There will be no displacement of poor people from their homes

Betty Krawczyk over at http://bettysearlyedition.blogspot.com/ has a very interesting column on the displacement of poor people by VANOC, the Gordon Campbell government and Mayor Sam.

And I think mayor Sam, she is correct in suggesting that you were duped. Why don't you do something about it?

Whistleblower Threats

There is a very interesting developement on BC Marys' blogsite The Legislature Raids about how whistleblowers from some quarters in the ICBC Scandal have been threatened. A person who calls themself Express Collision Shop has reported the threats. He goes on to say that the police have been made aware of these threats.

Now I don't know about the rest of you folks, but I know that threats to anyone for any reason is a criminal offense. And if the RCMP are aware of this, and it is true, it should be reported to the public. I personally have no doubt that what this person says is true. They have been reporting on this case from the get-go and have been quite accurate in what they are reporting. Get the mainstream media on it NOW. This is outrageous.

There is a link to the Legislature Raids in the left column of this page.

Mr. Premier, is it just me?

The Gordon Campbell Government is stalling on everything they do. Questions can't be asked in the Legislature on the BC Rail giveaway. All the opposition gets is "we don't comment. It's before the courts" This answer is given even if a question is remotely pertaining to the criminal giveaway of our railway.

We have a Major crisis in the Forest Industry and this government call for "roundtable discussions" How's that going Mr. Premier? We the people haven't heard a word. When you tell people something they expect you to act. You don't. Why did you sit on your hands and let the pine beetle take over our province? Where was your head.

You tell us you won't privatize our Railway. Then you do the opposite. You Lied.

You tell us you won't privatize the BC Ferry System. Then you do. You Lied. And this system is part and parcel of the Trans Canada Highway. What the hell gives. You say it was to keep fairs down. The fairs are going through the roof. People on small limited income pensions can't afford to ride these boats. And right after the fairs go up the Board has the god damned audacity to give themselves a hefty raise. This is one of the biggest insults to the people of this province ever. Then your minister has the utter gall to stand in the legislature and say he doesn't like it either. But he can't do anything. Bullshit. He can legislate a rollback. Just like the 25% you took from every needy citizen in this province.

You say you are not privatizing BC Hydro. How stupid do you think we are? You are making things so difficult for hydro that the will have to privatise so you can say that you are saving us money. Do you think we the population will be able to pay our hydro bills in 5 years after you give away all our rivers to buy back hydro that was ours in the first place.

And speaking of giving away the rivers. Was your idea of increasing the number of fish farms instead of shutting them down, done so you could have the sea lice kill off our river runs so that you can tell us that we have no fish so there is no impact on the runs? I think so.

You are supposed to be doing something about the "hallway medicine" and the long waits for surgery. When? In ten years? Sorry you won't be forming a government then. Is it your idea to set the health care in this province to such a state of caos that you could privatise it then say look what we did for you. Meanwhile the poor and mentally challenged would be dying in the streets.

Everything that your government is doing today give the appearance of a stall. Stall for what? So you can hand out goodies and have photo-ops just before the next election? I think so.

You say that you are appointing people to run what's left of our Crown Corporations that know how to do the job. If they can do the job then why when "the going gets tough the tough go".

Performance bonuses what a load of crap.

Well Mr. Premier I for one am not fooled by your grade school antics. And I'm damned sure I am not the only person in this province that feels this way

BC Supreme Court, 800 Smythe Street Vancouver

It has been suggested that we need a bit of direction regarding the Courthouse at 800 Smythe in Vancouver. Reasoning for this is to remind people that there is a very inportant case in the discovery stage dragging through the system. There are many people in this province that are unaware of what is going on here. And the lack of information in the past getting to the masses has for the BC Rail Corruption Trial been blamed on the MSM (mainstream media). So in this case citizen reporting would go a long way.

This lack of reporting has given rise to several blogsites on the internet. I speak of The Legislature Raids, http://bctrialofbasi-virk.blogspot.com/. House of Infamy, http://houseofinfamy.blogspot.com/ , The Gazettteer, http://pacificgazette.blogspot.com/ There are several others too numerous to mention here but most are listed in the above blogs as links. They all add an immense amount of information to this trial.

Bill Tieleman has a blog http://billtieleman.blogspot.com/ As well he reports to a couple of online News outlets.

