Frankly Speaking

Peter Fassbender ran for the BC Liberals in 2013 because he wanted to get things done. He believed the party could win an election that pollsters and most of the public thought would be a cakewalk for the NDP. He was right. He won his Surrey-Fleetwood seat, which had been held by the NDP's Jagrup Brar, by 200 votes - with that margin of victory likely due to an intensive door-knocking effort in the final weeks of the campaign. He talked with voters about jobs, growth and issues that mattered to them. When he ran, he was mayor of Langley City. While he was mayor, a position he held for eight years, he served for a time as chair of the Mayors' Council - which has limited oversight powers over TransLink. He lost that position, which is voted on by other mayors, because some of them felt he was too close to the provincial government. Fassbender pushed hard for many initiatives in Langley City during his years as mayor, notably a downtown master plan, more condo development...

A police shooting took place outside Starlight Casino in New Westminster on November 8, 2012. Image from CTV News The Independent Investigations Office is looking into the shooting death of 20-year-old Hudson Brooks outside the South Surrey district RCMP office early in the morning of July 18. It is the sixth investigation into an officer-involved shooting that the IIO has instituted since April 1. While police have said that Brooks was “suicidal,” he apparently was not armed. The shooting has provoked a wave of anger in South Surrey, and many people say the shooting was an extreme over-reaction by police. The IIO has emphasized the importance of getting witness accounts of what happened on July 18 , and particularly wants to hear from civilians. Anyone with information, or who witnessed the incident, is asked to contact the IIO’s toll-free witness line at 1-855-446-8477. Officer-involved deaths are deeply troubling. This shooting took place just a few days before th...

Former Surrey councillor Dalton Jones, who's been around the block a few times, has a great expression about the United States. He calls it the "Excited States of America." This applies most particularly to its politics. In U.S. politics, nothing is more closely watched than the protracted, convoluted and messy job of picking candidates for president. This process is always at its messiest when a president is nearing the end of his second term, and the office is wide open. However, the utterances by Donald Trump, one of more than a dozen candidates in the running for the Republican nomination, take the phrase "Excited States" to a whole new level. Trump, a multi-billionaire real estate developer with an outsized personality, has already smeared most Mexicans, and Americans of Mexican origin, by suggesting that most of them are rapists, drug dealers, criminals and miscreants of other persuasions. He did allow that a few might be alright, saying ...

I`ve been working in community media in White Rock since 1978, when I worked for the long-departed White Rock and Surrey Sun , under publisher Arlene Huberman and editor Edna Smith. I've loved White Rock from the time I could first remember. Both sides of my family have deep roots there, and my parents met on the pier. My mom is a 1950 grad of Semiahmoo High School. Today was a great day to be there in the early morning. There was minimal vehicle traffic, and it was mainly those of us enjoying the beach, salt air, views and sunshine - whether walking, running or cycling. By the way, parking is free until 10 a.m. Take advantage of it.

My column in The Surrey Leader and Peace Arch News for Friday, July 17 Yet another shoe has dropped at TransLink, which continues to be the target of enormous criticism from taxpayers and transit users. On Tuesday, it was announced that two of its most senior executives had been let go. Doug Kelsey, whose involvement with transit in the region predates TransLink’s creation, was most recently chief operating officer, and also president and CEO of the B.C. Rapid Transit Company. His 2014 salary and other payments totalled $355,000, and his severance is likely to total in the hundreds of thousands, if not into the millions, given how long he has been working with TransLink and its predecessors. Bob Paddon has been executive vice-president and was one of the most-quoted senior executives, given that part of his responsibility had been media and public relations. His 2014 salary was $299,000. He was also overseeing long-term planning, which has been thrown out the window by t...

Almost 40 years ago, I used to ride by bicycle over to Vancouver Island on an annual basis. I would meet up with my friends Barry and Terry O'Neill and attend the annual bottle show in the Juan de Fuca Arena in Colwood each summer. They would usually travel with Terry's parents Margaret and Ron Wagner and I could spend the night with them, so I didn't have to pack much of anything. In those days, I didn't even bother taking a bottle of water. I would drive to the Tsawwassen ferry terminal, ride my bike onto the ferry and make my way to Colwood. There was no easy way to cycle in from the ferry. I rode on Highway 17, East Saanich Road or Interurban Road. All had a fair bit of traffic, although Highway 17 was far and away the busiest. It also had some steeper hills, but it was the most direct. Nowadays, there is a much better alternative. The Lochside Trail , most of which is on the former Canadian National Railways right-of-way between downtown Victoria and Sidney,...

My column in this week's Surrey Leader and Peace Arch News Last week, word came down that the proposal to add 0.5 per cent to the provincial sales tax to pay for an ambitious program of transportation expansion was handily defeated. Surrey voters voted 66 per cent against the plan. Delta voters were against it by a 68-32 per cent margin, while 59 per cent of White Rock voters said “no.” What does this mean for the projects which most benefit Surrey? The Pattullo Bridge replacement project will still go ahead. Even supporters of the added tax acknowledged this during the campaign. TransLink’s portion of the cost of the new bridge will be funded by tolls, so the sales tax revenue plan really didn’t affect it. The bigger question on the Pattullo should be this - why spend more than $100 million to patch up the bridge to keep it open for a few more years? TransLink announced just before the final day of handing in plebiscite ballots that the bridge would be cl...

Two significant infrastructure improvements opened in the past two weeks, and unlike the usual changes to transportation corridors, these ones directly benefit pedestrians and cyclists. Cyclists and pedestrians can now use a multi-use pathway over the new Port Mann Bridge. It opened on Wednesday, July 1. This pathway was promised way back when the BC Liberal government, under then-premier Gordon Campbell and then-transportation minister Kevin Falcon, announced plans for the new bridge and Highway 1 improvements, under what was called the Gateway program. That announcement was made in January 2005, prior to the provincial election. The three-metre wide barrier-separated path connects to United Boulevard and Lougheed Highway on the Coquitlam side, and to 112 Avenue in Surrey via a new path along the top of Johnston Hill on the north side of Highway 1. The path has been much-delayed, largely due to the complicated overpass and access structure on the Coquitlam si...

The results are in on the transit plebiscite, which asked voters in Metro Vancouver if they backed an increase in the sales tax of 0.5 per cent to pay for transit improvements. Voters said "no" to a sales tax increase for transit in a resounding way - with 61.7 per cent opposed, and 38.3 per cent in favour. Surprisingly, the "no" forces won in every single municipality, except Bowen Island and Belcarra, both of which have little or no transit services. Vancouver, which already has the best transit service and stood to gain a subway line down Broadway as far as Arbutus, rejected the plan by a slim margin, with just under 51 per cent opposed to the new sales tax. The overall voter turnout was very impressive, with more than 51 per cent of the voting packages returned. However, a large number (38,393) were improperly filled out and another 2,513 votes were rejected, so the overall number of votes that were actually counted was slightly less than half. It's stil...