Will we get rental units with these changes?
After decades of promulgating developers, investors and landlords with untenable tenancy laws overly in favour of the tenant, it made for an easy decision for developers to build condos instead of rental units.
The related governments are now enforcing new laws (some would call this a form of socialism) to prevent entrepreneurs from profiting off of the current tourism boom in British Columbia and specifically Victoria by forcing them to either convert their units into long-term rentals (see above) or selling their hard-earned investments.
So what happens now? With the reduction in short-term rentals it almost guarantees a dramatic drop in tourism dollars to the area which reduces employment, and tax dollars.
Will it effectively increase the number of rental units? I have not seen any statistics that prove it would. It’s the old line: “It sounds good in theory.”
Christopher Marchant
Victoria
Recognize women at the legislature
I spent a little time recently in the back lot of the legislature, contemplating the statues and cheering on the short groom who made sure he was always one level above his gorgeous bride as they posed for photos on the library steps.
So I had time to cogitate on the stone sculptures. Not a woman among them.
We have Victoria R on the lawn, Emily Carr across the intersection and perhaps Elizabeth II inside. But what about a noted B.C. woman? Nellie McClung spent her last years here. Rosemary Brown? Mary Ellen Smith?
Or my favourite, Christine Sinclair?
Wouldn’t it be nice if the government could honour a B.C. woman during the next Women’s History Month, March 2024?
Anne Moon
Victoria
76 years later, great care at the same place
Recently, I had a medical issue and the fortune to be cared for by our Royal Jubilee Hospital.
I want all Victorians to know the benefit they have enjoyed since 1890. In that year, Queen Victoria’s son Prince Arthur Duke of Connaught, father of Princess Patricia and later Governor General of Canada, opened the hospital named to celebrate his mother’s Golden Jubilee.
All staff are kind and skilled. They saved me.
My life began there 76 years ago. They gave me more years to know my granddaughter.
Thank you.
Rodrick H. MacKenzie
Victoria
Many thanks for changes for Vic West streets
I wish to deeply thank the City of Victoria for the new pedestrian improvements in Vic West. The new buttons and rapid flashing beacons at the crosswalks at Tyee at Wilson and at Wilson between Tyee and Bay sure make walking between Dockside Green, Westside Village, and the popular Vic West Park significantly easier, safer and more attractive, particularly now that we are entering the dark, dangerous part of the year.
Even better is what the city has done to the intersection of Henry at Bay. Before Henry was transformed into a cul-de-sac, crossing this relatively minor street was very scary and I only dared do it less than five times in the more than 10 years that I have lived in the area.
It was also kind of a tragedy that residents of Henry had no direct way to access the Vic West Park even though they were just a block or two away.
Extending the sidewalk along Bay all the way across Henry and adding a crosswalk, elephant’s feet and rapid flashing beacons across Bay has made the area feel much safer for those of us who regularly walk around.
Indeed, even just in the past couple of days, I’ve already seen a noticeable increase in foot traffic between the park and Henry.
This improvement was clearly very sorely needed and I really want to thank the city for it. To all workers, staff and all those who made these improvements possible, a big thank you. I appreciate your efforts very much.
Now, if we could also get a crosswalk across Wilson (at Tyee) to access the southbound bus stop without feeling like we’re risking our lives every time…
Alfredo Franco Cea
Victoria
Flush toilets and political madness
It was great to hear of Premier David Eby’s focus on flush toilets for construction sites. I trust it will give him a bit of a rest from the class war his government is raging.
The latest skirmish relating to short-term rentals has had an interesting lead up.
First, the ability of landlords to deal with problematic tenants has been severely restricted, while at the same time rent increases restricted — all enshrouded in a smothering bureaucracy which actively discourages the building of new housing.
Then the government buys up hotels to hide the homeless, chronically addicted and mentally unstable.
Voila, a shortage of short-term rentals in a housing market which vilifies landlords. What is a property owner wont to do except move to the new market opportunity created by the government, the short-term rental market.
Horror of horrors, these profiteers must be shut down.
It is equally entertaining at the federal level. After years of running inflation inducing deficits and accumulating debt at the fastest rate in our history, it appears the solution is to threaten the major players in important sectors (groceries, telecoms, banking) that they must bring down inflation.
At the same time the Bank of Canada expresses dismay that the inflation rate is still too high, driven in large part by higher carrying costs for mortgages based on interest rate increases. Further rate increases must be considered.
Does anyone else suspect that these guys wear mercury laced top hats when the cameras are turned off?
At least the premier is going against his image of being a wooden robot. It turns out he does give a …
Thomas Maxwell
Victoria
Ferries should be run by the government
Re: “Salt Spring ferries brings additional stress,” letter, Oct. 18.
A recent editorial suggested B.C. Ferries should be brought (back) under the umbrella of the Ministry of Transportation.
B.C. Ferries is a public service, and no public service should have any private tentacles. Cost savings and profits for the shareholders’ gratification, etc. should not be B.C. Ferries bottom line or even part of it.
As a public service B.C. Ferries needs to be operated with reliability and good service being the priority. Deficits should be considered to finance top-notch service, just like most government services.
Wages and salaries need to be raised and job security guaranteed to make working for B.C. Ferries a career, a career with a future. Cost savings cannot be the priority.
Like health care, the basic needs of our society cannot be delivered on the basis of profit. Surely the failure of elderly care for profit should be bringing that message home.
B.C. Ferries must be run by the government. Deficits should be acceptable and service and reliability made the No. 1 priority.
Until that happens we will continue to see the unacceptable disruptions in service.
Robert Milan
Victoria
A heavy-handed move on Surrey policing
Has Premier David Eby put a nail in his coffin as premier when he announced that a court challenge by the City of Surrey regarding a municipal police service “will not be successful”?
Eby said Tuesday that Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke “fought a good fight” in attempting to keep the RCMP as its police force of jurisdiction, but the decision to move ahead with a municipal force has been made by his government and is “no longer up for discussion.”
Wow, isn’t that a bit heavy-handed?
Are we no longer living in a democracy?
I think the official Opposition has every right to be concerned that they aren’t able to weigh in on this matter.
Is that how Eby is going to handle everything that he isn’t in favour of, as if he were a dictator instead of an elected official whose job it is to work with a team?
Lia Fraser
Victoria
We need simpler lives to limit climate change
Can we survive? We are in big trouble already.
Worldwide we are at an average of just over 1.1 degrees above base line temperature, and spiked up to 1.4 for last month.
The scientific community has settled around 1.5, with 2 degrees being the number chosen by the political class before our situation is terminal.
I am not so sure. At present temperatures there is a decrease in harvests, ongoing soil erosion and, paradoxically, fertility degradation from the use of the same chemicals we use to increase the next harvest.
They kill the soil’s microbes which support the web of life at root level. Expansion of agriculture into forests reduces the all important carbon sequestration.
A lag in temperature rise for the parts per million of atmospheric carbon dioxide occurs while seas continue to rise from thermal expansion and ice melt, and weathers become destructive of lives and infrastructure, and the dispossessed attempt migration.
Newly mismatched weather and daylight length signals disrupt pollination and predator-prey relationships, further reducing the fecundity upon which we unwittingly rely for our own existence.
Evolution can’t keep up with chaotic change.
It may be a matter only of speed with which we die off, depending on what we do. There is hope for us only if we all reduce fossil fuel use to a minimum, live much simpler lives, and discover how to efficiently reduce the warming gases in the atmosphere.
That necessitates an immediate levelling down within and between societies, before wealthy communities suffer similarly to the poor.
Glynne Evans
Saanich
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