New sales tax going to pick taxpayers’pockets in all sorts of surprising

Derrick Penner
Sun

Vancouver Coun. Geoff Meggs said he has heard a lot of enthusiastic response to the idea of tearing down the Georgia and Dunsmuir viaducts since he re-raised the idea a couple of weeks ago.

However, the thought has also raised some anxieties among land owners on the eastern edge of downtown Vancouver.

While eliminating the elevated concrete roadways would be esthetically pleasing for the downtown neighbourhood, the city wouldn’t be able to do it without finding a way to deal with the traffic that the routes now carry.

“The first concern I hear is from people worried about traffic connections,” Meggs said in an interview.

“And we’ve always made it clear we’re not going to eliminate those, but thought they could be redone.”

Meggs brought up the idea of removing the viaducts in early March, right after the 2010 Winter Games, during which both viaducts were closed.

City staff now have started preparing a request for proposals to study the possibility of closing the viaducts.

Meggs said the Olympic closures demonstrated what the city could be like without them, so maybe it was time to look at closing the viaducts to help promote walking, cycling and transit use. “If you said a few year sago that we were going to close the viaducts, people would have said that would paralyse the city,” Meggs said.

However, the Olympic-period closure might not be the best real demonstration of what life without the viaducts might be like, Michael Ferreira, a development consultant with the firm Urban Analytics, suggested.

Ferreira said enough Vancouverites left town during the Olympics that “it was almost a pleasure going downtown.”

He said that maintaining the flow of traffic, not only for commuters but also for the delivery of goods and materials, is the critical factor.

“I’m not sure how you would reroute that traffic so other routes wouldn’t become a congested nightmare,” he said.

Of particular concern to the company that owns the Vancouver Canucks and GM Place is what kind of accommodation could be made for its access points to the stadium, which depend on the viaducts being there.

“When you design, for all stadiums, it’s a very delicate process to make them work for people coming in and going out,” David Negrin, president of Aquilini Development and Construction, said in an interview.

Negrin said the Aquilini Group is planning a new office tower that would sit at the southwest corner of GM Place, which would have its main lobby at the level of the Georgia Viaduct.

“It’s difficult to comment,” he said. “We haven’t seen anything in terms of what the city’s thinking.”

However, Ferreirra admitted that removing the viaducts could have some advantages by removing structures that effectively cut Northeast False Creek off from Chinatown and the Downtown Eastside.

He said the SkyTrain guideway would be much easier to bridge than the two elevated roads.

“From an esthetic perspective, it would absolutely be nicer not to have [the viaducts] there,” he added.

Meggs said that removing the viaducts would raise questions about what to do with the land adjacent to them: Allow development or use it for parkland.

Regardless of the decision, Meggs said there would be contaminated soil issues to deal with in what was once a heavily industrialized zone of Vancouver.

Peter Webb, vice-president of development for Concord Pacific, the company that developed the nearby former Expo 86 lands, said the idea of tearing down the viaducts is intriguing, but his company would have to see more information about how the city would do it before forming an opinion on whether it would be a good idea.

Concord Pacific has one development property sandwiched between the viaducts which could potentially be affected by such a move, Webb said.

The company also has four market and six non-market development sites on False Creek that face the viaducts.

“It is a point of interest,” Webb said. “I’m not sure how we feel about it, so we really do support the study to find out if it is a good idea or not.”

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Michael Smyth
Province

It was 16 years ago that a smooth-talking Las Vegas gambler named Steve Wynn blew into Vancouver with a fat roll of money burning a hole in his pocket and big dreams bubbling in his head for a waterfront hotel, casino and convention centre.

The Vegas gambling impresario was ready to drop $1 billion on his Seaport Centre extravaganza, which would have included a cruise ship berth, a 1,000-room hotel, high-end retail shops, a permanent $25-million stage for Canada’s Cirque du Soleil troupe and, naturally, a large casino.

And that convention centre? He would have thrown that in for free.

Oh, to think what could have been — now that we’re drowning in $800-million worth of red ink at our new, over-budget, government-built convention centre!

