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Working through the priorities...

A blog post on anonymous commenters get over 15 comments and much media coverage, while this Feb 17th post on my 3 top personal priorities as a member of Council in 2008 gets no comments and scant media coverage.

An interesting fact to chew over. 

On one of those priorities is:

Helping the Business Community Engage in Social Issues in Our Community: That's a long title, but its an important issue. If we are really going to house the homeless, or even help people who are housed but not to their satisfaction, we are going to have find more ways of bringing an entrepreneurial mindset to the table. Business and professional people want to help on the root cause social issues because they know it is the right thing to do from almost any standpoint - moral, financial, for community wellness.

Tomorrow, I am helping facilitate a meeting that will hopefully help more business people learn about the social issues in the community, and learn how they can add their positive entrepreneurial mindset.

I am looking forward to it.

Can't sleep, waxing not so eloquently about the North Shore Plan!

This video captures some of my thoughts:

A start at a new affordable housing strategy... not just secondary suites

Today at the council workshop session, we were taken through various tools that might allow the creation of more affordable housing units in the city. This process is just starting but here are some preliminary points and thoughts:

1. The creation of affordable housing in Kamloops goes beyond simply looking at secondary suites. In fact, a more permissive secondary suite policy may not be the even part of the strategy.
2. City staff feel the most promising strategy, at this early point, may be looking at offering builders the ability to add more units if they include some more affordable units in their projects.
3. We are looking at mainly the market sector, not non profit housing. This means we need to figure a way to work closely with the building community to achieve this community goal.
4. If we pursue a secondary suite strategy, good first step might be passing along appropriate and relevant information to potential suite owners on how to create a legal suite.
5. Two prong strategy: look at both helping create more rentals, and more affordable ownership opportunities.

Why I am Excited about North Kamloops...

The revitalization of the North Shore business and cultural districts should, in my mind, be of interest to people all over our community. We are too small and tight knit a community for the vast majority of us to think any differently.

We are just about to vote on the proposed North Shore Plan - a document three years in the making, with broad based community input. If you are interested in specific areas of the North Shore, there is likely to be proposals and details in the plan. Feel free to ask any questions.

A very brief and basic summary of what the North Shore Plan attempts to achieve, in my view: a more complete, accessible area. Buildings of increased height on Tranquille Rd from the Overlander Bridge to Fortune Drive, incorporating both residential and commercial, creating a more vibrant street life. Over time, transitioning from the auto malls at the foot of the Overlander bridge, and moving toward restaurants, boutiques, and more "people" places. Green building, crime prevention principles woven throughout.

The new Holiday Inn is being built as we speak. The new "Green" medical building across from the dilapitated Village Hotel is being planned. The Spirit Square public square should be complete by October. And I had a great lunch today at the recently opened Zorba's Greek Restaurant, kitty corner to Cowboy Coffee.

Towards More Holistic Enforcement of Sex Trade Laws...

I think the laws around the sex trade in Canada are confusing and unnecessarily victimize people. Every summer, as the streets come alive with many good things, not so good things also emerge. People see sex trade workers and drug dealers. They also see the homeless and addicted. I have long argued that the only way we are going to see a long term reduction in social ills and crime is to take a long term, holistic approach.  This applies very much in the case of the street sex trade, where the "criminal" is often one of the victims. Enforcement of sex trade laws also should be accompanied with meaningful assistance to those arrested so that they can live more healthy, happy lives.

That is why I was pleased to see the Kamloops RCMP, with their recent sex trade sting, build the operation so it encompassed an offer of help to the arrested workers. They had a bit of hiccup with the media, but all in all a very good job.

I wrote a letter to the Kamloops Daily News which talks a bit about the media "hiccup". Here it is:

I write today in response to both the RCMP's recent sex trade worker sting and Mel Rothenburger's subsequent  column "Prostitution Sting Raises Important Issues".

