THE WEEK: Water supplies are good, fireworks are bad and where Daniel Arbour lives

THE WEEK: Water supplies are good, fireworks are bad and where Daniel Arbour lives

by | Oct 26, 2022

THE WEEK: Water supplies are good, fireworks are bad and where Daniel Arbour lives

By

Vancouver Island has experienced record-high temperatures this fall and record-low amounts of rainfall. Even the Mojave Desert in California has received more precipitation than the Island.

And with rising temperatures, water consumption and evaporation have increased all over the world, draining water supplies from California to Europe to the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia down to dangerously low levels.

The Comox Valley has not been immune. According to Kris La Rose, the senior manager of water and wastewater services at the regional district, the Comox Lake reservoir is very low at the moment, particularly so given the wet spring that seeped into mid-July.

And there has been little replenishment since creating drought conditions. Although, two atmospheric rivers predicted to head our way this week may dump double-digit millimeters of rain.

But throughout the recent extended drought, La Rose says water supplies available to the Comox Valley system were never threatened.

“By Hydro manages the reservoir and prioritizes fish flows and power generation, but with the newly installed lake intake being well below the BC Hydro dam sill (the lowest point at which water can still flow down the Puntledge River), the community water system is no longer threatened by drought conditions,” he told Decafnation.

That’s good news. An important benefit from the $126 million upgrades and new water treatment plant that opened a year ago.

However, the water system’s licenses and water use agreements with BC Hydro still require the regional district to impose higher level water restrictions as Hydro reduces flow down the river. That was the reason behind shifting to stage 3 water restrictions in early October. Hydro concluded they needed to reduce flows to make it through to the start of fall rains.

So, if the weather forecast is accurate, and we get around up to 50mm over the next 72 hours, all this talk and worry about droughts and water supplies will fade into the background. At least until drought conditions occur again next summer.

 

NO FIREWORKS THIS HALLOWEEN

In just a few days, Halloween festivities will take place all across the Comox Valley. Kids will be trick or treating, adults will be dressing up for costume parties and some people will set off fireworks, annoying neighbors and frightening family pets and wildlife. And potentially starting fires.

This year, anyone igniting fireworks will being do so in defiance of an Island-wide ban imposed by the BC Wildfire Service.

Following directives from the Wildfire Service, the Comox Valley Regional District and the Village of Cumberland have banned the use of fireworks and have not issued any fireworks permits. Individual use of fireworks in Courtenay and Comox are banned.

In a normal year, however, the regional district has issued many permits for the use of legal fireworks. In 2019, it granted 76 permits; 117 in 2020 and 72 in 2021.

Given all the personal and community dangers associated with fireworks, is it time for a Valley-wide ban on individual fireworks

 

CLARIFICATION IN OUR COVERAGE

Thanks to an alert reader, Decafnation must clarify an oversight in our 2022 local government election coverage. Throughout the recent campaign, we were critical of the trend toward candidates living in one jurisdiction and seeking elected office in another.

While we had checked the residence of many new candidates, we did not check the nomination papers of Area A incumbent Director Daniel Arbour. We assumed he was still living full-time with his wife and family at their Hornby Island home.

But a reader’s comment to our last election commentary told us otherwise. So we checked.

Arbour listed two addresses on his nomination papers this year, one for the family home on Hornby and a second address on Ryan Road in Area B. Due to family matters, Arbour has regularly split his time between the Hornby and in-town residences over the past year.

The Arbours purchased a four-bedroom mobile unit in the Courtenay area to facilitate an easier daily commute for their children, who were entering high school at G.P. Vanier. It’s not uncommon for Island residents to lessen the burden of a long two-ferry commute with secondary accommodations on the Big Island.

Current School District 71 Trustee Sheila McDonnell, who served as board chair last year, told Decafnation that she has employed the same strategy.

“In my own case, we had a second home in Courtenay from about 2006 when it became clear that my daughter would not be able to complete Grade 10-12 either doing distance ed on her own or commuting,” she said. “ We had a tenant in the main part of our house, but retained an addition as a minimum base for weekends and summer use.”

McDonnell ran for the Board of Education position a few years later, in a 2010 by-election. She’d had time to be on the Parent Advisory Council at Lake Trail where my son went, and then on the District PAC.

“I do not think I would have been able to do the job commuting from Hornby for meetings – staying in hotels would have been very onerous and time away from the family would have been very difficult,” she said. “The temporary migration to town is something a lot of families do for a few years in various permutations. We often put up friends of all ages at our (in-town) place.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Comox Valley local government elections ramping up for Oct. 15 vote

Comox Valley voters will elect new councilors, mayors, regional district representatives, school board members and Island Trust reps on Oct. 15. Find out who’s running for what … and why. Decafnation returns to shine more light on local government issues and candidates

Let’s put one of the craziest Comox Valley elections into the history book, and then close it

Let’s put one of the craziest Comox Valley elections into the history book, and then close it

by | Oct 18, 2022

Let’s put one of the craziest Comox Valley elections into the history book, and then close it

By

Well, that was fun. Or was it? On the surface, the 2022 local government election should go down as one of the most unusual, maybe even the craziest campaign in Comox Valley history.