The Tyee http://thetyee.ca/ and 24hrs Vancouver http://vancouver.24hrs.ca/

It should be mentioned here that the MSM has improved, ever so slightly, on the reporting of this case. So what we need is for people to attend this court to get different perspectives on what is happening and to help fill a void. That being the possible absence of people to do the reporting. The two main reporters have been Robin Matthews, a retired professor, reporting for Vive Le Canada http://vivelecanada.ca/ and to the Legislature Raids. And Bill Tieleman blogging on his own site as well as reporting to The Tyee and 24hrs Vancouver. Others, including myself, have made appearances but it is not enough. The word needs to get out and we need to make the attempt to have this case televised.

So to help alleviate any frustrations or intimidations that may occur at the courthouse I'll attempt to take you on a walk through the building.

The Courthouse is of Course at 800 Smythe in Vancouver. The corner of Smythe and Howe.

Howe St. being part of the financial district in Vancouver.

There is a huge Glass front at street level, with several doors to enter into the lobby. Once inside the lobby, if you look to your left, you'll see a mass of couches and lounge chairs. Further left there appears to be a coffee and news stand. I'm not exactly sure as I never ventured there. On your right there are more lounge chairs. And just beyond of that is the reception desk for the RCMP officer or Sherriff on duty. Or at least that's my interpetation of it. As he is facing you, on his right, your left, is a bulletin board. This board holds the court docket (postings for that days court). Next to that on your left is another glass wall with doors. This is the court registry.

The posting used to be fairly simple. In the left column it listed the name of the defendants and the case number. Then the charges. Then the lawyers. Then the courtroom. and the Justice presiding. Now you need to know the Justice name and listed under that name are the cases they are handling that day as well as the time of day. Follow along the line to the couurtroom number.

The original courtroom for this case was 54 but it has been changed to 65. I can only assume that this was done for the accoustics. You can hear more clearly in the new courtroom.

How to arrive at courtroom 65: If you are looking at the docket next to the police desk turn around 180 degrees. You will notice an alcove where there are two elevators. You need to take one to the fourth floor. Get off at the fourth floor and walk out to the lobby. This is an area with a huge skylight the length of the building. Turn left and go to the next bank of elevators. Go to the sixth floor get off and walk out to the lobby. Turn left and walk down to courtroom 65. It is on your left.

Now, the last time I was there, I ran into a problem. I was at the courtroom just before 9:oo A.M. There was a notice on the door that there was a restricted hearing going on. And as I looked into the courtroom I noticed a sign that said something to the effect that you couldn't publish or record anything. The notice had a spanish sounding name on it so I figured that this was the hearing that was supposed to take place at 10:00. After further investigation (looking into the courtroom and seeing Bill Berardino and Kevin McCullough) I figured this was a ruse to prevent those not in the know from entering. Don't be confused by anything that may be a red herring. Read all the information given and enter the court. If it was to start at 9:00 it most likely will. If you're in the wrong court then the guards (sherriff) will tell you.

Another way of getting there if you want exercise is go to the fourth floor and walk out into the skylit area and walk up the stairs.

Don't forget to take a pen and a stenographers pad. And it would be real nice if you knew shorthand.

I hope this has been informative and not too complicated. If anyone has additions or corrections please advise. Gary E

B.C. Ferry Services board given $233,000 pay raise

B.C. Ferry Services board given $233,000 pay raise: "B.C. Ferry Services board members are each receiving an $18,000 bump in pay for their services.
As of April 1, 11 directors saw a hike in their remuneration to $48,000 from $30,000. Board chairwoman Elizabeth Harrison received an increase to $140,000 a year from $105,000 in 2006.
With vice-chairman Thomas Harris receiving an additional $15,000 on top of his $48,000 annual stipend, that means the corporation will spend an extra $233,000 this year in raises for the board members and chairwoman, for a total of $683,000.

How anyone in their right mind can elect to gouge the population like this, especially people on fixed incom is beyond comprehension. [emphasis mine]
New B.C. ferry.
Darren Stone, Times Colonist


At the same time, on April 1, the corporation implemented a 7.3-per-cent fare increase on the major routes -- fare increases expected to go up every April 1 for the next four years.
'We need to attract and retain the best people as directors, with the business, legal and financial skills necessary to oversee the company,' Harrison said.
Every two years Hewitt Associates, a firm dealing in human resource issues, compares 17 companies and recommends the board compensation fee -- with instructions to stay at or below the mid-point of the comparative group, Harrison said. The latest hike is below the average, she said.

