Ron Hatch: A Life of Books and Adventure (1939–2021)

Residents involved in The Story of Dunbar remember the kind and professional support of local publisher Ron Hatch, who died in November.

By Carol Volkart, Newsletter Editor

“When I heard of Ron Hatch’s passing last fall, I googled him and found an outpouring – a flood – of appreciation for him and his work coming from the province’s finest writers,” recalls Dunbar resident Helen Spiegelman. “How amazing that he made time to help a little committee pull together a history of their neighbourhood.”

The history was The Story of Dunbar: Voices of a Vancouver Neighbourhood. Ron Hatch was the quiet man who helped his neighbours capture the century-long transformation of their community from forest to suburb in 12 polished chapters, complete with old photographs, and high-quality index and sources sections.

The Dunbar book is among about 300 titles published by Ronsdale Press, the company Ron Hatch and his wife Veronica bought (and renamed) in 1988 after his retirement as a UBC English professor. Headquartered in their West 21st home, it became a strong and highly regarded press in the B.C. and Canadian literary world.

Dunbar’s efforts to capture its early voices before they were gone fit well with Ronsdale’s goals of giving Canadians new insights into themselves and their country.

But why would a world adventurer, mountaineer and lover of the wilderness choose to set up as a book publisher in his retirement? Asked about it when he won the Jim Douglas Publisher of the Year Award in 2014, Hatch said: “I felt I could add something.”

What he added was apparent in the torrent of appreciation unleashed when he died on Nov. 25. Author after author – poets, biographers, novelists – wrote online tributes to his fastidious editing, his kind support, his honest opinion delivered, as one writer said, “with a twinkle in his eye.”

Spiegelman, who took over the editing of the Dunbar book after the death of the original editor Peggy Schofield in 2005, had the Ron Hatch experience first-hand:

 “As I settled into that committee following the death of dear Peggy Schofield, I sensed the presence of invisible forces guiding our work, providing us with behind-the-scenes support that made our project so much more than it would have been, and our work so much smoother and easier to do. In retrospect, it looks like a fairy tale,” she wrote.

“I met with the kindly man on West 21st a few times without realizing that he was the wizard making it all happen. He would be the one who sent us our copy editor, Naomi Pauls, who read our manuscripts and sat with us at weekly meetings at Pam Chambers’ dining room table hashing out details. He would be the one who thought of bringing in a little behind-the-scenes team that distilled out of the sprawling text (400+ pages long) the meticulously detailed index at the back of the book, so people could look up references to things and people that they were interested in. He would have been the one who had the eye and the experience to approve a really great cover image, clear photos, and graceful design inside.

“In all those tributes to Ron Hatch that I read online, I could see the same Ron Hatch that we’d known, smiling, gentle, helping make magic happen.”

Hatch was so notoriously modest that his friend Alan Twigg organized a celebration of the Hatches’ publishing venture in 2013 because he felt that “Ron’s low-key and determinedly non-self-referential manner was being under-recognized.” On Hatch’s death, Twigg, an author and creator of BC Bookworld wrote: “A keen environmentalist, a meticulous proofreader and a courageous soul, Ron Hatch was a gentleman and a scholar who never sought the limelight; always empowering others to do so.”

Dunbar Residents’ Association board member Sonia Wicken recalls Hatch as a casually dressed, quiet man who could be spotted mailing off packages at the local post office or walking his black Labs in the neighbourhood. Sometimes, he’d show up on her doorstep with a royalty cheque for the Dunbar book.

When the DRA and Hatch sat down to negotiate the book contract, there was no drama, says Wicken, who was DRA treasurer at the time. The DRA had to guarantee pre-sales of 2,000 for a 5,000-copy run, which it easily did, and the book sold well afterwards. “He didn’t lose money on it, so we were pleased about that,” she says. Hatch didn’t come across as a salesman, she notes, but he did a great job of distributing the book, working hard to get it into the airport and onto the ferries.

Hatch, born in 1939, grew up in Dunbar after his parents moved here from Thunder Bay, Ont. in about 1947. Except for a few years working for CUSO in India and studying and teaching in Europe, he made Dunbar his home. The house where he lived and ran his publishing operation was a block from where he grew up, his grandson Forrest Berman-Hatch wrote in a Ubyssey obituary in December.