We had gun-toting Trumpers, Freedom Convoy Truckers and climate change deniers. We had women claiming our schools were grooming children for sexual exploitation. We had long-winded rants on social media over racism and sexual health education. We had groups of wannabe players that were afraid to show their faces.

We had candidates running for office in places where they don’t live because they think they know better than the people who live there. We had two secret political action groups pretending they represented the views of the average Valleyite when they really represented no more than their little clubs.

We had signs that violated city bylaws by a candidate who displayed them recklessly. And we had candidates, mostly of the conservative, pro-development persuasion, that boycotted public debates.

It was weird.

But when the sun rose on Sunday, Oct. 16, Comox Valley voters had made it clear they liked the direction charted by our local governments over the last four years. In the municipalities, they elected all but two incumbents. In most races, the vote was a definite pat on the back for a job well done.

The rest of it was just meaningless noise.

But there was something new and disturbing this year. It was the idea that telling a lie or otherwise intentionally spreading misinformation should be considered an acceptable campaign tactic. And those advancing this idea justified it because, they said, the underlying purpose of telling lies is to start public conversations about legitimate issues.

When Take Back Comox Valley (TBCV) ran social media ads and stated on its website that some unidentified local council members are trying to defund the police and had taken money from the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation via the Dogwood citizen action network, they were telling a lie. They have no proof of either claim.

In fact, a founding member of TBCV told Decafnation that he knew the defunding the police claim wasn’t true and had disagreed with the majority of the group about telling that lie. But he went along with it because, you know, the mob rules.

And they rationalized telling the lie because it’s just a big joke. Nobody actually expects it to be true. It’s just part of the game. Just like Trump claiming he won the US election. Just like Freedom truckers creating a fake letter from Prime Minister Trudeau or spreading the lie that Ottawa police officers were exempt from vaccine mandates.

It’s a reckless game that degrades public discourse. It turns voters off and diminishes the integrity of democratic elections. Those who play it sacrifice all claim to principle.

There were no meaningful community conversations created by TBCV. They encouraged no consequential dialogue and proposed no resolutions to the issues they raised. A quick look at their Facebook page shows a lot of angry and vitriolic invective thrown back and forth.

Most of the TBCV’s contempt was directed at the Courtenay council, which was wholeheartedly vindicated by voters and given a strong mandate to continue its work.

So what was achieved by telling the lies other than to have a laugh?

Fortunately, the people who cared enough to vote didn’t get the joke.

 

A CHANGING POPULACE

Has the mainstream of Comox Valley politics turned slightly left?

New Democratic Party candidates have won the last two provincial elections and the last three federal elections in our ridings. Progressive candidates won majorities on municipal councils in Courtenay and Cumberland in the last two elections and in Comox and the rural electoral areas in 2018.

In terms of which political parties voters have supported, a shift has definitely occurred. But why?

One reason might be found in this story. A Courtenay incumbent told Decafnation that they had knocked on 3,000 doors over the last four weeks and had spoken with many new Valley residents. The general consensus among those new residents was that they love it here and see comparatively fewer problems than where they previously lived.

The newcomers laugh at our traffic issues. They’ve already accepted the introduction of bike lanes. They’ve seen real traffic congestion, more serious crime and the problems associated with unsheltered people. They know these things exist everywhere.

So, maybe it’s not an ideological change that has occurred, but growth in the number of people who have had broader and more diverse life experiences. Maybe our issues don’t seem as problematic to them as they might to people who haven’t lived anywhere else.

Maybe what we’ve been labeling “progressive” is now the mainstream perspective of Comox Valley voters.

 

OTHER THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS ELECTION

– It’s too bad more people don’t appreciate the difference a mayor and council can make in their lives. Voter turnout for local government elections has always been low, but this year it was really low.

We don’t know why, but the turnout was lower across the board. Perhaps it was because of an uninspiring race for mayor of Courtenay – Bob Wells didn’t have any serious competition. Or maybe because there was no mayor’s race in Comox – Nicole Minions was acclaimed.

Maybe it was because there weren’t many all-candidates debates and something like half the candidates refused to show up anyway. If the candidates don’t give a damn about the process, then why should voters?

Maybe a few of the candidates disgusted people about local politics. The Comox Valley Mainstream and Take Back Comox Valley groups might have turned people off.

Maybe it was just the nice October weather.

But you know something’s in the air when the number of eligible voters in Cumberland more than doubles from 2018 but fewer than half as many voters turn out in 2022. Voter engagement dropped by 50.9 percent in the Village, according to data from Civic Info BC.

Twenty-one percent fewer voters turned out in Courtenay. Twenty-two percent fewer in Comox. Slightly lower in the rural areas.

