The View Through

Vancouver has a number of hearts.  The Sun Yat Sen Gardens in Chinatown is one of my favourites.

The Real Election

Today is Municipal election day in British Columbia.   These are the least supported elections compared to the already low turnout for Provincial and Federal elections; and that’s crazy really, because it is the municipalities that have the greatest effect on our day to day living.

It is the municipalities that determine our house taxes, that collect our garbage, that operate our libraries and community centres, that control how our schools are run, that fix our streets and set parking policies, that control zoning and planning permissions, that regulate taxis and businesses.  In Vancouver and a few others, they operate a police force, too.  If we could only get the voters to see that their best interests are best protected by their participation at the local and municipal level; then we could facilitate change that directly affected people’s everyday lives.

Provincial and Federal levels of government are the super-structures erected by the elite to draw power away from the people.  The municipalities are where individuals can claim back that power.  So go vote!

Anyway, with all that being said, this voting business in Vancouver is an exhausting process!  You only have to vote once for Mayor, so that’s easy enough.  But then there are 10 Councillor, 9 Parks Board and 7 School Trustee positions to choose.  And even when you’ve plowed through those, you turn over the ballot paper and find yet another four propositions to vote on!   No wonder they have seats at all the voting booths;  you are going to be there a while.