I am running for the COPE executive this year because I believe COPE must return to its roots – a municipal political party that fights to ensure social justice and includes the voices of the most vulnerable in our City. COPE by both nature and track-record is an activist, neighbourhood-based political party.

It is very important that COPE is not only active at election time, but between election time as well. This is what brought about COPE’s numerous electoral successes in the past.

On Sunday, a dedicated, activist slate of Independent COPE candidates will place our names on the ballot to join Independent COPE continuing incumbents Ifny Lachance and Anita Romaniuk as members of the 2013 – 2014 COPE Executive.

I would ask that you cast a ballot for each and every one of the six members of the COPE Independent slate, so that COPE might once again emerge as a strong independent municipal political force.

Voting for the different positions will take place in the following order:

**Internal Chair – Tim Louis
I am committed to a COPE that works with the community not just at election time, but between elections, a COPE that gives voice to the community on the Park Board, the School Board, and Council.

** Treasurer – Paul Houle
Past COPE Treasurer, committed unionist, longtime Shop Steward and community activist who will play a key role on an Independent COPE Executive.

** Corresponding Secretary – Kim Hearty (Incumbent)
A committed social activist, co-founder of the Vancouver Renters Union, Kim is very much engaged in the anti-gentrification movement on the DTES.

** Members-at-Large – Tristan Markle (incumbent), Wilson Munoz (incumbent), and Stuart Parker

• Tristan Markle A founder of The Mainlander, and co-founder of the Vancouver Renters Union, Tristan has  played a pivotal role this past year in returning COPE to its roots as an engaged, socially conscious, neighbourhood-based activist party.
• Wilson Munoz is not only a close friend, he is someone who has also long been committed to the fight for social justice, particularly within the Latin American community.
• Stuart Parker is an environmentalist and longtime community activist, who brings energy and commitment to the fight to restore social justice. He has campaigned for many years for meaningful electoral reform.

Looking forward to seeing you on Sunday. With your help, by 5pm Sunday afternoon, we will have elected a progressive Independent COPE majority to the COPE Executive.

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COPE holds its 45th Annual General Meeting this coming Sunday, April 7th, at the Maritime Labour Centre, 1880 Triumph Street, just up from Powell Street and Victoria Drive. Registration is at 1:30pm, the meeting starts at 2pm. Members in good standing (who have joined COPE prior to March 7th, or renewed their memberships within the last 24 months) are eligible to vote.

The city is promising incentives to the developer, but is not asking for any affordability requirements in return. As a result, the new housing will be too expensive for most Vancouverites. The owner has already admitted that they expect one bedroom apartments to rent at $1,400 to $2,600 per month. As renters will know, this is at the higher end of the market, far exceeding average rents in the West End (which are $1,179 for a one bedroom, according to the city’s own numbers).

Meanwhile, the owner, Devonshire Properties, receives gifts from the city. They get their land rezoned, increasing the amount of developable land. This is like giving the developer “free land”—an extremely valuable thing in Vancouver!

Normally the city recoups this land value increase, but in this case the city calculated the value of 133 units’ worth of new land as being less than $300,000, an unbelievably small amount. This estimate is based on the developer’s own calculations and expected profit rate (pro-forma), none of which has been made public. The city justifies their underestimate by saying that Devonshire properties will eat up costs associated with renting the new housing, but as we’ve seen these are market rents, for which there are no “costs”. The city’s calculations haven’t been made public either. That’s pro-developer mathematics.

A progressive city hall would publicize the developer’s pro-forma, including expected profits, as well as the city’s own calculations on land value increases. Transparency and accountability around rezonings is particularly important in a context where half of the campaign contributions to Vision Vancouver and the NPA come from property development corporations.

A progressive city hall also wouldn’t give free land to corporations without ensuring affordability requirements. In exchange for free land or tax breaks, at the very least rents should be fixed to the established definition of affordability, calculated as 30 percent of income.

For example, the city admits that the average annual income of renter households in Vancouver is $34,000, making affordable rent—according to the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation definition—less than $1,000 per month. So it makes sense to impose a requirement for the average new unit at Beach Towers to be $1,000 per month. In addition, the city could ensure that there are subsidized units for low-income tenants. COPE’s recent housing affordability report calls for one-third of units in new developments to be low-income.

The city will surely tell us that infill is good, but infill is better if it’s truly affordable. They’ll also say that rental is good, but rental is better only if it’s affordable. At COPE, we will continue to ask the questions: Density for what? Affordability for whom? We need a city hall that looks at housing with with an affordability lens, which will not happen so long as parties funded by property development corporations continue to run city hall.

