Lions Bay hears from MLA Candidates
British Columbia goes to the polls on October 19, and campaigning is in full swing. The Watershed posed a series of questions to the candidates for the West Vancouver Sea to Sky riding.
The Players:
Incumbent Jordan Sturdy, member of the former Liberal Party is retiring at the end of this session. With the dissolution of the United Party, he will not be followed by a candidate from his own party.
Instead the three major parties will be represented by fresh faces.
Jeremy Valeriote, Green Party candidate for West Vancouver Sea To Sky. The Greens are led by Sonia Furstenau.
Jen Forde will stand for the New Democratic Party, led by Premier David Eby.
The BC Conservative Party, led by newly acclaimed John Rustad is represented in this riding by Yuri Fulmer.
Reporting results in order of responses, we begin with Green Party candidate Jeremy Valeriote.
The Questions:
Lions Bay is among a handful of municipalities that have struggled with accountability. Would you support a change in legislation or a provincial body to oversee Municipal Affairs?
No community wants to be in the media, and known to the wider world, for a 'dysfunctional' town hall. We’ve seen a number of municipalities where conflict between mayors, councillors and staff have led to an inability to work together and staff departures, often accompanied by litigation and severance packages. These disputes lead to unnecessary costs and inevitably reduced capacity - both of which are felt by local residents and taxpayers.
In our system local government is self-regulating, with no external body to enforce decisions or hear appeals. Worse still, while the provincial government requires municipalities to consider adopting codes of conduct, it is up to councils to decide whether to have them at all. The BC Greens would work for stronger accountability measures - for staff and elected representatives - as well as tougher conflict of interest rules. This could mean that cities or regions are required to have codes of conduct backed up by properly empowered ethics commissioners. Or there could be a provincial watchdog overseeing municipal affairs, like the Auditor General for Local Government (an office the NDP scrapped in 2021, but shouldn’t have).
With a village sited on the Átl’ka7tsem / Howe Sound Biosphere, many Lions Bay residents are deeply concerned about environmental issues. What are your priorities to maintain or improve the protection of this region, with particular reference to concerns including the upcoming LNG transfer facility at Woodfibre, increased tourism in the region and climate-related drought?
I’ve been very consistent in opposing Woodfibre LNG over 10 years, and I am the only candidate in our riding against the project. Not only is it irresponsible to build new fossil fuel infrastructure in a climate crisis but this project threatens to inflict particularly damaging impacts on the recovering Howe Sound/Atl’ka7tsem marine environment.
The proposed project aims to bring fracked fossil gas at high pressure from northwestern BC, via Fortis BC’s pipeline to Coquitlam, across the North Shore mountains and under the Squamish River Estuary, to the historical forest-industry Woodfibre site south of Squamish. The gas would then be liquefied, and shipped in tankers through this sensitive, recovering marine environment - a UNESCO-designated Biosphere Reserve - to be burned for fuel in Asia.
After 100 years of environmental degradation we cannot allow the recovering sea life - anchovy, herring, salmon, glass reefs, orca, humpback whales, seals and sea lions and so much more - to be wiped out again. It's because we love Howe Sound that there is community opposition to WLNG in Squamish; Lions Bay; Bowen, Gambier and the other islands; Gibsons and the Sunshine Coast; and West Vancouver.
There has to be a balance with tourism. Communities benefit from tourism income, but must have the resources to cope with the crowds. Regional transit and active transportation are key to a choked highway, and the ‘Don’t Love it to Death’ tourism management campaign highlights the need for educating visitors to the region.
Our natural assets - including watersheds and aquifers - provide huge value, but they are often only recognized when they are compromised, and communities face massive costs. Water conservation is increasingly important given climate change-induced drought, so authorities must end our traditionally irresponsible use of clean freshwater, particularly by industries who consider it essentially ‘free’.
Highway safety is top of mind for many residents along the Sea to Sky Corridor. What is your stance on ensuring the safety of drivers in this region, for whom Highway 99 is the only route to and from their homes?
I’ve long advocated for public, regional transit between Vancouver and the Pemberton Valley. Regional transit is the solution to many problems: safety, affordability, equity, economic development, highway congestion, and climate pollution, and it should have happened by now. Of course transit isn’t a solution for everyone, but it provides options for many families and commuters, and reduces the number of vehicles on the highway overall.
I know residents in Lions Bay, as well as some of the other small communities along the Sea to Sky, have urged for the use of speed cameras and ‘average speed over time’ enforcement to deter dangerously fast and noisy motorists. There has to be a balance, and it’s clear from the many fatalities and traffic jams on the highway this summer, that the occasional police speed traps aren’t enough. I was surprised that they took away the "Speed Kills" sign given that both education and enforcement are needed to solve this problem.
What else would you like to share with voters in Lions Bay?
I've heard residents talk about the importance of bringing back the Block Watch program, which involved a regular dialogue with Squamish RCMP, and news about traffic incidents and home break-ins, for example. I would ensure that we restore that link. Overall, voters in Lions Bay have a clear choice this provincial election. We’ve had two big parties with one of them (BC Liberals/ BC United/ Soc-Cred) having represented the Sea to Sky forever, while the other (BC NDP) has never come close here. In government they trade power back and forth and waste time and money undoing each others’ efforts. Now that the BC Conservatives have replaced BC United, we have an election campaign dominated by fear and anger. In reality, they are not really that different from each other, captured by corporate interests and seeking absolute power.
The Greens were just 60 votes short (out of 25,000), proving that we can win. So I’d urge Lions Bay any resident to vote with their head and their heart, for a better future free of political ideology and populist games. Vote Green for your children and grandchildren, so that we leave them a world where they can succeed and thrive.
This is the first in a series of articles in The Watershed in the lead-up to the provincial election on October 19. Leave your comments below, or email us at editor@lionsbaywatershed.ca
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