s behind this in- sistence on an elevated system? Is it the desire to depress an dislocate the neighborhood, so that the developers can move in and buy up the property. Is the ultimate aim to surround Trout Lake with highrises?” 2 S ‘ ‘*The real issue is the quality of life in our neighborhood. If this huge overground station is built, Xmas issue There will be no Tribune next Friday. Instead, the enlarged year end issue, with special holiday fea- tures, will be off the press Dec. 16, in time for most readers to get it be- fore Christmas. The deadline for greetings is Dec. 11. PACIFIC TRIBUNE—DEC. 4, 1981—Page 2 soon it will be surrounded by highrises. I don’t want my area to become another West End.”’ “If this elevated system were be- ing proposed for the west side, there would be no question about it the line would go underground.”’ Park commissioner Pat Wilson attacked the Dec. 15 deadline for the city’s decision. “That’s Mr. Vander Zalm’s problem. He decided we should have this expensive system. So, if a tunnel is what everyone here needs and it costs more than an elevated system, let him find the money.”’ When Harold Carter presented Harcourt with a petition signed by more than 100 area merchants and accompanied it with an impassion- ed plea for construction of a tunnel “to save our neighborhood,” he received a standing ovation. Finally, as the clock neared 11 p.m., the aldermen gave their views. Warnett Kennedy was absent. Don Bellamy and George Puil had left. Rankin, Yorke and Eriksen were agreed that the line must go underground. Marguerite Ford said she ‘‘would like to see the line go underground as the best solu- tion,”’ but paying for it would be difficult, especially if the city had to bear the full additional cost. May Brown committed herself to no more than a promise to study the report and, pressed for a firm answer, held it would be improper to say how she would vote. Mayor Harcourt had no such reservations. ‘“We gave you a clear message in 1980 when we declared for a underground route on Com- mercial. And tonight you have given us a clear message,”’ he said. TEAM-NPA vote benefits Skalbania One of the most shameful ex- amples of the NPA and TEAM ganging up to kiss a certain part of the anatomy of a developer took place in Vancouver city council Noy. 24, 1981. I’m referring, of course, to the 6-5 vote to grant Skalbania Enter- prises Ltd. the right to convert the 132-unit Crofton Manor at 2803 West 41st Avenue to strata title ownership. That gives him that is some property that they can use to write off profits made elsewhere. The new owners of these apartments will then in turn rent them out at higher rents. The few tenants that re- main are paying $1,500 to $2,150 a month; ‘this includes - meals but as of January, 1982, tenants will have to provide and pay for their own nursing ser- vices. They: will soon be faced Harry Rankin with the option of buying their apartments at highly inflated prices or being evicted. the right to sell these units as tax shelters. Skalbania stands to make about $6 million in profit from this action by council; if he should decide now to donate generously to the election funds of TEAM and the NPA his ac- tions would be understandable. The money, of course, will come out of the pockets of the tenants. It’s a sordid story of ruthless and despicable profiteering. Crofton Manor was owned by N.B. Cook Corporation. It provided nursing services and meals for the elderly. Its assess- ed value was $4 million. Cook. served eviction notices to all the tenants and sold the Manor to Skalbania for $10.2 million. That gave him a nice profit of $6.2 million, or 155 per cent. Only 36 of the original 130 tenants stayed after receiving eviction notices. Skalbania then started cut- ting services. Now he is selling off most of the one bedroom apartments at prices ranging from $95,000 to $150,000. He stands to make a profit of $5.8 million by this means. The peo- ple buying the apartments are for the most part people with money who want a tax shelter, But that still won’t be the end of it. We can be certain that the new owners will soon come before city council asking us to rezone their property for higher density so they may make still higher profits. This need not have happen- ed. Council had the authority to refuse Skalbania’ the right to convert to strata title. The choice was whether to take care of the needs of elderly tenants or the profits of the developer. Bya 6-5 vote, council voted to give this $6 million gift to the developer, at the expense of the tenants. Voting for it were Warnett Kennedy, Don. Bellamy, Nathan Divinsky, Helen Boyce, Marguerite Ford, and May Brown. Voting against were mayor Mike Harcourt, COPE aldermen Bruce Eriksen, Bruce Yorke and Harry Rankin, and NPA alderman George Puil who broke with his party on this issue. If nothing else this vote shows why we need a COPE majority on council. fluence. - RR ccoainns, that last resort of political bankrupts, frequently deceives those who engage in it more than those it is intended to in- Its history in this province goes back to the time of Confederation, when Amor De Cosmos was denounced as a communist because he defended the principles of the Paris Commune. It didn’t prevent his becoming the second premier of British Columbia a few months after Confederation because people knew he had been the most consistent champion of Confederation. When the old Socialist Party elected three members to the legislature in 1903, the hysteria against the ‘‘red threat’’ to the province was heard throughout the British empire. It didn’t deter the working people of Vancouver Island from re-electing the men they identified with their. own interests. So it probably will dismay those who devised the red-baiting cam- paign in North Vancouver city and district during the recent municipal _ election campaign to learn that their generous advertising of the Pacific Tribune is being reflected in increased sales and subscriptions on the North Shore. * Oe wo aldermanic candidates who were targets of the smear campaign - in North Vancouver city, Richard Blackburn and Greg Richmond, have replied in a letter published in the North Shore News. Because Communists have been active in the Tenants Association, so went the red-baiters’ reasoning in their ‘‘guilt by association” approach, therefore the association must be ‘‘communist oriented’’ and its spokesmen branded accordingly. Understandably, tenants felt their intelligence was being insulted, particularly when they identified those distributing the anonymous . red-baiting leaflets as supporters of a government bent on removing rent controls. PEOPLE AND ISSUES “With respect to the unsigned ‘smear’ campaign conducted against us and others,’’ Blackburn wrote, ‘‘it is our view that provincial or federal party politics have no business being directly involved in municipal politics, and that is how Canada likes it. The issues are what - is important. “However, in order to set the record straight, Greg Richmond and myself are pleased to inform the public that we are not now, never have been, nor will ever be members of the B.C. Social Credit party. . .”’ : * oe x s we noted in our last issue, Julius Stelp, a founding member of the Communist Party of Canada, was to celebrate his 100th birthday on Dec. 1, as indeed he did, with congratulatory telegrams from the Queen, the governor-general and the prime minister. But the telegram he treasured came from William Kashtan, the Communist party’s | general secretary, greeting him as one who had worked all his life for socialism and noting that ‘‘in your lifetime many changes have shaped up in the world as in Canada, and more are yet to come,”’ changes Julius helped to bring about. © Less happily, Bert Padgham, one of. Julius’ few surviving co- workers from the turbulent years following the First World ‘War, is seriously ill in ward 2 of Chilliwack General Hospital, although he is able to have visitors. Now 86, Padgham comes from a family some of whose members have contributed more than half a century of dedicated work to the labor and progressive movement. Time may have taken its toll, but it has done nothing to diminish their convictions.