Pique Newsmagazine 2902

JANUARY 13, 2022 ISSUE 29.02

WWW.PIQUENEWSMAGAZINE.COM

FREE TO REPAIR

CANADIAN RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL GRAVES FORCED THE WORLD TO LOOK. WHAT HAS CHANGED?

14

AT HOME WITH OMICRON

Whistler’s COVID-19 problem is a housing problem

18

JAM SESSION

Traffic woes require both

short- and long-term solutions, mayor says

42

PLAN THE PARADE Whistler Pride returns to the resort this month after hiatus

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THIS WEEK IN PIQUE

38

42

32 Road to reconciliation Canadian residential school graves forced the world to look. What has changed? - By Stefan Labbe

14

AT HOME WITH OMICRON

Whistler’s

28

LET IT SNOW

“Unprecedented” snowfall in

notorious cramped living conditions make COVID-19 spread almost

Pemberton is creating challenges for roads crews and frustration for some

inevitable, and isolation near impossible.

residents.

16

MINIS MISSING OUT

Ski school

38

WATTS ON HIS WAY

Whistler luger Reid

programming for some of the resort’s youngest shredders is the latest

Watts is trusting the process en route to his second Olympic Games in

casualty of Whistler’s staff shortage.

Beijing next month.

18

JAM SESSION

Recent traffic woes require both

short- and long-term solutions, mayor says.

42

PLAN THE PARADE

Whistler’s long-running

LGBTQI ski week returns to the resort this month after a one-year hiatus.

COVER Like this piece, it kind of feels like most of the progress made so far has been symbolic. - By Jon Parris // @jon.parris.art 4 JANUARY 13, 2022

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THIS WEEK IN PIQUE

Opinion & Columns 08 OPENING REMARKS Whistler has done well in recent years to address gaps in its “housing

#202 -1390 ALPHA LAKE RD., FUNCTION JUNCTION, WHISTLER, B.C. V8E 0H9.

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continuum”—but council needs to get creative moving forward.

Founding Publishers KATHY & BOB BARNETT

10 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letter writers this week call for local housing solutions, ponder

Publisher SARAH STROTHER - sstrother@wplpmedia.com Editor BRADEN DUPUIS - bdupuis@piquenewsmagazine.com Assistant Editor ALYSSA NOEL - arts@piquenewsmagazine.com Sales Manager SUSAN HUTCHINSON - shutchinson@wplpmedia.com Production Manager AMIR SHAHRESTANI - ashahrestani@wplpmedia.com Art Director JON PARRIS - jparris@wplpmedia.com Advertising Representatives TESSA SWEENEY - tsweeney@wplpmedia.com GEORGIA BUTLER - gbutler@wplpmedia.com Digital/Sales Coordinator AMELA DIZDARIC - traffic@wplpmedia.com Production production@piquenewsmagazine.com

the impacts of Omicron, and thank Whistler Blackcomb staff.

13 PIQUE’N YER INTEREST For a town that was literally bought and sold on the promise of long winters, Whistler wasn’t really built for the cold or snow, writes Andrew Mitchell.

58 MAXED OUT Max delves into his inbox to respond to some of his faithful readers, doing his best to answer their burning questions.

Environment & Adventure

Arts & Entertainment/Features Editor BRANDON BARRETT - bbarrett@piquenewsmagazine.com

31 RANGE ROVER Some part of getting frustrated, pushing through, and levelling up is clearly

Social Media Editor MEGAN LALONDE - mlalonde@piquenewsmagazine.com

working for pro skier Anna Segal.

Reporters BRANDON BARRETT - bbarrett@piquenewsmagazine.com MEGAN LALONDE - mlalonde@piquenewsmagazine.com ALYSSA NOEL arts@piquenewsmagazine.com HARRISON BROOKS - sports@piquenewsmagazine.com

Lifestyle & Arts

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40 FORK IN THE ROAD Heading into the third year of the pandemic, we’re still facing

Office and Accounts Manager HEIDI RODE - hrode@wplpmedia.com

unpredictable shortages on store shelves—these days accompanied by higher prices, writes Glenda Bartosh.

Contributors G.D. MAXWELL, GLENDA BARTOSH, FEET BANKS, LESLIE ANTHONY, ANDREW MITCHELL, ALISON TAYLOR, VINCE SHULEY, LISA RICHARDSON

44 MUSEUM MUSINGS Though in-person visitation rebounded somewhat, 2021 was a year of

President, Whistler Publishing LP SARAH STROTHER - sstrother@wplpmedia.com

fluctuation for the Whistler Museum and Archives.

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OPENING REMARKS

Whistler’s suite defeat I VIVIDLY REMEMBER sitting in a Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) media briefing—or clarity session, as I sometimes like to refer to them—back in 2017, and listening to a municipal staffer explain the local approach to solving Whistler’s perennial housing woes.

The entire concept of the strategy was to alleviate the pressure points in Whistler’s “housing continuum”—or the way people move from renting to ownership as their lives change and families grow.

At the time, a lack of dorm-style housing for Whistler’s growing seasonal workforce

BY BRADEN DUPUIS was pushing workers into the rental market, where, with their combined incomes, they were outcompeting resident families and driving rental rates upward.

So families were stuck with what they had—a blockage in the continuum.

The rapid rise in value of market real estate also meant those living in residentrestricted housing couldn’t afford to make the jump to the market, which would free up the resident-restricted stock for a younger family—another blockage.

Listening to the argument all those years ago, the housing continuum strategy made perfect sense, and it still does—if Whistler wants to be successful, it needs appropriate, affordable rental housing for both permanent and seasonal staff, and flexibility and diversity in the housing that’s available for purchase.

It was also in that briefing that the RMOW declared its target of building 1,000 new beds over five years—a goal the municipality is now close to accomplishing.

The progress at Cheakamus Crossing and with private developer employee housing proposals in recent years is commendable, and will go a long way to filling in some gaps.

But looking at Whistler’s housing picture at the outset of 2022, it appears a crucial aspect of the housing continuum is

now plugged: the entry point.

“The erosion of market rental housing is distressing. There is no way that we can replace it,” said Councillor Cathy Jewett in an interview with Pique last year. “Every time someone buys a place that has a suite in it and renovates it and takes the suite out, it’s basically a $250,000 hole that we can’t fill.

We don’t have the capacity to build as fast as the erosion of suites in rental housing.”

Getting a handle on just how prevalent the loss of market rental suites is or has been in recent years is not easy; the RMOW doesn’t keep track, per se, but a spokesperson said more info will be available with the upcoming release of 2021 Census data.

But looking at some other figures provides some insight.

Since January 2021, there have been 161 homes sold in Whistler, and 49 in Pemberton and the surrounding area. Since 2017, about 496 homes have sold in Whistler—so more than 120 every year, on average.

Also since 2017, about 48 complete demolition permits have been issued for single-family homes in Whistler, according to the RMOW. Of 31 active permits related to suites, only five are to remove the suite, a spokesperson added—all of the others are to renovate an existing suite or add a new one.

So it’s not all loss, but there is definitely a big shift happening in the market rental stock.

As it relates to home sales, are those new Whistlerites renting out the suites in their shiny new homes to local workers?

If they’re demolishing and rebuilding, are they choosing to include a suite in the new floorplan?

Judging from the availability on sites like Craigslist, I’m going to wager a guess that not many are.

And why should they? If they can afford to buy in today’s real estate market, they surely don’t need the extra income. And who wants the stress of becoming a landlord, dealing with rowdy tenants, keeping an eye on repairs and upkeep? But maybe council needs to force the issue.

In Canmore, Alta., amendments to the Land Use Bylaw in 2020 aim to maximize

the development of accessory dwelling units—or suites—in the community.

One change in particular decrees that all single-detached dwelling units that include a suite are considered a permitted use.

Homes without a suite are considered a discretionary use, and as such require a development permit. It’s a subtle distinction, but one that incentivizes the creation of auxiliary housing in the development process.

Would something like that work for Whistler? It certainly can’t hurt to try new things, or get creative.

There are of course other factors at play here, too, like the proliferation of nightly rentals and an influx of remote workers choosing to make Whistler home.

Even if you are lucky enough to find a space, you’re not likely to be able to afford it working one, or even two jobs.

Anecdotally, rent is rising everywhere, so it’s not just a Whistler problem—and many will tell you these are just the downsides of living in a desirable ski town.

But as a post in the Whistler Winter Facebook group in early December pointed out, nobody should have to pay $3,400 a month to share a room. Not only is that not sustainable, it’s insulting, and borderline dehumanizing.