AT first all I heard was bits of general talk “… yes, I tell you I have it on very good authority … new year’s resolutions …”

The first voice I recognized was unmistakably Mike Magee. In detail he began to explain how Vision Vancouver had worked overtime and held meetings during the holidays to draft a motion which they planned to bring to the first Vancouver City Council meeting in the New Year. “This motion will ban donations from developers to civic parties during municipal elections.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, but there was no mistaking what I’d heard and who had been speaking!

A few minutes later, another voice took over the conversation. I’d heard that voice many times on the news – it was Jim Chu, Vancouver’s Chief of Police! He was talking about the root causes of crime, and how increasing the police budget more than that of any other city department budget year-after-year just didn’t make sense. “I’ve been thinking – if we froze the police budget and invested the savings in building housing for the homeless, supporting childcare maybe … you know, beef up our community services … now that’s a much better solution. So, I’m going to recommend that to Council.”

The hustle and bustle of the café drowned out the conversation at the nearby table. I took a long sip of my coffee. And then, just as I had given up on hearing anything further, the din died down and once again I could clearly hear the conversation.

Now a new voice emerged – a voice I hadn’t heard before – someone the others at the table referred to as the recently appointed General Manager, Planning and Development for the City of Vancouver. I realized it must be Brian Jackson speaking “… you know I would never have given the green light to the Rize development at Broadway and Kingsway – it’s unaffordable, out of character, and too tall. We need to put the community in charge of decision-making for large developments like the Rize … it’s the community that should be instructing Council, not the developer.”

Once again, I lost track of the conversation as a crowd of young people – students on a break I would guess – came in to grab coffees to go. My own coffee was getting cool by now so I got a refill and waited for the students to leave. Once again, I could overhear the voices at the nearby table.

Was that Ian Jarvis, CEO of Translink, I was now hearing? Sure enough, the conversation had moved on to transportation and the hotly debated topic of moving people along Broadway from Commercial to UBC. “I’ve taken another look at all the options and it’s now clear to me that an underground skytrain would be fiscally irresponsible. It would bankrupt Translink. Street-level light rapid transit – you know, at-grade LRT – is the way to go. It has more than enough carrying capacity to meet increasing demand for decades to come. We know this … many cities around the world, cities larger than Vancouver, are relying on at-grade LRT with ridership levels far greater than the Broadway corridor will ever need. And with the money that would be saved – LRT being only 1/8th the cost of underground skytrain – we could afford to build another 90 or so kilometers of at-grade LRT throughout Vancouver … so here’s to the next Translink Board meeting!”

Then, just as the conversation was shifting to yet another topic, it became harder and harder to hear as the café’s sound system began blasting CBC’s Early Edition. It was my favorite broadcaster Stephen Quinn. The coffee shop began to disappear and I realized it was my radio alarm telling me it was time to get up.

It had all been a dream but a great dream to start 2013!

A year of action indeed!

Organizationally, the party has regained the strength of its early years. At COPE’s February 2012 Annual General Meeting, the membership elected an executive with a greater diversity of political perspectives, many of them committed to building COPE into an organization capable of running a campaign to win a majority and form a truly progressive government. Since that time the activity within COPE has increased by an order of magnitude.

First, COPE is building on its core strength of being a member-driven party, where policy is developed democratically. Whereas in 2011, COPE’s single general membership meeting was the Vision-alliance ratification meeting, in 2012 COPE held six meetings for the general membership. These included quarterly general meetings in neighbourhoods across the city, featuring policy development alongside presentations by local activists around burning topics, such as labour issues, housing, gentrification, seniors issues, to name just a few. The COPE Education Committee hosted a well-attended conference around the corporatization of education called “Justice not Charity,” which produced this report.

Second, COPE has increased the ways in which members can get involved in the party on a daily basis. Whereas before the 2011 election, there were few if any active COPE committees — much of the organization’s resources were spent negotiating with Vision — now there is a comprehensive and accessible committee system. Under the leadership of COPE Executive member Ifny Lachance, COPE’s bylaws have been regularly reviewed and updated to reflect the new dynamic organization. Some of the other committees I’m excited about include: Housing, Electoral reform, Arts/Culture/Heritage, Communications, Membership, and the three caucuses.

