Please Advise! Why Does Sim Want to Fire the ABC Park Board?

[Editor’s note: Steve Burgess is an accredited spin doctor with a PhD in Centrifugal Rhetoric from the University of SASE, situated on the lovely campus of PO Box 7650, Cayman Islands. In this space he dispenses PR advice to politicians, the rich and famous, the troubled and well-heeled, the wealthy and gullible.]

Dear Dr. Steve,

Mayor Ken Sim has announced plans to abolish the Vancouver Park Board, even though six out of seven board commissioners come from Sim's own ABC party.

What's going on?

Signed,

Stanley

Dear Stan,

What an excellent question. It’s fitting that so many trees are being cut down in Stanley Park this month because, frankly, Dr. Steve is stumped. This is one of those political stories that is difficult to mock because one is too busy saying, “WTF?”

Sim has clearly been planning this move. After all, when you are dealing with park issues you want to get your ducks in a row. It would seem Sim has Victoria on board to off the board.

“We have brought up this issue with the province,” Sim told CBC's Gloria Macarenko, “and they have been great partners.”

Well, why not? The province must surely be looking for new municipal worlds to conquer, considering how well things have been going with the Surrey police situation. Once bitten, twice sticking your hand into the badger hole.

Sim's interview with Macarenko was a blend of sense and nonsense. At one point Sim condemned the park board by pointing out that “one out of four trees in Stanley Park is dead.”

So the mayor is accusing the park board of being in bed with Big Looper Moth? Don't try to take on the moth lobby, Mr. Mayor — they can turn out in billions.

But Sim raised worthwhile points as well, mainly the bureaucratic duplication that results from having two regulatory bodies governing the same turf. Dealing with both city council and park board, he insisted, can mean twice the permitting, twice the licensing, twice the frustration. Sim claimed there would be cost savings to eliminating the board, although he admitted he couldn't quantify them.

It makes sense, although of course the end goal of park management is not simply balancing the budget. Go that route and you could end up selling the Robbie Burns statue for scrap and extending the Stanley Park train to Port Coquitlam.

And it’s questionable that park management will be improved by taking it away from a body for whom it is the sole responsibility and handing it to a council for whom it will be one item on a very long list. The key to successful chainsaw juggling is not usually extra chainsaws.

Purely as an exercise in politics, this story makes for a fascinating case study — ABC Mayor Sim versus ABC park board commissioners. ABC originally wanted to abolish the board, did an about-face, elected six out of seven park board commissioners and now wants their own crew to walk the plank.

It’s like watching Heath Ledger’s Joker, who pulls off a bank heist and then bumps off all his accomplices. There's an almost Trumpy aspect to it. From Vice-President Mike Pence to Gen. Mark Milley, yesterday's Trump handshake is tomorrow's knife in the back.

In this case, though, Sim is asking his teammates to knife themselves. Shockingly, three of the proposed victims have declined to self-stab.

“Make no mistake about it,” said ABC-turned-independent commissioner Brennan Bastyovanszky, “abolishing the park board is an erosion of democracy and the centralization of power.”

Will the public rally to defend the elected park board? Will the masses cry, “To the barricades, mes amis! We fight to preserve an extra layer of civic bureaucracy!”

Some think it will happen. Former park commissioner and longtime community activist Sarah Blyth-Gerszak thinks a major pushback is coming, and ex-MP Libby Davies collected a long list of former commissioners on a “Save Our Park Board” petition, asking people to turn out at city hall on Wednesday to register their opposition to Sim's plan.

Who will win this battle royale? At his Dec. 6 press conference, Sim said, “I'm a lean-certified black belt. I understand workflow.”

The challenge has been issued to park board martial arts enthusiasts. Sounds like Wednesday's council meeting could turn into a coming attraction on Netflix.