Rushing to a bus stop across from my Peace Arch News‘ office last Sunday, I was more concerned with scouring my wallet for a misplaced Compass Card than actually being on the lookout to ensure the 531 wasn’t running early.
I got to the bench, glanced up and – despite the roar of traffic – could see no bus, no oncoming traffic, nor even the roadway across the intersection.
Instead, I saw the back of a large sign, a translucent poster through which I recognized the silhouetted image of a man campaigning to be Surrey’s next mayor.
Only by stepping out to the curb, and cricking my neck over busy 24 Avenue, could I see a bus nearing. More importantly, was its driver going to see me in time?
Boarding and reluctantly paying the higher credit-card fare, I looked back as the sign faded, thinking: “That candidate might just have lost the bus-rider vote.”
READ: Surrey removes 1,060 improperly placed campaign signs
Of course, it’s unlikely the pictured candidate himself posted the offending sign, contravening the city’s 25-metre-from-intersection rule. In these days of big-money civic politics, I wonder how many of Surrey’s presumed frontrunners do much of the heavy lifting themselves?
But the damage was done, by it and the other 1,059 illegally placed signs torn down by the city this week.
Politicians, after all, have lost votes for less. They get blamed for things largely outside their purview or personal control, often due to a less-than-understanding electorate.
Civic politicians get criticized for health care and gang violence; provincial politicians get criticized for housing costs and inflation; federal politicians get criticized for airplane noise and ‘chemtrails’ that conspiracy theorists say purposely pollute our atmosphere.
Remember last year when former Surrey mayor and then-Tory MP Dianne Watts abandoned the latter South Surrey-White Rock post mid-term for a swing (and ultimate miss) at the BC Liberal leadership?
We heard comment after comment about Watts opportunism in crossing-the-floor from the Conservatives to the Liberals. Evidently some ‘engaged’ voters hadn’t realized the BC Liberals, while clearly a right-wing party, are an amalgam of federal Conservatives and Liberals.
Opportunistic? Perhaps. But not for that reason.
For years, White Rock politicians – as all of them eventually discover – have had it worse than most counterparts. While politicians deserve to be critiqued, my tiny hometown has a reputation among officials as a hotbed of dissatisfaction, where the electorate has both the time and means to focus on issues that pass unchallenged in other metropolises.
Of course, big-city dissatisfaction is not immune from small-town complaints.
My daily commute used to involve a trek up Croydon Drive, where the ‘sidewalk’ was a thin strip dividing the road from an overgrown ditch. The safest walking route was on the pavement, then to step into the weeds when cars – too close and at high speeds – passed.
While, privately, I blamed city hall, I never voiced my complaint publicly… until now. Maybe my White Rock roots are starting to show, after all.
Lance Peverley is the editor of Peace Arch News.