Having fewer candidates on the ballot might help. Too many candidates seem to overwhelm voters. It looks like too much work to find out about each candidate and what they stand for.

We could start to pare down the ballot by requiring a candidate’s residency in the jurisdiction where they seek public office.

It’s a double standard, as one Capital City voter put it. “I have to prove that I reside in Victoria to vote for a candidate who doesn’t. Huh?”

– On the other hand, interest in the School District 71 Board of Education quadrupled. In 2018, only 4,392 ballots were cast, partly because four of the seven trustee seats were filled by acclamation. But this year, 11,472 ballots were cast, and only two seats went by acclamation.

Why such a huge and sudden interest? Maybe because several incumbents retired and more seats were up for grabs.

More likely, though, it was the age-old debate over sexual health education. Several candidates strongly opposed sexual health education in our schools and made wild claims about teachers encouraging kids to become gay males or lesbians and to engage in ‘deviant behavior.’

Yeah, that campaign platform might have brought out a large backlash of voters from the bulk of people who support LGBTQ rights and policies.

– Daniel Arbour received 80.2 percent of the vote (1,807 votes) in Electoral Area A. That was the largest percentage of support for a regional district director in all of BC. Well, except for incumbent Gerald Whalley who received 96 percent of the vote (215 votes) to represent Kyuquot/Nootka-Sayward in the Strathcona Regional District.

“I attribute this to being thorough and proactive on all the issues facing Area A’s five communities,” he told Decafnation. “People also appreciate my positive engagement at the provincial and federal levels on municipal-related issues, and bringing forward authentic policy proposals for our region and beyond.”

– The loss of Arzeena Hamir in Area B will be deeply felt in the Valley, especially in her leadership relating to environmental, food, and social policy issues. She lost by 23 votes to Richard Hardy, who will be the first K’omoks First Nation member of the Comox Valley Regional District board.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GET THE FULL LOCAL ELECTION RESULTS HERE

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A few random items as the 2022 election comes to a close

A few random items as the 2022 election comes to a close

by | Oct 14, 2022

A few random items as the 2022 election comes to a close

By

 

BRONCO’S FINAL RIDE

During all the bluster and chaos of local government elections, you might have missed the announcement that Bill “Bronco” Moncrief died on Sept. 15 at Glacier View Lodge.

Recent newcomers to the Comox Valley are not likely to know Bronco, but he played a key role in shaping the community for almost a half-century.  His passing should be noted.

Moncrief got his nickname because he was a fiery individual who could ignite at a moment’s notice. And it was a rough ride if you had struck the match.

He was first elected in 1967 as a Village of Cumberland Alderman and then served as mayor for more than 30 years, starting in 1969.

 

WHAT IS MANNO DOING IN GREECE?

Poor Manno Theos. The incumbent seeking re-election to Courtenay City Council has been maligned on social media and on this website over whether he has a serious commitment to his elected position.

For most of the last four years, Theos has lived in Nanaimo and has been absent from the full array of council member obligations. And he’s been completely absent during this election campaign, spending his time in Greece.

After photos appeared online that show him in vacation mode, which drew criticisms on social media and on Decafnation, Theos floated the idea that he was there to handle his father’s estate.

He made it sound like his father had died recently and that he was there on a somber mission that he had been prevented from carrying out because of the pandemic. He painted himself as a victim of unfair criticism.

But thanks to community sources, we have learned that Theos’ dad died four and a half years ago, two years before the pandemic. Theos has flown to Greece since his father died and before the Covid lockdown began.

So, not a recent death, plenty of time to handle affairs, a pre-Covid trip to Greece, and photos of him “vacationing.”

Meanwhile, Theos has missed the entire campaign. Maybe he didn’t want to answer questions about his residency and commitment to council work. The trip seems poorly timed for a politician seeking re-election, or maybe not.

But hanging out in Greece hasn’t stopped Theos from attacking Mayor Bob Wells and other council members on his social media pages.

And, perhaps most egregiously, Theos recently posted a negative attack on Councillor Melanie McCollum. McCollum just lost her mother to a bicycle-truck accident and is actually grieving. But no condolences from Theos who claims he’s still grieving four years later.

We hope personal integrity still matters to Courtenay voters and that they give Theos a good reason to stay in Nanaimo.

 

LIES AND MORE DAMN LIES

When you run for public office, you have to expect intense scrutiny of everything about you. And it helps to have a Teflon coat so that the lies and unfounded attacks never stick.

Electoral Area A Director Daniel Arbour recently issued a public statement after negative phone calls were made claiming that he was funded or controlled by the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation.

“This is crazy. My campaign expenses will be about $1,700 and it looks like a handful of residents across Area A are covering the bulk of it,” Arbour said. “I was saddened to hear from one of our elders on Hornby who had received a call and was shocked and confused by the claims and accusations made against me … Shame on the person or group who is fabricating this nonsense. If I was richer and had time on my hand, I would hire a lawyer … and sue them for defamation.”

