Vancouver mayor Ken Sim shifted city politics, but one year later solutions to opioid and housing crisis elude | Canada News Media
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Vancouver mayor Ken Sim shifted city politics, but one year later solutions to opioid and housing crisis elude

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Mayor Ken Sim of Vancouver during a news conference in Vancouver, B.C., Canada, on March 16, 2023.JACKIE DIVES/The New York Times News Service

A year ago, Ken Sim upended more than a decade of left-leaning civic politics to become Vancouver’s mayor, propelled by a surge of fed-up voters who hoped he and his new centre-right party could finally make a difference on the city’s most difficult files: homelessness, housing, crime, public disorder.

To the ire of critics who campaigned against him during last October’s election, Mr. Sim ordered the clear-out of the sidewalk homeless encampment on Hastings Street in the spring and he cancelled the city’s commitment to a living-wage policy and the Stanley Park bike lane.

Council, dominated by Mr. Sim’s new ABC Party, instituted givebacks of empty-homes tax money to developers. It has also entertained proposals to revise the city’s policy of protecting views of the mountains from various vantage points. Both policies were made with an aim of creating more housing.

Adrian Carr, the Green Party representative who is now the city’s longest-serving councillor, said Mr. Sim and his party seem to believe that they don’t need to consult. She added that their agenda appears to be about rolling back climate-change measures and policies previous councils had brought in to try to create some affordability.

“I’m worried that they’re forgetting that it’s not just about making the developers happy,” she said.

Some of Mr. Sim’s vocal supporters – the police union, Chinatown leaders and housing developers – argue that his early moves have been important and encouraging, including his promised hiring of new nurses and police officers.

But other observers say Mr. Sim’s platform of demonstrable change has shown little signs of being fulfilled one year since the vote results were tabulated last Oct. 15.

Last week, when he announced his council’s multipronged new plan to speed up and allow more housing development – an initiative that he called “bold” three times – the mayor was questioned about what was actually new or different from policies already under way.

One of Mr. Sim’s biggest promises was to hire 100 new police officers and 100 new nurses specializing in mental health to work along with them, a promise welcomed by law-and-order advocates on one side and those wanting a compassionate approach to the city’s homeless people on the other. But that promise has been slow to materialize.

“He’s created a sense of direction and purpose that wasn’t there before. But I’m still not sure what he wants to make his mark on. A lot of stuff is fiddling around the edges,” said Geoff Meggs, who has been both a chief of staff and a councillor at Vancouver city hall.

Mr. Meggs is on the other side of the political fence from Mr. Sim, but his observations are echoed privately by many people who supported Mr. Sim and who wonder why his council hasn’t made bolder decisions.

With eight of 11 positions on council belonging to his ABC, Mr. Sim has the kind of supermajority that previous mayors, like Gordon Campbell, Larry Campbell or Gregor Robertson, used to bring in big changes to the city, from Expo 86 to supervised-injection sites to major new climate-change initiatives.

But Mr. Meggs, who recently left his job as chief of staff to former premier John Horgan, is sympathetic to how much more entrenched Vancouver’s problems seem since he first started work at city hall in 2002.

Then, COPE had been swept to power because people wanted to see a changed strategy for the Downtown Eastside. Mr. Meggs helped then-mayor Larry Campbell get the city’s first supervised-injection site opened within a year. The group also instantly legalized basement suites to ensure some affordable housing.

But things on every front – housing, homelessness, drug poisoning – are exponentially worse now, Mr. Meggs notes. “The challenge for Ken Sim is that the problems are more intractable and they’re not solvable at the civic level.”

An example is Mr. Sim’s keystone promise of hiring 100 new nurses and police officers.

So far, only 10 nurses have been hired. And, although 104 new police officers have been hired as of this month, Vancouver Police Union president Ralph Kaisers, acknowledged that police had had 60 positions vacant a year ago and another 60 or so have left the force since then.

All the new hiring still hasn’t brought the force to its authorized strength of 1,388 a year ago, let alone the 1,488 that it’s supposed to be at now.

Chinatown leaders who also favoured Mr. Sim for his promise to devote more attention to their historic neighbourhood – he opened a satellite city office, for example – say the new council has made a difference.

“Comparing today to a year ago, it’s night and day,” said Chinatown’s business-improvement association president, Jordan Eng.

He pointed to the city’s aggressive efforts to tackle graffiti and the message sent by various policing efforts that anti-social behaviour isn’t acceptable.

On the building front, one of the city’s most vocal developers said there have been some key changes that will make construction of all kinds of housing, including subsidized or below-market projects, more feasible.

“There was maybe a little bit of a slow start, but there have been a lot of strong initiatives,” said Jon Stovell, CEO of Reliance Properties. Ltd. He cited decisions such as more openness to building new hotels, a potential move to allow larger floor areas for towers, a review of the city’s shadow policy, and the vote to give developers with unsold condos a break on empty-homes taxes.

“That took some political courage,” he said.

Mr. Stovell said he appreciates council’s recent move to review its mountain view cones, although it took almost a full year for that to come about.

The trick now, he said, will be whether council moves forward on changes like that, despite the controversy they are generating, including from former chief planner Larry Beasley, who remains an influential voice in the city. He has said that eliminating or reducing view cones is just a giveaway to speculators.

