CKNW Editorial
for July 5, 2000

I made a remark yesterday which will no doubt come back to haunt me ... I complained that the city council is so dominated by Vancouver's west side that it's lost it's sense of humour and fun.

You will not find a bigger Vancouver booster than I ... I was born here and except for a few years in Kamloops and five years in Victoria with the government I've lived here all my life. It is a wonderful city, the most beautiful I've ever seen - though in fairness I've not yet been to Rio de Janiero or Capetown. But it's run by those who can't see past their English gardens in Shaughnessy. If a merchant complains about a piper, a singer or an artist you'd think that there was mayhem afoot and City Council

leaps into action. Canada is an anally retentive country and Vancouver is probably it's most anally attentive city. We rejoice in Granville Island, where truly great shows are performed in the square but that only happens because it's federally administered.

Streets are for people - not just pedestrians on their way from one office to another ... not just for merchants who ply their trade on those streets but for all people. I don't even begrudge the panhandler his space on the street - beggars have been on streets since streets were first invented. Some buskers make noise. And some people - though this may be hard for you to believe - don't even like hearing the bagpipes playing Scotland The Brave as happens sometimes – and it’s neat – on the north-east corner of Georgia and Howe. But what's a little noise that sinks quickly into the background of honking cars and squealing brakes within a few seconds?

I would encourage buskers. If they're no good, they'll not make any money. My favourite city to visit is London. The first Sunday we arrive, Wendy and I go to Covent Gareden and sit in the large restaurant in the basement, sip our cappuccinos and listen to some truly fine musicians - opera singers and string quartets and the like - and for the occasional pound or 50P tossed into the hat enjoy the best entertainment value in London. There is a Harmonica player on the corner outside Fortnum and Mason's ... he always has a cheery sign such as "due to the weather songs are half price today" ... and to me it's part of London. Here is the place the swells all go to lunch and buy expensive, groceries and clothes and a man who hasn't two pence to rub together plies his trade in all weathers with a cheeriness that is in such stark contrast to the countenances of all who pass. There was - he still may be there for all I know - a very good saxophone player in the underpass to Speakers Corner coming form the Marble Arch Tube station.

It's these things and the abundance of open air markets - some on church property such as St James Piccadilly or St Martins-in-the Field or on the street itself like there is at Petticoat Lane or Shepherds Bush - that make London such a wonderful place to walk in. One of my favourite walks is the Queen's Walk on the south side of the Thames where in front of Festival Hall there is a super used book market, all just stalls thrown up on the walkway.

These sorts of scenes are repeated throughout Britain. And it is that, and the people involved, that give a place colour.

We've become a multiple cultured city and now a pretty big city. Since Expo '86 we've become a well known city. I have no doubt that when Mayor Owen and his fellow NPA councilors travel they like the same sort of street sterility they long for here. But real people don't.

And real people are quite prepared to put up with the sometimes less attractive side of streets full of buskers and artists just as they are prepared to put up with the backward looking, humourless and faceless bunch of people that run this city.

On the same subject I see that the side splitting sense of humour maintained by City Hall has rubbed off on Vancouver's finest who are contemplating charges against Community Development Minister Jenny Kwan. Her crime, which is unforgivable of course and must be dealt with using the full force of the law, was to paint a flower on those cruddy boards blocking off the old Woodwards building.

  The owner of the building complained and we're told by Constable Ann Drennan, that beacon of liberty who last year explained why the police could illegally search people for liquor and admonished that anyone downtown on New Years Eve had better have a good excuse or they'd go in the slammer ... we're told by the fearless flack of Vancouver's finest that mischief charges may be laid against Ms Kwan.

It's about time we gave these unemployed and shelterless folks a lesson. Who the hell do they think they are, demonstrating for a place to live and a square meal once in awhile. Are there no almshouses? Are there no comfortable bridges left to sleep under? And shame on Ms Kwan for leaving the comfy confines of her airconditioned, soft sofaed office to actually join the rabble. And the sheer vandalism of it takes the breath away. Imagine desecrating those cruddy old grey bits of wood with a yellow flower!

Throw the book at her, Constable Drennan! Bring back the stocks and the ducking stool. This city must be made free of beggars, buskers, and begonias on boards - actually it was a daisy but begonia made the alliteration work ... a little poetic licence.

It warms the heart to know that the City of Vancouver is in the very best of hands.