Residents and business owners rallied out front of the downtown Nanaimo provincial courthouse on Wednesday, Sep. 14 to demand reform of the criminal justice system. (Ian Holmes/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Water Cooler: Downtown Nanaimo safety rally, direct flights to Edmonton

Sep 17, 2022 | 9:29 AM

NANAIMO — The Water Cooler is NanaimoNewsNOW’s letters to the editor-style segment, featuring conversations about the news in Nanaimo and Oceanside.

This week’s feature deals with comments on the mid-week downtown Nanaimo safety rally by the courthouse and the announcement of direct flights between the city and Edmonton.

Linda R., Nanaimo: I am a senior, living with my husband in a senior’s mobile home park. I haven’t been directly impacted by the crime situation in Nanaimo but I know friends who have. There are parks and trails my husband and I used to enjoy using but we have felt afraid to go to some of our favourite places because of random violence and crime being reported in many places.

I used to love downtown Nanaimo and haven’t felt comfortable to access the places we used to go. Hearing that violent offenders are arrested and then released the next day with a “promise to appear” does nothing to alleviate our discomfort of using the parks or going downtown. I used to feel like we were fortunate to live in the best place on earth. I don’t feel that way anymore.

NanaimoNewsNOW: Tensions surrounding the safety and security of Nanaimo, centred around the downtown area, continue to mount. Recent events, including the murder of Fred Parsons at Maffeo Sutton Park over the long weekend stick out, but countless other incidents also hurt public safety.

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Stores are being robbed at knifepoint, people are having cash stolen by needlepoint while withdrawing at ATM’s. The constant presence of people loitering across wide areas of the city is enough to make some people feel uncomfortable.

These tensions however coincide with a municipal election in just under a month’s time.

At Wednesday’s rally, several candidates for both Mayor and Council attended, actively taking part in the demonstration and this issue will be central in the campaign as we get closer to general voting day on Oct. 15.

Nanaimo’s current Mayor and Council were attending the UBCM conference in Whistler and were out of town for the rally.

The existing councillors and Mayor Leonard Krog will point to strides they’ve made over the last four years to try and campaign for additional provincial cash, or actions the City has taken to fund their own initiatives.

Both have occurred through over $3 million in provincial funding for community response and the City spending an average of $2.5 million of local money on community safety officers and other initiatives.

Many of the benefits of the money spent, including the community safety officers, are only just starting to be actually seen where it’s needed most so time will tell how effective the spending was.

For candidates in the race looking for one of the nine seats around the Council table, this is their opportunity to say what they would do differently. How they would push for more, or what new ideas they have to try and correct the challenges this city faces.

But their proposals must be better than “just do something” to get elected next month.

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Julie H., Duncan: I’m delighted to read Nanaimo airport YCD is offering flights to Edmonton starting October 30, 2022. I would like to see some “quick vacation getaways” created that would be a package 3 day hotel stay, restaurant and attractions bundle for a refreshing change of pace. Just a getaway for a reasonable cost to a Canadian destination.

NanaimoNewsNOW: Additional daily service out of Nanaimo to major centres is a big win for all involved.

It allows easier access to the rest of Canada and the world for those locally, but also enables better tourism opportunities for people coming here.

Adding Edmonton also now largely mirrors the scope of flights available from Nanaimo to the airport in the Comox Valley and will undoubtably make travel packages and destination flights something more regular moving forward.

It’s important to note the travel industry is still getting on its feet.

Pandemic restrictions being removed is still relatively fresh, international travel is gradually getting back up to speed and as the months go by, hopefully following a successful holiday travel season over the winter, more summer destination flights will be available.

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