Unfortunately, we ran Steve Wynn out of town faster than you can say “double down.” The mid-1990s was a weird time in B.C. — when “casino” was still a dirty word, and the involvement of a flashy shark-in-a-suit from Sin City freaked out the politicians in our sheltered little provincial town.

Flash forward to our post-Olympic appetite for fun, fun, fun and the B.C. government appears ready to roll the dice again on a Vegas-backed gambling mecca, this one to be built next to a renovated B.C. Place stadium.

In Friday’s newspaper, I brought you exclusive details of the government’s still-secret deal with a private-sector partner to develop the B.C. Place lands. The grapevine is burning with whispers of a supersized hotel-retail-casino complex to be directly attached to the stadium, which is being pimped out with a $563-million retractable roof.

Once again, Las Vegas is in the house. This time, the whispered player is Paragon Gaming, run by the daughter of another famous Vegas tycoon, William Bennett, who brought the world the gaudy pleasures of the Circus Circus, Excalibur and Luxor casinos on the Vegas strip.

Paragon Gaming currently owns the downtown Edgewater Casino, which is near B.C. Place, but has been hindered by the lack of parking and street access. The Edgewater would presumably be shut down, and operations moved to the new facility to be built on the 700,000-square-foot parking lot between the stadium and the Cambie Street bridge.

There are more than a few ironic twists to the story. Back in 1994, Wynn’s Mirage Resorts partnered up with local developer VLC Properties to push the Seaport Centre casino project.

The president of VLC properties back then was David Podmore, who is now the government’s chairman of B.C. Place. Sixteen years after his Seaport Centre dreams were dashed, it looks like Podmore will finally get his casino.

The dasher of those dreams was then-premier Mike Harcourt. “Such facilities would be out of step with the quality of life British Columbians expect and value so highly,” Harcourt said in announcing the NDP government of the day would not approve the casino.

Gordon Campbell, then the leader of the Opposition, also opposed the Seaport project because of the public backlash against the evils of gambling.

“I have grave concerns about the openness of this process and the public perception of it,” Campbell said, insisting the entire concept of for-profit casinos should be put to a provincewide referendum. (Only small charity casinos were allowed at the time.)

One of the people sorely disappointed by Campbell’s stand back then was the late Jack Poole, then the chairman of VLC Properties. Many were surprised that Campbell didn’t support his friend Poole. “You know, in the world of politics, I guess we shouldn’t be surprised about anything,” Poole sighed.

Meanwhile, Steve Wynn’s people back in Vegas were appalled at the treatment they received in B.C. After all, all they wanted to do was come up here and spend a billion dollars.

“Our company was treated with the utmost disrespect, told that our product was not welcome and sent home,” huffed Alan Feldman, Wynn’s PR man.

The Liberals were unapologetic, as they continued to savagely criticize gambling as a social cancer.

“Children may die as a result of gambling expansion, and their blood will be on the heads of the government,” warned Liberal MLA Kevin Krueger.

Yes, that’s the same Kevin Krueger who is now the cabinet minister in charge of — you guessed it — the B.C. Place expansion.

But all that was before large casinos like the River Rock were built and accepted in British Columbia.

It was before Poole delivered the transcendent Olympic Games, changing Vancouver’s image as a “no-fun city” — and now nobody seems worried about casino gambling or Las Vegas sharpies anymore.

Expect an official announcement of the B.C. Place expansion plans within two weeks.

Oh, and by the way, we probably won’t be calling it B.C. Place for a lot longer. The renovated stadium, set to open in 2011, will likely be renamed after a corporate sponsor.

Anyone care for few hands of blackjack over a latte down at Starbucks Stadium?

My, how we’ve changed.

© Copyright (c) The Province

NDP rejects report’s findings

Jonathan Fowlie
Sun

The introduction of a harmonized sales tax in British Columbia will lead to the creation of 113,000 jobs within the next decade, a government-commissioned report to be released today has found.

“The tax reforms about to be implemented in British Columbia will have a profound effect on capital investment, jobs, and incomes in the province, representing a giant leap toward its becoming one of the most competitive economies in the world,” read an advance copy of the report provided to The Vancouver Sun.

