OPTICS OF PICKING OUR POCKETS

It has been widely suggested by legions of abused taxpayers that the more accurate definition of redundancy these days is an airbag in a politician’s car.
Maybe it’s just the freakin’ heat, but my b.s. detector has been going off more than a car alarm in Whalley as our Elected Ones in Victoria pitch “better new taxes” while stripping away services with the other side of their shameless mouths.
Maybe it’s just the heat, but how can they celebrate an expensive Olympic party for an elite few and not blink as they examine ways to downgrade Mission Memorial Hospital? Do you believe?
Why do they keep telling people to move to the Greatest Place on Earth if there is no room in our doctors’ offices, hospitals, schools or enough affordable homes? Is the invite for the rich only? Or those who don’t wonder why there are tolls on every new provincial project except the Sea-to-Sky Highway?
Do people know, for example, if they relocate to the Broke City in the Country that they will have user fees added to all the other increased costs? Or that they will subsidize dressing rooms, or pay a special (wink, wink) gas tax to do the job the other gouging gas taxes don’t?
How can our premier justify giving himself and his ministers humongous raises – and bring back gold-plated pensions – and then saddle the rest of the peons with a 12 per cent harmonization tax grab? And was it really necessary to increase the size of government during this recession, while telling our underpaid paramedics to get a grip on today’s economic realities?
How, we wonder, can our government justify having 223 people work in the Public Affairs Bureau as spin doctors telling us everything is fine, and yet not one person can offer a ballpark figure on the deficit?
And, if TransLink is really going to get people moving around the Lower Mainland without using their vehicles, how will we pay for the new Golden Ears Bridge and expanded Port Mann Bridge, given the need for increased vehicle traffic to pay for the structures and monthly bills?
And speaking of tolls, why are out-of-province vehicles exempt from paying, but there is no break for the working stiff in the morning as he or she waits in traffic lineups, burning valuable gas and time?
Why do we not have a better grip on B.C. Rail as everyone else is told to tighten his or her belt and share the pain? Four people make more than $100,000 per year to run a 40-kilometre-long railway.
And B.C. Rail’s CEO made a $275,000 base salary in 2008 but with perks, including a bonus, pocketed $494,182. No wonder “urgent care” is the buzzword in Mission these days.
Over in Ottawa, the governing Tory suits are upset with the Bank of Canada honchos for suggesting the recession is over. For good reason – these are the same feds who, with the Canada Council for the Arts, spent $40,000 to fly a giant inflatable banana over Texas. Good thing the monkeys were thrown in for free – heck, you elected them!
The feds and CCA also spent $15,000 to help bring a Belgian art exhibit to Quebec that produces a poop-like substance when fed with food. So, that flushing sound is another $55,000 of your tax money going down the drain.
And, I wonder how our prime minister’s promise to abolish the “irrelevant senate” is going now that he’s added to the numbers of bums in the not-so-cheap seats?
Yep, maybe it’s the heat.
Maybe it isn’t a coincidence that our governments raise the taxes on alcohol and then make sure our country and province are in such a mess that you drink more.
Enjoy the long weekend gang!

BREAKING BREAD WITH GEORGE!