First, I want to congratulate the RCMP, the city's crime prevention officer Mark Huhn, crown counsel, social service providers, and anyone else who had something to do with the creation of the sex trade worker diversion program.

A hard job tackling parts of a complex issue and a job well done.

Many people spoke out against last year's sex trade worker stings because the it was felt RCMP did not take a holistic approach to the issue. This year, I feel, everybody potentially wins - businesses, neighborhoods and the sex trade workers themselves.  Now, many arrested sex trade workers will have a choice - take the offer of help or have the justice system and society use more of the "stick" approach.

So, again, kudos to the RCMP and to all involved.

Second, while Mel Rothenburger makes some very valid points about the public good being always served well by media independence, I am currently questioning how it really harmed the public good to delay by a day or two what the Kamloops Daily News was going to publish anyway. Maybe, I am missing something. I share Mel's scepticism on many sex trade exiting programs, but this new diversion program is a huge positive step for our community. It's about an ethic that no longer views everyone involved in the sex trade as a throw away person - an ethic that still very much responds to concerns of businesses and neighborhoods.

By the Daily News not agreeing when the RCMP requested a publication delay (not a ban) on the sting so that they could conduct operations for one more day, did we lose an opportunity to try to help more people?

That's more of a question than a statement. And, its a a question for the whole community to ponder, not just for members of city council or the editor of the Daily News. I would be interested in hearing your views.

Photos from Council Tour of Tranquille

A few weeks back, city council took a tour of the Tranquille farm proposed development property. I took some photos, and am hoping these might give folks who have not the chance to visit a sense of the site now.

Here is the photo album.

We will be deciding on the proposed land uses this upcoming Tues, 7pm, at city hall.

Me, Peter Oswell, and the North Shore Plan...

Over the past year, I have been to many meeting with my friend Peter Oswell to work on a new community plan for the North Shore Kamloops. I like Peter a lot  - and we tend to agree on almost nothing. Yes, it is pretty rare to find Peter and I agreeing on a topic or an issue.

Ultimately, this is a good thing. And it is pretty indicative of how the North Shore plan community advisory committee works. We currently have a lot of people involved with North Shore Business Improvement Association on the committee. And although I am and have been a business person for a long time,  I think its important to state opinions from other North Shore interests. I try to do that when I can. Others do to. We have had some pretty animated discussions. What ultimately generally comes out of our discussions around the table is a pretty balanced view of where the North Shore is now, and where it could go.

Peter and I went for a drink after a committee meeting we had last Thursday evening. We continued a respectful, great conversation. Sometimes I find it hard to bite my tongue and just listen to what he has to say. But, I find listening to him almost always a rewarding thing.

I am beginning to think, through the many hours of meetings I have been to and the many hours of reading I have done, that the main issue on the North Shore is really one of perception. Statistics show the North Shore is really no more crime ridden than any other area of Kamloops, it is beautifully flat and enjoys some of the best weather. There are great deals to be had in real estate.

What we might want to focus on is changing people's perceptions. No street beautfication, no great condo or townhouse project will be able to do that alone. What we perhaps should do is showcase this part of town to the people we want to recognize its great value.

You can read a draft of the North Shore plan here.

More North Shore planning documents.

How to really do something about the Sex Trade...

I have a lot of respect for the difficult work done by the Kamloops RCMP.  And I believe Corporal Scott Wilson (a great new addition to the detachment) when he says the decision to arrest sex trade workers and ban them from certain areas of the North Shore was based on complaints from the public. I understand the police, like other public bodies, should be responding to citizen concerns. So, I would like to suggest to those concerned about sex trade activity in Kamloops a different approach to trying to get their concerns addressed. I base my suggestions on many different discussions I have had with people involved with supporting some of the most vulnerable, most marginalized people in our community.

When you pick up the phone or fire up the email to get someone to do something about the sex trade,  consider contacting a city councillor, an MLA, or our MP. Many outreach workers tell me that people sell their bodies on the street as a last resort or because they are mentally incapable of understanding what they are doing. They are often trying to feed a ruthless addiction. What we should be offering them is a guaranteed spot in a peer support program, a detox program, in affordable housing, away from people who dragging them down.  By instigating the arrest of street level sex trade workers and the ban from certain areas of town, are we not making already desperate people even more desperate? What we need is more funding to remove any and all waitlists for people who want and need society's hand up.

This is the oldest profession in the world. There is a reason why. Even Kamloops' finest can't stop it for good. The police are limited in the tools they can use. Yes, they can enforce the laws against communication for the purpose of prostitution. But, wouldn't you rather have them focus resources on the pimps, the johns, the drug dealers? Instead of chasing sex trade workers from one area of town to another.

I am currently of the view that we should also lobby the federal government to legalize prostitution, regulate it, tax it, and keep the real criminals away.  In the interim, would it not make more sense to open up a section of Tranquille Rd and Victoria St in the wee hours for a sex trade "stroll", as the experts call it. Keep it away from people's homes, between 12pm and 6am (outside of business hours) or something along those lines?

First Blush - Takeaways from the 2007 Smart Growth BC Conference

I am putting this post into a lot of different categories because Smart Growth can underpin so much in a community. It is not just the intersection of the economy and the environment. It also speaks to social issues, preventing crime, the arts, and so much more.

Today, I attended Smart Growth BC's annual conference. This was a gathering of hundreds. And the topic at hand was how to create happier, healthier, more environmentally friendly, and more profitable communities. It may be a little abstract at first, but Smart Growth makes more and more sense to me every time I hear about it. Of course, its not a perfect philosopy, but it is the best I have seen so far. It is a very holistic approach.

Here are some of the highlights from today:

John Knott Jr leads one of the most ambitious city revitalization projects in the US - the Noisette development in North Charleston, South Carolina. He spoke about building and development as an art form and a service to the human community - not just a way to make money. He talked about good development taking into consideration the history and context of a place - sometimes going back thousands of years. This made me think about how we can incorporate more first nation touchstones in Kamloops development. It made me think of ranches, and river travel.  John Knott talked about  how green development not necessarily being more expensive, but a simple product of more thorough planning in the beginning. He also talked of an almost moral imperative for developers to help solve social problems in society. He said developers are actually the best placed people to lead the effort. A quote:

"We come together now around what we fear or what we hate - we no longer come together around what we love"

Chris Corps talked about the value propostion in building green. In Kamloops, we have had some conflicting information cost / benefits. But, Chris Corps points to many studies that indicate the benefits - a green building, for example, is a healthier building and consequently inhabitants are healthier, workers are more productive, patients get better faster. Chris was asked whether this may be because any new building, green or not, produces an initial excitement for people inside. He said it may be too early to draw anything conclusive but preliminary data shows  green features do have a positive effect on wellbeing. Chris pointed to the Green Value report - very interesting reading.

Whistler is heating their new athletes village using waste water. SFU hosts a new community on Burnaby Mountain - Univercity - a walkable community with a variety of housing options, where the residents are offered a $100 discount on a monthly transit pass. Univercity favours local Burnaby businesses in its retail spaces.

Jonathan Westeinde, with Windmill Developments, spoke a bit about the potential of green development. He maintains that using current technologies and practices, we can reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from buildings well below Kyoto Protocol targets within 15 years. He pegged political will as a crucial element - helping to fast track green developments, and providing regulations that can make them successful.

I will be getting all the proceedings from the conference on a CD soon.

Healthy Lives, Not Clean Streets

Interesting thoughts at the Din on Inequity blog about the lens through many of us view homeless people in our community. In my view, we often get the prioirities "bass ackwards". I think if we assist the homeless get on their feet, it is not only a moral imperative, but also will "clean up the streets". But, if we talk of the poor and homeless as "abnormal users" for whom we should have "zero tolerance", this only serves to push people around our community and perhaps even makes them more desperate.