Olympics taking toll on taxis With the Canada Line taking much-needed business from Vancouver taxi drivers, the Olympics and its influx of tourists were meant to be a light at the end of the tunnel for the struggling industry.
But new driving restrictions are making it nearly impossible for cabbies to pick up fares and they’re getting ticketed for stopping downtown, said the owner of Black Top and Checker Cabs.
Amrik Mahil said business is down about 45 per cent from previous years because of the Canada Line and the recession, and the Olympic road closures and stopping restrictions are compounding the issue.
“Our mobility has been affected,” he said. “You can’t stop to pick up (passengers) anywhere ... and we can’t drop them off where they want to be dropped off.”
Drivers who do pull over are getting tickets.
“I wish (police) were a bit more lenient, but ... there’s no exceptions,” said Mahil, adding that drivers are working 12- to 15-hour shifts just to break even.
“My wife had to take a second job to supplement our income,” he said.
“We’re as eager to make the Games as successful as everyone else ... and we want to be able to serve people.
“There are a lot of taxis. It’s a question of moving (about the city).”
An unnamed source told police on Feb. 4 that a woman dumped her newborn into a nearby school dumpster. As many as 35 police officers searched the landfill until the infant was found on Sunday, which RCMP Cpl. Jennifer Pound said was both a relief and a shock.
“I know each of those members were searching through there very anxiously, it’s not something you want to have to do,” said Pound. “At the end of it, it was horrifying for them, but they were also relieved to have found the baby.”
The suspect is a 20-year-old woman who police said gave birth to a baby boy in a bathroom by herself while her boyfriend slept on a couch. The woman and the boyfriend then allegedly wrapped the baby in a towel, put him in a garbage bag and put the baby boy in a dumpster, police said.
The case is still under investigation, with an autopsy scheduled to determine if the baby was alive when put in the dumpster.
Paul Fraser says in a report that the children's and housing ministries failed to make adequate security arrangements to protect private information from unauthorized access.
He says the breach was discovered last April but nothing was done about it until October.
Fraser says this and other privacy breaches indicate the government needs to create the position of an executive-level chief privacy officer who would ensure that privacy breaches are dealt with quickly and effectively.
It's the second report to be released in a month that's critical of the government for handling the welfare data breach, after an earlier review found provincial authorities had poor judgment in their handling of the case.
Two public servants were fired last year after the leak was discovered, and while the incident is the subject of a criminal investigation, no charges have been laid.
The Liberal party rejigged the legislative calendar to accommodate this week's political session and the almost three-week break for the Games, followed by the tabling of the budget, which is forecast to include a $ 1.7-billion deficit.
The throne speech traditionally lays out the political agenda for the coming months, but political pundits suggest this version will be light on policy initiatives, heavy on rah-rah Olympics boosterism, and possibly sprinkled with hints of future budget cuts.
University of Victoria political scientist Dennis Pilon said the Liberals will cheer on the Olympics in the legislature this week, while leaving the politics to next month, beginning with the budget on March 2.
Pilon said Premier Gordon Campbell's Liberals and Harper want to be seen delivering good news during what will be presented as a historic time for British Columbia and Canada.
"What we've got here is a case where both the federal rightwingers and the provincial rightwingers want some good news," he said. "They are setting themselves up to be able to benefit, they hope, from the reflected glory of the Olympics."
Pilon said he expects politicians to play up the Olympics as if they were introducing the Beatles to the world.
"Both of them want to be the MC, and have people say, 'Wow, this is fantastic. Thank you Gordon Campbell and Stephen Harper."'
Harper is scheduled to address the legislature Thursday, the first time a Canadian prime minister has spoken in the British Columbia legislature.
Campbell has brushed aside criticism that Harper has chosen to speak to a sitting legislature in B.C. while in Ottawa, Parliament has been suspended until March 3, inciting outrage from opposition parties.
Campbell said Harper is coming to Victoria to congratulate British Columbians and Canadians on their efforts to host the Olympics.
Pilon said there may be some indications in the throne speech of future financial belt tightening ahead because the Liberals want to appear prudent, but the focus will be on bringing on the Games.
"If anything, opening themselves up before the Olympics allows the Opposition to score some points," he said.
Opposition New Democrat Leader Carole James said she will look for signs the government is beginning to respond to the economic hardships facing many British Columbians.