On the same day this city reclaimed its Murder Capital of Canada epithet, and Statistics Canada revealed we’re one of the country’s most violent places to call home, George W. Peary apologizes for running three minutes late for a lunch date.
Abbotsford’s mayor, seemingly in damage control mode since replacing The Other George in 2008, has been up early trying to make sense out of complex numbers relating to crime, taxes, budgets and civic proposals.
With his busy day just warming up, he has already been vilified by Today website scribblers, social bloggers, several Vancouver radio shows and the usual letter-writing suspects who, like cabbies and hairdressers, don’t understand why they are not running our country.
Peary looks fit, rested and in good spirits while we break bread across the street from City Hall, the perfect location as he enters Day 2 of a week-long car-free challenge with three other Metro Vancouver politicians.
A friendly waitress advises this scribe to treat her “favourite customer” well. Peary assures her not to worry because he “never argues with people who buy ink by the barrel.”
Well, that’s not entirely true (wink, wink), but like all personable politicians, he certainly enjoys a great debate. And unlike most in today’s much-too-scripted, spin-doctored world, he returns calls and e-mails no matter how bad headlines and commentaries are in the morning. It’s just the way he rolls in our Gangland in the Country.
After offering up a few Winston Churchill motivational quotes, Peary admits life in the “hot seat” is extra challenging when dealing with a civic cash scenario easily mistaken for Old Mother Hubbard’s cupboard.
Asked if he’s enjoying wearing the Chain of Command bling during this Great Recession, the mayor is blunt: “The way I look at it, is if somebody has to occupy the chair in tough times, it might as well be me.”
Infamous for such Peary-isms as “I’m not young enough to know everything,” and “Our new arena would have looked much better with a real parking lot,” the mayor’s best line came as a councillor several years ago when he promised during a slump in the economy: “I refuse to let this thing die on my watch.”
He said Tuesday that’s still his mantra, which, if nothing else, helps him cope as critics pump up the volume on the city’s spending habits, salaries, user fees, gangs, gas taxes and, of course, Plan A.
During his campaign last fall, he admitted the latter expenditure would “put a real constraint on the council of the future.” It has, and during lunch he hinted the “on time, on budget” cheer chanted by his peers may prove to be only wishful thinking when final numbers are revealed in a couple weeks.
Despite making some enemies over the years with his no-nonsense, shoot-from-the-lip style, Peary is intelligent, politically savvy, passionate and relentless. The Abbotsford Regional Hospital and Cancer Centre is an example of what happens when you tell this guy “it’s never going to happen.”
He spent 21 years lobbying and fighting for that impressive facility, being told by several premiers and governments along the way that it just wasn’t in the cards. Whatever. So, when critics suggest he’ll be Dead Mayor Walking if he continues to do things his way, you just know he’s got them exactly where he wants them.
“A professor once told me the perfect lesson has yet to be taught. So, you do what you think is best, learn from mistakes and hope the voters don’t make you a one-term mayor.”
Or, as Churchill said: “Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.”

'PET PROJECT' WORTH BACKING!

Back when Ledgeview Golf and Country Club was still dubbed the “Goat Ranch” and yours truly was a fresh-off-the-Prairie-bus sports scribbler, I received an intriguing call from an insistent woman.
“Hey, sports guy, there are at least 100 beautiful ladies who want to meet you right now – and bring your camera!”
What Diane Davies neglected to mention during that brief exchange was the “ladies” were weekend golf warriors, and her Highwayman Pub was the sponsor looking for in-depth coverage usually only afforded to men’s tournaments at the time.
When I arrived at the clubhouse that afternoon, some of the “ladies” were already in full party mode. One of the winners, still composed and patting “Lady Di” on the back with compliments between sips of celebratory concoctions, didn’t appear worried about having to be in Victoria the next morning for work.
“She’s [Davies] the reason we all come here. Look at the [prize] table. The men are actually jealous of that booty.”
It seems just two years earlier the women were competing for socks, golf balls and meal vouchers, while the men hauled home microwaves and fancy TVs. Anyone knowing Davies figured that inequity would change. It did, quickly.
She started “trailblazing” 37 years ago when, while working for the RCMP, sought to establish the Highwayman Pub. It took five tough years, endless door knocking and plenty of politics to finally open the place in 1977 – on Canada Day of all days.
Davies still recalls the “fights and games” to license a pub in mostly-Mennonite Matsqui, back when the Bible Belt wasn’t known for gangsters, Sunday shopping and liquor outlets.
“We had a rule. If you fought or caused problems, you were barred from the Highwayman for life. We couldn’t chance the negative publicity,” said Davies who, not surprisingly, has a new “pet project” these days.
At the rear of her West Abbotsford pub and liquor store – an addition made 15 years ago which took three years to obtain an licence – are huge kennels so that while patrons drink and eat, their animals can do the same.
Her passion for animals comes from the pleasure of owning six dogs and the heartbreak of losing each one. Her energies are now spent promoting a shelter.
She has attended numerous council meetings, has met with the mayor, has played e-mail tag with councillors and has “hounded” bureaucrats to get creative with the books. She has waited for a commitment. Her so-so patience is running out.
“Our politicians found money for Plan A. They found money for a Friendship Garden. They found money to accommodate a pro hockey team – why not spend $2 million more and set up an animal shelter that helps everyone?”
Davies admitted her timing may not be perfect given the recession, a growing homeless problem and pressure to spend less at City Hall, but she has witnessed the city’s “cupboard is bare” argument go AWOL in a heartbeat before.
“Create a plan [for the shelter]. Show us the land, affix a cost. There are enough dog lovers here who will make it happen. Doing nothing is irresponsible.”
If you’ve ever had an animal you’ll know why they bring cheer to sick kids at hospitals, why they can make a lonely senior smile from ear-to-ear in a care home and why it really bites not having a shelter, especially when so many folks are now forced to give up pets because they can’t afford the food, the vet bills or other costs.
For a city that likes to compare itself to the “big leagues,” it’s sad, really, that the closest animal shelter is in Aldergrove – and it doesn’t accept cats. To me, that’s actually a Pity in the Country.
We should find a clever way to support Lady Di’s dream – and bring your camera (wink, wink).

