Vehicle drivers, stop that idling
Now that car drivers have successfully tormented city council into reinstating their sacred right to power their climate killers to the top of Beacon Hill, would it be too much to ask them to stop parking there, idling in triumph?
Larry Hannant
Victoria
Speed up the vaccinations
I am really very disappointed with very slow rollout of COVID-19 vaccinations.
British Columbia has received more than 50,000 doses of both Pfizer and Moderna vaccines; however, only 17,510 people have been vaccinated. Why can’t this process be accelerated?
We had more than three months to train in handling these vaccines.
I admire and thank all the front-line health workers who are working round the clock to take care of British Colombians. I wish our senior public health care executives do the same.
In my opinion, the lag between receiving the vaccines and administering should not be more than three or four days.
Deepak Dilawri
Nanaimo
Not everyone can afford to stay home
Many thanks to Dr. Bonnie Henry for her safety and morale-boosting advice and efforts towards COVID-19 problems.
However, while she has told people to stay at home if feeling sick, many “working stiffs” cannot afford this.
Some have already lost a great deal. Some, I have heard, have lost it all. Public employees have some benefits others do not. Please, Dr. Henry, think also of them.
Stephen Lamb
Victoria
Alberta politicians don’t quite understand
Alberta Premier Jason Kenney probably also needs to tell his MLAs and staff to pull over and stop when they see an ambulance with flashing lights behind them.
Wanda Erikson
Nanaimo
Politicians say it’s OK to travel
We have been asked and required to forgo family gathering, to celebrate special occasions alone and avoid any non-essential travel.
Yet it seems these restrictions are only for us lowly citizens.
Politicians across this country are taking their vacations abroad, going to sunny destinations that we are all yearning for. COVID fatigue has gripped us all, but not our leaders, they seem to be going through this pandemic business as usual.
I have missed several important milestones and anniversaries in the name of doing my part. Now I wonder, why did I?
What an example they are setting. Makes me wonder what else we don’t know.
And now I hear the federal government will give you $500 a week to quarantine when you come back from a vacation that I am not supposed to go on.
Many times our leaders have said we are all in this together, and now my eyes have been opened. I think a good cure for my COVID fatigue would be a sunny warm beach with my wife at my side listening to the waves.
The message I hear is OK, go, enjoy and we will pay you to stay home when you get back. I am booking the tickets now!
Ron Alexander
Saanichton
Suicide belief is not just ‘far right-wing’
Disappointing is the characterization by the usually sensible Lawrie McFarlane of opposition to medical assistance in dying.
Such opposition is not merely conservative, not right-wing only, but a “far right-wing ideology.” Never mind that it contravenes a “basic belief” of some Christian traditions, and that, until recently, a majority of Canadian society held suicide to be morally untenable, opposition to it is now the same as the “far right-wing ideology that wrecked the Reform Party.”
There is no attention to principle here, no interest in natural law. Only, it would seem, that it does not align with the “80 per cent of Canadians [who] support the right to medically assisted death in one form or another,” and thus isn’t likely to be popular with the electorate.
Evidently, that’s what makes it a “far right-wing ideology.”
And I wish McFarlane had given us the source for that “80 per cent.”
Tony Parr
Duncan
Working together to end homelessness
Thanks to the Times Colonist for featuring news about the Hey Neighbour Container Housing Initiative, a partnership effort that will actually deliver housing.
The Greater Victoria Coalition to End Homelessness has teamed up with local builder Aryze Developments, and between the two of them, they are raising and leveraging the resources required to add up to 30 temporary housing units for those currently experiencing homelessness.
I’ve contributed to the initiative. I sure appreciate those who just roll up their sleeves and bring solutions to life. Here’s to more of these get ’er done initiatives and widespread support for each and every one of them.
Joanne Thibault
Victoria
Integrity is at risk of extinction
I was saddened to read that the white rhino is on the brink of extinction. This made me think of other things that have disappeared in my lifetime such as milkmen, lighthouse keepers and full-service gas stations.
It seems to me that the virtue of integrity could also be on the endangered list. You just have to turn on the news and watch some of the world leaders, and you cannot deny that integrity is as endangered as the white rhino.
I would argue that as a global community moving forward this should be very high on our radar at all levels of government.
Paul Knapik
Victoria
Dec. 21 rainfall was not typical
A letter writer states that the heavy rainfall on Dec. 21 that flooded the homeless camp at Central Park was “normal for this time of year.”
The rainfall in the Victoria area that day was by no means normal. Environment Canada’s UVic weather station recorded 70 mm of precipitation that day, making it the rainiest day at that location since Oct. 16, 2003 — more than 17 years.
In fact, there have only been nine wetter days recorded in Victoria in the past 122 years, making the Dec. 21 rainfall a roughly once in every 14 year event.
Steven Murray
Victoria
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