She said: “Surrey is desperate need of green voices to stand up for nature and marginalized communities at city council. Whether you are a struggling renter, frustrated transit user, homeless person, or one of our animal relations, you will have my full support.”
She added: “Our city, once called the ‘City of Parks’ has now become the City of Parking Lots. We need to protect what remaining green spaces we have left for all of us. The animals need our help to keep their homes, young, and food and water sources safe, and people need nature in turn for the social and health benefits access to natural places brings.”
“There’s a desperate need for more social housing in Surrey, and we need to fiercely protect our remaining rental stocks from redevelopment, which would result in massive displacements of vulnerable people. In a 0% vacancy rate situation, this means many of those people would become homeless or turn to precarious, unstable, and unsafe housing situations. The City needs to provide incentives to housing providers to maintain existing stocks, and to encourage more housing accessible to those living below the poverty line.
“I will be encouraging Translink to provide more buses and 24-hour service so shift workers, students, and party-goers can travel safely and affordably. I will continue to advocate for a municipal spay and neuter program which would reduce animal control costs and improve animal welfare.”
Website: www.roslyncassells.ca
Kuldip Pelia resigns from People First Surrey
PROF. Kuldip Pelia says that he’s quit People First Surrey and is running as an independent for Council. “The main reason for my resigning from People First Surrey is that my priorities are changed,” he claimed.
He said that if he is elected, he’ll vote yes for, among other things, cancellation of LRT; extending SkyTrain line from King George to Langley; Surrey’s own police force; a new hospital; more affordable housing; getting necessary funding from the provincial government to build more schools; shortening time period taken for inspections, and issuing permits, and licenses; approving new development projects; improving bus service; creating more child-care spaces; getting more college and university spaces; and building more libraries, fitness centres, swimming pools, ice rinks, and basketball courts.
He says he will make full use of his accounting and finance knowledge which he gained while teaching university and college students for more than 10 years.
Pauline Greaves is Proudly Surrey’s mayoral candidate
PAULINE Greaves, college business instructor and criminologist has accepted the invitation of Proudly Surrey to lead the party in the upcoming civic election.
“After a series of meetings and careful deliberation,” Greaves stated, “I have decided that the Proudly Surrey team shares the values and principles I have sought to bring to the race through my mayoral campaign. In coming together, we are creating a whole that is much greater than the sum of its parts. Our campaign is enriched by a diversity of candidates and perspectives. We are united by a shared understanding of the need to democratize our city around the principles of inclusion and diversity.”
Greaves, an instructor in the Langara School of Management, serves on the City of Surrey’s diversity committee. In the past, she has served as Director of the UBC Women’s Centre, Executive Director of the Downtown Eastside Women’s Centre and Policy Director of the Elizabeth Fry Society. Pauline holds a MA in Criminology and a PhD in Education Administration. “My understanding of the barriers that low-income and vulnerable people face is not just based on academic knowledge, it is grounded in my experience in helping people. If we want to live in a prosperous, egalitarian city, we need practical policies, such as barrier-free youth and community services on which our slate is running.”
“Obviously, this is a major development in the campaign and is a clear rethinking of the race at the strategic level,” said Proudly Surrey co-founder Stuart Parker, a council candidate. “However, we are still running on the same comprehensive set of policies we announced on April 26, which features a local police force, a South Fraser transportation authority and honouring the LRT contracts with the Federal and Province governments. Pauline’s candidacy has already had a positive impact on our Campaign. For example, we are adding an empty homes tax similar to Vancouver’s to our suite of policies to make housing more affordable and available.”
Greaves said: “Proudly Surrey will continue to promise what it can deliver. We will not fuel voter apathy and cynicism by campaigning on issues that are well outside of the jurisdiction of City Council. Candidates are obliged to campaign on what they can do, not what they wish others would do. That’s why so much of our platform is about restructuring our city’s relationship with senior levels of government. We want to bring more local control and oversight to our liability insurance, our transit system, our police force and our school staffing policies. We will reshape how Surrey conducts its own affairs.”