But Hatch was also an adventurer and traveller, with a passion for mountains, wilderness and foreign scenes. As a young couple, the Hatches took “epic motorcycle journeys across South Asia and the Middle East and spent time in the Himalayas so my grandfather could climb among the world’s most legendary mountains,” wrote Berman-Hatch. “He completed multiple first ascents but would never mention them unless pressed.” Later, there were sabbaticals abroad, but always the wilderness too – hiking in Whistler, summers off-grid in northern B.C., and a cabin on Hollyburn Mountain. “He loved that cabin and would go up there to read manuscripts under a propane lantern for decades,” Berman-Hatch recalled.

And underscoring it all, literature “of the kind that champions the values of freedom, decency and critical thinking,” Berman-Hatch wrote. “To my grandfather, literature was about maintaining civilization in the face of darkness.”

Twigg recalled Hatch as “old-fashioned in the best possible ways,” never speaking unkindly of others, saving money on stamps by dropping off cheque payments by hand. “At a crowded literary event,” he remembered, “I once spontaneously introduced Ron Hatch to the person next to me by saying, ‘This is Ron Hatch. He tells the truth and he does things on time.’”

New Pastor on the Side of the Angels

Immaculate Conception Church at 3778 West 28th Avenue has a neighbourhood feel and an ambience that pleases its new pastor.

By Carol Volkart, Newsletter Editor

When the members of Dunbar’s Immaculate Conception Parish welcomed Father John Horgan as their pastor last July, they also welcomed an expert on angels, medical ethics, and a 14,000-volume library into their community.

Plus, of course, a well-known name that surprises cab drivers and requires its bearer to quickly state, “No relation to the premier,” upon first introduction.

Father Horgan, 63, has an impressive background that includes graduation from Harvard University, seminary studies in Rome followed by ordination by Pope John Paul II at the Vatican in 1986, and an active role in palliative and hospice work with several Vancouver hospitals, including St. Paul’s during the AIDS crisis.

 During his nearly four decades in the Vancouver Archdiocese, the Cambridge, Mass.-born pastor has also served at Saints Peter and Paul in Shaughnessy; at St. Pius X in Deep Cove; and along with his hospital work, 12 years as a priest for the Musqueam Indian Band.

And now he is serving in the pretty cul-de-sac church on West 28th that nestles up against St. George’s Junior School.

 It suits him well.

 “I’m a neighbourhood person,” he says, noting he grew up in a similar environment. He says he’s had a soft spot for the city’s west side ever since his time at the Shaughnessy church, where he oversaw the creation of new stained-glass windows that have since become famous.

“Coming to Immaculate Conception is like coming home. I love the ambience and the people I’ve met.”

He noted that Catholic churches are very neighbourhood-focused, each with their own catchment area, although parishioners may come from outside, too. That neighbourliness shows up in many ways. At Immaculate Conception, it includes the beautifully kept gardens around the church and nearby rectory, which are maintained by parishioners. “The gardens are an important part of our outreach, and good neighbourliness,” he says. “I have a great appreciation for gardens.”

Inside that rectory is a very large library, which includes many volumes related to his fields of expertise, on which he has both lectured and written. One area is moral theology and medical ethics, arising out of his work with hospices and palliative care. A second is saints and angels, a subject of lifelong interest that he studied in Rome. He hosted the EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network) series Angels of God. His 2018 book, His Angels at Our Side: Understanding Their Power In Our Souls and the World, casts angels as an integral part of the world, speaking to humans through moments of enlightenment, inspiration and intuition.

Outside his library is the new parish and community he is getting to know. Although churches saw a drop of 35 to 40 percent in attendance during the pandemic, and only recently returned to full capacity, Masses and services continued, and Immaculate Conception’s doors stayed open for those wanting a quiet moment during the day.

 It’s a “marvellous” parish, says Father Horgan. He sees his goal as continuing to foster the little church’s role as a place of welcoming, strength and neighbourliness in the Dunbar community.

Help Us Save Our Beloved School

Queen Elizabeth Annex (QEA) is a safe and happy community for 70 French Immersion students from kindergarten to Grade 3 located in the heart of Dunbar.  But it will soon be gone if we – parents at the school and the larger community – can’t convince the Vancouver School Board to reject plans to close it and sell the large property it sits on.

