The breeding of hatred in Victoria
It started with a @JohnsonStBRDG tweet that was quickly amplified by others.
“Honestly, I have very little bandwidth for caring about police being struck by motorists when virtually nothing is done by those same police to ticket or prosecute drivers…”
Tweeters rallied around the account, hailing the poster as an inspiration.
I found myself looking back at the past two months, realizing I am living in a city where citizens are encouraged to and honoured for actively promoting hate.
There’s a Twitter feed “Not Janice Williams” for council, devoted to lobbing stones at her every word, and a Missing Middle Housing Initiative (MMHI) Discord group where members ridicule people who oppose their views.
They have gone as far as organizing verbal assaults on those who disagree with them (“please send me one of their user-names the game is on”) and calling a private citizen in their home.
This toxic soup of hate has boiled over into our public forums. A few weeks ago, a UVic student spoke at the MMHI public hearing and put residents on notice: “because of some $^&@-you I got mine mentality, be prepared when we have very little empathy for your complaint.”
It’s all becoming overwhelmingly common and very mainstream. As we witness the debate of the fate of our city through hatred, one has to wonder how many people will reconsider their desire to run for council. I know I am reconsidering mine.
Susan Simmons
Victoria
55 years later, still no beat downtown
When I joined the Saanich Police Department in 1967, then-police chief Bert Person welcomed me with “young man, six months from now you’ll be walking a beat downtown.”
Let’s get on with it.
Rick Gonder
Victoria
Regional policing needs to be done now
The amalgamation of police departments, as suggested in two letters on Aug. 24, is exactly what should be happening — now.
I sincerely hope our premier and other government officials “read and heed” these very important and necessary changes. Not only would taxpayers’ money be more wisely spent, but the continuity of policing would be much more efficient.
One well-managed Greater Victoria police department would certainly make Victoria look more like the capital city it professes to be.
Officials, now is the time and your chance to move forward. Let’s get going.
W.E. Morrison
Victoria
A health-care summary in 10 quick points
Recent letters demand comment.
1. Decades ago, demographics showed that the aging population would create more demand for health-care service. Instead, governments accepted the asinine conclusions of the Seaton report and cut medical student enrolments.
2. In B.C., successive governments accepted health-care outsourced to regional authorities with no effective oversight and accountability.
3. Despite clear evidence that the system was failing to provide health care, governments refused to require sufficient tertiary education places for adequate staffing levels.
4. Outsourcing of accreditation to the B.C. doctors’ governing body meant that there was no accountability for unreasonable accreditation processes — the quoted Georgetown-trained doctor being illustrative.
5. Despite clear indication for years that the current 1950s delivery model has been broken, minimal productive action has been taken to create a modern delivery system. A single nationwide electronic record system? What a novel idea. Real countries have them.
6. The concept of the GP “knowing” the patient is ridiculous. With hundreds of patients, she/he only “knows” you from the chart read before the visit.
7. Integrated health-care delivery facilities are needed efficiently and effectively deliver 21st-century health care. The infrastructure, including administrative staff, needs to be a provincial responsibility so that doctors and nurses need only practise medicine.
8. An integrated national health-care system is necessary to effectively deliver modern health care — as the fragmented COVID pandemic has proven. Provinces need to get their act together.
9. Federal funding is a red herring. Provinces can raise taxes if their systems are inefficient, and face voters’ wrath when such systems don’t work.
10. If the provincial Liberals want to win the next election, run on a credible recovery plan for health care with a suitable penalty for failure.
Roger Love
Victoria
The NDP has nothing to talk about
Wow, David Eby is frustrated. Suddenly he isn’t the only one who wants to lead the B.C. NDP. Now he might have to explain his ideas to NDP members, maybe even engage in a debate.
Scary! Won’t that be completely redundant?
Until now B.C. NDP members and caucus have been of one mind on everything that their leader says, right? When has anybody heard one word of dissent from within the B.C. NDP? Never!