Why are they using a corporate formula to get their raises when it is a public transportation system? Who is looking after the consumer in this province?[emphasis mine]

Many thanks to BC Mary for this item

A Walk to the Supreme Court

I was going to write a piece on the Legislature Raids Court Case here as I had attended Court on April 14 2008. My second trip to this court in a year. Kevin McCullough the lawyer for Dave Basi said it well in court. Nothing has been done. Nothing. I don't think he would disagree with me that not only nothing has been done this year 2008 but nothing has been done since I was in that court a year ago. And quite a few people would agree that nothing has been done since December 26,2003. And BC Mary over at The Legislature Raids has quite a few pieces that covered everything that I wanted to say. Bill Tielleman and Robin Mathews have written a couple of good pieces.

So instead I'm going to write a little about my trip to the Courthouse on Smythe Street.

The trip started out fairly well as I left my daughters place and headed for the Sea-Bus in my little gas saver car but it soon turned to crap.
You see there is limited parking at my daughters place and at 11:00am I would have had a ticket if I had left the car there and walked the short trip to the boat. The previous evening I had scouted out a parkade that I could use for five dollars all day until 5pm. Good Deal? Not!. You see they have these little complicated machines that suck up your money and they got me good. Two times five dollars. That's right, ten dollars. Apparently if you make a mistake on these machines you should cancel. Which I did without reading the fine print.No change given if you cancel They saw me coming. Anyway after cursing a couple of four letter words at the top of my lungs I figured "oh well its only five extra dollars out of my limited income". Better to get the blood pressure down and not go for a coronary. So I headed for the sea-bus.
I walked up to the kiosk that sucks up more money and this time I took a little more care. I didn't have enough correct change so I had to put a bill in to it. This I did. Nothing. Maybe there is a certain way to put in the bill? I tried them all. Nothing. So I decided to read all the directions. Having a male ego sucks when you have to do this. Nothing. Not a word on how to insert the money. So I went to the next kiosk (moneysucker). Tried the same. Nothing. While I was standing there scratching my head I figured I would hit the 2-zone button. Jesus the thing lit up like a one arm bandit in Reno. So I put the money in. Bingo. Success. Got my ticket,got my change and headed for das bot. Got down the ramp with 3 seconds to spare. Didn't even have to run.

I love boats and spend a lot of time in them. So the trip was uneventful. Didn't get seasick or anything. Got off the other side and walked up to the street.

Now something happened that made the extra fiver at the parkade seem trivial. As I walked out into the street I was accosted by no less than three people handing out free newsrags. 24hrs Vancouver, something called Metro, and get this. A complimentary copy of The Province Well I almost fell over.

So to continue. There is a mess of construction to my right on Granville. And I mean a messSo I decided to walk up Seymour. Now some people may wonder why I would walk instead of taking a bus. The first reason is I hate buses. Boat buses are okay. But ones with wheels. Uh-Uh.I trust only myself when driving. Been a passenger in too may accidents. So I walked. First thing I notice is when the walk sign comes on the birds start chirping. Mechanical birds. Or electronic. Whatever. Up here in the south Cariboo where I live we have real birds. Eagles, grouse, robins, crows, sandhill cranes, woodpeckers,Stellars Jay (the Provincial Bird) and something called a camp robber (Whiskey Jack). We even have a place here that some say is the only inland nesting place for the common seagull. No Lie. And these ones unlike those in the big smoke don't shit on you.

So I walked west on Seymour. Nothing strange for the first block. But in the second block things started to happen. I noticed that the streets were a little dirtier. As I walked on and into the third block I came across my first homeless person. Still sleeping on the sidewalk. Less that half a block further on were two people sharing a matress of cardboard and a couple of blankets. By the time I got to The Bay at Seymour I had counted nine people sleeping in the streets. I'm thinking "this is not acceptable". I get to Georgia and turn North. Everything is okay here. The longest bus stop, next to the depot, is still there. Still a couple of buskers. At Granville I turn North and when I get across the intersection there is more construction. Where the old Eatons building is (Now Sears) there is a gaping jesus big hole. I'm looking across what used to be Granville street to the Subterranian part of Sears. And it streyches the whole block. No room for people to nap here. But at Robson Strass it begins again. All the way to Smythe. Nine more living souls without a place to sleep. At Smythe I turn north and its almost like Dorothy entering Oz. Clean Streets, no one sleeping on the sidewalks. Nothing.