The QEA Parent Advisory Committee has taken every available opportunity so far to argue for our school – we’ve written, phoned, attended meetings and even held an outdoor protest. Our efforts will continue, but we hope the broader Dunbar community will get involved too. Trustees are scheduled to make their final decision on May 30, so our request is urgent.

It would be no surprise to us if you haven’t heard of the plans yet, as the school board has rushed them along in an incredibly non-transparent process at the height of a pandemic.  The initial meeting with the board of trustees was Jan. 17, with just 48 hours’ notice, given over a weekend. At that hastily called meeting, the board made a recommendation to close and sell the school, which sits on a large property adjacent to Camosun Bog and Pacific Spirit Park.

There are many reasons why the removal of this site from educational use by the VSB and its subsequent sale – either to the francophone school board or a private school – doesn’t make sense and will negatively impact the Dunbar community.

Aside from the fact that QEA is a uniquely popular, much-loved and successful school, it is illogical to close an elementary school and dispose of these precious lands at a time when plans are progressing to increase family housing in Dunbar and adjacent areas. These plans mean it is likely the VSB will need to expand school spots in Dunbar in the short and medium-term.  Buying sites like the one QEA sits on will be prohibitively expensive, if not impossible, in the future. The school board should save this land for future generations of Dunbar-area children.

Another argument is an environmental one. If the site is sold to either the francophone board or to another private school, it would mean many students being driven to the school from other parts of the city, instead of walking there, as our kids do. That means traffic congestion and a strain on the environment, especially as we understand the francophone board plans to build a much bigger, 435-student school on the site.

Ultimately, the VSB is entrusted to manage and maintain educational assets and resources in the public’s interest over the long term. To sell off resources to meet short-term needs during a time of growth is bad planning and a violation of the public’s trust. If we lose this precious community asset, it will be gone forever.

What you can do:

For more information, visit http://www.qea-pac.ca/advocacy/ or contact us at qea.parents@gmail.com.  And please help sign and share our online petition at https://www.change.org/p/no-school-closures-transparent-planning-first/

Remembering George Pinch

by Meredith Kimball, Dunbar Community Patrol Chairperson

On January 7 of this year, George Pinch died at the age of 87. He was born November 12, 1935 and grew up in Regina, Saskatchewan.  He earned an engineering degree from the University of Saskatchewan, where he met his wife, Lorna, at a church function in Saskatoon. They married on May 4, 1957.  After living in Winnipeg and Victoria, they moved to their house on West 22nd Avenue in 1966, where they raised their family.  George worked for years at BC Hydro in the Power Smart program.  For over 50 years he was an active citizen and a well-known neighbour in Dunbar who always had a cheerful word for everyone he met including children and dogs. George was an avid gardener and grew a fine tomato. He served for many years on the Dunbar Residents’ Association Board of Directors and as co-president with Susan Chapman. 

George was a member of the committee that founded the Dunbar Community Patrol in 2005, served on DCP Coordinating Committee for 15 years, interviewed new patrollers, and was one of the most active and enthusiastic of them all.  For 12 years he patrolled the most hours and his records of 102 hours in one year and a total of 942.25 hours over his career still stand.  He and Lorna very generously volunteered their home for our Coordinating Committee meetings from 2004 until the start of the pandemic.

Patrolling with George was never dull.  In addition to watching for problems, he had a keen eye for useful items someone had thrown away in a lane, including bottles to be recycled for money which he donated to Children’s Hospital.  He was always friendly and I was often surprised when someone from the neighbourhood would approach us with, “Hi George, how are you doing?”

He will be missed by everyone in the DCP, the DRA, and many, many of his neighbours. If you would like to find out what made the DCP such a big part of George’s life for many years, please consider volunteering to do walk or bike patrols.  Although the pandemic has made it difficult to train new patrollers, we will resume taking in new members as soon as possible. If you are interested, please leave a phone message at 604-222-9824, send an email to dcp-info@dunbar-vancouver.org or visit our webpage at www.dunbar-vancouver.org.

Sadly, after this article was written, we received word that Lorna Pinch died on February 15, 2022. To the Dunbar Patrol, it feels like an era has passed with both of these wonderful community members gone.

DEEP’s Spring Activities

Dunbar Earthquake and Emergency Preparedness (DEEP) continues to work toward building a stronger and more resilient community in times of emergency and disaster. 