When I moved to Whistler in 2014, I had several rental options to choose from, and I am eternally grateful I lucked into renting from a longtime local landlord who is thoughtful and reasonable.

If there were more like her—or some kind of mechanism ensuring the rental of market suites in perpetuity—maybe others wouldn’t feel empowered to charge such exorbitant rates.

Then again, greed isn’t going anywhere, nor is the desirability of Whistler.

The municipality’s own modelling predicts that growth in visitation isn’t likely to slow down any time soon.

So maybe the next council we elect in October needs to get creative to ensure our workers can actually afford to move here and staff our businesses.

On a related note, any landlords out there holding a reasonably priced suite they might like to rent to a new Pique reporter?

Like everyone else in town, we’re hiring. ■

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR So here is just one of many ideas that I invite mayor and council to consider ahead of October: A condition of sale for ANY property in Whistler should require that the buyer of the property must first complete a suite of training courses, in person, that will educate them about the perils that renters in this community face with regards to housing, and also train the proposed buyer on how to be a reputable, contributing member of our community.

This is the kind of “Spirit Pass” Whistler really needs.

Danny Mason // Whistler

Time for Whistler to get creative on housing solutions Everybody knows about the Spirit Pass—for nearly 30 years, Whistler Blackcomb has offered a reduced-rate season pass called the Spirit Pass, sold in conjunction with the Whistler Chamber of Commerce. All registered businesses and employees must qualify for the Spirit Pass by attending the Whistler Experience training sessions. The suite of training courses aims to empower every frontline worker to create outstanding service experiences and to uphold Whistler’s reputation.

My family currently rents a two-bedroom suite situated in the lower portion of a visually stunning six-bedroom estate home in Whistler. Last year when the property was sold to out-of-town buyers, our housing security was at risk and our nerves ran high with the possibility that the tenancy may not be continued. We were relieved and grateful to learn that the new owners wanted to continue the tenancy agreement.

This week (Jan. 8, 2022), two months into our renewed tenancy agreement, we received a Notice to End Tenancy with the reason supplied that the landlord’s adult child just sold their condo in Vancouver and wants to find a job in Whistler, so naturally they offered their child the rental suite.

So here we are; a family with children, a Whistler Health Care Centre worker and

Does Omicron spell the end of the pandemic?

responsible tenant who have lived and loved in Whistler for decades, being displaced during a raging pandemic so that a wealthy, in-Whistler-on-weekends-only family can enclose themselves in their fortress at the expense of the actual people this town relies upon to create outstanding experiences and uphold Whistler’s good reputation. We will dispute the Notice to End Tenancy, but our relocation is inevitable.

However, it does have me thinking (in an election year) that this is EXACTLY the type of scenario the critically-needed and hardworking renters of Whistler have constantly

endured—to which past and present municipal legislators and local power-elite (realtors) are wholly complicit in. Is it any wonder why outstanding service experiences in Whistler have plummeted? Is it any wonder why Whistler’s reputation as a place that cares for employees is shattered? The backbone of this community doesn’t have the housing security needed to uphold the Chamber of Commerce’s desired goals. A local resident of Whistler said something on social media earlier this week that really stood out to me: “Whistler doesn’t owe you a home, just because you are gracing us with your presence.” Wise words.

For the last three to four months there have been some intelligent people locally demanding more controls and mandates be placed on a small minority of skiers in order to somehow protect the vaccinated from the unvaccinated.

BC (Before Covid), this concept, akin to wearing a seatbelt to protect someone else from being harmed in a car crash, would have been open to debate. AC (After Covid), this narrative is not only widely accepted, but is actively pushed by health authorities and politicians in a strange effort to expand vaccination rates far beyond what we were initially told would be enough.

It’s all about the evolving science, we are told, but this brings up a rather obvious question.

If it’s about “The Science,” where is the control group of unvaccinated people in this experiment? Surely with an amazing 90-percent-plus injection rate, we would be grateful

Congratulations to my clients on their purchase of an amazing building lot in Riverrun

Steve Shuster

t: 604.698.7347 | e: steve@steveshusterrealestate.com www.steveshusterrealestate.com 10 JANUARY 13, 2022

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR for a 10-per-cent group of brave volunteers willing to risk their personal safety and act as a control group so we can better understand this new science in the years and decades to come?

It’s hard to believe that two years have passed since the first talk of a collapsed health-care system entered our collective fear consciousness; even harder to believe that after two years, despite best efforts and our government’s apparent access to unlimited borrowing, the health-care system remains as fragile and unprepared as it was two years ago. Perhaps even more so given the burnout, and health-care workers who were dropped due to mandates.

This new Omicron strain reportedly threatening our health-care system yet again is so contagious experts are saying it’s unlikely that anything else will be able to outcompete it for dominance. The same experts are also looking at the data from South Africa and Europe, where they are a month and half ahead of us, and so far everything looks very positive in regards to Omicron not infecting lungs, not causing longterm sickness, and greatly decreased mortality compared to Delta. For the most part, Omicron is being compared to a common cold. A cold that most people will hardly notice, and yet after infection will receive the latest and greatest booster shot currently available.

It’s hard to imagine that we could be looking

at the end of the pandemic coming during the darkest and coldest months of the year, but day by day the data is pointing in that direction. Are we ready to receive that kind of good news?

Clearly our health-care authorities, politicians and Big Pharma were not prepared for Mother Nature to jump in and solve the problem so quickly, but nevertheless we should be prepared to accept this huge win and not quibble over who did what—let’s move forward together free from fear and division!

Happy new year, everyone. I look forward to seeing your faces and beautiful smiles once again!

Charley Raine // Whistler

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A big thanks to Whistler Blackcomb staff After a challenging holiday period with the freezing temperatures and rising COVID cases, though with great snow, the Whistler Mountain Ski Club would like to say a very big thank you to Whistler Blackcomb staff.

Youth sport has been impacted like so many others through the pandemic, and for us in skiing and ski development, it’s the lifties, patrol, groomers, snow-makers, F&B team members, maintenance crew, managers and so many others who help make it happen.

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Write to us! Letters to the editor must contain the writer’s name, address and a daytime telephone number. Maximum length is 450 words. Pique Newsmagazine reserves the right to edit, condense or refrain from publishing any contribution. Letters reflect the opinion of the writer and not that of Pique Newsmagazine.

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

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Thank you for the work that you do! Our kids, athletes, parents, coaches and staff greatly appreciate it.

Mike Janyk // Executive Director, Whistler Mountain Ski Club

Disappointed over lack of mask enforcement at WB I tested positive for COVID-19 in Whistler [in early January]. I thought I did the right things; I wore a medical-grade mask under my buff in the gondola, and I did my best to maintain physical distancing in Whistler Blackcomb (WB) common areas.

I am disappointed and angry that there

there are any solutions to these ongoing motor vehicle traffic snarls in Whistler.

Like what if there was a vehicle that could carry 50-plus people while consuming the same road space as two small pickup trucks?

What if there was a mode of transportation that could travel on tiny roads, separated from cars and trucks, that never crashed (in a way that inconveniences other users of that tiny road) and caused no harm to others?

What if these modes of transportation were facilitated and prioritized by our governments?

It’s now 2022, and the Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) has done little to prioritize either buses or bikes. The solutions have been

“Despite all the platitudes about encouraging cycling, there is not one inch of Whistler where a bike is the priority.”

- BRENDAN AND AMANDA LADNER

is no enforcement of use of medical masks (not buffs) in the gondola, and that the gondolas are riding at maximum capacity with no encouraged social bubbles. WB’s maskwearing signs only pay lip service to protective efforts by its organization.

Does Vail Resorts care about its guests’ well-being? It doesn’t look like it.

I am pretty sick, and so is my family.

Luckily no one is severely ill.

Do we want this mountain to stay open?

Surely we can do better.

Janie Venis // Vancouver

RMOW should prioritize bikes, buses Whistler roads became parking lots again this holiday season… if only there was a solution!

After hearing reports of two and a half hours to get from the Day Lots to Alpine Meadows last weekend, we cannot wonder if

implemented around the world—even in the Arctic people ride bikes—but the RMOW is too busy planning the next paving projects to improve our mobility.

More people on buses and bikes frees up road space for smoother vehicle traffic.

Despite all the platitudes about encouraging cycling, there is not one inch of Whistler where a bike is the priority.

