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Entries from January 2016

Retired from city hall but not gone: The woman who made all us of see the homeless as people

May 31st, 2013 · 12 Comments

Vancouver’s official advocate for the homeless had her last day at city hall Thursday, along with her birthday. My story about her in the Globe is here but I wanted to add a few words. I started covering city hall for the Vancouver Sun in the fall of 1994 (when I was a toddler, of […]

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The new old corner store: Little shops in the middle of neighbourhoods see a revival

May 30th, 2013 · 45 Comments

Sometimes as a journalist, you write about things because you have to. Other times, you get to write about what you love. This is my story about the new old corner store. Many thanks to Andy Yan for generating the map and data on their locations. (BTW, a piece of information I didn’t squeeze in […]

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What we talk about when we talk about politics: Vision Vancouver aims to connect the city to its residents

May 26th, 2013 · 178 Comments

Last week, the Vision council brought out the first recommendations from its Engaged City Task Force, with more heavyweight ones to come later on. The report with their recommendations is here and my story, one of several done on the day, is here. A few of the quick starts here inspire me with a certain […]

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No, the black helicopters are nothing to worry about. Really.

May 23rd, 2013 · 12 Comments

This just out from the city’s communications people: The City of Vancouver wishes to advise residents near the lower Fraser River that on Friday, May 24 there will be several planned and authorized helicopter low altitude fly overs. The flights are all part of two filming projects underway around the city. The pilots are not […]

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Changes to popular bike route provoke anxiety among small, indie, green businesses

May 22nd, 2013 · 122 Comments

I post this story with trepidation, having observed already on a few Twitter exchanges that the cycling crowd immediately jumped into trashing these businesses for not being progressive enough while the predictable anti-bike crowd weighed in. Can I just reiterate one more time. These businesses ALREADY HAVE 4,000 bikes a day going past them, so […]

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The Bob Rennie annual event: “I told you so” + “Two markets, one paycheque”

May 21st, 2013 · 8 Comments

My account of condo marketer/power broker Bob Rennie’s speech to the development industry, which began with him saying “I told you so” and continued from there. (For those recently living under a rock, Rennie was one of Premier Christy Clark’s most vocal backers, convinced to the last minute she would win.)

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Municipal politicians a big bloc in new Liberal government — and what will they do with that power?

May 20th, 2013 · 33 Comments

Christy Clark used a card from Gordon Campbell’s book to draft candidates — she plucked them from city councils around the province. As a result, about a dozen new MLAs will be leaving their jobs as mayors and city councillors to sit in Victoria. Here’s my story from this week on what a few of […]

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Green NDP candidates win in Vancouver, surge in West Van. What does it mean?

May 15th, 2013 · 147 Comments

I note that the places where the NDP did make a few gains were in particular spots where the NDP candidates managed to combine the usual party line with a green message: West Vancouver-Sea to Sky, where NDP candidate Ana Santos didn’t win, but achieved the biggest gain for any riding in NDP votes. Vancouver-Fairview, […]

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Why vote when you’re in a riding where your candidate has little to zero chance of winning? There’s a reason

May 14th, 2013 · 54 Comments

I’ve always wondering about those dedicated souls who turn out to vote Liberal in Vancouver-Mount Pleasant or Surrey-Green Timbers, or the equally hardy souls who vote in West Vancouver-Capilano, Vancouver-Quilchena or Kelowna-Mission, where there’s not an ice cube’s chance in hell that their candidate will win. My story today takes a look at that phenomenon.

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How Vancouver’s housing solutions get promoted elsewhere

May 14th, 2013 · 1 Comment

Always instructive to get the view from far away.

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