CRUCIAL LIFE LESSONS LEARNED AT STREET LEVEL

They say you’re built upside down when your nose runs and your feet smell, so forgive me today for dipping into the “archives” while I battle the remains of a pesky flu that, like our gang problem here, refuses to go away.
Given that the Special Olympics B.C. Summer Games started last night in Abbotsford and runs all weekend, this “encore presentation” seems appropriate:
My former neighbour Kevin, once the Roberto Luongo of winter street hockey in Yorkton, Sask., would be high-fiving my folks today if his kind heart didn’t stop beating three days shy of his 16th birthday.
Later this evening, Kamloops Immigrant Services will award 19 people – including this shocked scribe – with a Community Diversity Award. If truth be told, my mother’s name, not mine, should be inscribed on that cherished certificate.
Adele Mildred Kurenoff, my awesome mom, taught me early, and often, about tolerance, goodwill, compassion and decency. (She joked that these things didn’t apply in today’s workplace.)
She also taught me to not let the ignoramuses of the world hijack my outlook or lofty dreams. And, more importantly, she forced me to play street hockey with Kevin when nobody else in our small Saskatchewan neighbourhood would.
Kevin was mentally challenged. We looked at him, as naive kids would, as being very different. And odd. And weird. We never asked him to join our hockey games, even though it was he who often got up earlier than Prairie roosters and shovelled the one patch of road to make the entire exercise possible.
Mom asked one morning why Kevin wasn’t allowed to play. I confessed nobody wanted him to join us. Visibly upset with me for going along with the “lame-brain majority,” she ordered me to change that the next time we played – “or else!”
Well, when I picked Kevin for our team, the other kids on the street mocked me big time.
“Kurenoff, are you completely nuts?” yelled the neighbourhood mouthpiece, encouraged by the others’ non-stop laughter and catty shots.
“No. We’re both nuts,” Kevin blurted back unexpectedly. “And we’re going to beat you boys bad!”
What we didn’t know until he played was that Kevin could stop lightning from getting past him. It didn’t take long to figure out that the team with Kevin playing goal usually won. Darn neighbour even got cocky about his near-perfect record. When he passed away, the church was filled with his ragtag “hockey buddies.” His foster mom thanked each of us for making a much-too-short life full of so much joy.
We all got seriously choked up when she told the funeral gathering that Kevin thought “we were all pretty odd, lousy goal-scorers, but the nicest friends in the whole wide world.”
When my first editor – Dick DeRyk of Yorkton This Week – molded me into a weekly columnist, he explained that people sitting behind a keyboard have a lot of power and responsibility. Used incorrectly or dishonestly, our words could become weapons of mass destruction. Just like closed or narrow minds.
My mother encouraged me to use this special privilege to make people smile, to make them think and eventually make them tolerate everyone around them who may be different. Like Kevin.
My mom continues to encourage these columns. Allow me to offer loving thanks to her for removing my blinders and, of
course, a big high-five in the sky to the best street hockey goalie I ever knew.
Rest in peace, Kevin. This award’s for you buddy.

Gord Kurenoff is editor of the Abbotsford-Mission Times. He was a nominee last fall for an Abbotsford Diversity Award. To comment, e-mail letters@abbotsfordtimes.com.

ART CLASS NO. 1 ON JULY 1!