Despite hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars spent on a highway capacity report, this report has done nothing but collect dust while our elected officials shrug their shoulders; as buses idle in traffic with our town’s employees late for work again.

Rest assured, more electric vehicles on our roads will not speed up traffic.

Oh… and we’re facing a climate emergency.

Happy new (election) year everybody!

Brendan and Amanda Ladner // Whistler ■

Backcountry Advisory

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Serving sea to sky for 18 years

12 JANUARY 13, 2022

AS OF WEDNESDAY, JAN. 12 The Sea to Sky has seen a dramatic shift in weather this week. Following a very cold and snowy start to the year, a series of warm and wet fronts rolled through this week, creating conditions that change significantly with elevation.

Terrain below 2,000 metres saw fairly heavy rainfall over Tuesday and Wednesday, likely saturating the snow surface. Terrain above 2,000 m received mixed precipitation and snow, with strong winds. All elevations saw natural avalanche activity, with wet avalanches in terrain that received significant rainfall and dry avalanches in terrain that remained above the freezing line.

The wet weather is expected to give way to a high pressure system, with freezing levels remaining high on Friday. The weekend will see a mix of sun and cloud, and freezing

levels gradually falling back to 1,000 m by Sunday morning.

As you head into the backcountry this weekend, be aware the landscape has changed.

Remember to approach all avalanche terrain with fresh eyes. Where the snow was impacted by rain, a supportive melt freeze crust will likely form on the surface as the weather cools. Avalanches are unlikely where a thick surface crust is present, but it will make for challenging travel conditions. The crust will thin higher up towards the freezing line and become less supportive.

If you head to higher elevations in the search for dry snow, expect to find a variety of wind-affected surfaces. Avalanche hazard may decrease following this storm, however windloaded features in the treeline and alpine may still hold slabs reactive to a human trigger.

Check the forecast at avalanche.ca to get the most up-to-date information. ■

CONDITIONS MAY VARY AND CAN CHANGE RAPIDLY Check for the most current conditions before heading out into the backcountry. Daily updates for the areas adjacent to Whistler Blackcomb are available at 604-938-7676, or surf to www.whistlerblackcomb.com/mountaininfo/snow-report#backcountry or go to www.avalanche.ca.

PIQUE N’ YER INTEREST

Unwinterized FOR A TOWN that was literally bought and sold on the promise of long winters, Whistler wasn’t really built for the cold or snow.

A seven-day cold snap with temperatures descending below -20 C caused pipes to freeze up, sprinkler systems to burst, and all kinds of other plumbing and ice-related emergencies. People posted photos of

BY ANDREW MITCHELL single-pane windows, which would have been considered cheap in the ‘80s, layered with a solid inch of ice. A co-worker drove to the office holding his car door handle the whole way because the door latch had frozen. A lot of people couldn’t even get their vehicles to start.

While cold snaps often spell disaster in the Sea to Sky, the rest of Canada gets by just fine. In most of the country—being the mostly unpopulated middle and northern parts— temperatures below -20 C are common from December to March, and it can get a lot colder than that. Parts of northern and eastern B.C. dropped to -50 C in the week between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. Cities like Winnipeg, Edmonton and Montreal also manage to survive temperatures that can dip

below -40 C for weeks at a time without an endless string of emergencies.

That’s because other places were built for those extreme conditions. Water and wet sprinkler lines are both insulated and heattraced, and don’t run through cold attics or exterior walls. Cars have block heaters and there are outlets everywhere you park.

People grease their car door latches with silicon lubricants that don’t freeze and use cold-weather oil and fluids under the hood.

You could argue that level of weatherproofing isn’t necessary here because our temperatures are generally mild by Canadian standards. And they are—most of the time. But we almost always get at least one or two cold snaps every winter, followed by the usual cold weather emergencies. It would have made way more sense to build for the extremes than for seasonal averages. Our current way of doing things means getting our asses kicked every time we drop below negative double digits.

The expensive reality is that we need to better winterize our businesses, homes and other buildings by properly insulating and heat-tracing water and sprinkler lines.

All hose bibs should be frost-free. All rooms with pipes and sprinklers should have interior heating. Every house and housing unit should have at least two water shutoffs, one inside and one outside accessible in an emergency. All windows should be

double paned. No pipes should run through exterior walls, and if it’s impossible to retrofit those places then those pipes need to be insulated and heated.

It won’t be easy or cheap, but having pipes crack every winter isn’t necessarily the cheaper option and insurance rates and deductibles are already going up.

Extreme cold is one thing, but when it comes to snow you’d think we’d have everything all figured out by now. And yet every major storm seems to result in total chaos, and sometimes carnage, on local roads and highways. The main culprit is often someone from the city who thinks allseason tires are good enough (if they gave it any thought at all), but in truth I see lots of locals fishtailing on our snowy and icy roads as well. Winter tires can still slip and slide if the conditions are bad enough—you actually have to slow down sometimes and drive for the conditions.

If visitors from the city are inexperienced and ill-equipped, then locals are overconfident—following too closely, taking corners too quickly, and making assumptions about their skills and vehicles that can sometimes turn out to be wrong.

Road maintenance is also a challenge.

We don’t usually sand our roads here like they do in places that get extreme cold, but instead layer on salt and other de-icers that are increasingly ineffective as the

temperature drops. We also use mountains of gravel, which can provide some added grip in certain conditions but can also make it feel like you’re driving on ball bearings.

It seems like it would be a good idea to temporarily close the highway during the big storms to let the plows do their job, but instead we leave everything open and wind up with accidents and traffic jams that delay people far longer than a closure would. Tire checks do happen but not nearly enough, and rarely during actual storms when emergency services have their hands full. We also don’t encourage people to stay at home until the roads are properly taken care of. Everybody pretends like it’s business as usual even if 70 centimetres of snow falls overnight, then complains about the state of the roads and parking lots.

In a lot of ways, it turns out that we’re not built for summer either, as last summer’s heat wave showed. There is an active FireSmart and tree-thinning project underway to reduce our wildfire risk, but we still have a massive job ahead as forests have grown up around homes. Instead of preventative landscaping to maintain safe buffers, we let things run wild for too long.

With weather systems clearly changing in the region—I don’t know how else you can explain new records for heat, rain, cold and snow in less than a year—Whistler needs to be ready for everything. ■

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JANUARY 13, 2022

13

NEWS WHISTLER

Whistler’s COVID-19 problem is a housing problem THE FIRST IN PIQUE’S SERIES LOOKING AT THE HUMAN IMPACT OF THE RESORT’S RECENT OMICRON SURGE

BY BRANDON BARRETT MUCH HAS BEEN MADE over the past two years of the ways the COVID-19 pandemic has brought Whistler’s long-simmering issues bubbling up to the surface.

It has forced overdue conversations about our community’s mental health and well-being, exacerbated a years-long labour crisis, renewed focus on overtourism and Whistler’s exploding visitor numbers, and pushed local leaders to think hard about the resort’s long-term future as a global destination in the face of climate change.

But if the pandemic has exposed the cracks in the façade of one longstanding issue above all else, you could make a solid argument for it being housing.

“Again, we find ourselves in a place where people working frontline [jobs] and [living] in high-density, congregate housing, or the underhoused, are the first to be impacted by this,” said Jackie Dickinson, executive director of the Whistler Community Services Society (WCSS). “This

SIGNED, SEALED, DELIVERED Between Dec. 1 and Jan. 7, the Whistler Community Services Society made more than 150 food-bank deliveries to locals.

FILE PHOTO

14 JANUARY 13, 2022

period, in a way, has repeated itself, so what is it continuing to teach us about what we have to do and think differently?”

In the first of Pique’s series looking at the human impact of Whistler’s recent Omicron surge, we spoke to locals who have had to self-isolate in crammed living spaces, navigate shifting personal dynamics among housemates with conflicting views on the virus, and heard

Varty rents a room with her partner out of a chalet in Alpine for $800 a month, and although she was never infected, in the span of about a week this January, 11 of her housemates tested positive for the virus.

“People are doing this because of their socioeconomic status. I would not be living here if I had other options,” she said.

Needless to say, with a dozen-and-a-half people spread out in seven rooms—with as

“People are doing this because of their socioeconomic status. I would not be living here if I had other options.”

- LARA VARTY

about the spike in demand for a WCSS program that helps locals isolate safely.

COMING DOWN WITH COVID IN AN 18-PERSON HOUSE We all know the pandemic is stressful enough on its own, but for 22-year-old ski instructor Lara Varty, COVID-19 has come with the added worry of sharing a living space with 17 other people.

many as four to a room—all sharing four bathrooms and one communal kitchen, it has made self-isolating incredibly difficult.