 

SHADOWY RIGHT-WING GROUPS POPPING UP EVERYWHERE

Climate denial has been a stealth candidate in several BC municipal elections, according to a review by The Energy Mix and published in The Watershed Sentinel.

“When voters go to the polls, some will be able to cast their ballot for candidates running as members of a “slate” backed by elector organizations like Surrey First, founded in 2008 by a group of citizens concerned about rampant development in their community. But a number of other such civic political parties are very new on the scene, including Maple Ridge First, ParentsVoice BC, Viva Victoria, and Kelowna’s Spirit Alliance, all of which were founded in September, a review by The Energy Mix has found.”

Read the full article here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHERE AND WHEN TO VOTE

General Voting Day is Saturday, Oct. 15 for all local government positions.

Comox Valley Regional District

General Voting Day and advance voting take place at the CVRD building in Courtenay from 8 am to 8 pm.

Go to this link for General Voting Day locations in the three Electoral Areas.

Courtenay

General Voting Day, Saturday, October 15, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Queneesh Elementary School, and at the Florence Filberg Centre.

Comox

General Voting Day runs from 8 am to 8 pm on Oct. 15 at the Comox Community Centre.

Cumberland

All voting in the Village of Cumberland takes place from 8 am to 8 pm at the Cumberland Cultural Centre.

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Who’s behind the shadowy Comox Valley political action groups? We shine some light

Who’s behind the shadowy Comox Valley political action groups? We shine some light

by | Oct 13, 2022

Who’s behind the shadowy Comox Valley political action groups? We shine some light

By

 

This story was updated Friday afternoon to add comments from a former Courtenay Dogwood organizing manager and remove some names from the Take Back Comox Valley supporters.

It’s tough growing up. For someone in their early teens, life can be confusing. You don’t know who to trust, who to follow, everything feels emotional and every decision, no matter how trivial, seems so important.

For communities like ours in the midst of a rapid growth spurt, life can also be confusing. New residents bring fresh perspectives that have the potential to alter historical values and ideologies. That can make it difficult for newcomers to blend in and for old-timers to deal with change.

These growing pains may be at the root of a dark subplot in these 2022 local government elections. Secretive groups have formed to resist change. A new media player is trying to facilitate more of it.

Decafnation hopes to shed some light today on these multiple shadowy organizations; a light that we hope will lead to a brighter day.

Who is behind CV Mainstream, Take Back Comox Valley and VanIsle.news?

OUR POPULATION GROWTH

The Comox Valley Regional District grew 8.9 percent from 2016 to 2021, a population increase from 66,527 to 72,445. And it’s a good bet that a large slice of those new residents is gig workers, tech industry workers and other people who can work remotely. These people tend to be young, in the 30-50 range and to lean a little more liberal than conservative.

The 2018 municipal elections seemed to reflect this shift. Voters chose more progressive candidates focused on climate change, creating urban density rather than sprawl, setting clearer rules for new developments and helping people get around by walking or cycling. And they started changing the rules and setting a course toward a different vision of the Comox Valley’s future.

This has alarmed the most conservative among us and also those who have grown up here or have been here a long time. 

In normal times, this scenario would have been seen as just a healthy difference of opinion. But not this year. Advertisements and phone calls have spread lies and misinformation. Fringe candidates have popped up in every jurisdiction, inspired no doubt by the Freedom Convoy and anti-vaxx movement. But it’s too simple to blame the anger expressed in this election on pent-up frustrations in the post-pandemic era.

Maybe it’s because Big Moneyed Outside Interests have started meddling in small-town politics.

Decafnation has been doing some digging around, so let’s see who’s really behind these shadowy Comox Valley political action groups.

 

COMOX VALLEY MAINSTREAM

As we suspected, this group is just the latest incarnation of the 2018 Comox Valley Taxpayers Alliance, and the 2014 Common Sense, but with slight differences in membership.

We now know that Dick Clancy, a well-known local conservative activist, is not involved with CVM. Which makes us sad that we can’t write about Dick and the boys anymore.

A source tells us that Mainstream was launched by Art Meyers, Mike Finneron, Murray Presley, Dave Mellin, Curtis Scoville and Sue Finneron. There were others involved, like Marg Grant, at various times who attended the meetings, some of which were at the Crown Isle clubhouse.

Our source says the group originally intended to gather names of like-minded people to make phone calls encouraging people to vote and to promote conservative candidates. The original intent was to be middle-of-the-road and non-political.

At some point, the group’s goal shifted into recruiting candidates and endorsing them, apparently with scant background checks. And that caused some members to leave the group.

Still, those involved have tried to hide their identity, although it was public knowledge that Presely registered CVM as an Elector Organization with Elections BC, and Scoville’s social media posts were a dead giveaway.

This is the Old Guard still pissed about losing control and doing a slow boil just thinking about the new kids messing up their house.

 

TAKE BACK COMOX VALLEY

This group formed out of a small gathering of people in their 30s and 40s and grew to include 12 people.

