THE CASE FOR SAVING OUR PARK BOARD
Abolishing the Board Would Be Wrong-Headed and Undemocratic

by Jerry Fast
(click images to enlarge)

A coalition of concerned citizens, thirty former Park Board Commissioners, and nineteen of our Vancouver neighbourhood Community Centre Associations (APG) are strongly opposed to the decision by Mayor Sim and seven City Councillors to abolish the elected Park Board. We have formed a group called Save Our Park Board. We are asking Vancouver residents to sign our Petition available on the website (see link below).

Eight City Councillors do not have a mandate to eliminate the Park Board elected by 170,000 Vancouver voters in October 2022 to serve a four-year term. And a recent legal opinion presented to Park Board on September 9 concluded that the Mayor’s proposal likely violates the freedom of expression and assembly rights in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms of the Canadian Constitution.

The Mayor’s plan is a violation of fundamental democratic and constitutional principles. It is not acceptable. The Mayor says he will proceed regardless.

The Park Board has a mandate to protect, preserve and develop the parks and recreation facilities loved by the citizens of Vancouver. That is their ONLY mandate. Park Board Commissioners are elected to carry out that mandate and are accountable to Vancouver citizens at election time. City Councillors have a much broader mandate, managing all aspects of City operations and development. We are deeply concerned that parks and recreation will not receive the same priority attention that it has now with the elected Park Board. Former City Councillors tell us they were far too busy to devote the necessary 10 to 20 hours per week to Park Board business.

Here’s an example of the difference between dealing with City Council and with Park Board.

**the Park Board's sunset nursery germinates the plants seen and enjoyed in parks throughout the city.**

When I appeared before City Council on December 13 to speak against the Mayor’s plan, I was cut off after three minutes and told to sit down. No discussion permitted. When I appeared at Park Board on September 9 and 23 to address issues related to the Mayor’s plan, I spoke for five minutes and then engaged in a 20-minute question and answer session with Commissioners. That’s the difference.

With an elected Park Board, we have direct, frequent, meaningful discussion of our concerns with elected officials responsible for decision making.

The elected Park Board was created in the 1880s because the citizens at that time wanted to be sure that the pressures for real estate development did not compromise their determination to have a robust parks and recreation system. We have the same concern today.

We all know how influential the development industry is at City Council. There is an inherent conflict of interest when the same elected officials must deal with both development proposals needing land assembly and parks preservation and expansion. The elected Park Board is a powerful bulwark against the loss of our park land. Examples of some treasures created by our visionary elected Park Board include: English Bay Beach, VanDusen Botanical Garden, The Stanley Park Seawall, Kitsilano Pool, Fraserview Golf Course, Sunset Nursery.

The deterioration of the Seawall, Kits Pool, and other amenities is often blamed on the Park Board, but "City Council is responsible for this disrepair because it took control of the specialized facility maintenance staff from the Park Board in 2010"

The Mayor’s plan is a bad idea for Vancouver’s Community Centres. Most folks don’t know that 19 Community Centres are jointly managed by Park Board staff and by volunteer, community based, Associations with elected Boards of Directors who are responsible for programming. Directors work closely with the elected Commissioners on all matters related to community centre operations. We have regular, open access to Commissioners at bi-weekly Park Board meetings, and between meetings.

Commissioners attend Association Board meetings to keep the lines of communication and decision making open. Eliminating the elected Commissioners will completely disrupt this effective working relationship. The Mayor’s plan is all wrong, because it will mean the Community Centre Associations will be much less effective in delivering programming for their unique communities across the City. With the Mayor’s plan, the governance structure becomes less informed of community needs and concerns. It is a step backward eliminating this layer of elected governance, not a step forward as the Mayor would like us to believe.

He wants to centralize decision-making in City Council; we want to keep decision-making decentralized, with engaged community based groups.

The Mayor has yet to produce any evidence of the benefits of City Hall control over Parks and Recreation. What we do know is that he is trying to tell Vancouver citizens that the governance system is broken, by pointing to the disrepair of facilities such as the Aquatic Centre and Kits Pool. The facts are that City Council is responsible for this disrepair because it took control of the specialized facility maintenance staff from the Park Board in 2010. Ever since, the Real Estate and Facility Management department in the City has failed to properly maintain these facilities and respond to work orders in a timely manner. This attempt at “streamlining” maintenance has failed.

Legally, City Council cannot make this change in governance by itself. It must ask the Provincial Government to amend the Vancouver Charter. It contains a provision for an elected seven member Board of Parks and Recreation. This is why we are asking you to sign our Petition demanding that the Premier and all MLAs take no steps to dissolve the elected Vancouver Park Board unless requested to do so by the voters of Vancouver.

If the Mayor wants to abolish the Park Board, he must go before the voters in the next municipal election in October 2026 stating clearly his intention to do so, and have the voters of Vancouver decide on its future.

For more information visit our website and sign the petition here.

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Jerry Fast is the president the Kitsilano Community Centre Association and
chairperson of the Association Presidents Group (APG), representing
most of the City of Vancouver’s community centres.
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EDITOR’S NOTE: While The West End Journal supports the efforts of Save Our Park Board, in the interests of fairness our “Viewpoints” page is open to other opinions. If you would like to contribute an editorial on this topic, contact me at editor@thewestendjournal.ca

Y’rs,
Kevin Dale McKeown
Editor & Publisher
The West End Journal