(An eighth room in the house is occupied part-time by the landlords, but Varty said it sits empty much of the time. The landlords declined to comment on the record when reached.)

“We’ve been hit with the COVID wave pretty hard, and it is impossible to selfisolate, take care, or stop the spread of COVID in our house,” Varty noted.

Local Natalie Amanda faced similar frustrations after she came down with the coronavirus on Dec. 29, confining her to her room over New Year’s in a 12-person house.

“I was stuck in my room for five days trying to follow the rules, but it’s just so difficult,” she said. “It’s definitely not easy, especially sharing a kitchen ... You don’t want everyone else to get sick.”

Like a lot of frontline staff already struggling to make ends meet, the 29-yearold spa worker had to decide between going back to work immediately after her mandatory quarantine, or taking a few extra days off until she felt fully recuperated.

Ultimately, Amanda chose the former, a decision she said was influenced by the fact she couldn’t take advantage of all five annual paid sick days that B.C. began to offer as of Jan. 1 because she hasn’t been at her job for the full 90-day eligibility period.

“I think everyone should be entitled to that sick pay,” said the U.K. native. “Like myself, it’s making me go back to work earlier than I probably should, and I don’t really think that’s fair when it’s something that’s not your fault.”

RELATIONSHIP RIFTS We’ve heard plenty about the pandemic’s effect on Whistlerites’ physical and mental

NEWS WHISTLER health, but less has been made of the rifts COVID-19 can open up in personal relationships. Given the nature of the resort’s housing landscape, many young frontline workers are often forced, out of economic necessity, to share cramped quarters with complete strangers. That can make conversations about the virus and related health protocols all the more difficult, which Varty experienced first-hand as COVID ripped through the house.

“We had discussions about what the protocols would be, what bathrooms people would be using, wearing masks in the common areas and whatnot,” Varty explained. “That was pretty much followed by everyone until we got to 10 or 11 cases, and then people just gave up, which was really frustrating. People stopped wearing

said. “That idea projection that that’s just how you enter the community and get to experience Whistler, the world is telling us that’s just not an option [anymore].”

That much is evident just by looking at the volume of residents seeking refuge through WCSS’ Temporary Self-Isolation Unit Program, a partnership with BC Housing, Vancouver Coastal Health and local accommodations to provide community members a safe place to isolate.

In the past year, the program has provided 410 nights of accommodation, with the majority coming between January and March 2021 before another spike at the end of the year and into the first weeks of 2022.

WCSS has also seen the impacts of COVID-19 in the demand for its food bank, with 103 deliveries made in December alone,

“Every one of these individuals belongs to a family, and when they are in your housing care, they’re looking to you to keep them safe. I think we’ve lost the personal connection.”

- JACKIE DICKINSON

masks in the house and started using the regular bathroom they’d been using before.”

Compounding the issue, in Varty’s mind, is what she sees as some of her housemates’ unwillingness to get tested despite displaying signs of illness. (Pique attempted to verify this with other housemates, but none were willing to speak.)

“It’s very frustrating hearing them coughing and seeing them being sick and then asking them if they are and getting back, ‘Oh yeah, a little bit but it’s cause I was up late last night,’” she said.

At this point, Varty said the house is divided into two camps: those willing to follow the proper health protocols, and those carrying on as usual.

“I know they understand the guidelines for being sick and going to work and maybe it doesn’t click that this goes beyond themselves, beyond just them as a person and us as a household. There are others in this town and others who take this seriously and are missing out on work,” she said. “I feel like I have quite an empathetic outlook on this and I follow the guidelines because I know they work … so it’s really frustrating to see them go on as usual and have honestly no consequences to that as well.”

CRAMPED LIVING QUARTERS NOT A RITE OF PASSAGE We all know by now that living in one of the most beautiful communities in the world comes with certain trade-offs. But if the pandemic has shown us anything, it’s that the old ways of thinking don’t really apply anymore—and that includes the Whistler rite of passage of living in a crowded flophouse.

“I think we’ve made ourselves believe that those types of living experiences are essential to the beginnings of adventure and what Whistler has to offer,” Dickinson

and about three-quarters of those in the last 10 days of the month. The organization made another 50 deliveries between Jan. 3 and 7.

“That’s a really interesting stat to look at how quickly this virus hits that very economically and socially vulnerable population,” Dickinson said.

M I C H E L L E

B R O W N

P E R M A N E N T

M A K E U P

***TEXT to book 604.905.8385 ***Valid until Feb 28, 2022 call or text for more info

Unit 206 Blue Highways, 4368 Main St. Whistler 604.905.8385 * mbpmu@outlook.com

FIND THE S PA C E T O B R E AT H E . . .

W H I S T L E R ’ S L E A D I N G R E A LT O R

‘EVERY ONE OF THESE INDIVIDUALS BELONGS TO A FAMILY’ Dickinson still remembers the place she lived in as a university student that was without heat in the frigid winter months and, at a certain point, was hit with an infestation of “biting ants that started coming out of the vents.”

After raising the conditions with her landlord, she was met with inaction. That is, until her father took the matter into his own hands and paid a visit to the landlord’s home. After noticing the landlord had children of their own, Dickinson’s dad turned it back around.

“He pointed to me and said, ‘Well, this is my child. I’m asking you to consider the decision you’ve made in how you’ve housed her. She’s down there without any heat and just space heaters. She belongs to me. She’s my kid,’” she recalled.

Within two days, the heat was installed.

It speaks to a personal touch that Dickinson believes has been lost in Whistler’s current housing climate.

“I think that for a lot of these people who have come across the country, a lot of their families or family systems don’t have the ability to do that. I’m wondering if we could start thinking that way, just like my dad did,” she said. “Every one of these individuals belongs to a family, and when they are in your housing care, they’re looking to you to keep them safe. I think we’ve lost the personal connection.” n

4868 SUMMIT LANE $14,885,000

JANUARY 13, 2022

15

NEWS WHISTLER

Whistler Blackcomb staff shortage prompts weekend ski school cancellation RESORT OFFERING FAMILIES A DEEPLY DISCOUNTED LESSON ALTERNATIVE AFTER SCRATCHING WEEKLY MINIS CLUB

WEEKLY SKI SCHOOL programming for some of the resort’s youngest shredders is the latest casualty of Whistler’s debilitating staff shortage.

Parents, including Pemberton local Richard Joce, were informed via email on New Year’s Day that Whistler Blackcomb’s Minis Club weekend program for threeto-four-year-olds, scheduled to start on Saturday, Jan. 8, would not return as planned this season and they would be automatically refunded for the program’s fees. The message cited “several challenging dynamics, including staffing,” as the cause.

Joce said his four-year-old son is disappointed after looking forward to getting on snow for his first-ever ski lessons. “We could have enrolled him last winter, but that was obviously cancelled because of the pandemic,” said Joce.

“This year was going to be the first year.

“We take him skiing, but it’s good to get him with a real instructor and skiing with

WHISTLER

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growing our sport and will always prioritize bringing new skiers to the mountains—this includes working with the families who trust us with teaching their children,” the spokesperson added.

The reduced price, which comes to $62.40 plus tax per day, is only available for the 2021-22 ski season and cannot be rolled forward.

Joce said he plans to schedule his son for five weekend lessons, as the weekday availability doesn’t work with his family’s schedule. The discounted rate is definitely “reasonable,” he added.

“We’ll do that and see how it is,” Joce said.

“It’s obviously not the same program, because the old program was the same instructor and the same kids every week, once a week for the season ... but it’s better than nothing.”

For skiers under five, “it’s great if they can turn up and see the same face every day—it gives them a lot more confidence,” Joce explained. “Whereas if they turn up and it’s kind of a different situation every time, it takes a while to build the trust.” n

NORTH SHORE

338-4573 CHATEAU BOULEVARD, WHISTLER

FOR SALE

$206,000 (1/4 share)

cancelled a week or two until everyone’s better again,” he said. “It’s either one or the other.”

While Joce and his family weren’t relying on ski school as childcare, many other families in the corridor were, he pointed out, and might have trouble finding a substitute this late in the game.

“It just comes across that they just don’t care at all,” Joce said. “These kids are their future customers.”

Whistler Blackcomb, however, is hoping an alternative solution can help ease some of the sting of disappointment.

The resort is providing a reduced-price flexible lesson offering for three- and fouryear-olds, allowing families to schedule up to 10 lessons, half of which can be on weekends and the other half on weekdays.

