Frankly Speaking

Affordable housing and preservation of the existing rental stock have been important issues in the Langley City election. The City has some of the most affordable rental units in the Lower Mainland. It also has a much larger stock of social housing (per capita) than many other cities. The race for mayor in Langley City will likely be a close one – which should give voters in that community even more incentive than usual to get out to the polls on Saturday. Former mayor Peter Fassbender is seeking his old job back. Fassbender served as mayor from 2005 until he resigned in January, 2014 (in order to prevent a byelection). He had been elected as a BC Liberal MLA for Surrey-Fleetwood in May, 2013, and served in several cabinet positions during the 2013-17 term of the Christy Clark government. He lost his seat in the 2017 election. Ted Schaffer took over as acting mayor after Fassbender resigned, and ran and won election as mayor in 2014. He is not running again. Fassbe...

Three years after the shocking murder of high school student Serena Vermeersch by a lifetime criminal, he has finally pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. Raymond Lee Caissie, 46, entered the plea in court on Sept. 14. His guilty plea may be the only decent thing he has done in the past 25 years, Caissie was let out of jail in June, 2013 after serving a 22-year sentence for raping a woman in Abbotsford at knifepoint in 1991. It was a particularly brutal case. He confronted her while she was working at a museum in Abbotsford, abducted her, sexually assaulted her and left her tied to a tree, but not before making her withdraw money from her account at a bank machine. He also stole her car. Two days later, he robbed a woman pushing a two-year-old child in a stroller. That incident took place in a park. Caissie had been in trouble before that. He was in and out of jail from the time he was 15. He was released from prison a short time before the Abbotsford case, after being c...