The report was done for the provincial government by Jack Mintz, chair in public policy at the University of Calgary, an independent fiscal and tax policy specialist and a former president of the C.D. Howe Institute.

It comes amid public backlash over the new tax — which will come into effect on July 1, and will combine the seven-per-cent PST with the five-percent GST — and just days after the government announced plans to link money collected from the HST with that spent on health care.

In the report, Mintz said the move to an HST will significantly lower barriers to investment and, by the end of the decade, will account for an extra $11.5 billion in capital investment by companies in B.C.

“With the creation of a much more competitive environment for capital investment, businesses will be more willing to invest in British Columbia, and with greater capital investment will come more jobs, which will attract more people to the province,” he wrote.

Mintz also said that a reduction in the cost of capital investment will mean an increase in incomes paid to workers.

In his 14-page report, Mintz spoke in detail about the effect the HST will have on costs to business, but addressed only in passing the effect of the tax on consumers.

“It has been suggested that British Columbia’s adoption of the HST will raise product prices for consumers, but this is far from clear,” he said.

“Although it takes time for the elimination of taxes on capital goods to result in a decline in the prices charged to consumers, past tax reductions by the provincial government are reducing the prices businesses charge today,” he added.

New Democratic Party finance critic Bruce Ralston said the report makes improper assumptions.

“He uses a faith-based approach that tax cuts always create jobs and the empirical evidence doesn’t support that at all,” said Ralston.

As evidence, Ralston pointed to the machinery and equipment tax, which the government cut in 2001, saying he believes there is no evidence that any significant new investments came as a result.

Ralston also questioned the independence of the report, saying the government knew it would get a positive result from Mintz, because he did a similar report for Ontario last year.

In that report, Mintz found the HST in Ontario would lead to the creation of almost 600,000 jobs over the next decade.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Lam Lo Nishio
Other

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The 17-day event represented ‘the largest traffic trial in North American history,’ notes Vancouver planner

Bob Ransford
Sun

Vancouver‘s Olympic experience was a huge experiment on a number of fronts, not the least of which involved putting the city’s urbanism under a microscope.

A whole bunch of new theories and big leaps were put to the test in how this city is designed and how people function within it.

The results proved that some long-held assumptions were little more than myths, and the experience also revealed some obvious — and not-so-obvious — ideas and innovations. Many of those ideas and innovations will help further shape and refine what has come to be known as “Vancouverism” — a brand of urbanism that combines livability and sustain-ability to produce an exceptionally high quality of life for our people and a unique urban experience for visitors to Vancouver.

The City of Vancouver’s director of planning, Brent Toderian, has already begun sifting through the findings produced by this massive living laboratory.

He singles out the Olympic Athletes’ Village as having “fundamentally changed business as usual when it comes to community-building in Vancouver.”

Only a few days into the Olympics, the U.S. Green Building Council bestowed its “Platinum LEED-ND” rating on the Olympic village development, proclaiming it the greenest community in North America by virtue of its highest rating under the green-neighbourhood rating system.

But Toderian says that the recognition of the village for its exceptional performance in sustainable planning and green design is only one indicator of its success. He points to the quality of life and livability in the village as a key indicator of success, as well.

The Olympic village’s settlement pattern and physical form, with medium-rise buildings, certainly creates a promising environment for a new kind of livability and a new model for development in Vancouver.

However, the economics of combining ultra-green with a whole range of social and community objectives all in one development have yet to be fully tested.

As I have said before, the Olympic village project will end up either being a great showcase for the full range of green technologies, new urban principles and community-building social objectives, or a model for a truly sustainable community, one that can be replicated without a huge public subsidy.

Toderian also points to the way in which Vancouverites temporarily changed the way they move about the city during the Olympics as “the largest traffic trial in North American history.”

He cited the “massive pedestrianization of countless streets” and a 30-per-cent drop in car trips into the downtown in a city already used to walking, cycling and transit for mobility, and the running of the Olympic Line streetcar pilot project as huge experiments that have shaped how Vancouverites will forever perceive traffic and movement in the city.