Mr. Stovell is hoping the new council will be able to stick to the direction it has started and keep going with new policy changes now in the works.

“Those are all pretty tangible things if they have the courage to bear down on staff.”

 

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‘Disgraceful:’ N.S. Tory leader slams school’s request that military remove uniform

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HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.

Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.

A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”

Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.

“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.

In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”

“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”

Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.

Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.

Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.

“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.

“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.

“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.

“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”

NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”

“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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Saskatchewan NDP’s Beck holds first caucus meeting after election, outlines plans

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REGINA – Saskatchewan Opposition NDP Leader Carla Beck says she wants to prove to residents her party is the government in waiting as she heads into the incoming legislative session.

Beck held her first caucus meeting with 27 members, nearly double than what she had before the Oct. 28 election but short of the 31 required to form a majority in the 61-seat legislature.

She says her priorities will be health care and cost-of-living issues.

Beck says people need affordability help right now and will press Premier Scott Moe’s Saskatchewan Party government to cut the gas tax and the provincial sales tax on children’s clothing and some grocery items.

Beck’s NDP is Saskatchewan’s largest Opposition in nearly two decades after sweeping Regina and winning all but one seat in Saskatoon.

The Saskatchewan Party won 34 seats, retaining its hold on all of the rural ridings and smaller cities.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.

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Nova Scotia election: Liberals say province’s immigration levels are too high

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HALIFAX – Nova Scotia‘s growing population was the subject of debate on Day 12 of the provincial election campaign, with Liberal Leader Zach Churchill arguing immigration levels must be reduced until the province can provide enough housing and health-care services.

Churchill said Thursday a plan by the incumbent Progressive Conservatives to double the province’s population to two million people by the year 2060 is unrealistic and unsustainable.

“That’s a big leap and it’s making life harder for people who live here, (including ) young people looking for a place to live and seniors looking to downsize,” he told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.

Anticipating that his call for less immigration might provoke protests from the immigrant community, Churchill was careful to note that he is among the third generation of a family that moved to Nova Scotia from Lebanon.

“I know the value of immigration, the importance of it to our province. We have been built on the backs of an immigrant population. But we just need to do it in a responsible way.”

The Liberal leader said Tim Houston’s Tories, who are seeking a second term in office, have made a mistake by exceeding immigration targets set by the province’s Department of Labour and Immigration. Churchill said a Liberal government would abide by the department’s targets.

In the most recent fiscal year, the government welcomed almost 12,000 immigrants through its nominee program, exceeding the department’s limit by more than 4,000, he said. The numbers aren’t huge, but the increase won’t help ease the province’s shortages in housing and doctors, and the increased strain on its infrastructure, including roads, schools and cellphone networks, Churchill said.

“(The Immigration Department) has done the hard work on this,” he said. “They know where the labour gaps are, and they know what growth is sustainable.”

In response, Houston said his commitment to double the population was a “stretch goal.” And he said the province had long struggled with a declining population before that trend was recently reversed.

“The only immigration that can come into this province at this time is if they are a skilled trade worker or a health-care worker,” Houston said. “The population has grown by two per cent a year, actually quite similar growth to what we experienced under the Liberal government before us.”

Still, Houston said he’s heard Nova Scotians’ concerns about population growth, and he then pivoted to criticize Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for trying to send 6,000 asylum seekers to Nova Scotia, an assertion the federal government has denied.

Churchill said Houston’s claim about asylum seekers was shameful.

“It’s smoke and mirrors,” the Liberal leader said. “He is overshooting his own department’s numbers for sustainable population growth and yet he is trying to blame this on asylum seekers … who aren’t even here.”

In September, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said there is no plan to send any asylum seekers to the province without compensation or the consent of the premier. He said the 6,000 number was an “aspirational” figure based on models that reflect each province’s population.

In Halifax, NDP Leader Claudia Chender said it’s clear Nova Scotia needs more doctors, nurses and skilled trades people.

“Immigration has been and always will be a part of the Nova Scotia story, but we need to build as we grow,” Chender said. “This is why we have been pushing the Houston government to build more affordable housing.”

Chender was in a Halifax cafe on Thursday when she promised her party would remove the province’s portion of the harmonized sales tax from all grocery, cellphone and internet bills if elected to govern on Nov. 26. The tax would also be removed from the sale and installation of heat pumps.

“Our focus is on helping people to afford their lives,” Chender told reporters. “We know there are certain things that you can’t live without: food, internet and a phone …. So we know this will have the single biggest impact.”

The party estimates the measure would save the average Nova Scotia family about $1,300 a year.

“That’s a lot more than a one or two per cent HST cut,” Chender said, referring to the Progressive Conservative pledge to reduce the tax by one percentage point and the Liberal promise to trim it by two percentage points.

Elsewhere on the campaign trail, Houston announced that a Progressive Conservative government would make parking free at all Nova Scotia hospitals and health-care centres. The promise was also made by the Liberals in their election platform released Monday.

“Free parking may not seem like a big deal to some, but … the parking, especially for people working at the facilities, can add up to hundreds of dollars,” the premier told a news conference at his campaign headquarters in Halifax.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.

— With files from Keith Doucette in Halifax

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