The group offers neighbourhoods assistance in emergency preparedness with our Map Your Neighbourhood Program (MYN) via Zoom. A group member will help a block volunteer organize the Zoom meeting by informing residents of the upcoming meeting with a postcard providing registration information. When the meeting date is set, the volunteer will be supported online by a member to go through and discuss a video presentation.

DEEP is also offering a presentation and a full set-up of DEEP’s Disaster Support Hub this spring.  Our presenters include Dr. Carlos Ventura, Professor and Director Earthquake Engineering Research at UBC; and VECTOR, a volunteer group of HAM operators who assist the City of Vancouver and VPD with communications during or after an emergency or disaster.

Scheduled for this spring were presentations by Dr. Ventura on March 28; a meeting on April 25 (to be confirmed); and on May 28 or 29 at 10 a.m., a full set-up of the Disaster Support HUB at DCC.

If you are interested in learning more about DEEP’s MYN program or participating in our training, please contact us at www dunbaremergency dot ca.

Speak up for Dunbar this Election Year

By Bruce A. Gilmour, DRA President

As 2022 began, I reflected on the DRA’s 2021 accomplishments and the path forward. Much of last year’s focus will continue to influence our agenda this year. That includes an increased emphasis on collaboration with the Dunbar Village Business Association and with Dunbar residents through the newsletter, list serv, and home page. As 2022 is a municipal election year, we must ensure candidates understand that protecting liveability and maintaining stability are priorities for our neighbourhood.

One of the DRA’s major and increasing concerns is what is happening to our once-vibrant retail district. You only have to stroll between West 16th and West 41st Avenues to see the difference between what Dunbar was just a few years ago and what it is now. While some new stores are opening and new apartment buildings are going up, many stores are closing or at risk, and there are far too many vacant blocks and storefronts along our main street.

We must lobby and petition city council to help us protect and attract retail diversity on Dunbar. It makes no sense to be densifying our area while our retail district disappears and transit is cut. While residents succeeded in convincing TransLink not to go ahead with plans to cut 40 percent of the bus stops between 16th and 41st in January, we still lost five on Dunbar, and many on West King Edward and Macdonald that once served Dunbar residents.

Another concern is how little attention the city pays to the voices of communities like ours. Councillors are elected to represent the residents, the neighbourhoods called Vancouver.  But as we saw with the Streamlining Rental plan, which allows four- to five-storey apartment buildings in residential blocks adjacent to arterials, the concerns of many of our residents who opposed this were ignored. We know when it comes to development issues, the deck is often stacked by developers who recruit speakers and generate multiple emails to support their case. Residents are considered obstacles to development.

Which brings me to the Vancouver Plan, where once again the DRA has not been consulted, let alone notified. The Vancouver Plan is described as a single, city-wide plan to guide future growth. Council initiated the plan in 2019, and is scheduled to make a final decision on it this summer.

According to the city website, the plan will “guide future growth in line with the key priorities the community has identified including: housing, climate action and sustainability, employment and economy, environment, transportation, social well-being, arts and culture and infrastructure.”

I have had no details or timelines about the planning process touching down in neighbourhoods such as Dunbar. The DRA did not know! How many Dunbar residents were involved, or even knew this plan was happening?

We have been upgrading our communication tools such as the DRA newsletter, the list serv, our website, and we have started a Facebook page to increase awareness and feedback on issues like this, but it’s a work in progress. Meanwhile, the mayor, council and city staff must be clearer about the process if any neighbourhood is to add value to initiatives such as the Vancouver Plan!

Garden Club Jumps into Spring

By Jutta Zeisler, President, Dunbar Garden Club

After a year made challenging by record high and low temperatures, high winds and devastating floods, Dunbar gardeners are going full steam ahead into the new growing season. With high vaccination rates and venues opening up in late fall, we had anticipated being able to hold in-person meetings again, and in November polled our members about their comfort level at making this happen.

While Zoom meetings allow us to recruit interesting speakers from out of town, the social aspects cannot be recreated on a screen. Chatting with friends over a cup of tea and admiring the plants brought in for the “show bench” often inspires new projects for our own gardens and that “I need this for my garden” feeling.

