8 - Friday, March

14, 1986 ~ North Shore News

Doug Collins

© get this straight

THERE’S NO doubt about it. The Socreds are practically
a bunch of Nazis and things are happening on Vancouver’s
Skid Road that are making the Age of Dickens look like

heaven.

Or so you would think froin
watching the nightly newscasts
and reading the daily press.

The Evening Wirmip, the biggest
hand-wringer in B.C. and the only
one that can’t make its mind up
about what to call itself, wails as
if all its advertisers had just gone
broke. In far-off Toronto, the
National Wimp, sometimes
known as the Globe & Mail, swells
the chorus.

On TV and radio, indignant
reporters add to the din. Jim
Green of the Downtown Eastside
Residents Association (DERA),
the chief propagandist in all this,
pats the media on the head for do-
ing a good job.

Seeing a bunch of poor old men
having to find other places to live
is not the happiest of sights, I ad-
mit. But there’s another side to
the story.

It’s called the market.

In the market, people get what
they can for their goods and
services.

The rule applies io newspaper
editors and owners, weepy female
reporters, the sanctimonious B.C.
Federation of Labor, and hotel

proprietors. It even applies to
DERA, it having stuck the City of
Vancouver for an annual grant of
about $20,000. (Which will be
more when Comrade Harry
Rankin becomes mayor.)

It was the market, too, that
made the heartless East End hotel
people give the old men cheap
rooms in the first place. For the
hotels are dumps that no self-
respecting rat would accept will-
ingly. So owners and guests met
on common ground and struck a
bargain beneficial to all.

However, the old men did not
get leases for life. They got rooms
by the week, or month.

Along comes Expo. The market
changes. The old men are told to
go. And they knew a long time
ago that that day would come.

Everyone cries foul.

It’s all the fault of the Socreds
for putting on Roman saturnalias
when the people want bread, says
Green, a professional left-wing
organizer,

Hear hear, cry his allies in the
media.

But wait a moment.

Don’t the TV and radio stations

screw their advertisers for as
much as they can get?

Doesn’t Pacific Press get as

much as it can for its product? {
Hasn't it just put up the priceofa |

newspaper from 25 cents to 35?
Hasn't the humanitarian National
Wimp just doubled its price from
25 cents to 50?

How do these socially-
conscious organs feel, charging so
much that the poor old men can't
even afford to see their pictures in
the papers?

Putting up prices like that is
tantamount to telling the old men
to get their butts over to the North
Shore, where they can get a paper
for nothing.

There is no end to man's in-
humanity to man. Landlords run
rampant, newspaper folk run
rampant, there is no health in us,
and no one wants to tell the truth
about a story that's too good to
miss,

Obviously, the hand-wringers
want the run-down hotels to re-
main run down forever. How
dare anyone put a lick of paint on
the things and charge more!
Wouldn’t it be awful if East Van-
couver ceased being a Skid Road
and became bourgeois?

As long as the media don’t have
to live there, East Van is now and
ever shall be just perfect for the
poor old men.

Bowen {sland wants better power

B.C. HYDRO is being asked by
the Greater Vancouver Regional
District to improve its electrical
service to Bowen Island.

Bowen Island GVRD director
Gail Taylor said in a report to the
regional board that there have
been repeated problems of power
failures on the island, and that
during a cold spell this winter some

For North Shore Homeowners to claim your

residents were without heat, light
and water for up to 27 hours.

The cause of the problem is old
equipment, no provision for
emergency replacement and the
distance that repair crews must
come, she said.

GVRD directors gave their sup-
port to a community petition urg-
ing Hydro to replace its main cable

(0

from West Vancouver to the
island, wpgrade and replace other
existing equipment where war-
ranted, and prepare an alternate
emergency service to the island
during power shortages or failures.
The GVRD’s position will be
communicated to B.C. Hydro, and
provincial government repre-
sentatives.

from Federal Govt.

Federal Grant for home insulation ends March 31. You must act today so we can complete
work by March 31st. Do your part to make Canada More energy efficient, get Freeman
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HERE’S HOW IT WORKS:

Sample A

$1000.
$333.
$667.
$0

Total Price
1/3 Govt. Grant
B.C. Hydro Program
Balance owing

Sample B

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$ 500.
$ 750.
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Using sample A there would be no cash outlay required. Using sample B there
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Completion.

We feature ‘‘Super Pink II by Fiberglass Canada. We do all the paperwork —
you get all the savings. Call Jim Eisenhauer or Pat Harrand, Freeman Services.
Call now 684-4304. Registration lines open from 6 a.m. to midnite for your

convenience.

Ambleside plan
makes progress

FINAL INPUT on the revitaliza-
tion of Ambleside Park has been
submitted.

West Vancouver Council receiv-
ed a report Monday from the
Parks and Recreation Advisory
Commission (PRAC) on the
Ambleside by the Sea-Waterfront
Program Review, the third and last
report to be commissioned on the
Ambleside Plan.

One of the recommendations
made by the PRAC is to extend
and landscape the seawalk where
possible.

Five other recommendations
from the PRAC followed:

*There should be very little
commercial development at the
foot of 14th Street and it should be
compatible with the seaside en-
vironment.

*The foot of 15th Street is more
suitable for commercial develop-

ment than the foot of 14th Street,
though it may take some time to
acquire land here.

*An outdoor cafe is preferable
to a restaurant at the 14th Street
site.

*A sailing/boat club on the 14th
Street Site is not favored.

*Council should organize a
committee of distinguished ar-
chitects, planners and perhaps
some lay people, to establish
criteria and to evaluate proposals
for all buildings to be constructed
on the waterfront to ensure their
compatibility with the seaside en-
vironment,

Now that West Van's three ad-
visory commissions have com-
mented on the plan, director of
development Steve Nicholls said
that staff will bring back their
report to council in April for fur-
ther action.

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