To the editor:
Re: "City worker alleges privacy breach," May 1.
Bob Mackin's article referencing an alleged breach of privacy in the ongoing community centre discussions contains some fundamental errors and misunderstandings that need to be clarified.
The article states that Mr. Kljajic is part of a group of six Community Centre Associations (CCA) that opposes the park board centralization plan, which implies that the other 12 CCAs are sympathetic to it. But all the community centres oppose it.
Last summer, the park board and community centres representing the entire Association Presidents Group (APF) engaged in eight roundtable discussions with city and park board officials resulting from the fact and frustration that all the community centre associations had been attempting to negotiate an updated joint operating agreement for over a decade. The community centres are run by associations in partnership with park board under a Joint Operating Agreement (JOA) which, with one exception, was agreed to in 1979. In the fall of 2012, the park board proposed its centralization plan that all 20 of the community centre associations involved rejected.
In the first week of January 2013, the associations presented their own 12-point proposal to the board with 16 CCA signatories, which in essence requested a meaningful negotiation on all the identified issues. The park board presented its response in the notorious meeting that ran until 3: 30 a.m. and the public clearly again demonstrated their opposition. In mid-February, 12 associations entered into negotiations with the objective of obtaining an updated JOA that would be acceptable to all associations. Six have continued to engage in an active public campaign resisting the rejected centralization plan. None of the Centres supports the proposed centralization. The associations at the table have offered a number of strategies to achieve the four jointly agreed upon outcomes or goals while still allowing all the associations to continue to deliver local programs to their local communities with local autonomy, a uniquely Vancouver model that has served Vancouverites for generations.
Christopher Richardson, President, Mount Pleasant Community Centre Association