On the Take Back Comox Valley (TBCV) Facebook page, some members have revealed their identities, including the Courtenay car dealer Rod McLean.

A source privy to the group’s formation – who wanted anonymity because association with TBCV could negatively impact his business – told Decafnation that the idea was to create community conversation around five key issues: the restriction on urban sprawl and the trend toward urban density, the proliferation of bike lanes, the Courtenay updated Official Community Plan, inaction on rising crime and homelessness issues and health care.

They also wanted to shed light on the Dogwood Initiative, which they say is partly funded by the U.S.-based Rockefeller Brothers Foundation. They go so far as to infer that local incumbents have taken money from Dogwood and, therefore, by extension, the Rockefeller foundation.

Our source said the group also aligned themselves with the Pacific Prosperity Network (PPN) for support on legislation and regulation and some guidance on how to “perform our messages.”

The PPN is run by Micah Haince, a BC United Party (formerly BC Liberal Party) supporter, with the mission to “provide training and support right-wing and center-right candidates running for political office.”

And, according to an Aug. 3 article in the Vancouver Sun, PPN has been financed by Vancouver Billionaire and Lululemon founder Chip Wilson who donated $380,000 and lobbied other wealthy people by a personal letter to donate from $50,000 to $200,000 each.

The PPN group was fined $1,000 on Oct. 6 by Elections BC for two violations of the BC Local Elections Campaign Financing Act and the Election Act.

Our source says it was the Pacific Prosperity Network that made the ads and videos that ran on social media but the content came from the local members. When the ads became controversial and blew up their Facebook page, “some members stepped back personally from revealing themselves” because they could be “attacked as people and therefore their businesses.”

But, our source says, TBCV has no involvement with the phone calls being made to voters in certain areas that point-blank state the lie that incumbents in this election are taking money from the Rockefeller foundation.

“There were some phone calls done late September and earlier October that were petition-based on some of the issues,” Rod McLean told us via email.

“Businesses in Courtenay are fed up with the homelessness situation, crime, increased taxes locally, provincially and federally and how that tax money is being spent in a nutshell,” he said. “Our local council (Courtenay) has increased taxes significantly to businesses and taken away services.”

McLean said the TBCV group is “really concerned about housing affordability, and the 271-page OCP’s with vague language and an agenda that only benefits 1 segment of our community.”

McLean also said that mental health and addiction issues are being ignored. “People try to say it is a provincial issue, is it?”

Our source told us that members of TBCV are business people, Rotary Club members, volunteers in nonprofits and generous donors to Comox Valley charities.

And McLean added that “TBCV isn’t going anywhere, it will be on-going.”

 

VANISLE.NEWS

Although not yet a major player in our community, this relatively new media outlet publishes stories about local, provincial and national relevance for three Vancouver Island regions: the North Island, the west coast of the Island and the Comox Valley. They are included in this rundown of political activists out of complete transparency on our part.

We happen to know that Vanisle.news was originally conceived by people at least loosely associated with the Dogwood Initiative, calling themselves Together We Win at the time and now Together News. We know that because a couple of years ago (using the first person now), I was approached by these people – one of whom was a local resident. They wanted me to share my stories with them, perhaps even blend Decafnation into their new product.

While I liked the idea of someone providing more news coverage of interesting local stories on the north and west parts of the Island, I rejected the offer simply because I didn’t want to be a part of their project. Decafnation is a proudly transparent and independent website because we have no financial support and, most of the time, it’s just me.

Reached at his home for comment, Dave Mills said that Dogwood has no affiliation with VanIsle.news, “loose or otherwise.” The Dogwood Organizing Program Manager, who was based in Courtenay but is currently on a one-year leave, told Decafnation that VanIsle.new was started by Will Horter, who was Dogwood BC’s executive director for more than a decade but left the organization in 2015.

“That is as far as any connection goes,” Mills said. And he added that Dogwood is not involved in any way in Comox Valley local elections.

Unfortunately, like the political action groups, VanIsle.news also hides behind anonymity. We don’t know who runs and supports the organization today, and neither does the public. Their website doesn’t provide the names of any staff, owners or financial supporters.

That’s not acceptable for a news organization.

 

SO WHAT DO WE HAVE …

What you have here is some well-funded BC political action groups – Dogwood and the Pacific Prosperity Network – dipping their toes into small-town politics. One works for right-wing and center-right candidates, and the other works for left-wing and center-left candidates.

The difference between the two is that the Pacific Prosperity Network went about its work by posting video advertisements on social media that contained lies and misinformation. We don’t follow the VanIsle.news websites regularly but to our knowledge, neither they nor Dogwood has published anything or made any phone calls comparable to the PPN/TBCV material.

You also have a group of the Comox Valley aging Old Gang who used to have some sway, especially when Art Meyers and the boys could count on former BC cabinet minister Stan Hagen.