COPE is speaking out on the issues and fighting for social justice

Despite having no one elected to City Council, COPE has been in the public conversation as much as any time in recent memory. When the Vision-dominated Council released its affordable housing report, COPE was quick to responded by drawing attention to the report’s shortcomings and to release its own more ambitious and socially just recommendations. COPE’s housing affordability report proposed to end renovictions, stop gentrification (particularly in the Eastside), and create a housing authority that is democratic and independent of the real estate development industry. The recent victory at Little Mountain Housing was organized in large part by COPE activists, including Kim Hearty, Tristan Markle, and David Chudnovsky. As these two (and many other) examples show, today more than ever only COPE can be trusted to speak and propose action from a position of progressive principle.

COPE’s Education Committee has taken the lead on issues of child poverty and adult education. These issues have remained on the agenda of public schools because of the work of Alan Wong and the Committee.

COPE’s Park Board committee has been the voice of reason regarding parks and recreation, with Anita Romaniuk, Ray Tomlin, Mia Edbrooke, and others fighting against Vision’s plans to erode the Board’s independence, increase community centre fees, and displace permanent community gardens.

When Vision approved the city budget this month, I worked with the COPE Council Committee to propose an alternative view based on social justice principles, and cautioned against a city that increasingly puts more money into its police budget at the expense of funding for community support services such as social housing, libraries, childcare etc.

Thinking back to November 18, 2011

I also had some thoughts about why I found myself so excited by the dynamism in today’s COPE. It’s been only one year since the November 2011 civic election loss, which was COPE’s worst showing since 1996. In the aftermath of such defeats it can be difficult to admit taking the wrong path and to change course. I recalled that after the 1996 shut-out, COPE held an election debrief to discuss what had gone wrong — and the general conclusion was that we lost because on election day it was snowing out! So when, two months after the 2011 election, the party held a gathering to discuss this latest defeat, I hoped for honest self-criticism and accountability this time around.

Members had many different explanations for our defeat. Some individuals thought that only minor mistakes had been made, such as running the wrong candidates or poor timing for the candidate nomination meeting. It seemed hard to see the forest for the trees, the long-term trends from short-term fluctuations.

While some members were willing to look to our own decisions, such as not running our own mayoral candidate, others preferred to blame the Green Party and Neighborhoods for Sustainable Vancouver [NSV] rather than acknowledge that COPE is responsible for its own mistakes. They felt that if other smaller parties had not run candidates then, at least, COPE’s Ellen Woodsworth would have eked-out one seat on council. The Green party’s Adriane Carr, some said, had “diluted” the vote. But Adriane Carr is not complaining that COPE diluted her vote – because she won! And she ran on a shoe-string budget to boot. Nor is Vision complaining that Adriane Carr diluted their vote – because they won as well.

Blaming the Green party suggests that the only way for COPE to win is by stopping the Green Party from running candidates, or by forcing them into a coalition with Vision. Even if that were desirable (which I think it is not) I can’t imagine any democratic means to achieving such ends. Before the last election, the Green Party general membership voted democratically in favour of a coalition with COPE instead of with Vision.

Similarly, some individuals blamed NSV for diluting COPE’s vote. But NSV did not run anyone for Parks Board or School Board, so that does not explain COPE’s defeat there. Where NSV did run candidates, on Council, it explicitly asked its supporters to vote for all three COPE candidates. In the main, NSV candidates did best where COPE did the best – Commercial Drive and Mount Pleasant. In my opinion NSV boosted COPE’s vote.

In the end, blaming other small parties for diluting the vote is a form of denial. Once we look at these parties with the respect they deserve, there is actually much to learn from them. Now that the tornado of the election is behind us, let’s ask some tough questions: why did the Green Party refuse to join in coalition with Vision? Why did NSV run its own candidates? In politics as in life, everything happens for a reason.

Let’s start with the Greens. They ran with the COPE-Vision coalition back in 2008, allotted one spot on Parks Board. Stuart Mackinnon was elected, but soon became extremely disillusioned with the way Vision ran the Parks Board: they supported the corporate developer agenda, covered it up with green-washing, and then bullied anyone who didn’t vote with them (concerns are often shared by COPE). Mackinnon’s conscience left him no choice but to reject that style of government. Indeed, at the Green’s Party’s general meeting before the 2011 election, Mackinnon himself put forward the motion to reject running on Vision’s slate, and to instead run one candidate for each of the three levels of civic government. Mackinnon then put forward a motion to leave the door open to running a joint slate with COPE, who he said shared the Greens’ genuine environmental and democratic principles. Mackinnon’s motions passed with near unanimity of the entire Green Party membership. (Unfortunately, COPE’s leadership at the time was not open to that arrangement – and the divided COPE membership voted for joining Vision’s slate, though just barely).