Our membership has grown a lot in these past two years, a reflection of the growing interest in gardening as a chance to connect with our environment, and the ease with which exciting presentations have been available from the comfort of one’s home. This has raised questions around occupancy limits and enforcing public health guidelines for in-person meetings. We planned for every possible scenario, fully online, in-person, or hybrid for those not yet comfortable with larger groups, but the arrival of the latest Coronavirus variant put another stop to meeting face-to-face.

Our fantastic executive team still lined up amazing speakers on Zoom for the spring. Members are again preparing for our annual Plant Sale in April, to be held online, sharing the bounty of their gardens to raise funds for educational programs and speaker fees. In line with that, our first speaker of the year was Maria Valana, who talked on Jan. 25 about the many ways to divide and propagate plants to increase density and variety in our gardens. Of course, we hope there will also be lots of plants contributed to our Plant Sale!

Amidst the many limitations posed on us by the pandemic, we have found that gardening is a pastime that continues very much unchanged. We can still enjoy our gardens as we did before and experience the feeling of beauty and calm of creating our own restful “vacation spot” next to our home or harvesting produce in our community garden plots.

Even the St. Philip’s Orion Ranger Girl Guides held a meeting focusing on “Gardening and Sustainability.” Gardening is a bandwagon everyone can be excited to jump on!

After Valana’s presentation in January, the Spring 2022 schedule included Dr. Richard Hebda speaking on “Snowdrops” on Feb. 22nd, and Amy Sanderson speaking on “Cut Flowers from the Garden” on March 22nd. The upcoming April 26th meeting will feature Johanna Moretto and Karen Pyne speaking about Nutrifore Soil, an exciting new product that utilizes solid waste and wood bi-products to create a beautiful organic composte without weed seeds.

For more information, or to attend a meeting as a drop-in, contact midgeoke at gmail dot com.

The Hearts of Dunbar

By Carol Volkart, Newsletter Editor

I suspect I wasn’t the only one mystified by the big fat pink hearts that began popping up around Dunbar in February.

Hearts, Valentine’s Day, February – I got that much. But what was their point, and who were they aiming at with their slogans – “I (heart) Dunbar,” “Be Mine,” “Here 4 You”? There were no explanations attached – just chubby symbols of adoration on two thin metal legs, watching the traffic go by.

Lisa Clement of the Dunbar Village Business Association enlightened me. The hearts were part of the @loveyourcitycontest staged by business improvement associations across the city in February. The groups put up colourful street installations –banners, decals, wooden hearts – and waited for the Instagram crowd to do what came naturally.

Which was, take photos of bright objects and send them off to Instagram. Each post was an automatic entrance into a contest with a grand prize of about $4,000 worth of goodies from the various participating neighbourhoods.

The hearts came down in March, but I don’t know who won the grand prize. I only know it wasn’t someone who’d never posted to Instagram in her life.

St. Philip’s Anglican Church: A New Chapter

St. Philip’s Anglican Church’s welcoming courtyard at 3737 West 27th

By Debbie Matheson

From its founding in the growing neighbourhood of Dunbar Heights in 1925, St Philip’s Anglican Church has served not just as a place of worship and service, but as a centre of fellowship for the whole community.

The first building, constructed by parishioners, functioned as Dunbar’s community centre. There were dinners, dances, theatricals, sports teams, community meetings, tennis courts on the property, and twice-weekly bowling leagues. Today, that original church is the gym where community groups meet, voters assess candidates, the DRA gathers, and shoppers enjoy our sales. We have hosted Crown and Tom Thumb preschools for over 70 years. The current church and rectory were built during WWII, a time of uncertainty. Later, the Fireside Wing was built to meet the needs of returning servicemen and their families, the rector at the time recalling the stress of his own re-entry into civilian life after WWI.

Along with attention to individuals’ needs, engagement with the whole community continues as a major theme for St. Philip’s. Outreach volunteers have sponsored refugees to Canada, most recently a Syrian family of eight. Neighbourhood Ministry volunteers weekly give out food, clothing, and support to vulnerable people on west-side streets.

During the pandemic, St. Philip’s never missed a Sunday, pivoting quickly to recorded and live-streamed online worship. We even gathered on lawn chairs in Caldecott Park to keep people connected and lift their spirits.

In 2021, online fundraising events were created, the church reopened, community groups reconvened, and hope continued. When Omicron arose, we checked vaccination passports at the door, and sadly cancelled the sold-out live reading of Dickens’ A Christmas Carol.