James, who bought her own tickets to attend Olympic curling events, the closing ceremonies and the opening ceremonies for the Paralympics, said she expects the Liberals to accuse the NDP of being Games bashers when they question the government.
"I'll be watching that throne speech to see if the B.C. Liberals have any kind of idea of how to help people through these difficult economic times after the Olympics," she said.
Last fall, the Liberals endured a season of bad news at the legislature that saw the government pass a record deficit budget of $2.8 billion that included deep cuts in grants to social, sport and volunteer organizations.
The Liberals continue to face criticism of their plans to introduce a harmonized sales tax in July that combines the five-per-cent federal Goods and Services Tax and the seven-per-cent provincial sales tax.
Big business cheered the 12-per-cent HST last fall, which offers them $2 billion in tax cuts, but consumers and the tourism, real estate and restaurant industries are preparing for increased costs.
James said the New Democrats will continue to fight the HST, adding they need the votes of seven Liberals to dump the tax.
Campbell, elected to his third consecutive term last spring, said he will not drop the HST and plans to continue on as leader after the Olympics.
RCMP in Richmond, B.C., say as many as 35 officers from several Lower Mainland police agencies searched through trash at the Burns Bog landfill south of Vancouver between last Thursday and Sunday, looking for any sign of a newborn baby.
Corp. Jennifer Pound says the remains of what appears to be a full-term baby boy were found in the landfill Sunday, but an autopsy will be needed to determine if the infant was alive at birth.
Pound says the mother was arrested and police are recommending charges ranging from infanticide to committing an indignity to a dead body.
Mounties received a tip last Thursday and were able to confirm the woman had delivered the baby on Jan. 21 while staying with her boyfriend in Richmond.
Police say she told her boyfriend she had miscarried and the pair tossed the remains in a nearby dumpster, but by the time police learned of the incident two weeks later the bin had been emptied and its contents taken to the landfill.
Eligible members of the aboriginal group will now have an opportunity to vote on the agreement, which, if passed, would be signed by all parties before being implemented.
As part of the agreement, the 155-member band would get almost 2,000 hectares of settlement lands that include 217 hectares of former reserves and over 1,700 hectares of Crown lands.
About 21 hectares of provincial Crown land that is currently designated as Agricultural Land Reserve would also be transferred to the First Nation that would have the power to make decisions about matters such as health care, education and child welfare.
The agreement would also provide the aboriginal group with $10.7 million and economic development funding of $2.2 million as well as mineral rights, forestry and domestic fish resources and gathering and harvest rights.
The Yale First Nation's access to commercial fishing for Fraser River sockeye and pink salmon are in a separate harvest agreement.
"This treaty will be the foundation upon which Yale members can realize self-government and economic certainty, and will help to close the social and economic gaps between Yale and their non-aboriginal neighbours," said B.C. Aboriginal Minister George Abbott.
Federal Indian Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl said the agreement shows that the B.C. treaty process is producing results and that the First Nation will now have the tools and authority to take control of its economic future.
Only two other treaties - by the Tsawwassen First Nation in suburban Vancouver and the Maa-nulth First Nations from Vancouver Island, have been finalized under the modern treaty process.
Council to amend homeless plan City council voted on Thursday to revise its Homeless Action Plan by April to come up with better short-term solutions to street homelessness and make sure bylaws are current.
The latter point is important to the Pivot Legal Society, because the Supreme Court of B.C. ruled last year that homeless people could erect temporary shelters on city property if shelters were full at night.
Pivot plans to distribute red tents to the homeless during the Olympics to draw attention to the city’s lack of affordable housing.
“This is an acknowledgement that the (Supreme Court) decision is binding and current bylaws need to be updated,” said John Richardson, executive director of Pivot. “We hope the city respects the rights of people to camp outside.”
Coun. Ellen Woodsworth called the city’s seven temporary shelters “Band-Aid solutions, at best.”
“We need to draw attention to this (homeless crisis) any way we can,” she said.
Leonardo da Vinci’s Anatomical Manuscript A, a series of detailed sketches considered to have been seminal in the artistic and medical community, has not been on display in its entirety in 500 years.
“This is a milestone in the gallery’s 79-year history,” said Kathleen Bartels, director of the gallery.
