6- Friday, April 1, 1994 - North Shore News PA Sai apa Take the Fist FRoin TH oneaM. the We animals ~ FROM THE FORGST... ¥ - DMD 88 FOR THE TREES, patra se 0 RESPONSIBLY... Tae We BiRDS FROM THe aif... Zz . + SERRANO oc NG sneeeanentee eta netananeate SREY a ONS eta See SG EG SOR R EN ‘NEWS VIEWPOINT Sans span . AY. yes to no. New First Narrows cross- ing. or any First Narrows crossing, that As re ealed i in this April 1 issue, unnamed e ‘members ‘of the committees examining the ) fature of the Lions Gate Bridge have decided “ to: support the No Crossing At'All Option to ie ‘replace the troublesome old structure. ‘Amen to that. Ever ‘since it was. built 56 years ago, the Lions Gate Bridge has funneled far too much ‘riff-raff from elsewhere. to the quiet backwa- ters of the North Shore, where aristocratic folk traditionally enjoy a more culturally _advanced ‘lifestyle than their counterparts Over There. And‘now more than ever is our ‘North Shore way of life threatened by Lower Mainland barbarism. "Greater Vancouver folk, for example, are considering dumping more chemicals in our reservoirs, they are building monster hommes ‘in our neighborhoods and, most recently, are planning to apply user fees to Vancouver park facilities to drive tennis enthusiasts and other athletic vulgarians across the inlet to ‘drip sweat upon our fair recreational soils: and fill the peaceful air with their horrible sports jargon. Aside from any other consid- eration, the cost of other Lions Gate Bridge options runs into the hundreds of millions of dollars, compared with the No Crossing option’s far more reasonable price tag of nothing. Any improved transportation link will-only encourage transients and other louts to hijack evermore vehicles and venture northward to pester innocent Northenders. So it is time to stand for nothing: say no to a First Narrows crossing and yes to the No Crossing At All Option. Your North Shore good life depends uponit. —~ LETTER OF THE DAY Trustees have selective hearing disorder Dear Editor: As | write this fetter, the primary play structure is being relocated at ‘Blueridge elementary school, at a “cost in excess of $10,000. | During the past two years, two ‘successive school boards have heard the complaints of a single homeowner, who is displeased about the location of a play struc- ture close to his property. That the structure was built in ‘accordance with law is acknowl- edged by all concerned. Fences and trees were offered and refused. No : at ; / Publisher Managing Edltor. Associate Editor. . Sales & Marketing Director Compitrolter.... - compromise was acceptable and the _. structure is being moved -—~ osten- sibly as a show of good faith. It has been said that this was “the right thingtodo.”—* A school trustee stated to me that it is a schoo! trustee’s job to listen and respond to the concerns of the taxpayers, and that by mov- ing the structure they have done so. The selective hearing of these school trustees is distressing, Many people voiced concerns about this matter to the school, to the trustees, to the newspaper, without the same t 1 Display Advertising - 980-0511 Real Estate Advertising Classified Advertising Newsroom 986-6222 Fax Distribution 985-6982 Subscriptions ‘985-2131 Administration regard from the board. The trustees have demonstrated that an unreasonable person can, by sheer persistence, win his or her case. I seriously doubt whether a play structure located on the per- sonal property of a trustee would have been relocated at personal expense in response to a neighbor's complaint. How easy it is to make high: minded gestures when dealing from ’ the public purse. Angela Trudeau North Vancouver 986-1337 986-1337 985-3227 985-2131 “North Shore News, ‘founded in 1969 as an independent suburban | newspaper and qualified under Schedule 111, Paragraph 111 of the Excise Tax Act, is published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Lid. and distributed to every door on tha North Shore. Canada Post Canadian Publications Mail Sales Product Agreement Ne. 0087238, Mailing rates - available on request. Submissions are welcome but we cannot accept responsibility for unsolicited material including manuscripts and pictures which » should ba accompanici by a stamped, addressed 7 envelope. V7M 2H4 1139 ‘Lonsdale Avenue North Vancouver B.C.° North Shore Managed -~ _———-— MEMBER cua SINS S04 OIVISION . 