“We recognize, and apologize for, the disappointment the families that were set to participate in the Weekend Minis program are feeling, and have heard their frustration,” the statement read.

“This allows us to schedule accordingly across the week, based on instructor availability and lesson demand.”

The mountain operator is “committed to

his peers once a week.”

While Whistler Blackcomb apologized for the cancellation and told parents its staff did not make the difficult decision lightly, “as the latest wave of the pandemic advances, it has required careful evaluation of our ability to offer all of our Ski & Snowboard School programs,” a spokesperson said in a statement.

“We are dealing with the staffing shortages affecting so many businesses right now, complicated further by COVIDrelated call-outs and exposures.

“Our goal right now is to focus our staffing resources where we can maximize the overall guest experience.”

Joce said he understands the challenges posed by labour shortages, but finds it “extremely frustrating” that parents were informed of the cancellation at the last minute.

“If they knew they didn’t have enough instructors, they would have known that weeks, if not months ago, in which case they should have told us weeks or months ago. And if they’re short because of sickness, illness, then that’s temporary, right? They would have just

BY MEGAN LALONDE

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PROPERTY CO-LISTED BY:

DANA FRIESEN SMITH

DAVID WIEBE

KRISTEN DILLON

HANNAH GARCIA

604 902 3878

604 966 8874

778 266 0150

604.966.8941

*PREC

SADIE BRUBAKER

*PREC

*PREC

dana@seatoskydreamteam.com

david@davidwiebe.ca

kristen@seatoskydreamteam.com

604.907.1400

hannah@hannahgarcia.com | sadie@sadiebrubaker.com

Stilhavn Real Estate Services | 208-1420 Alpha Lake Road, Whistler • 1388 Main Street, Squamish | stilhavn.com This communication is not intended to cause or induce the break of an existing agency relationship. *Personal Real Estate Corporation.

We would like to acknowledge that we work and live on the traditional, unceded territory of the xwməθkwəýəm, səlilwətaɬ, Lil’wat & Sḵwxwú7mesh People.

16 JANUARY 13, 2022

NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING

TUESDAY, JANUARY 18, 2022 – 5:30 P.M. This Public Hearing will be held electronically pursuant to s.465 of the Local Government Act and Council Procedure Bylaw No. 2207, 2018.

LAND USE CONTRACT TERMINATION BYLAW (BLUEBERRY) NO. 2337, 2021 SUBJECT LANDS: The lands that are the subject of the proposed Bylaw are shown on the map attached to this notice and are located within the Blueberry neighbourhood, including parcels located along portions of Blueberry Dr, Falcon Cres, Heron Pl, Ptarmigan Pl, Peak Dr, St. Moritz Cres, Osprey Pl, and Nighthawk Lane.

PURPOSE: In general, the proposed Bylaw will terminate the Blueberry Land Use Contract (LUC) from the subject lands and apply seven different zones to the subject lands.

The seven zones are: 1) the newly proposed RTA30 Zone (Residential/Tourist Accommodation Thirty); 2) the newly proposed RTA31 Zone (Residential/Tourist Accommodation Thirty-One); 3) the newly proposed RTA32 Zone (Residential/Tourist Accommodation Thirty-Two); 4) the newly proposed RTA33 Zone (Residential/Tourist Accommodation Thirty-Three); 5) the existing RR1 Zone (Rural Resource One); 6) the existing LP1 Zone (Leisure Park One); and 7) the existing RM4 Zone (Residential Multiple Four).

The proposed Bylaw will also rezone the portions of 3595 and 3591 Falcon Crescent that are currently RS1 Zone (Single Family Residential One) to the newly proposed RTA33 Zone (Residential/Tourist Accommodation Thirty-Three).

If the Bylaw is adopted, it will take effect one year after the date of adoption.

INSPECTION OF DOCUMENTS: A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may be inspected at the Reception Desk of Municipal Hall at 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler, BC, during regular office hours of 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday to Friday (statutory holidays excluded) from January 6, 2022 to and including January 18, 2022.

A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may also be viewed online on the Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) website at: whistler.ca/LUC00006 PUBLIC PARTICIPATION: All persons who believe that their interest in property is affected by the proposed Bylaw will be afforded a reasonable opportunity to be heard by Council at the Public Hearing. All persons can: 1) submit written comments to Council; and/or 2) make oral representations LIVE via online video or phone conferencing. (Your image will not be broadcast to Council or the public.)

1. Submit Written Comments to Council Written comments must be addressed to “Mayor and Council”, and include your name and mailing address. Until 3:30 p.m. on January 18, 2022, written submissions will be received at the following: Email: corporate@whistler.ca Hard Copy: Resort Municipality of Whistler | Legislative Services Department | 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler BC V8E 0X5 Written submissions will also be accepted on January 18, 2022 between 3:30 p.m. and the time when the motion to close the Public Hearing is made. During this timeframe, written comments must be submitted by email to: corporate@whistler.ca All submissions will form part of the Public Hearing record and will be added to the Public Hearing Package as they are received. The Public Hearing Package will be available on the RMOW website at: whistler.ca/LUC00006 2. Participate LIVE via Online Video or Phone Conferencing The live Public Hearing will take place January 18, 2022 at 5:30 p.m. via online video and phone conferencing. The Public Hearing will be conducted using Zoom and can be accessed via either online video or phone conferencing. No registration is required.

If you wish to make oral representations to Council on the proposed Bylaw by online video or by phone, please use the Public Hearing web link or one of the phone numbers (including Webinar ID) provided below.

• The web link for the Public Hearing online video option is: https://whistler.zoom.us/j/61200088811 • The phone numbers to access the Public Hearing phone conferencing option are as follows: +1-778-907-2071 +1-647-374-4685 • The Webinar ID is: 612 0008 8811 Instructions for Participating via Zoom Online Video or Phone Conferencing • Online video: It is possible to access the Public Hearing on a computer, tablet or smartphone using the web link above. Your camera will not be available, but your microphone will need to be enabled.

To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, click on the ‘raise hand’ feature. The moderator will allow each person to speak in turn. When it is your turn to speak, your microphone will be unmuted and you will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

• Phone conferencing: To access the Public Hearing by phone, use one of the phone numbers above along with the Webinar ID as prompted. To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, use the ‘raise hand’ feature by dialing [*9]. When it is your turn to speak, the moderator will announce the last three digits of your phone number, and your line will be unmuted. You will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

After the conclusion of this Public Hearing, Council cannot receive representations from the public on the proposed Bylaw.

General information on participating in the RMOW’s electronic public hearings is available here: https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/public-hearings Members of the public can also view the Live Stream of the Public Hearing at: Map showing Subject Lands (Subject Lands are https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/watch-council-meetings outlined in heavy black line and shaded grey)

JANUARY 13, 2022

17

NEWS WHISTLER

‘We know the highway won’t fix itself’ MAYOR SAYS RECENT TRAFFIC CONGESTION SPEAKS TO NEED FOR BOTH SHORT-TERM AND LONG-TERM SOLUTIONS

BY BRANDON BARRETT AS AN ELECTED official, particularly one in a community with as passionate a population as Whistler, you tend to get a lot of messages from your constituents. But even Councillor Ralph Forsyth was taken aback when he checked his inbox after the recent string of traffic delays on Highway 99.

“I’ve never had so many emails,” he said. “As long as people know that we get it, we don’t want this either and we’re doing everything we can.”

Between the seemingly endless snowfall and icy conditions wreaking havoc during Whistler’s usual busy holiday period, major disruptions to several Whistler Transit routes, and the closure of other major B.C. highways pushing motorists to the resort, the past few weeks have proven to be a “perfect storm” of conditions on local roads, Forsyth said.

While traffic volumes over the holidays were below pre-pandemic levels, according to the Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW), local police responded to 13 per cent more collisions than they did in the same period in 2019-20, and 60 per cent more than last year’s holidays.

18 JANUARY 13, 2022

For local Patrick Smyth, that’s meant up to three-hour delays for his fine food delivery company based out of Richmond, and an hour delay from the indoor vertical farm he’s a part of in Pemberton’s industrial park.

“From a business perspective, it’s a pain,” he said. “The other day I had a delivery … and the chef was like, ‘Paddy, where are you?’ I was on West Side [Road].

I couldn’t even get through the highway.

So it was faster for me to take West Side just to do a delivery.

“So from a business point of view, it’s impacted our delivery times, our scheduling and then we’re idling on the road.”

