I don't know about the rest of you but I'm kinda looking forward to a post-Olympic party for the July 1 weekend.
Considering a seven per cent increase in the property tax rate on top of a 25 per cent increase in assessed property value, a July 2 deadline for property taxes and a seven per cent increase in the price of cake due to the HST, that weekend may be my only chance for a while to get a piece of cake, a balloon and my face painted.
In fact, I would suggest that our "fiscally responsible" council blow, oops, allocate the unspent $54,000 on other need periods such as New Year's and March 2011. Hopefully council buys the cake before July 1.
It is clear that the present council members take their constituents' opinions and suggestions very seriously because it is clear that no expenditure is too great for a piece of free cake.
Someone once said that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. And today's history lesson is that Marie Antoinette once uttered the immortal words, "Let them eat cake" to her faithful following, and we all know what happened to her.
David Deally
Whistler
Olympic party solution
So the mayor and council want a party but the taxpayers do not want to have to pay for it.
It has been my experience that when people want to have a celebration but cannot afford the expense of having a party they invite their friends over and ask them to bring something for the party. If it is an organization with limited funds, like a school, they will ask for volunteers and solicit the local businesses to contribute something. Have a cake sale or car wash to generate some funds.
So instead of spending valuable taxpayer dollars let's ask the community who would like to volunteer to organize a party with the objective of doing it without any taxpayer money.
Maybe, instead of having it on a holiday weekend when the town is already crowded with visitors it should happen on a normally slow weekend and businesses could use the opportunity to set up sidewalk displays.
So let's get creative and show our ingenuity and have a party without ignoring the financial issues facing the town.
Bill Langlais
Whistler Town Plaza
Whistler's party needs
I hope that Whistler voters remember which council members were in favour of spending $96,000 on a post-Olympic celebration on Canada Day, of all days.
Only two councillors voted against it.
I have yet to hear anyone in our community in favour of a party.
Consultant-speak from council members about "leveraging our Olympic success" sounds pathetic in the attempt to appear visionary.
Is it too much to ask for coherence from council?
Let's talk paving company.
Mayor Ken doesn't even want to talk about how a paving company got permission to operate someplace it wasn't zoned for, even though he was on council when the decision was made, or why he wants to defer the decision to give it the heave ho until he's out of office.
The families of Cheakamus Crossing deserve better regardless of language buried in their purchase contract.
Mayor Ken is being well paid with Whistler tax dollars to ensure the best interests of our community are met.
He actually said he would be "disincentivized" if he wasn't granted a proposed increase. More consultant-speak.
His job is to be the spokesperson for our community, plus marshal the resources of council and committees they sit on. He can't seem to do either despite his increased incentive.
Page 2 of The Natural Step is sustaining the people who live on the land in question. I guess he didn't get that far.
On the subject of a party, I believe Whistler does need a party.
We need a political party.
In a recent letter to the editor Lydia Harrison-Lucy documented the workers' struggle. She asked readers to imagine 500 servers, cooks, receptionists, cashiers and housekeepers walking off the job for one day in the middle of summer.
She figures that Whistler would collapse.
At Mont Tremblant, 1,600 union workers walked off the job just before Christmas a few years ago because they were fed up with Intrawest bargaining in bad faith.
I personally feel that we are in the hospitality industry and that it's not good business to deny service. We're supposed to install and service good memories in Whistler.
A few unions have tried to organize Whistler. They realize that the mayor's chair can be won with around 1,500 votes and that people in the service industry, by far, represent the largest block of voters in Whistler.
All politics is local and the public gets the government they deserve.
A Whistler Service Party could elect a mayor and members of council that not only met the needs of Whistler's service society, but also sell other blocks of voters on its relevant importance.
Instead of a union, a Whistler Service Guild could establish professional standards across job descriptions of labour and management.
Rather than walking off the job to teach some Whistler employers a lesson, a Service Party could affect needed change in a responsible way.
I ask Lydia Harrison-Lucy and anyone who agrees with her to imagine 2,000 people in the service industry simply getting out to exercise a vote they've already paid for with every dollar they earned and spent.
If you are a Canadian citizen who is 18 years of age, have lived in B.C. for six months and in Whistler for 30 days before the election date, you have a direct say in the future of Whistler and can end complaints about its present and past.
Now, there's a party reason.
Brian Walker
Whistler
Bottle water no disaster
I read with interest the article that appeared in the April 21, 2010 edition of Pique Newsmagazine entitled, "RMOW bans bottled water."
In the piece, a couple of statements were made that require correction.
Contrary to what was written, 93 local governments over the last 22 months have actually rejected proposals to ban the sale of bottled water in their facilities, while just 17 municipalities, three school boards and two universities have eliminated availability of the product on their premises over the last four-and-a-half years.