Except that the CV Mainstream effort was feeble, as it has been in its past iterations. They didn’t engage in the issues or give any justification for endorsing one candidate over another. And this year they picked a couple of stinkers.

In the end, they are just the good-old-gang of yore hoping they could still hand-pick their local councils.

And then you have TBCV, a group of younger conservative, pro-development citizens who wanted to raise issues important to them, but went about it in the worst way possible. Instead of proposing specific courses of action to address their issues, they joined forces with an organization that made them look like a bunch of angry lunatics.

That strategy won’t win them any friends or respect.

Neither of the TBCV members we talked to was repentant about their negative approach that relied on lies and misinformation. They told us they had created valuable community conversations and that their methods weren’t controversial.

What we don’t understand is why people who are afraid their association with a political action group could negatively affect their livelihoods get involved with that group. This isn’t a police state and there are other ways to engage in the democratic process.

Politics is always messy. You’re always going to have people who don’t agree with you, and the more extreme your presentation, the more extreme the reaction to it.

What we need is more civil public discourse.

 

AND THEN THERE ARE THE CANDIDATES

We have MAGA hat-wearers, climate deniers and anti-vaxxers. We have a candidate who shot himself in the foot over some campaign signs and made it worse by stuffing the wounded foot in his mouth.

We have challengers who don’t live in places but feel qualified to represent the people that do. That includes one candidate currently living in Nanaimo. We have a mayor candidate so detached that he watches from the sidelines.

We have a candidate running on a personal grudge and some long-time incumbents who don’t know when to quit. And we have a whole bunch of challengers too scared to meet the public at all-candidates meetings.

Judging by some signs around town, the Comox residents flooded out of their apartments by a broken town water pipe and promptly abandoned by the Town Council would have had some pointed questions for Maureen Swift and Ken Grant.

But thank goodness, we also have incumbents with class who defended their records without disparaging the opponents. When the challengers went low, the incumbents stayed high.

Now, it’s up to the voters and how on God’s Green Earth they’re going to sort out this mess is anyone’s guess. But it will be interesting. Vote.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHERE AND WHEN TO VOTE

General Voting Day is Saturday, Oct. 15 for all local government positions.

Comox Valley Regional District

General Voting Day and advance voting take place at the CVRD building in Courtenay from 8 am to 8 pm.

Go to this link for General Voting Day locations in the three Electoral Areas.

Courtenay

General Voting Day, Saturday, October 15, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Queneesh Elementary School, and at the Florence Filberg Centre.

Comox

General Voting Day runs from 8 am to 8 pm on Oct. 15 at the Comox Community Centre.

Cumberland

All voting in the Village of Cumberland takes place from 8 am to 8 pm at the Cumberland Cultural Centre.

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Local candidates clam up rather than speak to Comox Valley voters in public

Local candidates clam up rather than speak to Comox Valley voters in public

by | Oct 11, 2022

CAPTION CONTEST: Send us a caption for this photograph that relates to the current election campaign. There could be prizes.

Local candidates clam up rather than speak to Comox Valley voters in public

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Alert! Call in the mental health professionals at once! The Comox Valley is experiencing a severe outbreak of Glossophobia among the candidates in this year’s local government elections. And strangely, it appears to have infected only the conservative, old-guard, pro-development and wacky candidates.

Apparently, being a progressively-minded incumbent or challenger gives you natural immunity.

Glossophobics, as I’m sure you already know, have a fear of public speaking. And what other possible explanation could the conservative, old-guard, pro-development and wacky candidates have for avoiding almost every opportunity to answer questions in a public setting?

Assuredly, this is an odd situation. Politicians in general, and especially those on the fringes, normally drool over any chance to speak in public and drown their audiences in a stream of non-sequiturs.

But this year, a specific group of candidates has refused to participate in normally sedate all-candidates forums. They are mostly those endorsed by the conservative, old-guard, pro-development and wacky organization that imagines itself in the “mainstream” of Comox Valley ideology. And that’s a delusionary state in itself.

For Courtenay City Council, there were only two all-candidates forums and just one for the Comox Town Council. Electoral area candidates were invited to both.

So, other than a sudden onset of Glossophobia, we can’t think of any reason why Brennan Day, Deana Simkin, Mano Theos, Michael Gilbert, Starr Winchester, Phil Adams and Lyndsey Northcott didn’t show up for the Courtenay forum on Oct. 7.

Okay, Theos was on vacation in Greece and Adams was on a honeymoon trip, so they are just bad at scheduling.

But some of the same bunch didn’t show up at the North Island College Oct. 4 forum either.

Glossophobia infections went off the charts on the peninsula. Comox candidates had only one forum on Oct. 7 to make their pitch up close and personal with voters. But Peter Gibson, Ken Grant, Maureen Swift, Steve Blacklock and Chris Haslett blew it off anyway.

Even Tamara Meggitt in Area A caught the bug, as did Richard Hardy, who is running in Area B but actually lives in the heart of Comox. Both were no-shows at the Comox event.