Mayor Jack Crompton heard about similar troubles from numerous Whistlerites in recent weeks, and said he has brought up the issue personally to B.C.’s Ministry of Transportation, responsible for highways in the province, pushing once more for improvements to highway infrastructure, as well as action on a proposed regional transit system that has been on the table for years. The mayor has also requested that municipal staff bring a road management report to the next council meeting on Jan. 25, and intends to ask the RMOW’s Transportation Advisory Group (TAG) to update its previous work on Highway 99.

“We know the highway won’t fix itself,” Crompton said at the Jan. 11 council meeting. “We need to continue to work with the province and be a part of finding appropriate mechanisms that we can implement to help address traffic volumes.”

Crompton noted that officials can’t be narrow-minded when considering solutions.

“I’m convinced we need to take this on with both a short-term and a long-term view in mind as the Lower Mainland and the Sea to Sky continue to grow,” he said.

One short-term solution some residents online have pointed to is bringing back the traffic-flagging program that was implemented at busy intersections in the winter of 2016-17, a joint initiative between the RMOW and Whistler Blackcomb.

According to the RMOW’s analysis, however, the program actually added to the congestion.

“The 2017 program was a success from the public perception perspective, but unfortunately it didn’t provide higher vehicle throughput. In fact, the data showed that the traffic actually moved more slowly when flaggers operated at intersections,” Crompton said.

One of the RMOW’s preferred

approaches is introducing a transit queue jumper lane on the highway, which would help incentivize transit ridership, Crompton said.

“In my view, the best incentive to encourage people to ride the bus is to make the bus a more efficient mode of transportation,” he said. “Certainly if there was a way for the bus to bypass traffic, many of us would have considered it as a preferred option to being in vehicles [during the recent traffic jams].”

Taking a longer view, Forsyth, who also sits on TAG, said future strategies will likely lie in emerging technologies, like autonomous vehicles.

“I don’t think it’s the solutions we’ve thought of to date,” he said. “I don’t think we’re in the time and place for that solution to solve our problems; it’s going to be something we haven’t thought of yet. Or some emerging technology that is not readily available.”

Of course, that is cold comfort for the scores of Whistlerites that have gotten stuck in crawling traffic in recent weeks.

“The No. 1 solution, and people don’t want to hear this, but it’s get on the bus,” Forsyth said. “If we were all on a bus, then that’s probably a quarter of the traffic right there.” n

NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING

TUESDAY, JANUARY 18, 2022 – 5:30 P.M. This Public Hearing will be held electronically pursuant to s.465 of the Local Government Act and Council Procedure Bylaw No. 2207, 2018.

LAND USE CONTRACT TERMINATION BYLAW (4612 BLACKCOMB WAY) NO. 2324, 2021 SUBJECT LANDS: The lands that are the subject of the proposed Bylaw are shown on the map attached to this notice. The civic address is 4612 Blackcomb Way, which is known as the Fairmont Whistler Golf Course.

PURPOSE: In general terms, the purpose of the proposed Bylaw is to: 1) terminate the Blackcomb Land Use Contract (LUC) from where it applies within the subject lands; and 2) apply a new LR11 Zone (Leisure Recreation Eleven) to the subject lands.

If the proposed Bylaw is adopted, it will take effect one year after the date of adoption.

INSPECTION OF DOCUMENTS: A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may be inspected at the Reception Desk of Municipal Hall at 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler, BC, during regular office hours of 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday to Friday (statutory holidays excluded) from January 6, 2022 to and including January 18, 2022.

A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may also be viewed online on the Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) website at: whistler.ca/LUC00002 PUBLIC PARTICIPATION: All persons who believe that their interest in property is affected by the proposed Bylaw will be afforded a reasonable opportunity to be heard by Council at the Public Hearing. All persons can: 1) submit written comments to Council; and/or 2) make oral representations LIVE via online video or phone conferencing. (Your image will not be broadcast to Council or the public.)

1. Submit Written Comments to Council Written comments must be addressed to “Mayor and Council”, and include your name and mailing address. Until 3:30 p.m. on January 18, 2022, written submissions will be received at the following: Email: corporate@whistler.ca Hard Copy: Resort Municipality of Whistler | Legislative Services Department | 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler BC V8E 0X5 Written submissions will also be accepted on January 18, 2022 between 3:30 p.m. and the time when the motion to close the Public Hearing is made. During this timeframe, written comments must be submitted by email to: corporate@whistler.ca All submissions will form part of the Public Hearing record and will be added to the Public Hearing Package as they are received. The Public Hearing Package will be available on the RMOW website at: whistler.ca/LUC00002 2. Participate LIVE via Online Video or Phone Conferencing The live Public Hearing will take place January 18, 2022 at 5:30 p.m. via online video and phone conferencing. The Public Hearing will be conducted using Zoom and can be accessed via either online video or phone conferencing. No registration is required.

If you wish to make oral representations to Council on the proposed Bylaw by online video or by phone, please use the Public Hearing web link or one of the phone numbers (including Webinar ID) provided below.

• The web link for the Public Hearing online video option is: https://whistler.zoom.us/j/61200088811 • The phone numbers to access the Public Hearing phone conferencing option are as follows: +1-778-907-2071 +1-647-374-4685 • The Webinar ID is: 612 0008 8811 Instructions for Participating via Zoom Online Video or Phone Conferencing • Online video: It is possible to access the Public Hearing on a computer, tablet or smartphone using the web link above. Your camera will not be available, but your microphone will need to be enabled.

To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, click on the ‘raise hand’ feature. The moderator will allow each person to speak in turn. When it is your turn to speak, your microphone will be unmuted and you will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

• Phone conferencing: To access the Public Hearing by phone, use one of the phone numbers above along with the Webinar ID as prompted. To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, use the ‘raise hand’ feature by dialing [*9]. When it is your turn to speak, the moderator will announce the last three digits of your phone number, and your line will be unmuted. You will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

After the conclusion of this Public Hearing, Council cannot receive representations from the public on the proposed Bylaw.

General information on participating in the RMOW’s electronic public hearings is available here: https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/public-hearings Members of the public can also view the Live Stream of the Public Hearing at: Map showing Subject Lands (Subject Lands are outlined in heavy black line and shaded grey) https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/watch-council-meetings

JANUARY 13, 2022

19

NEWS WHISTLER

Suite complaint leads to housing discussion at Whistler council table COUNCIL WANTS TO UPDATE PAYMENT STRUCTURE THAT ALLOWS OWNERS TO BUY OUT MANDATORY EMPLOYEE SUITE

BY BRANDON BARRETT IN THE FINAL days of 2020, the Resort Municipality of Whistler’s (RMOW) bylaw department received a complaint that a suite in a Spring Creek property was not being occupied as required by a qualified local employee.

About a week later, bylaw notified the owner on Tynebridge Lane that they were not in compliance with their housing agreement, and on June 10, 2021, the owner submitted an application to discharge the mandatory suite covenant—at a cost.

Dating back to a rarely used cash-inlieu procedure from 2004, the owner had the option of paying nearly $200,000 to the municipality’s employee housing reserve fund to effectively buy out the suite.

At Tuesday’s council meeting, held over Zoom, some elected officials raised concern over the precedent such a cost structure would set in Whistler’s red-hot housing market.

“There’s a reason that these covenants were put on: it’s to create housing,” said

Councillor Cathy Jewett. “This actually doesn’t replace anything. Yes, it helps fund it, but it doesn’t replace the actual unit and it also increases the erosion of neighbourhoods.”

The main issue surrounds how the cash-in-lieu amount is calculated. In 2004, the council of the day set it at $150,000, to be adjusted annually to the Consumer Price Index, which in 2021, puts it at $198,409.73.

“In a housing market where prices are 20- to 30-per-cent higher, it seems like this is a very good deal for this person,” said Coun. Ralph Forsyth.

Ultimately, council passed an amended motion at its Jan. 11 meeting calling for municipal staff to review the current cashin-lieu procedure and establish a policy for future modifications to discharge mandatory resident employee suite covenants. But the greenlight came with a hitch: by passing the motion, it meant the almost $200,000 buyout would still go ahead. Only Jewett opposed, worried of the “domino effect” it could create.

The RMOW has received a recent inquiry from someone interested in a buyout of their own after hearing about the Tynebridge

property, but there have only been two other instances since 2004 of owners actually discharging their mandatory employee covenant for cash—one on Khyber Lane and one on Hillcrest Lane.

“There’s a reason that these covenants were put on: it’s to create housing.”

