2 THE DAILY VOICE, FRIDAY, NOV. 28, 2014 EDITOR MIKE HODDER Cws hee KERA SKOYLAS photo Baty Langara students catching the bus home may be some of those most affected by a transit referendum that could take place in 2015. Expert urges students to vote Young votes are vital to transit referendum, says Langara instructor By KERA SKOCYLAS lthough Langara students claim they are in favour of the proposed transit referendum, one expert is concerned the plan will fall though due to a lack of young voters. The Mayors’ Council has released an outline of its $7.5 billion transit im- provement plan on its website. The ref- erendum will allow Lower Mainland residents to vote on the funding of this project. Mayors’ from Metro Vancouver are currently working on what question will appear on the ballot next year. Ac- cording to the Mayors’ Council website the transit plan will include 11 new B- line routes, the Patullo Bridge replace- ment, as well as better service on the existing SkyTrain and bus routes. Murray Mollard, a Langara criminal justice instructor, said one of the chal- lenges with the proposed referendum is ‘who votes for more taxes?’ “Generally speaking people don’t want to pay more taxes,” he said, “even in good causes, it’s a tough battle to win.” He said students are directly affect- ed by this referendum and should want be involved. “For many students who have had to wait in line and miss buses or been frustrated by the lack of transporta- tion,” Mollard said. Adam Rossi, a Langara applied plan- ning student said it’s vital for students to vote on this. “They will be a large component of a pro transit outcome,” he said, “I will vote in favour of in- creased funding.” Mollard said it is necessary to en- gage citizens in a meaningful way, in hopes of increasing voting. “One of the things ’ve been working to do is to try to persuade the mayors to create a citizens assembly on the trans- portation funding referendum as a way to engage a diverse set of citizens from the Metro Vancouver region,” Mollard said. “To think carefully about the ref- erendum and about transportation in- frastructure spending.” Mollard said the mayors have not re- sponded well to his idea about the citi- zens’ assembly. Mike Buda, executive director, May- ors’ Council on Regional Transporta- tion said once the final details are con- firmed they are planning to hold on-campus information programs and meetings to engage students and all voters. “This is a huge decision that’s going to affect Metro Vancouver for a good 10 years, it doesn’t just affect transit rid- ers, it affects people who drive” Rossi said. “The more people you put on tran- sit the less cars you have. That’s pretty basic concept but a lot of car commut- ing people don’t recognize that.” 66 The more people you put on transit the less cars you have. That’s a pretty basic concept... MIKE BUDA EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR MAYORS’ COUNCIL ON REGIONAL TRANSPORTATION Education Is the best say Van police Education campaigns for vulnerable citizens may help prevent victimization By CHARLOTTE DREWETT (VPD), in conjunction with commu- nity policing centers, is using edu- cational campaigns to catch groups of thieves scamming Vancouver resi- dents. There have been recent reports to VPD of a scam is working it’s way through Vancouver, police are calling distraction theft, where through a slight of hand, middle eastern woman are “placing a piece of fake jewelry around somebody’s neck and then re- moving their legitimate jewelry from underneath,” said Randy Fincham, me- dia spokesperson for VPD. About 150 incidents have been re- ported in the last year and a half. Police will run an education campaign and push the group out of the city for a bit, but they come back. The goal of educa- tion campaigns is to eliminate the thieves victim market by keeping the community fully aware of the scam, Fincham said. Through information cam- paigns and community engagement, five arrests were made in a similar case in and the market the scammers prayed on was eliminated, said Fincham. In 2012, a group of scammers engaging in acts of theft, dubbed bless- ing fraud by police, plagued the Chi- nese community, specifically targeting elderly Asian women. Karen Low, executive director of the Chinese Community Policing Centre, said two middle aged Chinese females would approach a victim and convince them to see a feng shui master. The master would say something bad would happen to the victim or their family, but he could prevent it. He would then in- struct the victim to put all of their mon- ey and jewelry into a bag, seal it and bless it, and then instruct them not to open it for two months. “It’s amazing how many people do fall for that,” Low said, adding that the theft was a “complete exploitation of the victims cultural beliefs and super- stitions as well as the love for their families.” Fincham said it’s been over a year since the last case of blessing fraud was reported. “We do believe there [were] more cases than what [were] reported to us but we don’t have any recently that have been reported,” he said. T Vancouver Police Department BCFED official highlights healthcare resolutions CUPE regional vice president says healthcare privatization will be a burden, and could weaken an already-strained public system LENA ALSAYEGH photo CUPE members vote on new repre- sentatives at the BCFED convention. By LENA ALSAYEGH menced its annual convention in its fourth day of meetings today. Health care was the topic of note as CUPE Regional Vice President Victor Elkins highlighted the resolutions in- volving privatization and Dr. Brian Day’s Cambie Surgery Centre. The resolutions limiting and pre- venting the further privatization of ser- vices passed almost unanimously. Elkins said allowing the private clin- ics to operate weakens our public healthcare system. “Tt’s clear math, if you have five doc- tors, five are in the hospital and you take two or three of them out and work them in a private clinic, the wait times Te BC Federation of Labour com- aren’t? going to go down, Elkins said, “they’re just allowing the public system to fail so they can turn around and say we have a private option we can offer you.” Elkins said his union’s role is to pro- tect the public health care system, and the clients and patients they look after, which in their view lies in public health. Les Rowe, a retired teacher and con- vention Seargent at Arms, said it’s an issue that affects everyone. “Because of the underfunding of the entire medical system by various levels of government have permitted priva- teers to come in and set up alterna- tives, those who can take advantage of it, the rich, are dividing the system and watering it down, so as a result the rest of us are not getting the services we are paying for and deserve,” Rowe said. Elkins also explained the impor- tance of the convention and unions as a whole. “We all have our different things 66 In my view, unions are that equal- that we’re really here fighting for our members for or the groups or societies that we service, but I do think public education and public services are real- ly the ones that bind us really all to- gether, and also trying to fight for that middle class,” Elkins said. “In my view, unions are that equal- izer, it really does provide that stable middle class which all societies really need,” he said. “We're trying to make sure we sur- vive this and provide this safety net for our members and the citizens of the country that we live in.” izer, it really does provide that stable middle class which all societies re- ally need VICTOR ELKINS CUPE VICE PRESIDENT