Editor:
It was a relief to see the Banff chapter of the Truthiness Squad back last week with their semi-regular humour column.
Unfortunately, there is often an assumption that if no one speaks out against something, there is an implication of agreement. Therefore, I find myself once again having to speak out.
First some simple math – the 879 votes received by Councillor Christensen in the last election does not represent a majority of the 1,878 voters in the 2013 election and as a result cannot be said to represent a majority. In addition, it is flawed logic to suggest that a consensus among a group of people on a particular issue, such as paid parking, translates into overall support or opposition for a particular candidate, as Mr. Whelan implies.
Second, it strikes me as confusing to be opposed to the subsidizing of affordable housing to the tune of perhaps $100,000, but in support of subsidies to the tune of $300,000+ for people looking to park an Audi, Escalade, or F150 in downtown Banff.
Move over Maslow, we now have Whelan’s Hierarchy of Needs. Frankly, if the taxpayers of Banff can afford to subsidize parking, they should most definitely be able to fund affordable housing – which can even be operated at a break even point, which is more than can be said for parking.
Although this could go on, as some do, I’ll restrict myself to a final point. Of the seven points raised by Mr. Whelan, six of them related to issues raised during the last election (somehow fencing didn’t make the cut), all of which had candidates on both sides of the issues.
The elected council, which actually does represent the majority of Banff voters, has been looking at many options with respect to transportation and housing. These have been difficult issues in Banff for several decades now and if there were simple answers they would have been implemented long ago.
The only certainty at this point is that doing nothing is no longer an option. If these issues were not being reviewed in a reasonable way by council I suspect there would be a greater swell of opposition than the occasional letter to the editor from the same one or two residents on the exact same topics time after time after time after.
Ben Berci,
Banff
