Letters Dec. 4: NCAA tournament at UVic; dealing with speeders

NCAA tournament at UVic a lost opportunity

Re: “Victoria the winner as basketball events roll in,” Dec. 1.

Contrary to Cleve Dheenshaw’s glowing report of the recent NCAA Women’s Invitational Tournament at the University of Victoria, it needs to be pointed out that there were a number of areas that could have been much improved.

I was not in attendance at the final, which reportedly played to a near full-house, which was a good thing, for the quality of basketball played was very high.

I was in attendance for Friday night’s semi-final games, however. On that night, if not for the travelling fans and families of the teams, and despite a Hall of Fame induction ceremony, the attendance was embarrassingly sparse. It was further embarrassing to show respect to an anthem with a “pocket handkerchief” U.S. flag. There were no programs or team list, no tournament draw visibly displayed, and a pathetic kiosk offering of hot dogs, popcorn and a slice of pizza, intended to suffice for four hours of basketball viewing.

Most disappointing was a total void of pre-tournament publicity. It was a good thing that teams had ambassadors who were able to sell our city.

Teams in attendance had plenty of supporting dollars, e.g. staying at the Empress and Bear Mountain.

This was a golden opportunity to promote high-quality basketball and our sponsor communities. I doubt very much if we will see a repeat of this tournament at UVic.

Ian MacLean
Victoria

Saanich won’t act on speed complaints

Re: “Improve speed-limit enforcement,” letter, Nov. 30.

I have been working for over two years to get Saanich to deal with the speed of traffic on our street.

I have met with senior police and engineering officials, as well as Mayor Fred Haynes and council, all to no avail. Their position is that their studies don’t show a problem and they are comfortable with the speed of traffic on the street.

A survey I did shows those living on the street do not share this comfort level. A study done by Saanich engineering shows that, on average, more than 300 vehicles a day pass our house doing in excess of 60 kilometres per hour.

When I showed the study to Mayor Haynes, he pointed out that police do surveillance in the Emily Carr Park area and their random checks resulted in more than 130 tickets being issued in 2017. This, in itself, would suggest there is a problem, however his response is that most of the speeders are residents of Broadmead.

It is difficult to see how where the drivers live is relevant; the issue is the speed they are travelling. Saanich states it does not have the resources to patrol the street and the police say their mandate is primarily speed control for parks, school zones and high-crash areas.

Unfortunately, we do not qualify under any of these. They also refuse to entertain any form of traffic calming. We are all aware of the impact speeding drivers have had, with serious crashes on Ash Street and Prospect Lake Road.

So, if they are not going to enforce the speed limit, reducing the limit will have minimum impact. As a young man recently said to me: “Everyone knows there are no speed limits in Saanich, so everyone just drives at the speed they are comfortable with.” This is just not acceptable.

Brian Reynolds
Saanich

Speeders need a three-and-out policy

The province is about to spend $85 million on improvements to about a one-kilometre stretch of Highway 14. The net result will be an increase in speeding.

Highway 14 between Sooke and Langford is a training circuit for traffic-crash fatalities. Particularly between sunset and sunrise, there’s routine passing on solid double lines, tailgating and driving 20 km/h or more above posted limits.

Enforcement would help, but even better would be a more honest assessment of how to get rid of this behaviour. To chronic offenders, current speeding penalties don’t mean a thing. Check out the ICBC stats for the decade — it continues to be a leading cause of crash fatalities.

It’s time to wake up and get this recalcitrant and lethal population off the road. With a three-and-out policy, the first speeding offence would come with a fine equal to a month’s average full-time salary in B.C., the second with a licence suspension of one year and the third with a permanent revoking of both licence and insurability.

Brian Nimeroski
Sooke

Joe Clark led the way on Conservative Pride

Former interim leader of the federal Conservative Party Rona Ambrose made news recently by tweeting about how proud she is to have been the first (and only) Conservative leader to have marched in a Pride parade. While Ambrose’s commitment to inclusiveness is heartening to see in an Alberta Tory, it’s worth noting that she is only the first since the merger of the Conservative and Reform parties.

In 2000, I was living in Calgary Centre, Joe Clark’s riding, when, as leader of the Progressive Conservatives, he ran against Canadian Alliance candidate Eric Lowther.

My friends and I got together and agreed that our only chance of keeping the far-right candidate out of office was to vote for Joe.

Progressives across the city came together to vote for Joe, who was elected with 46 per cent of ballots cast. He well knew who had elected him, and stayed true to his principles.

In 2001, he led the Calgary Pride Parade, as the first (former) prime minister to take on the role of grand marshal. This moment in history deserves to be remembered. I, for one, will never forget it.

Martha McGinnis
Victoria