“The drawings ... reveal the beauty and wonder of the human body in ways that had never been conceived before. I can’t imagine a more fitting presentation that celebrates athleticism (during the Games).”
The series of 240 drawings was created during the winter of 1510 and, five centuries on, physicians still refer to the drawings
“The drawings are not just historical curiosities,” said Martin Clayton with the Royal Collection, and the exhibition’s curator. “They’re quite simply the finest anatomical illustrations that have ever been made.”
The exhibit runs until May 2, and is free to the public during the Olympic Games.
HIV/AIDS treatment to hit the streets Health experts in B.C. are taking their fight against HIV/AIDS into the back alleys and strolls of the province’s poorest neighbourhoods.
Officials will seek hard-to-reach HIV-infected people who have been untreated or who remain undiagnosed.
The four-year $48-million pilot program entitled Seek and Treat, unveiled Thursday at St. Paul’s Hospital, will expand the use of antiretroviral drugs to survival sex workers and injection drug users.
An estimated 12,000 people in B.C. have HIV — more than a quarter are unaware that they are infected.
“While the treatments are very highly effective, they are only as effective as access to treatment,” said Dr. Julio Montaner, director of the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS.
“The whole strategy is to go out there, seek and facilitate treatment.”
If successful, the project will slow the progression to AIDS among people with HIV and result in fewer HIV infections. It will be piloted in the Downtown Eastside and Prince George. Health Services Minister Kevin Falcon estimated that the pilot program could save the province $65 million in lifetime HIV treatment costs.
The B.C. Utilities Commission has approved the $825 million deal involving the Waneta Dam, despite the objections of several groups, including the City of Trail.
Mayor Dieter Bogs says the deal leaves West Kooteney residents paying higher power rates than those in Metro Vancouver and there should have been a more open bidding process for the dam.
Kootenay-West New Democrat MLA Katrine Conroy says many people were against the sale but it appears to have been a done deal and nothing said to the Utilities Commission was going to change things.
B.C. Hydro says the dam will provide electricity for 100,000 homes in the province and if it hadn't bought a share in the dam, the power may have been sold into the U.S.
The CYA(cover your ass) Brotherhood will be launching their operation's against the other half of the citizen's of our city who are not really behind the Foney Freak Festival imposing their Doctrine on OUR city.Each one of the member's of the brotherhood in my opinion,need's to pop a prozac and put your gun's away so everyone can enjoy themselve's.Light's,citizen's camera's,action we will be recording The Brotherhood's reaction............
This little piggy,screwed the gangster's girlfriend.(the oldest trick in the book)Another little Piggy smahed in the face of one of our fellow citizen's(out and out brutallity)The head little Piggy doesn't know what the fuck is going on!!!!!!!Excuse me for offering advice,YOU really got to get a handle on the bunch of egotistical muntant's in your organization.Please,or the citizen's of OUR city , you claim to serve and protect,won't be on the receiving end of the amassed police-state oppressor,s occupying OUR city.The international media has already seen through the sharade.There is no VIBE in this city because all the VPD know's how to SUPPRESS.I recammend,one week's vacation in Montreal,where the people know how to be civil.BC is 250 year's behind the East.We should give you guy's some time to catch up.I hope that's soon.
Let the GAMES begin!Baracade's and wire fence's.How Orwellian!The VPD is really entrenched in supporting the faciast Olympic Doctrine it isn't funny.Where do a very good percentage of our citizens who do not support this Urine testing program to weed out the cheater's.Let's hope they don't unleash the full brutallity of the Police State oppressor's that have occupied OUR city.Keep your cell phone cam.s,video cam's and all recording device's at hand to keep the oppressor's at bay.
The citizen's of Vancouver need to warned of an emminant danger in there midst.In my opion that is the bunch of sociopath's running amuck in our city that hang out in various establishment's,called POLICE STATION"S!!!!!!!!Send in the shrink's.We want all the mutant's weeded out.The public safety is at risk.The Keystone Sociopath's strike again.
Canadian police are "treacherous u.s.a.neo-terrorist govt cock suckers"! They have sold-out Canadian Sovereignty. Did their fathers teach them to suck cock? 138 u.s.a. neo-terrorist cock suckers were exicuted in Afghanistan by supporters of a Free World!
