A group of West Vancouver citizens are fundraising to hold the council accountable by ensuring locals are well informed on decisions taken by West Vancouver Mayor and council.
West Vancouver Community Stakeholders aims to raise $3,000, which can be used to print posters, pamphlets, send mail outs, and buy advertising with the goal to inform the community about council decisions. The grassroots campaign is to keep the council accountable, said organiser Tyler Blair.
“The councillors are the voice of the people and we want to hold them accountable so they remain the voice of the people. During the B-Line bus debate, we saw that wasn’t the case and councillors were interested in their own agenda,” he said.
The campaign is an evolution of Stop the Road Closures led by Ambleside business owner Nigel Malkin. The campaign was successful, Blair said, in stopping the B-Line from going west of Park Royal. “Only after the stoppage of the B-Line did it come to the attention of this group that there are many other agenda items that Mayor and Council have tried to push through, including the most recent Five Creeks Project,” Blair said.
He said the District of West Vancouver has spent considerable amount of taxpayer’s money on advertising and online campaigns as well as telephone surveys on issues such as the B-Line and the Five Creek Project. The district spent $14,000 on phone survey alone, Blair noted. “We are just trying to compete with them, in terms of messaging so we need the funds to get the word out,” he said.
The $3,000 will be spent on flyers, advertising, signage, banners, running the website, and getting people organised so information missed out by the District can be presented to the public, he added.
“This is about people and getting the message out to the community and making sure all the voices are heard. People can also let us know what they would like to pursue and we can get on that. We are interested in all the voices getting heard,” he said.
Blair said all the receipts for any of the expenses incurred by the group will be posted on Facebook, and all financial records will be available for review.
Someone’s got to do it. This mayor and most of the council of West Vancouver are opaque. They don’t care about residents. They have their own agendas for West Vancouver and they never ask taxpayers and citizens what they want. It’s all about the power to do whatever they want.
Short sighted people influenced by the Ambleside business community. West van has always been eletist and this is elitism at its finest. Almost as bad as the hissy fit had by many when Rockbridge school was announced and hillside closed .
Think it is time for any major issue in West Vancouver to go to referendum. These major projects in West Vancouver have been hijacked by a bunch of special interest parties at the expense of the taxpayer.