Why did Neighbourhoods for a Sustainable Vancouver decide to become a political party and run candidates for council? NSV originated not as a party, but as a network of residents’ associations and grassroots organizations mobilized against Sam Sullivan’s EcoDensity initiative. They criticized it as a Trojan horse for the corporate developer agenda. But when Vision came to power Sullivan’s agenda continued. Many on the left had numerous legitimate complaints against the ruling party, concerns not dissimilar to those expressed by the Greens. But these folks did not see an opportunity to voice their frustration with Vision by working inside COPE. COPE’s decision to join Vision’s slate in June 2011 resulted in some people in COPE joining NSV in order to speak freely against Vision. My point is not to say that every member of NSV is progressive, nor that the party is as progressive as COPE – COPE’s position always strives to put social justice front-and-centre. But it is unlikely that NSV would have become of political party at all if COPE had run its campaign independently of Vision.

I believe strongly that we can’t blame the Greens and Neighborhoods for Sustainable Vancouver for COPE’s 2011 loss.

COPE was an unequal partner in the Vision alliance

Contrary to the Greens or NSV being responsible for COPE’s decline, it’s COPE’s dependence upon Vision which became the cause for the Greens’ and NSV’s rise as opposition parties. So what, then, is responsible for COPE’s eviction from city council? I believe it’s the result of a long-term process where, for seven years, COPE not only formed an alliance with Vision, but did so as an unequal partner. In any unequal relationship, the constrained partner loses its independence over time – and that was certainly the true for COPE in this relationship.

One obvious example is that COPE’s profile has been harmed by not running a mayoral candidate since 2002, and by running so few candidates each election campaign. Equally crucial is the fact that COPE’s organizational capacity has suffered. COPE became increasingly dependent upon Vision’s developer-funded campaign machine. In a sense, when the COPE membership was asked in June 2011 to support the Vision deal, it was not a real choice. COPE’s organization was no longer up to the task of running a larger slate or a full election campaign. The membership did not err on that day alone; rather, the problem was systemic one of becoming organizationally dependent upon Vision.

The toll all this took was great. Although progressive voters across the city still believed in COPE’s principles, many began to doubt whether COPE had the capacity to form government and to turn ideas into action. It was hard to get excited about that.

An independent COPE emerges

When I take the long view, it’s clear that COPE’s 2011 election loss can’t be explained by a few minor mistakes, but was the inevitable end-result of a long-term project in which COPE was the unequal partner of developer-backed Vision Vancouver. It is factually incorrect to blame smaller parties for COPE’s decline, and it is unfair to criticize them for filling the role of opposition where COPE had abandoned it. Although COPE’s profile and organization took a serious hit under the previous arrangement, in the past year the stage has been set for a renaissance. COPE is now by far the most democratic and progressive civic party in town. But much hard work lies ahead as we build a party that is big enough and strong enough to overthrow the current developer-funded Vision-NPA council. Now that’s something to get excited about in the new year!

In arguing for an underground skytrain system for the Broadway Corridor, Councillor Meggs relies on inaccuracies presented as facts. This is because a decision, based on the facts, makes an At-grade LRT [ALRT] the only sensible choice – both fiscally and environmentally.

We all agree that an underground skytrain from Commercial to UBC is estimated to cost approximately 3 billion dollars. Councillor Meggs then proceeds to suggest that ALRT [Light Rapid Transit] by comparison would cost approximately 1 billion dollars. The fact is that ALRT would only cost in the neighborhood of 360 million – that is, not 1/3 of the cost of underground skytrain but more like 1/8th!

Councillor Meggs then attempts to justify the more expensive underground skytrain [2 billion dollars more expensive using his figures and in reality more like 2.64 billion more expensive] by suggesting that ALRT doesn’t have the ridership capacity to meet future demand – which he suggests is 146,000 people a day. The fact is that ALRT in dozens of cities around the world is operating today with even higher capacities.

With equivalent or higher ridership, ALRT would not only address the pressing problem of rising demand along the Broadway corridor, but also pay for the construction of additional ALRT throughout the city of Vancouver if we use the cost savings of 2.64 billion dollars to do so. At 30 million per kilometre, that’s 90 additional kilometres of ALRT criss-crossing the city. To put this in perspective, the Commercial to UBC line is only 12 kilometres.