When asked whether the 20,000 to 25,000 daily boardings on Bombardier’s Olympic Line streetcar proved that Vancouver needs to turn the pilot into a permanent project, Toderian says any investment in the project “needs to be considered in the context of a regional transit system”, but pointed out that most good regional transit systems are comprised of multiple technologies.

Toderian says the Olympic-period closure of the Dunsmuir and Georgia viaducts certainly spurred on consideration of their permanent removal and what that might do for urban renewal in the area.

But it is the way Vancouver transformed its public spaces, especially its streets, that got Toderian most excited about the future potential for improving Vancouver’s urbanism.

“Perhaps the best example of great urbanism on display was the way the streets, squares and former parking lots were all transformed into LiveCity sites, international houses, and constant street celebrations,” Toderian explains.

He says the experiment in using streets like Robson, Granville and others as part-time spaces for public gatherings and activities — both planned and spontaneous — may permanently transform our mindset as a city and citizenry about those streets.

“We need to think about a whole system of public spaces in the downtown, including places like Robson Square, as completing our downtown,” Toderian says.

“Also, spaces that can only do one thing will be less successful than some spaces that are more nimble and flexible.”

Toderian sums up this huge Olympic experiment: “Like Expo 86, the city will never be the same again because of this amazing laboratory of urbanism.”

He stole a few words from the Canadian “slam poet” Shane Koyczan, who was featured at the Olympic opening ceremonies: “We’re an experiment going right for a change.”

Bob Ransford is a public affairs consultant with COUNTERPOINT Communications Inc. He is a former real estate developer who specializes in urban land-use issues. E-mail: [email protected]

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Museum and UBC both want the historic site, but the city says it’s too early to talk about what will happen

Kelly Sinoski
Sun

The Vancouver Museum wants the space for its urban exhibits and the University of B.C. wants to fill it with students and lectures.

They are just two of the prospective hopefuls for the heritage stone building housing the Vancouver Art Gallery when — and if — it vacates its current site.

VAG officials said Wednesday they are negotiating with the City of Vancouver for the entire square block of the former bus depot site at Georgia and Hamilton streets, where they want to build a new, greener, home.

But city manager Penny Ballem said no decisions have been made on VAG’s proposal and “it’s all up in the air” about what’s going to happen. The city had been pitching to have the new VAG on the False Creek lands.

“People have got a bit overexcited on this; we haven’t come to any conclusions whether or not that’s what we agree with,” Ballem said.

“If the art gallery ever did move out of there we would have to have those discussions on what could move in.”

She said whatever came in would have to fit into the cultural mix of the area.

Although it could take years before a decision is made, demand is already high for the VAG’s current location on Hornby Street, where the art gallery has been housed since 1983.

Both the museum and UBC said they have been holding off on serious discussions with the province, which owns the land, and the city, which leases it, until the VAG officially announced it was going to move.

“Now that there’s a possibility, we’ll have to start having conversations with the city,” said Nancy Noble, head of the Vancouver Museum.

“Eventually the politicians will have to make [a decision]. It’s been a cultural centre of the city for some time. We’re hoping that can be retained.”

Noble said while the museum is interested in the site, it has to

determine if it’s feasible. While the VAG is already designed for exhibits, she noted its storage

space is smaller than that of the museum site at Vanier Park. But she added there are other

benefits, particularly the fact that the VAG site is in the heart of the city and this would bode

well for the museum’s new branding, which aims to focus more on the city itself.

She noted the museum may also be interested in sharing the site, offering more space for other arts and culture groups in Vancouver.

Amanda Gibbs, the museum’s director of engagements, agreed that while the museum has a beautiful location, it isn’t attracting as much traffic as it could. As it leans more toward investigating urban issues and what happens in the city, she said it makes more sense to be in the heart of Vancouver.

During the Olympics, she said, it was evident that Robson Square “has the opportunity to provide that sort of hub for people to gather.”

But the museum isn’t the only one vying for the site.

Stephen Owen, vice-president, external, legal and community relations at UBC, said the university is also interested in the VAG site as it would offer “a natural expansion” for UBC’s Robson Square campus.