Further, bottled water is not "considered to be an environmental disaster by many," as was stated. According to Nielsen Research, 60 per cent of Canadians consume bottled water daily and 75 per cent drink it occasionally. According to Quantis International, bottled water has the smallest carbon footprint of any bottled beverage. The oil and energy usage figures quoted in the article are typical of the mis-information one typically finds on the Internet. Both stats are incorrect.
It is unfortunate that the Resort Municipality of Whistler chose not to consult with the Canadian bottled water industry before rendering its decision on an industry that has a significant presence in British Columbia, provides hundreds of local jobs, supports thousands of local businesses across the province through procurement and pays millions of dollars in taxation to all levels of government in Canada - some of which has been re-invested recently in Whistler through international tourism initiatives and Olympic infrastructure projects.
We have contacted the municipality to explore options that meet its environmental sustainability requirements yet respect the basic right of Canadian consumers to have unfettered access to the healthiest bottled beverage available to them.
John B Challinor II
Director of Corporate Affairs
Nestlé Waters Canada
Best make play
Playground Builders gives thanks to Sue Eckersley, Lilli Clark, Watermark, the GLC, Avaa Hotel, the artists of the festival, Rob Foort-Greater Vancouver Sound, Wassabi Collective and everyone who came out to The Best of the Fest last Sunday night. Enough funds were raised to construct another playground in Afghanistan. Playground Builders now supplies safe playgrounds for over 100,000 children in areas affected by war.
Thank you Whistler for sharing the gift of play!
Keith Reynolds, on behalf of
Playground Builders Foundation
Don't fade away
Please don't take our festival away.
So many Whistler businesses need a busy April, and we used to count on WSSF to stretch the season. Over the last couple of years it seems WSSF is turning into a locals event. In last week's paper, WB's ad "This Week On The Mountains" did not even mention WSSF. Don't they own it? I haven't seen any ads for WSSF in the Vancouver Sun, Province or the Georgia Straight, only ads for next year's passes.
I talked to my friends in Vancouver and they told me they've heard nothing about WSSF in the city, they didn't even know it was on! My friends from back east used to fly in for the fest, now they don't. The bands aren't half as good as they used to be and they're getting more obscure each year. My first year in Whistler, they had the Black Eyed Peas and Justin Timberlake!
There are some good events (the bike film was fantastic), but the main attractions like the Big Air are now gone! To the powers that be, please don't let WSSF fade away, all the Whistler businesses need it.
Angie Roberts
Whistler
Filmmakers raise the bar
On behalf of the TELUS World Ski & Snowboard Festival and the Watermark Communications team I just wanted to send out a HUGE thank you to all the filmmakers who came out to shoot, edit and produce a short film for the Columbia 72hr Filmmaker Showdown.
The films that were submitted this year blew us all away and as the producer of the event you just can't ask for more. The dedication, passion and hard work that the filmmaking teams brought to the table was remarkable. I can't help but be in awe of every one of you and thank you for contributing to creating a successful night for locals and visitors alike.
We are very proud to be able to create an event that gives up and coming and established filmmakers a chance to stretch their muscles and create something amazing to be screened at the Gala Event. We will continue to do our best to support filmmakers and filmmaking in this community and beyond.
Thank you again to all the finalists involved your professionalism and camaraderie was inspiring and I'll not soon forget it.
Lilli Clark
Multi-Media Events Producer
TELUS World Ski & Snowboard Festival
Equal rights for all
In my opinion, the senior governments are sleepwalking into evermore unjustifiable and unsustainable commitments to settle Native land claims in British Columbia (Canada changing language policy for B.C. treaties, Pique, April 1). They seem to ignore two cardinal but conflicting facts: First Nations claim 100 per cent of the province as unceded "traditional territory" while 97 per cent of the province's population in non-Native.
What makes settling land claims so difficult is the basis for them: aboriginal rights. The concept of aboriginal rights though is fundamentally flawed. First, aboriginal rights are special rights of land title, land use and self-government the rest of us do not have. They divide the citizenry along an artificial time line in history: if your ancestors got here before 1492, you had special rights; if you or your ancestors got here after 1492, tough luck. In 2010 that is surely unrealistic and unreasonable in an eqalitarian and pluralistic democracy. After all, long-time immigrants having more rights than recent immigrants, native-born Canadians more than immigrants and tenth-generation Canadians more than second-generation Canadians would be untenable and unconstitutional. Similarly, Natives having more rights than non-Natives - simply for getting here earlier - is untenable and should be unconstitutional.