Tim Louis, former COPE Vancouver City Councillor

First, it is now more clear than ever that the majority of the people living at Heather Place will be displaced. There are currently 86 units of affordable homes which house 200 people. After redevelopment rents will increase an extra-ordinary amount. Whereas today the highest rents are around $1,100, after redevelopment two- and three-bedroom units will rent at “competitive market rates” expected to exceed $1,700 and $2,100 respectively. This means that two-thirds of tenants who are not on subsidy will very likely be displaced unless they agree to an extra-ordinary rent increase. For these tenants the Heather Place redevelopment plan is essentially a large-scale “renoviction.”

On its website, MVHC says that tenants will have the “right of first refusal” on the new units. But that’s poor comfort for most families, as the rent will be set at new market rates, not at the previous rates. To stop renovictions, it’s necessary that tenants have the “right of first of refusal” at today’s rates.

For the one-third of tenants who are on subsidy, the MVHC website presents the situation as more hopeful:

“Generally, rents in the new development will be at competitive market rates. Existing tenants receiving a subsidy, or ones that will require a subsidy in the new development, will receive it if they qualify.”

But for these tenants there are no guarantees, either. Tenants currently living on subsidy will be allowed to move into the new building only “if they qualify” for the subsidy. There is a world in this “if they qualify.” BC Housing subsidies only cover up to a set ceiling in each neighbourhood; if the market rent exceeds that ceiling, the subsidy will not cover the difference. It’s key for tenants on subsidies to have a guarantee in writing from MVHC and BC Housing that they will be allowed to stay.

Even those few tenants able to move into the new buildings may suffer significant stress due to displacement and uncertainty of tenure. MVHC says it is planning to use a phased redevelopment to minimize displacement, but again it makes no guarantees. As the Georgia Straight article notes, the similarities between Heather Place and Little Mountain in this regard are striking.

It is not clear to me why tenants would accept MVHC’s proposal. If the redevelopment is presented as a an opportunity to increase affordable housing, then it makes no sense to accept a plan that results in a net loss of affordable housing. Why would the tenants accept housing that’s less affordable than what they have now? Why would the non-subsidized tenants sign-on to a plan that will double their rents? Why would the tenants on subsidy assent to a plan that may cause stressful displacement, and where they may no longer “qualify” for subsidy? Why would the greater public as a whole support a plan that reduces the number of affordable units in Fairview?

I believe that we can do better. What would a truly progressive Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation do? First, it would properly maintain buildings so that demolitions are unnecessary. Second, where redevelopment is unavoidable, it would absolutely guarantee, in writing, all tenants a home in the new building without an extra-ordinary rent-increase. Not only would any development be phased, but it would be made clear exactly who will be forced to relocate and for how long, and those tenants would be compensated fairly for moving costs and associated stress.

In addition to maintaining the current amount of affordable housing, more truly affordable housing could be built – below “competitive market rates.” MHVC owns the land, making development costs lower than market. Further, MVHC collects revenues from a small property tax levy applied across the Lower Mainland; even a minimal increase in that rate would allow MHVC to fund the capital costs of key retrofits or redevelopments like Heather Place. After redevelopment, rents would be used to maintain the building so that it doesn’t fall into disrepair.

There is a huge demand for social housing in the city and the province. The newly formed BC Social Housing Coalition is calling for construction of 10,000 units of new social housing in BC each year to catch-up for the social housing deficit caused by 20 years of neoliberalism. Many will be watching the struggle over Heather Place closely: will it result in increasing that social housing deficit, or will it be the start of a new era where public housing is protected and new public housing is built through progressive taxation?

But it could be that Translink’s consultants have drastically overestimated the cost of light rail. This week Kathryn Mandell and Patrick Condon argued persuasively that the true cost of the light rail option is likely closer to $360 million than it is to Translink’s estimate of $1.1 billion. If so, Translink could build not just 3, but 8 light rail lines for the price of 1 underground line. After building the three lines mentioned above, we could build 5 more! In this paradise scenario, the city would be traversed with rapid transit lines, more people would get out of their cars, and ridership would skyrocket. If you combine this with my ideas for a universal bus pass, I believe car usage in Vancouver would become one of the lowest in the world for a city its size.

So then why this week did the City of Vancouver argue in favour of the more expensive option? Let’s take a look at a couple of the stated reasons.