For 2022, ever hopeful, we plan the return of the online Flower Basket Sale in April, a Book Sale in June, a Christmas Fair, and a new “Everything but the Closet” Sale in late May. Watch for news on our website and the Dunbar Neighbours list serv.

Sadly, in the spring of 2021 our rector Stuart Hallam and his family returned home to the UK. Stuart had made many connections and friends in Dunbar; his talents in community building were recognized in a thank-you from DRA President Bruce Gilmour in the spring 2021 newsletter. A chapter had ended.

St. Philip’s is resilient, however, with a committed parish family. In October, we welcomed with open arms our new rector, Reverend Lorne Manweiler. A new chapter has begun.

BUS-STOP FUSS CONTINUES; CITY HALL WEIGHS IN

By Carol Volkart, DRA Newsletter Editor

Dunbar residents may be relaxing after TransLink rescinded plans that would have cut 40 percent of the No. 7 bus stops between 41st and 16th in January, but the larger battle is far from over.

The status of some of the saved Dunbar bus stops is unclear, as TransLink’s website says the plan is to “revisit” some of them in the spring “in partnership with the community and the City of Vancouver.”

And now concerns are being raised about the large number of stops being cut elsewhere on the route, while Dunbar lost only a few. The CityHallWatch website noted Feb. 22 that Nanaimo Street lost a total of 12 stops in mid-January, one directly in front of a school at Cambridge and Nanaimo, while only three out of a planned 15 were removed along Dunbar and Alma at that time. (https://cityhallwatch.wordpress.com/2022/02/22/many-bus-stops-removed-on-nanaimo-st/)

Regardless of what happens on this route, many other communities will be facing similar controversies in the future, as TransLink plans to expand its Bus Balancing Program throughout the region, removing or relocating stops on four to eight routes a year.

And Vancouver City Council recently kicked things up a notch by weighing in on TransLink’s undemocratic governance structure and asking the provincial government to review it.

“I think we have a problem with TransLink the way it is,” Councillor Jean Swanson told a Feb. 9 debate on a motion about transit governance. She said the city needs a convenient, easy-to-use transit system that encourages people to get out of their cars as part of the battle against climate change, “but lately TransLink has been cutting bus stops, reducing frequency of service and raising fares. These are all things that reduce ridership.”

At the core of the motion, initiated by the city’s Seniors Advisory Committee and Transportation Advisory Committee, is the lack of democratic representation on the TransLink board that approves initiatives like Bus Balancing. Nine of the 11 board members are unelected, and there is no guarantee of Vancouver representation, even though Vancouver has the highest transit use in the region, with 50 percent of transit riders.

TransLink governance has been an issue since 2007, when then-provincial transportation minister Kevin Falcon – now leader of the B.C. Liberals – rejigged it to take power away from a board of elected mayors and councillors and put an appointed board in charge. The elected officials had run afoul of Falcon by opposing (before finally approving) plans to build the Canada Line.

Regional mayors, who now sit on a 21-member body called the Metro Vancouver Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation, have been pushing since 2015 for a review of TransLink’s governance structure. The NDP promised in the 2017 and 2020 election campaigns to do so, but so far has taken no action.

City council’s motion was the latest stab at the issue. It asked the mayor to write the provincial government urging it to reconfigure the board so the majority are local elected officials, with positions allocated according to the populations, ridership and transit infrastructure of the member cities.

Connie Hubbs, a member of the city’s Transportation Advisory Committee, told council that TransLink is perceived as undemocratic, opaque and unapproachable, with few public meetings or opportunities for speakers to address it. She said the majority of the appointed board are corporate executives who may do a good job of fiscal responsibility, “but may do less well in making transit more attractive to users.

“Raising bus fares in a pandemic and cutting over 100 bus stops, doubling or tripling the distance people must walk to a bus stop, discourages transit use,” said Hubbs. “How is making transit less affordable and less accessible consistent with the Vancouver Climate goal of cutting our carbon in half by 2030? Obviously, it is not.”

Marc White, co-chair of the city’s Seniors Advisory Committee, criticized TransLink’s “current over-emphasis on satisfying the needs of regional customers and rapidly reducing the number of local bus stops, mostly ignoring the needs of seniors and people with disabilities and ignoring the real benefits of having a robust transportation system.”