Second, aboriginal rights (or facsimile whereby dominant newcomers ceded special rights to those already there) are not a Native concept and did not exist in pre-Columbian America. If not then, why now? B.C. First Nations, in effect, demand rights which they have denied each other historically. To wit, First Nations did not arrive here together, all at the same time. Some came earlier, some later, some much later, and conflict, conquest, displacement, raids, slavery etc. were common in turbulent pre-Columbian times. Yet, I am not aware of any acknowledgment, apology, compensation and treaty process between B.C. First Nations to right Native-on-Native historical wrongs. Surely, non-Natives have as much right to be here without facing onerous land claims as the later-coming First Nations do.
How did the province get into the land claims predicament? Up until 1991, successive colonial and provincial governments maintained - reasonably and correctly - that aboriginal rights, if any, had been extinguished by colonization in the 19 th century. Furthermore, in 1973 the Supreme Court of Canada ruled on aboriginal title (rights) in the Calder case. Seven justices heard the case, six ruled on the title issue. All six agreed that aboriginal title exists in Canadian law but it can be extinguished by legislation. They split evenly only on the issue of whether or not aboriginal title had actually been extinguished during B.C.'s colonial period. Three said "yes," three said "no." The seventh justice ruled against the Nisga'a plaintiffs on a technicality.
With two lower courts and four of the seven Supreme Court justices ruling against the Nisga'a, the senior governments could have formally extinguished aboriginal rights by legislation. Instead, the Trudeau government enshrined them in the 1982 Canadian Constitution - a monumental unforced error. Constitutional status means that aboriginal rights trump provincial and federal laws - surely a prescription for conflict and chaos when it comes to land ownership and management authority in the province. Subsequent court rulings (particularly Delgamuukw) left B.C. First Nations in a practically unassailable position of strength, the senior governments in a bind, non-Natives in limbo and treaty making high-centred.
In a modern democracy, Natives and non-Natives should have the same rights. As long as one or the other has more, it will always be "us" and "them." The Nisga'a and other recent modern treaties, and the proposed concessions on title and treaty language in Jesse Ferreras's report amount to far more than what could reasonably be needed to discharge the non-Native moral obligation of bringing reserve living standards up to mainstream levels. In the end, First Nations and the senior governments need to realize that land claim settlements must also be fair to the four million non-native British Columbians.
Joe Bako
Vancouver
Reality check
After a visit today to a local ski-shop, after reading several letters-to-the-editors and talking with suffering merchants, I have to ask, who wants another party - and at Muni expense? It seems the answer is only our spendthrift mayor and council - excepting Tom and Grant.
The next question is, what does our esteemed council plan to do? Do they plan a monster parade - bearing in mind the wimpy July 1st parades of the past? Do they think they can do better than a July 4th parade in Blaine? Blaine is not a perjoritive - a tiny American border community like Blaine puts on a magnificent parade and show that puts our puny parades to shame, and not at local taxpayers' expense! Hats off to the Americans - and they do it, not from the public purse, but from local Chambers of Commerce, private enterprises and the support from surrounding community organizations.
Our mayor and council need a reality check - put the money to better use for the local taxpayers! And start making real cuts for the sake of survival of our local merchants and us local taxpayers.
Clive V. Nylander
Whistler
Thanks to Nita Lake Lodge
A big thank you to Nita Lake Lodge owner Ram Tumulari, Food and Beverage Manager Ryan Dyck, Head Chef Tim and servers Jared and Vanessa for an outstanding evening on Saturday, April 17th, in the patio/lounge at Nita Lake Lodge.
We had planned Bill's 65th Birthday for a while and after reviewing many venues in Whistler, we decided to host the party, with our friends, at Nita lake Lodge. It was a great success! Our friends thoroughly enjoyed it!
From the moment we met with Ryan Dyck to the end of the evening, we were impressed with the warm and relaxing atmosphere, the wonderful food, amazing bourbon carrot cake and excellent service! Also, the absolutely beautiful setting overlooking the lake totally enhanced our event.
Many, many thanks to all at Nita Lake Lodge who helped make Bill's 65th a most memorable birthday! Hats Off!
Judi Spence and Bill Falls
Whistler
So long and thanks for no foam
I wanted to thank the entire staff of the Alpine Cafe for making my favorite morning drink over the last two years. I am moving from Alpine, I will miss the convenience and the great service of the Alpine Cafe the most.
I started going to the cafe just because it was close to my place and the coffee was cheaper than in town, but after only about a week everyone knew what I was drinking and the coffee was the best I had had in a long time. The personal service is just awesome and it made me discovered the true meaning of a neighbourhood business.
The Cafe might not win the best lattes in the Pique Best of Whistler Awards but I am sure they are a big part of why Alpine Meadows is voted best neighbourhood year after year.
I will come back for sure whenever I am around but for now thank you for making my "no foam lattes" and making my morning always start on a good note!
Jean-Pierre Giroux
Whistler
