As I write this, Mayor Gregor Robertson and Vision Coun. Raymond Louie are in Montreal scouting the Canadiens to report back to their friends and financial backers, the Aquilinis, on how the Canucks should best prepare for their Oct. 27 tilt with les habitants.
Seriously, they are.
I’m not kidding.
Alright, alright, that’s probably not true.
The part about the Canadiens, that is.
But if I opened this piece with a line about how the Vision Vancouver duo is attending the Montreal Thematic Meeting on Metropolitan Areas to talk cities, would you keep reading? Didn’t think so. Probably, I’m guessing, not even if I used the French translation of the event, Conference Thematique de Montreal sure les aires metropolitaines.
Ah, comme la langue est belle, non?
Anyway, you’ve read this far, so please stick with me for a few hundred more words.
As civic watchers know, Robertson and Louie have been travelling across the country, preaching the Vision Vancouver gospel and the need for the feds to dispatch planeloads full of cash to our world-class city so people can afford to rent or buy here and get around a lot easier on transit.
They want a national housing strategy, which would see the feds – among other initiatives -- provide incentives for developers to build much-needed rental stock. They also want the feds to contribute at least one third of the $1.9 billion cost to build a subway from the VCC-Clark SkyTrain station to Arbutus.
Good luck, right?
Well, who knows.
But if ever there was a time that Vancouver council could open federal doors that were closed, you have to think this is the opportunity. It’s not every council term that Vancouver has a mayor who is the chairperson of the Big City Mayors’ Caucus and a councillor who is the president of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.
That’s a bit of Vancouver power at the national level.
And it’s no secret that Vision Vancouver has ties to the federal Liberals and NDP, both of which are promising funding for housing and transit across the country. That’s if they win the election, of course. And therein lies the problem/challenge/trouble.
With all the belly-aching Robertson, Louie and their Vision mates have done about the Harper government’s contrasting views on drug policy, housing, transit, mental health and pipelines, you’ve got to wonder what happens to Vancouver if Harper wins again.
I caught up with Louie before he headed off to Montreal and asked him about this.
“We’re a dense urban centre with challenges of poverty and drug addiction and mental health issues and cities are not equipped to deal with these without the support of these other levels of government,” Louie said by telephone from city hall. “So while we may come off as critical of government, it’s because we have significant issues to deal with and we’re not receiving the support that we need. I make no apologies for being critical of governments that don’t recognize that people are suffering on our streets.”
So which party best lines up with Vancouver’s needs?
Louie, who is lives in the NDP-friendly riding of Vancouver-East, isn’t saying.
Instead, he’s urging voters to go to the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ website to check out which candidates are committed to throwing cities a bone, or two. The website also features a “policy tracker” that -- you guessed it -- tracks the parties’ promises on policies related to cities.
Some of us reporter types caught up with the mayor last week and asked him how he’d be voting. He lives in Vancouver-Centre, where the Liberals’ Hedy Fry has held the seat since 1993. Former Vision park board commissioner Constance Barnes is the NDP’s candidate, Elaine Allan represents the Conservatives and Lisa Barrett is the Greens’ choice.
“Still working on my decision,” said Robertson, who noted the Liberals and NDP have the "most robust" platforms, followed by the Greens. "The Conservatives have catch up to do and we want to see more tangible commitments in the weeks ahead."
I attempted to speak to Vancouver's only Conservative MP, Wai Young, about city issues but her campaign manager said she was too busy for an interview. Quelle surprise, said the reporter speaking on behalf of fellow journos across the country getting the same runaround from Conservative candidates.
Incroyable.
@Howellings
