EWS & features — srroxome«s02 THE VOICE, TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 2011 2 Surrey MLA to try welfare Jagrup Brar will live on $610 for a month, impel gov't to raise rate By MATT HYNDMAN Surrey MLA will live on $610 in January to draw attention to the struggles of people surviv- ing on welfare. Responding to a challenge from wel- fare advocacy group Raise the Rates, MLA for Surrey-Fleetwood Jagrup Brar will attempt to live within the cur- rent B.C. monthly assisted living rate. “lve decided to accept the welfare challenge to experience firsthand what life is like for 180,000 B.C. families who live on welfare,’ Brar told reporters Monday at the Surrey Urban Mission. Raise the Rates wants to pressure the B.C. government to reduce poverty by raising welfare compensation. Brar will spend the month in Surrey and Vancouver collecting bottles and possibly panhandling as he meets with people living in poverty to better un- derstand their daily struggles. “We're hoping that if people really understand how low welfare is they Newly elected city council- lor George Affleck of Non- Partisan Association is against swearing-in party By LYNDA CHAPPLE AND PATRICK JOHNSTON in, Vancouver city council officials are already butting heads — over where the ceremony should be held. Rookie NPA city councillor George Affleck says the city’s plan to hold council’s swearing-in ceremony away from City Hall is a waste of taxpayers’ B™ they have even been sworn MATT HYNDMAN photo Jagrup Brar announced on Monday he will live on the B.C. welfare rate. will help press our government to raise the rates and bring in a poverty reduc- tion plan,” activist Jean Swanson said. Brar is following in the footsteps of Emery Barnes, the former NDP MLA money. “We don’t need the pomp and cir- cumstance,” said Affleck. In a tweet Sunday night, Affleck questioned the need for “an expensive swearing in cer- emony for me and my fellow council- lors[.]” “Tt is disappointing to see councillor- elect Affleck trying to score political points just days after an election, but we look forward to working with him this term,” said Mayor Gregor Robert- son in a statement released Monday. In 2008, the ceremony was held a Sunset Community Centre with a Scot- tish pipe band, Indian bhangra dancers and Asian dragons, at a cost of $85,000. “If costs are coming down that’s go- who spent time living in the Downtown Eastside in 1986. Barnes’ daughter is supporting Brar, and hopes the chal- lenge will result in change she says never came from her father’s attempts. “The sad thing is that 25 years later we're having to go through this again,” she said. “Emery Barnes lived on $850 a month,” Brar said. “Today I will be challenged to find a place to live and survive on $610 per month.” Back in 1986, Barnes concluded that welfare for a single person should be $700, equivalent to about $1,250 today. Brar and Swanson rejected the sug- gestion that with the one-month chal- lenge he would simply be a tourist in poor people’s lives. “T want to experience that life and listen to their stories and share them with the people of British Columbia,” Brar said. “Tt won’t be the same as actually be- ing on welfare,” Swanson said. “But hopefully it will draw attention.” WELFARE breakdown $610 coor $375 io: S7 left to spend 132,828 people on welfare in B.C. in 2010 ing in the right direction,” said council newcomer Adriane Carr, also the depu- ty leader of the Green Party of Canada. Seattle and Vancouver both have a population of about 600,000. Seattle will spend roughly $2,000 on its ceremony for swearing in new councillors, ac- cording to Seattle City Council commu- nications manager Laura Stockard. Carr would like Vancouver to follow that example. “That would fit my val- ues that things are kept simple and don’t cost a lot,” she said. City of Calgary spokesperson Janet Crosby-Kerr said Calgary had their swearing in ceremony in council cham- bers a week after the election, and a celebration that cost $20,000. JESSE WINTER photo NPA city councillor for Vancouver George Affleck, pictured left, doesn’t want the city to throw an expensive swearing-in ceremony. Ceremony wastes taxpayer dollars - NPA 66 We don’t need the pomp and circum- stance. GEORGE AFFLECK Viaduct voting ends Vancouverites given a voice in viaduct makeover, but may not see changes for another 15 years By SHAWN GILL troversial viaducts — hanging gar- dens, a bike-and-pedestrian only zone or a swimming pool — will be re- warded on Thursday. Designs were submitted for three categories. The top prize is $5,000. The proposals in the city-run design competition include one imaginative proposal to tear down the viaducts and flood the underlying False Creek flats with water, harking back to their 1898 appearance. The project would involve the con- struction of 1,500 bridges to connect over 800 islands in the flood zone. The award-winning proposal may or may not become a small part of the city’s official plan for the future of the viaducts and the underlying False Creek flats. But a report by city engineers said that closing the viaduct to automobile traffic wouldn’t be feasible for at least 15 years. City councillor Geoff Meggs, a pro- ponent of overhauling the viaducts, in- terprets this to mean that it could be done gradually over that period of time. “There’s never been any suggestion that we would simply disregard the traffic impact in tearing down the via- ducts,” said Meggs. “Though the oppo- nents try to phrase it that way.” The viaducts transport approxi- mately 43,000 cars and trucks per day and are one of the city’s major trans- port corridors. Skeptics, who value the efficiency of the viaducts as a transit corridor, say that the best thing to do with them is to just leave them alone. “It’s going to cost a lot of money [to tear down the viaducts]. They should leave it the way it is. They could put that money into a tax decrease,” said Mohammed Soleimani, a Langara arts and science student. “There’s increasing residential den- sity in that area [...] so more park land would be nice,” said Langara business student Kevin McCrank, 37. The viaducts were built in the 1960s to connect downtown Vancouver to the freeway system. The freeway was nev- er built and today Vancouver is known as the only major North American city without a highway connecting directly to its downtown core. The viaducts run between B.C. Sta- dium and Rogers Arena on the east side of downtown. They connect down- town to the Strathcona neighbourhood to the east, passing over the northeast False Creek industrial lands. Ti: best idea for Vancouver’s con- Photo from City of Vancouver website A proposal for flooding False Creek.