- CATHY JEWETT

“So this isn’t something that’s going to all of a sudden snowball, I don’t believe, having been on the [Whistler Housing Authority board] and whatnot since then,” said Coun. Jen Ford.

The mandatory suite covenant established in 2004 was the result of a

subdivision of lots two years earlier in Spring Creek; 13 of 26 lots are required to provide an employee suite, an effort in part to boost Whistler’s affordable inventory.

Ford said there has been some confusion around the policy in the public sphere.

“This is one of those policies that a lot of people mistakenly have pointed to over the years saying that all of Whistler’s market housing has required these suites. That’s not true,” she explained.

“There are only certain neighbourhoods that had this, certain subdivisions that had this—and it didn’t necessarily create the housing stock that was envisioned.”

While supportive of the review, Coun.

John Grills stressed the importance of balancing Whistler’s clear need for employee housing with a cost structure that incentivizes homeowners.

“At the same time as staff look into this, it’s important that it makes sense and that it’s not so restrictive that people just don’t exercise the ability to buy it out and just not use the space for either a suite, or the housing reserve doesn’t get the money,” he said. “So there’s a fine line between making this work for both parties.” n

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NOTICE OF PUBLIC HEARING

TUESDAY, JANUARY 18, 2022 – 5:30 P.M. This Public Hearing will be held electronically pursuant to s.465 of the Local Government Act and Council Procedure Bylaw No. 2207, 2018.

LAND USE CONTRACT TERMINATION BYLAW (VALE) NO. 2309, 2021 SUBJECT LANDS: The lands that are the subject of the proposed Bylaw are shown on the map attached to this notice. The civic addresses are 2110 and 2111 Whistler Road. The subject lands are known as the Vale townhouses and Vale Inn. PURPOSE: In general terms, the purpose of the proposed Bylaw is to: 1) terminate the Vale Land Use Contract (LUC) from the subject lands; and 2) apply a new RM71 Zone (Residential Multiple Seventy-One) to the subject lands.

The new RM71 Zone proposes to change the permitted use of the Vale Inn (located at 2111 Whistler Road on strata lot 37 of strata plan VAS549) from “hotel” as specified in the LUC to “apartment” including a provision to allow for the apartment units to be used for temporary accommodation when not occupied for residential use.

If the proposed Bylaw is adopted, it will take effect one year after the date of adoption.

INSPECTION OF DOCUMENTS: A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may be inspected at the Reception Desk of Municipal Hall at 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler, BC, during regular office hours of 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday to Friday (statutory holidays excluded) from January 6, 2022 to and including January 18, 2022.

A copy of the proposed Bylaw and relevant background documentation along with written submissions received may also be viewed online on the Resort Municipality of Whistler (RMOW) website at: whistler.ca/LUC00010 PUBLIC PARTICIPATION: All persons who believe that their interest in property is affected by the proposed Bylaw will be afforded a reasonable opportunity to be heard by Council at the Public Hearing. All persons can: 1) submit written comments to Council; and/or 2) make oral representations LIVE via online video or phone conferencing. (Your image will not be broadcast to Council or the public.)

1. Submit Written Comments to Council Written comments must be addressed to “Mayor and Council”, and include your name and mailing address. Until 3:30 p.m. on January 18, 2022, written submissions will be received at the following: Email: corporate@whistler.ca Hard Copy: Resort Municipality of Whistler Legislative Services Department 4325 Blackcomb Way Whistler BC V8E 0X5 Written submissions will also be accepted on January 18, 2022 between 3:30 p.m. and the time when the motion to close the Public Hearing is made. During this timeframe, written comments must be submitted by email to: corporate@whistler.ca All submissions will form part of the Public Hearing record and will be added to the Public Hearing Package as they are received. The Public Hearing Package will be available on the RMOW website at: whistler.ca/LUC00010 2. Participate LIVE via Online Video or Phone Conferencing The live Public Hearing will take place January 18, 2022 at 5:30 p.m. via online video and phone conferencing. The Public Hearing will be conducted using Zoom and can be accessed via either online video or phone conferencing. No registration is required.

If you wish to make oral representations to Council on the proposed Bylaw by online video or by phone, please use the Public Hearing web link or one of the phone numbers (including Webinar ID) provided below.

• The web link for the Public Hearing online video option is: https://whistler.zoom.us/j/61200088811 • The phone numbers to access the Public Hearing phone conferencing option are as follows: +1-778-907-2071 +1-647-374-4685 • The Webinar ID is: 612 0008 8811 Instructions for Participating via Zoom Online Video or Phone Conferencing • Online video: It is possible to access the Public Hearing on a computer, tablet or smartphone using the web link above. Your camera will not be available, but your microphone will need to be enabled. To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, click on the ‘raise hand’ feature. The moderator will allow each person to speak in turn. When it is your turn to speak, your microphone will be unmuted and you will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

• Phone conferencing: To access the Public Hearing by phone, use one of the phone numbers above along with the Webinar ID as prompted. To indicate that you wish to make an oral representation, use the ‘raise hand’ feature by dialing [*9]. When it is your turn to speak, the moderator will announce the last three digits of your phone number, and your line will be unmuted. You will be asked to provide your name and address for the public record. Please be patient as there may be others in the queue before you.

After the conclusion of this Public Hearing, Council cannot receive representations from the public on the proposed Bylaw.

General information on participating in the RMOW’s electronic public hearings is available here: https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/public-hearings Members of the public can also view the Live Stream of the Public Hearing at: Map showing Subject Lands (Subject Lands are https://www.whistler.ca/municipal-gov/council/watch-council-meetings outlined in heavy black line and shaded grey)

JANUARY 13, 2022

21

NEWS WHISTLER

Whistler welcomes home its first baby of 2022 RONEAL ANDRE SIBAL BORN AT SQUAMISH GENERAL HOSPITAL ON SUNDAY, JAN. 2

BY MEGAN LALONDE RONEAL AND FAITH Sibal were just relieved their third child wouldn’t have to share their birthday with any other members of their immediate family.

The couple’s six-year-old daughter and five-year-old son were both born on March 8—the same date as Faith. “So three of them are already celebrating their birthday on the same day,” Roneal explained with a laugh.

With Faith’s due date set for Jan. 21, 2022, the possibility that their youngest son would become Whistler’s first resident born this year didn’t even cross their minds.

But that’s exactly what happened when Roneal Andre Sibal, named after his father, was born at Squamish General Hospital via C-section at 10:16 a.m. on Jan. 2, weighing 2.49 kilograms.

It started when Faith went in for a scheduled check-up on Jan. 1, only to discover her blood pressure had skyrocketed. “She was experiencing preeclampsia,” her husband explained.

22 JANUARY 13, 2022

Faith had been on maternity leave since early December, after a false labour scare at 30 weeks forced her into bed rest.

Roneal Sr. was on his way to work at the Fairmont Chateau Whistler when his phone rang. “She called me and said, ‘The doctor said we need to go to the hospital right now,’” he explained.

Roneal hastily informed his head chef, met his wife by the gondola, and the couple hopped aboard a bus to Squamish. Once at the hospital, they were presented with two options: stay and have Faith induced, or head back home to Whistler, keep resting, and wait for things to get rolling naturally.

The family chose Option 1. Once Faith’s labour kicked into gear between 7 and 8 p.m., “we were still hoping that he might be a New Year’s Day baby,” Roneal recalled.

“That was a very long day.”

Roneal has been working in the Fairmont’s kitchen since he arrived in Canada from the Philippines three years ago, before Faith followed him to Whistler in January 2021. Their two children stayed in the Philippines while the parents worked on sorting out their visas. After lengthy

NEW YEAR’S BABY Parents Roneal and Faith Sibal welcomed son Roneal Andre Sibal into the world at Squamish General Hospital on Sunday, Jan. 2. He is Whistler’s first baby born this year, according to Vancouver Coastal Health.

PHOTO SUBMITTED

immigration delays, Roneal and Faith’s elder children are expected to finally arrive in the resort for good in June, once their school year comes to an end.

The siblings video chat with their new baby brother “every day,” said Roneal.

“They always want to see their new buddy.”

In case an early, almost-New-Year’s-Day birth wasn’t enough excitement, another factor made Roneal Jr.’s birth all the more special: it was the first time his dad could witness one of his children entering the world.

“In the Philippines, I cannot go in the labour room or the operating room—I can’t be beside her,” he explained. “But here in Canada, generally, you can be by her side … I just wanted my wife to feel that I [was] there for her.

