Langley MLA Mary Polak speaks to the audience at Saturday’s town hall meeting, which also featured MP Mark Warawa (left) and Langley City Mayor Peter Fassbender. About 150 people were in attendance. 

John Gordon/ Langley Times


By Andrew Bucholtz - Langley Times

Representatives of three levels of government were peppered with questions at a town hall meeting Saturday.
The meeting, sponsored by The Times and featuring Langley City Mayor Peter Fassbender, Langley MLA Mary Polak and Langley MP Mark Warawa, attracted around 150 people.

In his opening statement, Fassbender said one of the key issues facing the City is how to manage growth and prepare for the future.
“If we’re going to keep pace with the economic pressures, growth is going to have to be a part of that,” he said. “Growth is part of what we need in order to accomplish that, but growth not just for growth’s sake.”

Fassbender said increased growth is vital to improving transit and other services, but that growth has to be in a way that makes sense for the community.
“We have to look 10, 15, 20 years into the future to make sure we have a plan that makes sense for all of us,” he said.
Polak said she’s been very impressed with what Langley City has done in the last decade.

“Your Langley City council really punches above its weight in terms of how much it accomplishes and how much it leads in the region,” she said.
Polak said on a provincial level, there have been encouraging economic signs recently, but the government is still very much in recovery mode from last year’s economic downturn.

“We have a long way to go to get back to where we were a few years ago,” she said.

The provincial government is projecting a $2.78 billion deficit for 2009-10, but expects that deficit to shrink annually over the next few years as their revenues recover, resulting in a balanced budget by 2013-14. Polak said the immediate future looks brighter for citizens.

“People will feel the recovery in their daily lives before we see a recovery in revenues,” she said.

Warawa said Canada is still in much better shape than many countries around the globe.

“The world has gone through some tough times,” he said. “Canada now has come out of it. We’ve had growth and employment for the last three months, and we have the strongest economy in the G7.”

Warawa said the federal government is also moving forward on the environmental front, particularly with the recent commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 per cent of 2006 levels by 2020. He said Canadian technology is also going to play a critical role in the global reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

“We’re the number one contributor to clean technology such as carbon capture and storage,” he said. “About 25 per cent of global carbon dioxide reductions will come from that technology. The world is counting on Canada’s technology.”

Warawa was asked about why he voted for the federal bill that allowed B.C. to implement a controversial harmonized sales tax. He said other Canadian provinces had lowered business taxes by going that route, and the B.C. government wanted to follow suit to offer an attractive business environment.
“To be competitive, B.C. wanted to go that route,” he said. “On the principle of fairness, I supported allowing any province that wanted to move to a harmonized sales tax to do so.”

Polak, who also serves as the provincial Minister of Children and Families, was asked about the planned move to all-day Kindergarten in the fall. She said scientific studies have shown that the full-day approach will be beneficial to kids, but registration in Kindergarten is not mandatory and parents who only want their children in school for a half day can either send them to private schools that offer half-day kindergarten or just pick them up early from public school.

“There’s no principal that’s going to stop you from taking your kid home halfway through the day,” she said.

Fassbender was asked about the apparent slow pace of the Nicomekl Bridge project. He said work has been ongoing, but it’s been limited mainly to planning and environmental assessments.

“You don’t just make an announcement and build a bridge the next day,” he said. “The preparatory work is as important as anything else; you don’t want to make a mistake.”

Fassbender said the project may even be ahead of schedule. Construction was originally expected to begin in May, but it may start earlier.
“You’ll see shovels go into the ground probably in April,” he said.

The $9 million project must be completed by March 31, 2011 to qualify for federal funding. Fassbender said he’s confident it will be completed on time.
Fassbender was also asked about a planned development at 203 Street and 54A Avenue. He agreed that the streets around there aren’t as wide as would be optimal for a new development, but development shouldn’t be held up on account of that.

“The City was planned at a time when we had a lot less people, a lot less cars and a lot less development,” he said. “We can’t fix the sins of the past. We’re trying to look at the big picture.”

Fassbender said it’s difficult to balance housing development, parking space and increased transit service.

“Our ultimate objective in the City of Langley is to force people in the future to get rid of their cars, but we can’t do that until there’s transit,” he said. “However, we don’t get the transit until there’s density.”

All three politicians were asked if they had received Olympic tickets or planned to attend Olympic events. Fassbender said he does have tickets for the Games.
Polak said she won’t be going to sporting events, but she will be working for the province during the Games by hosting business dignitaries at Olympic functions. Warawa said he’d planned to buy Olympic tickets, but he chose to donate the money he’d set aside to help relief efforts in Haiti,after hearing about the devastation there.

Polak was questioned about the provincial government’s recent cuts to funding for arts and sports organizations. She said those fall into the budget category of “discretionary costs,” which doesn’t mean they aren’t important, but means that the government isn’t forced to spend that money. Thus, when budgetary pruning was required, those areas were targeted.

“We had to make some important decisions in areas where we had some control,” she said. “It was a decision we had to make to support things that were a higher priority.”

Polak said the government will be reviewing cuts to discretionary grants, and may decide to bring some back. However, she emphasized that in order to do that, they’ll have to find ways to slow down ballooning costs in areas like health care.

“If we want to support things like that, we have to get the health care costs under control,” she said.

Polak and Warawa were asked about when an independent agency to investigate police will be created. Polak was supportive of the idea.
“From a provincial level, we’re continually moving forward with that,” she said. “We recognize the issues with police investigating police.”
Warawa said he thinks some of the scrutiny of the RCMP is undeserved, though.

“The RCMP has taken a lot of hits recently, and if they make mistakes, they deserve to get hit,” he said. “I think they’ve been targeted unfairly in some of the recent incidents. I’m very proud of the RCMP. I think they do a great job.”

Warawa was asked about decriminalizing marijuana. He said the Conservative government is overwhelmingly against the idea.
“Our government has said absolutely not,” he said. “We have a strong position that we will not be decriminalizing marijuana.”

Warawa said he values these kinds of forums because they allow him to hear from his constituents.

“We don’t have all the answers,” he said. “We need to hear from you. That’s why I appreciate being here today.”process