Every NDP MLA agrees that it is good to export raw logs, to extort old growth logging complicity from First Nations, to send RCMP goons to gas and beat forest protectors (and to stomp on their guitars), to impose fees on “freedom” of information requests, to forbid MLAs to reply to letters or phone calls from constituents, to spray glyphosate on clearcuts, to frack like there’s no tomorrow, to push pipelines through Indigenous lands at gunpoint, to allow TMX to wipe out salmon spawning runs, to break agreements and laws with clever snap elections, etc.
Why bother with another candidate? What’s to talk about?
Martin Hykin
Victoria
20,000 riders a day? Better check the math
Re: “Saanich considers pop-up shops on Galloping Goose and Lochside trails,” Aug. 24.
Saanich Mayor Fred Haynes said “about 20,000 riders travel through Saanich on a daily basis on the trails.”
Do the math — that’s 7. 5 million yearly. Absurd. Colwood in a recent filing says 200,000 per year, less than three per cent of Saanich’s figure.
If the powers-that-be in Saanich are doing that type of math with our tax dollars, it goes along way to explaining why our taxes have gone up so dramatically over the past four years.
Nice to see Saanich has lots of extra money for these pet projects of late, but virtually no money to maintain the neighbourhoods.
That’s silo budgeting, it takes much-needed funds from the necessities like road repairs and boulevard maintenance budgets and moves the funds to the unnecessary pet projects of the political side.
Just contributes to the “we just don’t have the budgets for that.”
I’m sure we’ve all read or heard that when we questioned City Hall. Perhaps the local politicians should deal less on trying to get re-elected on a day-to-day basis and spend more time on managing effectively on a day-to-day basis.
The upcoming election will be very interesting.
Doug Coulson
Saanich
Rail revival could help health-care access
Re: “The future of health care? Look to our railway,” letter, Aug. 24.
A modern Island rail system can play a role in health-care delivery, patient outcomes and quality of life. Our population doesn’t support certain health services in more than one location on the Island.
I often hear stories of people who reside north of the Malahat staying at a hotel in Victoria the night before a test or procedure to avoid missing, or having to wait months to reschedule, a potentially life-saving appointment in the capital region due to the lone, unpredictable highway.
The elder generation of my family lives in the Cowichan Valley, and not one of them likes driving over the Malahat at the best of times. A recent illness left one of them in Victoria General Hospital for several weeks, so spousal visits were not exactly convenient and driving only added to the stress of the situation.
Taking one of three, or more, daily round trips on the train, as proposed in the Island Corridor Foundation’s business case, to a potential Six Mile station would only leave a short connection to VGH by bus, shuttle, taxi or foot for patients or visitors.
Kerry Davis
Esquimalt
What will the future think of failure to act?
Re: “The future of health care? Look to our railway,” letter, Aug. 24.
At the current growth rate of the population of Vancouver Island, there will likely be near two million residents in 100 years, perhaps even more.
At that time, the transportation network of one main Island Highway will be clogged with whatever kind of vehicles will be in use to haul freight plus meet all the other transportation needs.
The future need of a railway will be dire in the distant future, which must be put in place immediately before the right-of-way is lost, as it now appears in serious jeopardy.
Just think what the distant-future folks will think when they feel desperate for a railway and look back to 2022 and say how short-sighted those folks were about the future of the island transportation needs, knowing full well of the popularity of living in such a Canadian paradise.
The need will grow and grow, as assuredly will the population. The provincial government must act now to commit support to save the railway as an essential asset for the future.
Stanley Brygadyr
Victoria
Tough to be David Eby, tough to be an NDP member
Alas for David Eby! Imagine being a multi-millionaire lawyer and attorney general who has been chosen by party insiders as the next leader and premier.
Imagine being frustrated by a young and talented environmentalist woman who recently lost an election for an MLA seat in Vancouver. Imagine having to win an election against her to be the official nominee.
Imagine having to wait for an two extra months to have your name painted on the premier’s office door after the party insiders tried to ensure your victory with a set of highly restrictive election regulations that would be difficult to meet unless you were also an insider.
Imagine also that you are a B.C. NDP member who has prided yourself in being a member of an open and democratic party that, once upon a time, was dedicated to the well-being and survival of ordinary working people and families in B.C.
W.C. Graham
Victoria
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