My very first thought here is "this city is hiding its homeless. Out of sight, Out of mind". Everything I hear or read is true. This is a god damn shame. This is the city I was raised in (I was born in Northern Ontario). This is where I went to school. I worked here. It was never like this.What the hell is going on? In this day and age nothing like this should be happening. But there it is. And I'm going to say this right here. Because of this Provincial Governments Corporate welfare system and the lack of concern for the average citizen, the people who vote them in, we have a mess like this. Eighteen people in a short walk on the street. But where the money and law happens. Nothing. For Shame.

About the Olympics

When the BC Olympic Comittee first announced a bid for the Olympics in 2010 for Whistler I was ecstatic. Whistler is not too far away and it may be a good thing.
In my younger years I was a competitive skiier, and I loved the sport with a passion. Still do, but the bones won't take the hammering anymore. My competitive career ended in 1961 with a bad fall. And it wasn't even related to a race. Just a dumb move skiing where there was no snow.
So I looked forward to maybe volunteering as a groom. That might give me a free ringside seat for the GS or the Downhill which were my specialties. All these volunteering thoughts came about as I was getting ready to retire and I knew the money would be tight.
But being a person who is interested in many social and political issues I started taking a second look at the volunteer thing. I didn't like what I saw with the Homeless situation and the way this government wanted to treat them. Just sweep them under the carpet and pretend they didn't exist. Then the way they have been pouring taxpayers' money into projects like the Convention center and calling things P3 projects (partnerships) that give companies absolute freedom to do things their way with no interference from any quarter. And all this with little or no financial output. Bridges that are going to be built with toll booths. And roads as well. And they say that the tolls will be temporary. Thirty years maybe. What a crock of shit. Just look at the Coquihalla. They will never lift the toll off that JOKE.
So, recently I have seen a lot of people saying Boycott the Olympics and some columnists saying "Olympics? Why not boycott China?" Or in other cases "Boycott McDonalds" Well as far as McDonalds goes they have been on my boycott list since they sold 8 million burgers. As far as boycotting the olympics goes I am doing just that for 2010. I will not be volunteering, what-so-ever. For this year I may read a few items but I don't have TV so I won't be put in the position of having to watch them.
Things are so much simpler without TV. Without it you can eliminate much of the spin by the big networks.Or the advertising every 11 minutes or whatever.

The Mud Just Keeps Getting Thicker

This morning while I was checking out News items and other blogs like The Legislature Raids I decided to take a little trip to the BC Court Dockets online. This was around 9:20am. So,lo and behold what do I find but a scheduling for case #23299-1 Bobby Virk. The bail proceeding was listed as UTA. Undertaking to Appear. The offenses listed were :
count 2 ccc121-1a-ii
count 4 ccc121-1c
count 6 ccc121-1d
count 8 ccc122
count 9 ccc390-1a
count 10 ccc380-1a. Courtroom 65 at 4:00pm. All counts listed as an Application (APP)

As fast as my dial-up would make it, I went over to BC Marys' Place to inform her of this appearance. I left her a message and she checked it out and posted it on her Blog. I knew I could trust her to get it out there real fast.

Now , I left it at that for a bit while I went outside to chip ice and shovel snow. (you see I live quite high in the mountains, about the same as the top of Grouse Mountain) I chipped and shovelled, and shovelled and chipped then came in about 11:40am to make lunch. The bride was at her mothers you see.

So I sat down to the dial-up and rechecked the court cases. Nothing changed. Then I went to the completed cases and found that there had been an appearance on this matter on March, 28, 2008 which had been put over to April 2, 2008 at 4:00pm.
Ate lunch, surfed the net, looked again at Marys' blog and noticed Baldrey was doing damage control, took care of some family business and back outside to shovel and chip and play Paul Bunyon. I came back in about 3:40pm. Checked the court docket at 3:50pm online again and it was still there. Nothing Changed So you can imagine my complete surprise when I was checking the comments on this at The Legislature Raids and noticed Mary had post scripted one of her anonymouse comments. The commentor had gone to the courthouse for the 4pm hearing only to check the docket at 3:50 and find out that the case had been moved to 1:55PM. Anonymouse stayed around till 4:10 just in case this was a Fools Joke I guess.

I went into the online docket and sure as christ it had been changed. Now the timing is crucial here. Both the anonymouse and I checked at pretty much the same time. They had the hard copy which was changed and we had the online copy which was not. I figure that they must have changed the hard copy as anonymouse was walking in the door. Which was a full one hour and fifty-five minutes after the case was heard. Conspiracy? I think so