When you look at this list of candidates who refused to participate there is an obvious common thread. They are the conservative, old-guard, pro-development and wacky candidates.

And when we say ‘wacky,’ we mean candidates like Erik Eriksson, who showed up for the NIC climate-focused forum but didn’t join his colleagues on stage. Bizarrely, Eriksson sat in the front row and watched. Hey, Erik, a great display of mayoral leadership qualities.

Or, wacky like Area C candidate Matthew Ellis who has been laying low since the social media hounds found that photo of him standing in front of a confederate flag wearing a Trump Make America Great Again hat and holding both a shotgun and a bottle of Tennessee whiskey.

Maybe it’s a joke. But if you’re seeking public office and you leave that photo online, in my book you’re wacky. And if it wasn’t a joke, you are definitely wacky because you’re in Canada, dude.

So, all kidding aside, by refusing to spontaneously answer questions from the public, these candidates are usurping the democratic process. It’s the equivalent of Taking The Fifth Amendment (we know, American reference, but a good analogy) because they don’t want to incriminate themselves.

What could possibly happen by having the courage to stand up and defend your beliefs? Well, you might slip up and expose your truth, and that could cost you votes.

It’s a sad commentary on the state of election campaigning in the Comox Valley when candidates of similar ideology refuse to engage with those they want to represent. Just imagine how unresponsive they’ll be if you elect them.

These people hope to get elected by default, getting throw-away votes from people who just picked a name without really knowing the candidate. Dash that hope. Please.

 

WHERE WERE GRANT AND BLACKLOCK?

We know that Courtenay candidate Phil Adams was on a honeymoon, but what important business did Comox Council candidate Ken Grant have that kept him from the all-candidates forum last Friday afternoon? Well, readers report that he was sunning himself on the lawn of Milanos coffee shop just as the meeting was getting underway at the K’omoks Band Hall.

Meanwhile, Comox candidate Steve Blacklock took a different route. He didn’t go to the All-Candidates cafe-style forum Friday night either, but he sent a proxy with a phone.

Voters at one of the Comox tables (candidates rotated among small groups to answer questions in more intimate settings) noticed a young woman texting who had introduced herself as a friend of Blacklock. She then read from her phone a text that she said Blacklock was sending her. The people at the table advised her that because Blacklock didn’t show up, it was inappropriate for her to speak on his behalf and that she should leave. Which she did.

Is this what some people think passes for meaningful public discourse these days?

Kudos to the candidates who had the decency to show up at last week’s public forums. That includes Comox Mayor-Elect Nicole Minions, who will be acclaimed, but showed up anyway to pay respect to the organizers and the tax-paying public.

 

KEN GRANT STILL MISLEADING VOTERS

This story was sent to us by a reader with access to questions sent via email to Comox Council incumbent Ken Grant. They asked:

“The urban forest is essential in making Comox the beautiful place it is and prevents overheating in heat domes or any time of excessive heat and helps regulates water flows (prevent flooding). What will you include in a ‘Tree Bylaw’ to ensure that the benefits of trees and other natural environments are maintained in Comox?”

To which Grant answered:

“We have a robust tree bylaw in Comox. We just increased the amount trees to be preserved on development from 25% retention to 30% retention. We have purchased Bay brook park a few years ago and are preserving the trees on it as well as with all of our parks (unless trees become dangerous). The tree canopy is one of the things that make Comox stand out as a livable community.”

But what Grant didn’t say was that he voted against the tree retention policy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHERE AND WHEN TO VOTE

General Voting Day is Saturday, Oct. 15 for all local government positions.

Comox Valley Regional District

General Voting Day and advance voting take place at the CVRD building in Courtenay from 8 am to 8 pm.

Go to this link for General Voting Day locations in the three Electoral Areas.

Courtenay

Advance Voting continues on Wednesday, October 12, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Florence Filberg Centre.

General Voting Day, Saturday, October 15, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Queneesh Elementary School, and at the Florence Filberg Centre.

Comox

Advance voting continues today Monday, October 10 from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. at the Genoa Sail Building at Comox Marina, and on Wednesday, October 12 from 8 a.m. – 8 p.m. at the Comox Community Centre.

General Voting Day runs from 8 am to 8 pm on Oct. 15 at the Comox Community Centre.

Cumberland

All voting in the Village of Cumberland takes place from 8 am to 8 pm at the Cumberland Cultural Centre. The next Advance voting takes place on Oct. 12

 

 

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Councillor Melanie McCollum’s mother dies in bicycle-truck accident in Courtenay

Councillor Melanie McCollum’s mother dies in bicycle-truck accident in Courtenay

by | Oct 10, 2022

Photo Caption

Councillor Melanie McCollum’s mother dies in bicycle-truck accident in Courtenay

By

On an unusually warm Oct. 2 Sunday, an older woman rode her bicycle to do some errands in downtown Courtenay. Just after noon, she collided with a large truck near the intersection of Fourth Street and Cliffe Avenue. People having lunch or a beer in Gladstone’s outdoor patio might have witnessed what turned out to be a fatal accident.