61,582 (average circulation, Wednesday, Friday & Sunday) Entire contents © 1994 North Shore Free Press Ltd. All rights reserved. Var REVOLUTIONARIES in West Vancouver are, natu- rally, polite. No throwing tea in the harbor. Nothing so rude, No barricades, no bombs. Buta recent submission to coun- cil of five earnest and, | would say, savvy West Vancouver taxpayers is explosive stuff, If their figures are correct -— and Iwo of the five are accountants, and their sis is largely based on the municipality's own financial fig- ures — you, dear West Van taxpay- er, have been right royally taken to the cleaners in the last decade, especially since 1987. The submission, made by H.J. Brice Macdougall, Gordon G.C. Kerr — the two CAs — and William G. Brown, Ronald W. Baldry, and David A. Hall, makes meaty reading. This is not the work of a few ragtag gramblers and old grouches in tenni:, shoes. It’s a for- midable challenge to Mayor Mark Sager, council and staff. [t says, in so many words: Cut the fat. Budget carefully. Manage. Recommendations: , Reduce the 1994 operating bud- get to 95% of actual spending in 66 Jt says, in so many ' words: Cut the fat. Budget carefully. Manage. 9? 1993. Reduce the capital budget to 90%. Reject all supplementary bud- get requests (almost $1 million) this year. Also: A hiring freeze. A freeze on council salaries and expenses and all non-union employ- ees pending an independent opera- tions analysis. A ban on overtime, No charitable grants. Cancellation of a $19,000 contract with a Washington, D.C., group studying West Van's firehall requirements. And so on. “We firmly believe,”.the authors declare, that “$37 million of cur- rent, direct annual spending by the municipality can be reduced by at least $2 million (annually) ... Coun. Ron Wood recommended that the adisory finance commission take a look at the submission. ~ ‘Coun. Allan Williams urged municipal finance director George Horwood to check the data for accuracy before council proceeds further. (Ata meeting March 18 with Baldry, a regular at council meetings and a candidate last fall, _ and Brown, a former Woodward's executive, Horwood identified one flaw: the 1984 expenditures were unconsolidated, sligttly skewing figures on one graph.) A personal imerjection: Ata lime when senior governments are at least talking restraint and making gestures at holding tie tax line, Pve found small interest at the top in such matters locally — not even during last fall's elections when, Trever - Lautens GARDEN OF BIASES - a viel ” just a reminder, our mayor was acclainicd and therefore under no pressure to defend his administra- tion, The submission’ stone is firm.. but courteous, Ron Baldry remarked to me that George Horwood has always been coopera; -” "ve with regards to providing infor- mation. But the figures aren "SO". polite. They’re devastating. The information ‘ ‘conclusively shows thit increases in municipal... ; “spending since 1984 have far. exceeded the increase of intlation - « and have far exceeded the rate of: increase in West ‘Vancouver’ s Pop- ulation.” «571 - The accompanying graphs fell the tale — graphically, you might say. The poputatien curve is rela- tively flat. The inflation curve: : (Vancouver figure) is steeper. But’. the net municipal tax curve looks. “ like a rocket’s trajectory. The total ~: tax and utilily billing curve is almost thé same. Z -Police and fire department and. s and recreation (exchiding the ‘ library) costs are also far above the rate of inflation. A bar graph shows ‘the discretionary debt bumping : along at about $1 million a year :. fro: 1984 to 1987. Then, in O88, during Don Lanskail’s mayoralty, it takes off to almost $4.5 million, «~ then nearly doubles in 1989 (a time. - when, in fairness, prosperity was high, and businesses and. most senior governments also were - spending and borrowing heavily). It: eased to about $8 million in 1992, the last year compared. * .. What isn’t so excusable is that municipal costs continued to rise during the subsequent years of recession. In 1987, only 29 munici-» pal jobs paid $50, 000 a year or. more; by 1992, 180 —a520% . increase. And 21 of them paid‘: $70,000 or more. Meanwhile, the process of scru- : tinizing the budget — to be released this month — seems to lurch on, out of public sight. Council studies it at a series of private meetings. A-fly on the wall would, I think, teport that those mectings sometimes lack focus and’ concerted application. Councillors ; are only human. Studying budgets — while it should be a top priority - of elected people — can be paralyz- ingly boring. Councils everywhere tend to rely on paid staff. But bureaucrats have much greater tol- erance for ballooning governments - and their costs than most taxpayers. Such as the five authors of this submission. It shouldn’ t be sloughed off.