First, head transportation planner Jerry Dobrovolny said that an at-grade train would require unacceptable reconstruction of the streets and sidewalks and cutting down the trees. But is it really impossible to build light rail without such a disturbance? As Mandell & Condon mentions, Portland’s light rail “Max” did not require such reconstruction.

Second, City manager, Penny Ballem, attempting to argue that the underground Skytrain option would be cheaper than at-grade LRT pointed to the higher annual operating costs of at-grade LRT, for example, drivers’ salaries and benefits. While it is true that at-grade LRT’s annual operating costs are higher than those of the driverless underground Skytrain, in order to do a true cost comparison, we must dig a little deeper. We must know how much higher. Penny Ballem provided no figures for the annual costs. Without these figures it is impossible to know whether or not the higher annual operating costs of at-grade LRT are so much higher that they offset its much lower capital cost. I point this out because every at-grade LRT system I have looked at is cheaper than underground Skytrain even after taking into account its higher annual operating coasts.

It sounds to me like the City of Vancouver first made up its mind, then made up facts to support its predetermined conclusion. It is often the case with large scale public works projects that ruling parties, like Vision Vancouver, are in constant conversation with friendly companies hoping to win large contracts. The bid process is not truly competitive if the decision to go with a particular mode of transit has been made before the RFP [Request for Proposal] is issued. This is particularly true if underground Skytrain is the chosen mode as it’s a proprietary technology – only one company, Bombardier, owns this technology. With only one bidder, there is no opportunity to use the RFP to get competitive bids.

With this in mind, I have a suggestion. If the City of Vancouver and Translink want to prove that they have not already made up their minds about who will win the contract, then when they send out their RFPs for the Broadway-line, they should not stipulate just one mode of technology. The RFP can lay out the goals for ridership, speed, and so on. The bidders will provide their business cases, whether for Skytrain, light rail, or rapid bus.

Those submitting at-grade LRT bids would have the opportunity to suggest creative ways to address the problems raised by Jerry Dobrovolny, such as how to reduce disturbance and reconstruction above ground, how to avoid cutting down trees, etc. This would allow designers to be creative, instead of saying “no” to light rail from the start.

Opening up the RFP would also test Translink’s cost estimate for light rail (or SkyTrain for that matter). If proposals come in at closer to Mandell & Condon ‘s $360 million estimate, then indeed Translink can look at building 8 transit lines instead of just 1!

With the cost-of-living rising faster than wages, many working people don’t have money left over for transit. The fare hikes will only push the working poor deeper into debt. Even worse, for those living in the suburbs and commuting to work in Vancouver, the increase in the 3-zone fare to $11 per round-trip is atrocious. It means that for those working at minimum wage, their commute will cost them more than an hour’s wage everyday. Further, this $11 roundtrip fare is one of the highest costing work commutes in North America.

In addition to speaking out against the injustice of these fare increases, it’s about time we recognize that using fares to fund transit does not make sense at all. Under the current funding formula, Translink pays for 1/3rd of its expenditures with fares. That number is arbitrary. Motorists would be up-in-arms if a full 1/3rd of road construction and maintenance costs were funded through road tolls.

But amount alone is only half the argument. Efficiency is the other half.

Raising transit revenue though fare collection is a most inefficient way to raise revenue. For each fare dollar collected, a full 10 cents is spent collecting or accounting for that dollar — ticket dispensers, police, and now turnstiles. Buses spend a significant portion of time at a stand-still, especially during peak hours, as drivers collect fares and check identification. Translink pays for this wasted time in drivers’ salaries and other costs, while passengers are delayed in reaching their homes and workplaces. These costs, which economists call “friction costs,” make fare collection one of the most inefficient forms of raising revenue.

The other 2/3rd of Tanslink’s funding comes from property and gas taxes. Collection from these sources, as well as from income taxes, is far more efficient than fare collection. Based on efficiency considerations alone, it does not make sense to fund transit through fares.

Fare increases also deter ridership. BC Ferries’ recent fare hike caused a decline in ridership. When Translink first proposed the current fare increases, they anticipated a 2% decline in ridership because people would switch to cars. But as we seek to address climate change, we want more, not fewer, people to use public transit. Therefore, we should reduce fares to get people out of their cars and onto public transit.