During debate on the motion, Swanson said council has passed motions about TransLink initiatives that discourage transit use, but nothing happens “because we don’t control transit, TransLink does. The hope is that if the folks on the board are elected, they will be more representative and maybe we can get a better system. We need a connection between the transit users and the decision makers.”

Councillor Colleen Hardwick said an open and democratic process is “key to the success of our institutions. . . . I’m much more comfortable seeing elected members sitting on the TransLink board than I am seeing appointeds, many of whom are political appointments.” Councillor Pete Fry, who introduced the motion, said because TransLink is a taxing authority and collects money from residents’ tax bills, “there is a direct line for accountability with the public that pay for that.”

The main opponent of the motion was Councillor Christine Boyle, who along with Councillors Sarah Kirby-Yung and Rebecca Bligh, voted against it. Noting that many elected councils, including Vancouver’s, are behind on their climate targets, Boyle said she’s not convinced more elected representation on TransLink’s board will be the solution. “I agree we need more advocates, transit users at the table, but I’m not sure elected representatives will get us there.”

Kirby-Yung said the TransLink board can’t be considered in isolation, as it’s part of a complex, interconnected system. The goal of the motion may be laudable, she said, “but this is not the way to get there.” She said one of the problems with giving control to elected representatives is that they tend to focus on the moment, while transit must be planned for the long term.

The motion passed, with Mayor Kennedy Stewart and Councillors Lisa Dominato and Melissa De Genova absent for the vote.

TransLink says its Bus Balancing Program, launched in 2020, is aimed at improving speed and reliability by removing or relocating stops considered too close together. This year’s cuts to the No. 7 and 4 routes followed earlier rounds affecting the No. 2, 17 and 25 routes.

As for how Bus Balancing made its way onto the streets of Vancouver, TransLink official Sonia Takhar emphasized that the TransLink board and the Mayors’ Council have been in sync on the issue.  The program was “initially endorsed by a joint TransLink board of directors and Mayors’ Council New Mobility committee in a closed-door meeting in 2020. This was then taken to the Mayor’s Council in July 2020 for public endorsement of the program,” she wrote in an email. Since then, it has had continued support through the TransLink board of directors’ 2021 and 2022 business plans and the Mayor’s Council Rapid Response plan in February 2021, she said.

When it comes to balancing individual routes, she described an intensely consultative process involving close work between TransLink and the city, with input from bus operators, key community stakeholders and the public. “We share the proposals with senior leadership of each organization and city council.” Each round of balancing is presented to three city committees, followed by a six-week public notification process that includes signs at every bus stop. After that, the stops proposed for closure are removed for six weeks while public response is monitored.

Whatever consultation surrounded the closures on Dunbar, the first many residents knew of them were signs on bus poles announcing stops would either be closed or kept.

Dunbar Residents’ Association president Bruce Gilmour, who is blind and navigates the transit system with a guide dog, first learned about bus balancing during the 2021 cuts to the No. 25 route. When he bumped into a cardboard sign at one of the dual No. 7/No. 25 stops on Dunbar, he had to have a passerby read him the contents. He was shocked to learn that stops were being removed; he hadn’t been contacted in either his capacity as DRA president or as a member of the blind community.

DRA board member Angus McIntyre, a retired long-time bus driver, also criticized the consultation process. When people encounter a sign saying their stop will be closed, “that sounds pretty final,” he said. It’s “confrontational, even nasty,” to come into a community and “put up all these signs and get everyone upset,” he said. “What about some engagement first, and then see what happens?”

Gilmour and McIntyre were both surprised at the success of the Dunbar residents’ campaign against the bus-stop closures, which involved letter-writing, phoning, media appearances and a pre-Christmas walkabout with TransLink and city officials.

Expectations had been low given that TransLink had restored just two stops on two previously “balanced” routes and six on another. “Dunbar is the first group in two years to win the battle against TransLink on bus stops,” said Vancouver transit advocate Nathan Davidowicz after the decision was announced in January. “It’s a big win.”

Welcome as the result was, the process left Dunbar residents scratching their heads. Why were so many stops originally planned for removal? What and who was behind the dramatic reversal? It’s all a mystery that other communities will soon be tackling for themselves.