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Sun

If you want to borrow money to buy a home, car or any other big-ticket item, you will need to have a credit history before the financial institution will lend you money. Your credit history (called a credit report) is held by the major credit-reporting agencies: Equifax and TransUnion. Your credit report is one of the main tools lenders use when they decide whether or not to lend you money.

Your credit report contains the following information:

– Personal information such as your name, address, social insurance number, employers, date of birth and telephone number.

– Information related to any loans you have, such as a credit card, mortgage or secured or unsecured loan.

– Your payment history, including bad loans and late payments.

– Banking information about your various accounts, including any bad cheques you may have   written.

– Public records such as a bankruptcy or judgment from a lawsuit.

– Any people or organizations that have inquired about your credit.

Once you start borrowing and have a credit file opened, it is important to regularly ensure that your credit report is correct. You can check by phone, fax, email, mail or Internet. There is a fee if you check online but you can get your report for free by using the mail.

When you get your report, look closely at the data from the credit reporting agency to see that it is correct. Watch for:

– Wrong mailing addresses.

– Incorrect social insurance number.

– Signs of identity theft.

– Errors in your credit accounts.

– Late payments.

– Unauthorized inquiries.

You have a right to correct any errors you find. The correction process, as well as instructions on ordering your credit report, can be found on the agencies’ websites at www.equifax.ca and www.transunion.ca.

Terri Williams, CFP, is vice president, editorial services and production, with DundeeWealth .

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun

Country’s companies are staying traditional in their behaviour and mindset, Patrick Pichette says

Matt Hartley
Sun

From his office in Silicon Valley, Patrick Pichette has a unique view of the business landscape in his home country of Canada.

What he sees is a country in danger of missing international opportunities afforded by the Internet and the digital revolution which could potentially turn Canadian businesses into global champions.

The Canadian-born chief financial officer of web giant Google Inc. — a post he once held at BCE Inc. — was in Toronto on Tuesday to speak to a gathering of business leaders about using the Web to think beyond the borders of the Great White North.

“Every company now is global,” Pichette said in an interview. “As I travel the world, everybody who’s innovating doesn’t think ‘I’m doing this for France’ or ‘I’m doing this for Japan.’ They think ‘I’m taking this global.’

“I just want to make sure we as Canadian companies don’t miss the boat because we’re not set up that way.”

Although Canadians spend more time online than people in just about any other nation, advertising dollars and marketers haven’t followed audiences online to the same degree as in other countries such as the U.S. and U.K.

“The needle hasn’t moved in any significant way, and it continues to be an area where there’s fantastic opportunities for any company willing to invest in that space, whether they invest with Google or not,” he said.

“It’s not a Google issue, it’s an issue of ‘there’s a world out there that’s shaping and people should seize the opportunity.'”

Embracing the marketing power of the Web is especially important for small and medium businesses, even if they’re only spending $100 a month online, Pichette said.

“Canadian companies do not spend what would be required to capture the advertising opportunity; they are staying traditional in their behaviour and mindset,” he said.

“Even if they’re a medium-sized company and they’ve never done any of it before, to go and learn — whether it’s with Google or somewhere else — learn digital advertising, because that’s where people live now.”

While some areas of the economy are still recovering from the effects of the global economic downturn, Pichette said there’s really no recession in the digital space and the technology sector continues to grow despite the broader economy.

“The e-commerce and the digital sectors have done tremendously well,” he said. “It just shows there are two economies moving at different rates because they are governed by fundamentally different forces.”

Last week, the European Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice approved a landmark search advertising deal between Microsoft and Yahoo, which will see Google’s two biggest competitors in search team up to challenge the Web giant’s dominance.

Still, Pichette said the new alliance won’t change the way Google conducts its business in the search world.

“Competition is good because it keeps everybody honest,” he said. “We, Google, continue to be only one click away for everybody, so as soon as there’s a better mousetrap, you switch. So in that world, it will keep us even more focused on what we do well, but it doesn’t change our core agenda. We just need to take even more notice because now we have a competitor that has even more scale.”

© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun