Alberni Valley News
www.albernivalleynews.com
INBOX Feedback on news items
Wednesday, November 28, 2018 A9
«Share your opinion
editor@albernivalleynews.com
Pot shops should be concentrated in Uptown To the Editor, Re: Port Alberni To Talk Pot Monday, Nov. 19. I spoke briefly at the City of Port Alberni’s committee of the whole meeting but I would like to share my views on the retail sale of marijuana in Port Alberni more concisely. First of all, I think that all of the marijuana shops should be located
somewhere in the Uptown area. This could inject the area with money, creativity and a fresh vitality which the area so desperately needs. It could become a tourist destination point for some of those million people who currently bypass Port Alberni (with the exception perhaps of a brief stop at Walmart and a gas station on Johnston Road) on their
way to the west coast. It would also make regulation and enforcement easier because the trade would be contained in a central area. Currently, my impression is that any one applying for a license would decide on a location themselves. It’s the same old desperation – the tail wagging the dog – and I would hope that the new mayor and council
would take a more creative approach to revitalizing the Uptown area. The irony of a proposal to locate an outlet in the Pacific Rim mall is not lost on me. That very mall, with its big box stores, is a large part of the reason Uptown is such a retail desert. Locating a store at Pacific Rim will just facilitate traffic cruising through. We need to give these
tourists a reason to stop, shop, eat, and enjoy our city. We need a way to create a critical mass of traffic necessary for success. Cars pulling into a shop in Pacific Rim is not going to provide heightened traffic in town, it will be just another gas up spot on the way to wherever. Brent Knox, Port Alberni
PR must stand for ‘pathetic Opportunity knocks rhetoric’ in Leaders Debate in building retrofits To the Editor, The much-vaunted and highly-anticipated televised Leaders Debate on Proportional Representation (PR) on Nov. 8 was touted as a way to bring the electorate up to speed on three options being offered by the BC NDP government in the PR referendum. Sadly, it turned out to be the exact opposite, as despite BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson asking over and over and over for NDP leader John Horgan to explain those options, none were forthcoming. In fact, the NDP leader muddied the waters even more, by resorting to what is possibly millennial-speak when he said at one point : “If you were woke you would know that pro rep is lit.” There are many voters who wouldn’t
Anyone expecting some transparency was obviously left wanting...
understand this use of famously said: “There are modern slang language, known knowns. These are but later on when he things we know that we admonished his oppoknow. There are known nent to embrace elecunknowns. That is to say, toral reform and “be there are things we know hip”, some older viewthat we don’t know. But ers probably realized he there are also unknown wasn’t talking about a unknowns. These are hip replacement. things we don’t know we don’t know”. Anyone expecting Rumsfeld’s ramblings some transparency was obviously left wanting, perfectly summed up – Bernie Smith what the NDP leader as history repeated had to say about PR, itself with Horgan sounding like former US Defence Sec- which is probably stands for ‘pathetic retary Donald Rumsfeld trying to avoid rhetoric.’ Bernie Smith, answering questions in 2003. When Parksville quizzed about the Iraq Attack, he in-
To the Editor, Re: Port Alberni to receive $8.7 million in affordable housing, Nov. 14, 2018. As of 2050, an estimated 70 per cent of buildings standing today will still be in use. Unless we take action, homes and buildings constructed without regard for energy efficiency, carbon pollution, or air quality will continue to waste energy and cough up emissions until our children’s children are adults. To make good on its climate goals, B.C. must reduce carbon pollution from buildings by 50–60 per cent below 2007 levels by 2030. B.C.’s task at hand is retrofitting 30,000 houses, 17,000 apartment
units, and 3 million square feet of commercial space every year between now and 2050. Meeting these goals will require private and public investment of up to $1 billion per year. This could create more than 10,000 sustainable jobs across B.C. and generate $4–8 billion in economic growth. This is a prime example of the bold action we need to see in this fall’s B.C. climate strategy. Making our homes and buildings energy-efficient, healthy, safe, and affordable should be B.C.’s next megaproject. Betsy Agar, Senior analyst, Pembina Institute, Vancouver
Speaker demonstrates his character again It almost seems there’s something about putting on the TOM three-cornered hat of SpeakFLETCHER er of the B.C. Legislature that causes overheating of the brain BC Views underneath. B.C. Liberal MLA Linda Reid embarked on a spending spree that included renovations and se-
We offer our patients a wide range of preventative and restorative dental care services including the following General Family Dentistry • Hygiene Services Implant Dentistry • Sedation One Day Crowns and many more . . .
New Patients and Families Welcome!
curity upgrades to her Richmond constituency office as well as extravagant remodelling of the legislature she found herself ruling over with near-absolute authority. Before Reid, Penticton MLA Bill Barisoff kept a tight leash on the press gallery and a veil over legislature finances, ruling with an imperial
disdain not usually seen in trucking company owners. At least I’d buy a used truck from Barisoff, which is more than I can say for the current occupant of the ornate old speaker’s office, Abbotsford South MLA Darryl Plecas. We now know that Plecas hired his buddy and campaign worker as a po-
litical adviser, a job never before seen in the speaker’s office, and that buddy spent months conducting some sort of amateur gumshoe investigation that burst into the media with the unnecessary public humiliation of two long-serving senior administrators. Then Plecas tried to get his buddy Continued on A15
Dr. Kenneth McCracken and Dr. Janet Carson CALL TO BOOK YOUR APPOINTMENT
250.724.6789 |
100-4115 6th Ave, Port Alberni