A progressive transit authority would not start from the random funding formula where 1/3rd of revenues come from fares. Instead it would start by asking what portion of people we want to ride the bus, then work from there. It would look at creative ways of getting people out of their cars. Last week I spoke on TV and radio about establishing “fare-free zones,” like those in Seattle, Portland, Philadelphia, and other cities. The most common criticism of my proposal was that it may unfairly benefit residents of downtown Vancouver. But congestion by definition is a sign that people are coming from areas far-and-wide, so a fare-free zone in downtown Vancouver would benefit a wide range of people. Furthermore, it makes good sense to have fare-free zones in all congested areas throughout the Lower Mainland.

There are other things I have suggested to increase ridership. Translink is proposing a fare hike for off-peak hours from $2.50 to $2.75. That’s a step in the wrong direction. There are already too many empty seats during off-peak hours. If we’re serious about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we should fill those empty seats. We could start by eliminating fares during off-peak hours. This could be done by municipalities purchasing a kind of “u-pass” for off-peak hours, funded through a minor adjustment to the property tax mill rate, making public transit free for all their residents during those times.

Other ideas I’ve proposed include another type of “u-pass”, a neighbourhood “u-pass,” where residents within a particular catchment area could vote democratically for a neighborhood “u-pass.” The cost would be divided over all property tax bills in that catchment area. Everyone in that neighborhood would get a free bus pass – just like post-secondary students do now. Public transit would then be free for everyone living in that neighborhood.

Why stop there? The twin crises of climate change and stagnant wages demand big thinking. I’ve always thought we should look at a “u-pass” for all workers in the GVRD. Assuming Translink collects $400 million in fares annually, and assuming 600,000 workers participate in the program, then a premium of $50 per worker per month would eliminate all fares. If the costs were split 50/50 between employer and employee, the universal pass would cost each worker only $25 per month. Something like that could start the system change we need to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.

So now you know what I would do if I were in charge of Translink! What are your thoughts?

Looking at the redevelopment plan, it’s clear to me that the fundamental principle at work is maximization of corporate profits. The developer is asking to triple the amount of housing allowed on the site, which could triple the land value in the order of hundreds of millions of dollars. How much of that value the city recoups to fund affordable housing, and how much the developers keep as profits, depends on the political will of City Council. As it stands, however, only 50 of the 2,800 housing units proposed for Oakridge are planned to have below-market rents – that’s less than 2%.

There is unlikely to be much pushback from City Council. The Oakridge landowner is the Ivanhoe Cambridge Corporation, which cleverly hired the developer, Westbank, and architects, Henriquez Partners, to bring City Council on board with the plan. These firms are very close to the ruling party Vision Vancouver – having also collaborated on the Woodward’s redevelopment in the Downtown Eastside. It does not hurt that Westbank donated $12,000 to Vision’s electoral campaign last fall, and an equal amount in previous campaigns.

In contrast to this pro-developer approach, I believe our starting principle should be building housing for those who need it. Oakridge, like the city around it, is in the midst of a housing crisis, with 20% of homeowners and 30% of renters spending more than they can afford on housing. When planning Oakridge, we could be guided by the formula that 1/3^rd of the units be made available to those on social assistance, 1/3^rd of them have rent geared-to-income, and 1/3^rd sold at market — a policy to which the Coalition of Progressive Electors (COPE) re-affirmed its commitment in its Affordable Housing Report released last month.

Naysayers will predictably tell us that there’s no money to build affordable housing due to the restraint of higher levels of government. But let’s look at what a progressive City Council would do. It makes sense for the city to invest in low-income homes. Interest rates are so low right now that the city’s Property Endowment Fund cash assets are sitting in the bank, collecting as little as 2% return. If instead, that cash was invested in building low-income housing at Oakridge, welfare housing allowance payments alone would generate double that revenue.  In addition, if we built 1/3^rd of Oakridge as low-income, we’d have almost 1,000 homes for those in need. The middle 1/3^rd of units with rent geared-to-income would pay for themselves and overhead, while the 1/3^rd market units would generate 20% profits for the city.

This general formula of “1/3^rd 1/3^rd 1/3^rd” worked in the past at Champlain Heights and South False Creek. The COPE Council of which I was a part in 2002-2005 applied it to the original plan for the Olympic Village, but unfortunately the NPA and then Vision whittled down the affordable housing portion to almost nothing.

In addition, we could again remind the naysayers that the Canada Line has increased land values in the Oakridge area so dramatically that if City Council had the political will to recoup even a fraction of that value, it could be invested in a phenomenal amount of housing.

