I have a simple question, so simple even a local politician SHOULD be able to understand it. Although it is very clear they do not want to understand or answer. If the current cost of Plan A is 108.6 million and the taxpayers are only paying $85.0 who is it that is to pay the $23.6+ million in extra costs?

If the city has some mysterious benefactor donating this money this should be made clear so citizens can say a very big thank you. Even if anonymous we as a City need to acknowledge this great display of largess.

If on the other hand the money is being paid by the city and no one else then no matter what word games and accounting tricks the city is using, homeowners will be paying for all $108.6 million.

Citizens have the right to know exactly where the extra $23.6 million is coming from, because if it is coming out of city revenue it is coming out of citizens pockets. Particularly if the city is using any mislabeling tricks such as establishing a very large line of credit, say $23.6 million in order to say “we are not borrowing that money, we are just using the city’s line of credit”. Especially since these type of word games come with the extra interest costs of the high interest rates on “lines of credit.

What ever is going on the citizens of Abbotsford have the right to demand and receive a clear accounting of just were all the money for all parts of plan A are coming from.

Because should it prove that the claim of it only costing $85 million is merely word games and accounting misdirection, then clearly politicians and senior city staff are in effect lying to us.

Citizens have a need and a right to know how truthful senior city staff and our politicians are in speaking to us

Consider the words of that famous businessman Jacob Marley “Mankind was my business”. In choosing to pursue the premiership of British Columbia you made the health and welfare of these citizens “your business” and your “business” is failing badly due to your neglect, fear and unwillingness to provide needed leadership. These issues may not be pleasant, easy to address, popular or without great challenge.

True leadership is about making the tough choices. The story below from www.homelessinabbotsford.com calls for true leadership. It is time for you to Decide.

“Why is it so god-damned hard? Why is it so unfair?” I could hear the pain and fatigue in her voice as she asked the question, her eyes revealing her soul deep weariness of spirit.

She was not speaking of life but of detoxification from drugs. For the first time in the years I have known her, she desperately wants to get clean. If there were a detox bed available she would now be started on the path to a life free from drugs and off the streets.

But there are no beds, no room for someone seeking help. It will take up to three weeks of phoning every day, struggling to keep clean and free of drugs, trying not to use drugs to ease the pain of the wait. Homeless – but having to find a phone to call every day; Homeless – but having to try to keep from surrendering to hopelessness; Homeless – crying for help, those cries falling on deaf ears.

We know that the best chance for her those who find themselves seeking to reclaim their lives is to get a bed immediately. We have witnessed how many we lose of those who face the wait for a detox bed back to drugs and the street.

If a person is lucky in their timing there is a bed available to them immediately. The unlucky majority rolls snake-eyes and face detoxing on the street surrounded by the drugs that will relieve their pain. Many people get a little headache and they quickly take the drug aspirin for pain relief. Do you honestly think that YOU, facing the pain of detoxing alone and on the streets, would not seek the “pain relief drugs” you needed?

Maple Ridge, Chilliwack. Cordova and Vancouver – four detoxification centers for the entire lower mainland. There is a drug use epidemic on our streets and we have only these four inadequate facilities for those trying to find help. If this was not enough of a barrier bureaucracy steps forward to add another in the form of “health” regions. With two centers in the Coastal region and two in the Fraser region you cannot be on all four waiting lists in order to get the first bed but are restricted to your health region. Which raises the question of whether the reason we are not now opening another detox is that the two regions are to busy fighting over which region gets funding for such a facility to remember they are suppose to about Health?

I do know that a serious commitment to getting clean should not depend on, nor so often be defeated by, so literally a roll of the dice.

So the next time you see someone suffering the scourge of addiction instead of looking down your nose or assuming a “holier than thou” attitude it would be a more truthful reflection of reality if you apologized for the lack of detoxification, rehabilitation and the community based support programs we know will reclaim lives from addiction.

Abbotsford’s New Homeless Strategy: zip, nada, zilch

It has been close to a year since Compassion Park with several city councillors recently quoted in the newspapers ballyhooing the strides made on the homeless front since the closing of Compassion Park.

Looking at Compassion Park in the spring of 2007 what changes in city behaviour do we find? Well, the notices posted to vacate the park now bear the date March 15, 2007 and …… that’s it. It is truly amazing what progress can be made on homelessness and other growing/pressing social issues with leadership, imagination and intelligent behaviour. Unfortunately for the citizens of our City, Abbotsford City Hall is lacking all three.

A year to plan and prepare and we are unprepared and apparently lacking in any plan but pointlessly chasing of the homeless from spot to spot around the city. What Progress!

It may be of interest to readers that the park is pretty much the last choice on the local realty listings for camping spots. For those who have not visited this area it is basically a steep wooded hillside with little level ground for comfortable tenting. But with all the best camping spots around the city taken and the demand for camps rising with the homeless population, you’ve got to take what is available. Especially since so many of the doorways, overhangs and stairwells are already homesteaded by other homeless.

And so it appears we face another spring and summer of senseless chasing of the homeless from point to point around the city until they arrive back at the starting point to begin yet another fruitless merry-go-round chase, and another, and another, and another. More homeless, more wasted time, more waste of taxpayer dollars to achieve – NOTHING. Apparently Abbotsford City Hall’s action plan for dealing with homelessness and other social ills lies in creating a plan in their own image – a perpetual motion money wasting machine.

Maybe it is just me, but personally I would have decided to try at least one different, preferably several different approaches to these problems. What do you think? Would not you also want to have been prepared with new and different approaches, instead of the same old wasteful behaviours?