NATURE

Sea, land, river

PEOPLES

Community

For earlier materials see Table of Contents

September 22nd	We See
	Street art to OCP philosophy

Moon coming over the mountain

Presumably Tuesday night will be the last of our splendid fall weather --- we need the rain anyways – to clean things off etc

There goes the sunshine

System approaching from west

	Modern Art??
	I liked the look – but it is only the primer coat – shucks

	And what happened to the Patio?
	Gone – I suspect the yearly rent convinced the owners to remove the wooden structure off public sidewalk etc

	This truck is delivering to the store in background
	This is the reality – huge trucks parked for short periods of time--- OCP etc should reflect this reality I suggest

See My previous on this Council meeting

Council has mostly long and irrelevant public meetings

Even the newer Councillors like Garon & Ashley seemed to have melted into Council Consensus – ‘let staff tell us what to do’---- I will argue below that the present Council ‘represents’ the Middle Class (specifically merchants) perspective --- thus: suburbia—car dependency – social exclusivity etc

Note the ‘offence’ which required a permit was a new porch roof that would now ‘shade’ the front yard –Image above meant to illustrate how many presently have dared ‘encroach’ into their own front yard –the ‘real’ ‘community norms’ (see below)

Houses made of Ticky Tacky—My generation rebelled against the 1950s style of suburbia – where all the houses same etc (here are the lyrics)

My first reaction has been to blame the planner (Zeno-Saurus) who seems to ‘preach’ this kind of 1950 dogma --- but the responsibility rests with the elected Council – perhaps because of their long periods of in-camera meetings before every Council meeting, they tend to offer a single vision to the public with apparently no debate etc -----

Ashley even wondered during Council discussion of set backs on Omineca if this wouldn’t open the door to all kinds of property owners wanting to modify their setbacks--- Heaven forbid – or in the words of the song: And they're all made out of ticky tacky ----And they all look just the same.

Getting into the Philosophy of ‘Houses Made of Ticky Tacky’ --- reflecting conformist class view of Rupert --- implicit in my critique is that most Rupert’s population is First Nations’ origin – and their needs and norms are seldom articulated at Council level – thus my critique

The Philosophy behind ‘social contract based upon social norms’ etc ---excellent review if you are interested --- to this I would counter either more modern Smart Growth or the Transit Orientated Development (TOD) championed in California – good PDF

Zeno-saurus and Merchants’ City Council base their Zoning etc upon ‘representing community norms’ in Bylaws etc ---

According to Zeno a ‘community norm’ in Rupert is reliance upon car --- (though I suspect the great majority do not possess cars) --- thus the necessity to have parking spaces for commercial and residential properties based upon square footage of space etc --- and to enforce the rules throughout the town etc by using the Official Community Plan (OCP), By-laws etc --- when I asked him how he came up with these ‘community norms’ he responded through conversations with individuals or consultation meetings as last week etc --- My point is that it is not based upon Census data – thus not ‘normal’ in sense of numeric average etc --- thus uses a flawed methodology based upon Zeno’s powers of intuition etc -- more later

Old adage: ‘All fish politics (salmon) comes down to Allocation’

SMFCA is an implicit critique of my Ticky Tacky argument

We will see what comes of it – but Council is presenting an outward face to other communities that apparently champions regional economy and 1^st Nations --- a cynic might say it is more Fish Politics posing as ‘community’ --- thus fighting ‘upriver’ allocation etc

Events prove me wrong?--- Baker story in Muskeg

That the City entering into ‘exclusivity agreements’ with Port +Lax Kw’aalams & Metlakatla (City press release) --sounds great --- but it is Rupert’s internal majority that remains ‘unheard’ and to whom I referred

More Nuisances

Presumably all the sprucing up etc around town driven by Council ‘suggesting’ to recalcitrants that either they do it or Council will contract it out etc

This sign is about to blow away --- but maybe the owners are VIPs etc