Speaking of the Canada Line, when I look at the Oakridge redevelopment proposal, I can’t help but think about how it would be different had the city taken a different approach to rapid transit. During my 2002-2005 term on City Council, I belonged to a group of COPE councilors arguing in favour of a more comprehensive approach to public transit. Instead of spending $2 billion on the Canada Line (then called the RAV Line), with its needlessly expensive technology, we could have built a rapid-bus system along Granville, which would have operated at 80% of the capacity of the Canada Line, but cost only $300 million. With the $1.7 billion savings, we could have built light-rail along other key corridors, including Cambie, and doubled transit service throughout the entire city. By making more of the city accessible to public-transit riders, we would have also made much more of the city appropriate for affordable housing development.

Instead we got a single line down Cambie, causing real-estate speculation that sent property values sky high — displacing renters and affordable shops. Now much of the new density opened up by the Canada Line, instead of being spread around the city, is being concentrated on a few plots of land, to be developed by those corporations who happen to be financial funders of the ruling party, Vision Vancouver. It is not entirely coincidental that Vision was formed from a faction within COPE which went along with Gordon Campbell and his developer friends to push the Canada Line idea.

There is a name for the arrangement where almost all new density and development are in the hands of a few corporations: monopoly. That’s what the Oakridge redevelopment proposal, with its height and concentration of density, represents to me — concentration of money in the hands of a few firms, and concentration of power in the hands of the party they finance.

The plan is alarming, but not because it represents a “war on the car.” In keeping with the BC Liberals’ premise of austerity and declining public funding, the 2040 plan adopts TransLink’s logic of regressive fees and privatization. Vancouverites should reject the plan first because it accepts the provincial government’s framework of neoliberal financing for buses and trains.

The 2040 Plan is also a developers’ Charter of Rights dressed up as a transportation plan. Under the rubric of transit-oriented development (TOD), the plan delivers a reckless blank slate to developers at the expense of housing affordability. Among other things it builds an umbilical cord between transit funding and new high-priced market condo development. This strategic move by developer-backed Vision goes beyond the policy framework of the BC Liberals pioneered by Kevin Falcon, which ties transit development directly to the private development industry. By approving the 2040 plan the city is positioning itself politically to the right of the provincial government, rejecting the notion of a commercial property tax increase in a city with the second-lowest combined corporate tax rates in the world.

At a time of corporate tax cuts and so-called “austerity” budgets, the report contemplates the idea of channeling development amenity benefits into public transit (see page 36, Section 6.1). Transit-oriented development is a worthwhile goal if it means building affordable density in transit corridors, but Vision has already shown its interest in using the policy to opposite effect. Last spring Vision councillors brought in TOD to justify the expensive Rize mega-projects at Kingsway and Broadway, describing Rize as “a major housing development that supports transit.”

Yet it is the lack of affordability in Vancouver that continues to force people into their cars. The cost of housing in Vancouver is the driving factor for car dependency and longer commute times in Metro Vancouver. One Vancouver resident has rightly pointed out that in the absence of increased public funding for transit, the idea of transit-oriented development puts the “cart before the horse.”

Instead of focusing on an affordable plan for housing development in transit corridors, the 2040 plan is a trailblazer document that paves the way for high-end development in current affordable neighborhoods. By labeling Fraser Street a transit corridor, for example, Vision Vancouver is revealing its cynical objective of using transit goals to further boost the agenda of the development industry. Fraser has one bus — the #8 route — and is not a transit corridor. Rize, not Vision’s lofty rhetoric, is an indication of what’s next for the affordable housing stock between Main and Fraser. Land speculation, renovictions and building demolitions are already forcing working-class renters further eastward within Metro Vancouver, at a greater commuting-distance from their jobs.

The 2040 plan is not a war on cars, and we have to put the Province’s false populism into perspective. The editors of that newspaper have never defended the people of Vancouver against the interests of the richest people in British Columbia. The formula of the Province is precisely to find wedge issues that obscure the real debate while latching onto the legitimate undercurrents of resentment against the city’s ruling elite.

When the Province attacks “Vision’s holier-than-thou attitude that they should dictate how the rest of us live,” we have to pause for a long moment. There is a kernel of truth lying under the surface of illusion. Vision Vancouver does not represent a war on cars, and the 2040 plan is explicit in its targets: the absolute number of car trips in Vancouver will remain stable (see page 10). If Vision represents a war on anything, it is a war on housing affordability. Deregulated tax-free market condos cannot and will not bring housing affordability to Vancouver.