Jamie McCue was also riding his bike that day and rode past the scene on his way home. He saw emergency vehicles, a large white truck, uniforms and onlookers. He took it all in and rode away.

Later that afternoon, McCue was starting to make dinner plans. His wife, Courtenay Council member Melanie McCollum, was at a field watching one of their daughters’ soccer games.

At 5:15 pm, while standing on the sidelines, Melanie’s telephone rang. On the line was an emergency room doctor from Victoria General Hospital.

That was the moment Melanie learned that her mother, Ruth McCollum, 68, was the cyclist who had collided with the truck in Courtenay. She had been flown to Victoria because of the severity of her injuries. Surgery was required but there was no guarantee she would survive it.

And she would not. Melanie and other McCollum family members traveled to Victoria on Monday where they made the decision to discontinue life support.

McCollum and her family are now grieving.

“We are still in shock, and I’m turning all of my energy toward grieving and supporting my family at this time. While I’m still a candidate for Council, I’m taking a step back from campaigning and wanted people to understand the reason why,” she wrote on her council Facebook page.

McCollum may have suspended her campaign activities for the Oct. 15 election, but her council colleagues have continued to carry her brochures and her message to voters.

It is, of course, heart-wrenching that one of McCollum’s campaign messages has been a fierce defense of the council’s decision to introduce bike lanes on city streets.

The odds are incalculable that a candidate in favor of bike lanes as a means of increasing traffic safety should lose her mother to a bike crash in the midst of an election where some challengers have tried to make bike lanes a controversial issue.

It feels awkward to say right now, but doesn’t this tragically inconceivable accident highlight the value of protected bike lanes and validate the council’s actions?

There is no official police report yet about the accident. But whether the truck driver or the cyclist must shoulder the majority of blame for what happened in this particular accident makes no difference.

The point is that anything a city can do to make our roads safer for drivers, pedestrians, cyclists, children and the mobility impaired should be praised, not criticized.

 

WHAT’S THE VALUE OF YOUR LOVED ONES’ LIVES?

But one or two candidates in this election have made it their goal to unseat the incumbents by shamelessly using protected bike lanes as a punching bag.

They have tried to imply that the City Council has “misspent” local taxes to build these safer bike lanes, calling it a waste of our money.

Setting aside the misinformation in that allegation – the 17th Street project was primarily funded by a federal infrastructure grant – what monetary value would you put on the life of your child, your spouse or your parent?

Why is there such vocal outrage about something that benefits so many? Studies and real-life experience show that cities with separated and protected bike lanes have reduced fatalities for everyone using the roadways.

“The most comprehensive study of bicycle and road safety to date finds that building safe facilities for cyclists is one of the biggest factors in road safety for everyone. Bicycling infrastructure — specifically, separated and protected bike lanes — leads to fewer fatalities and better road-safety outcomes for all road users,” says a University of Colorado, Denver study.

There is always room for civil public discourse about where bike lanes are most needed and where traffic safety poses the greatest risk. But with the invention and popularity of electric bicycles, there will be more and more cyclists on all of our roadways.

According to Statistics Canada, more commuters now walk or bike to work than take public transit.

Local governments have an obligation to make our communities safe for everyone. And it’s okay for people to choose to commute or get around town on bicycles. They shouldn’t be made to feel like second-class citizens.

And, yeah, we’ve all seen bicyclists roll through stop signs. But who hasn’t seen drivers doing the same thing every day?

Let’s have more compassion for people who want to use bicycles to move around out communities. It’s clean and efficient and adds a certain charm to our ambiance.

And let’s drop the rhetoric that improving traffic safety through protected bike lanes only benefits one segment of the population and that it’s somehow a misuse of public funds. That’s a bunch of nonsense from desperate candidates who run negative campaigns for personal gain.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WHERE AND WHEN TO VOTE

General Voting Day is Saturday, Oct. 15 for all local government positions.

Comox Valley Regional District

General Voting Day and advance voting take place at the CVRD building in Courtenay from 8 am to 8 pm.

Go to this link for General Voting Day locations in the three Electoral Areas.

Courtenay

Advance Voting continues on Wednesday, October 12, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Florence Filberg Centre.

General Voting Day, Saturday, October 15, 2022, 8 am to 8 pm at the Queneesh Elementary School, and at the Florence Filberg Centre.

Comox

Advance voting continues today Monday, October 10 from 10 a.m. – 2 p.m. at the Genoa Sail Building at Comox Marina, and on Wednesday, October 12 from 8 a.m. – 8 p.m. at the Comox Community Centre.

General Voting Day runs from 8 am to 8 pm on Oct. 15 at the Comox Community Centre.

Cumberland

All voting in the Village of Cumberland takes place from 8 am to 8 pm at the Cumberland Cultural Centre. The next Advance voting takes place on Oct. 12

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