“Before, I was just waiting outside the labour room.”

Faith has since been recovering at home while Roneal takes some time off from work to be with his family. “She’s feeling great, she’s doing great on healing herself,” he said. “Everything is new for us. Everything feels like the first time again.”

For now, the parents are enjoying bonding with their newest addition while looking ahead to reuniting with their children this summer and raising them here in the resort.

“My other two kids are going be here soon. Being all with each other, and starting our family here in Whistler, that’s what I’m really excited for,” said Roneal. “That’s what my goal was, since the day that I came here. I wanted them to be here, right away.” n

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NEWS WHISTLER

Demand for COVID-19 testing in Whistler stays steady following holidays A RECENT DROP IN HOWE SOUND’S WEEKLY CASELOAD ISN’T NECESSARILY REPRESENTATIVE OF COMMUNITY TRANSMISSION, SAYS DOCTOR

BY MEGAN LALONDE WHILE B.C. PROVINCIAL health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said Tuesday, Jan. 11 that she’s “getting the sense that we have levelled off somewhat,” in terms of COVID-19 infections, local officials caution that a relative dip in the number of cases recorded in Whistler’s local health area during the last week of December may not paint the full picture of transmission within the community.

Currently, “the vast majority” of people seeking COVID-19 tests in the resort are being provided with take-home rapid tests, which aren’t included in the official counts, said Whistler Medical Clinic’s Dr. Karin Kausky.

The Howe Sound Local Health Area (LHA), which includes Whistler, Pemberton, Squamish and parts of the southern Stl’atl’imx Nation, recorded 208 confirmed cases of COVID-19 between Dec. 26 and Jan. 1.

That’s down from the all-time high of 391 cases recorded in the region the week prior, between Dec. 19 and 25, but more than the 125 cases logged between Dec. 12 and 18, and far greater than the double-digit weekly case counts the LHA was registering prior

to the Omicron variant’s surge. (B.C. LHA weekly COVID-19 case counts for the most recent seven-day period spanning Sunday to Saturday are released each Wednesday, after Pique’s print deadline.)

While those numbers have long served as an important measuring stick for transmission across the corridor, daily and weekly caseloads can no longer be relied on as an accurate representation of the number of active cases in a given community.

“We’re not counting cases like we used to. We’re just at a part of the pandemic where that may not be the most useful information,” said Kausky.

“We’ve also heard Bonnie Henry say, once we have this level of community transmission of Omicron, if you have classic signs and symptoms, it doesn’t even make sense to do the rapid tests. It’s definitely an option to stay home and self-isolate.”

For locals living in shared accommodation, “there’s probably no need to test 15 people that all live together who have similar symptoms,” Kausky added. “I think if somebody’s tested positive, then you can just assume everybody’s positive and do the five days of isolation—which is quite a bit shorter [than previous isolation

guidlines—and then wear a mask for the following five days.”

Rather than gauging transmission through case counts, experts are now looking more closely at hospitalization rates and test positivity—data that’s far harder to nail down for smaller areas.

Henry acknowledged Tuesday that hospitalizations have been rising in recent weeks, reaching an eight-month high on Jan. 11. As such, public health orders “are likely to remain unchanged” for the time being, the provincial health officer explained. Health Minister Adrian Dix provided data to show that B.C. hospitals are not yet overwhelmed, with nearly 81.2 per cent of B.C.’s total acutecare beds filled.

More detailed modelling on hospitalizations will be released Friday.

“I want to encourage people this wave is moving quickly. And it means you need to do everything to protect yourself right now. And we know that this wave will move through quickly as well,” Henry said.

“We tend to see this with any pathogen that has a shorter incubation period, you see these rapidly explosive growth [periods], and you also see a rapid decrease once a certain level has been reached in the population.”

Henry cautioned, however, that is far from a certainty and some other countries are having different, more severe experiences with the Omicron wave.

Demand for testing in the resort is also levelling off since it skyrocketed last month, said Kausky.

“We had a massive increase preChristmas, and I think it’s stayed pretty steady” since, she explained.

Those experiencing COVID-19 symptoms—including a runny nose, sore throat, cough and fever—can access a rapid test in Whistler, available at a distribution site in Olympic Plaza that’s open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.

Health-care workers and those experiencing severe symptoms qualify for the more-reliable PCR test, which can be booked by texting Whistler’s COVID-19 testing line at 604-966-1428.

Though Whistler’s medical facilities are not immune to the wide-scale staff shortages that have accompanied the recent explosion in local cases, Kausky said the resort has rallied together to help keep up with the demand. In particular, the clinic’s COVID-19 response efforts have received tremendous support from

Resort Municipality of Whistler

Accessibility and Inclusion Committee Membership The Resort Municipality of Whistler is seeking qualified applicants to serve in a voluntary capacity on the Accessibility and Inclusion Committee for the 2022 Resort Municipality of Whistler to 2024 term. Applications are being sought for two community members.

Recreation and Leisure Advisory Committee Membership

The Accessibility and Inclusion Committee is a volunteer committee appointed by Council to advise on matters concerning accessibility and inclusion in Whistler. The Committee’s Terms of Reference can be viewed at: whistler.ca/AIC Nominees may include: with disabilities; The• Persons Resort Municipality of Whistler is seeking qualified applicants to serve in a voluntary • Caregivers; and capacity on the Recreation and Leisure Advisory Committee for the 2020 to 2022 term.or tourism sectors whose roles • Professionals in the accommodation This include committee is to provide an objective view in the public interest inclusion and accessibility. to municipal staff and Council on the provision and delivery of indoor Apply submitting a brief statement reflects your services interest inand issues. and by outdoor recreation and leisurethat opportunities, Download terms of reference for this committee participating on this Committee to the Planning Department: at whistler. ca/committees.

ByApply mail: Planning Department by submitting a resume and brief statement that reflects your interest in participating on this committee in PDF format to Resort Municipality of Whistler resortexperience@whistler.ca.

Include ‘RLAC 4325 Blackcomb Way, Whistler, BC V8E 0X5 Membership’ in the subject line.

ByPhone email: planning@whistler.ca 604-935-8180 for more information.

Phone: 604-935-8170 Submission deadline: Monday January 27, 2020 at 4 p.m.

Submission deadline: Thursday, January 20, 2022 at 4:30 p.m.

Resort Municipality of Whistler whistler.ca/AIC

24 JANUARY 13, 2022

the Resort Municipality of Whistler and Whistler Community Services Society in recent weeks, she explained.

“They’ve been partnering with us in scaling up in this incredibly big way, so that’s been really motivating and really nice to get to work with our community partners, and I think that’s what keeps everybody’s morale up as well. We’ve had a lot of volunteers putting rapid kits together and the municipality supplying both staff as well as [help with] logistics and space. So it has really been, once again, an incredibly collaborative community effort.”

Everyday is Better with Jewellery

HAVE YOU HAD COVID-19 RECENTLY? CHANCES ARE HIGH YOUR ANSWER IS ‘YES’ Pique ran a poll on its website last week that asked 286 readers whether they’d caught the virus recently. (Of those 286 respondents, 73 are from within the Whistler community.)

More than 52 per cent of both local and total respondents answered ‘Yes,’ they’ve had COVID-19 recently. More than 45 per cent of locals and 43 per cent of total respondents said ‘No,’ but acknowledged they know someone who did, while less than three per cent of locals and 4.5 per cent of all respondents replied ‘No,’ and said they I didn’t know anyone who has.

The margin of error for the poll is +/5.72%, 19 times out of 20.

—With files from Glen Korstrom and Colin Dacre, Castanet n

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NEWS WHISTLER

Sea to Sky students head back to class with new protocols in place STAGGERED START TIMES, MORE DISTANCING ON THE AGENDA AS SCHOOL DISTRICT PREPARES FOR POSSIBLE STAFF SHORTAGES

BY MEGAN LALONDE SEA TO SKY STUDENTS likely noticed a few changes when they returned to class on Monday, Jan. 10, following an extended holiday break.

At Whistler Secondary School, for example, those changes—triggered by surging Omicron cases—include staggered start times and dismissals, and lunches eaten in classrooms so masks can be worn in spaces like the gym and hallways. Students will also store their boots, jackets, backpacks and textbooks in classrooms for the month of January, rather than in lockers, according to a letter sent to parents.

Across the Sea to Sky School District (SD48), existing safety measures like daily health checks and staying home if sick, handwashing and mask-wearing will be reinforced; while school gatherings and events will be held virtually whenever possible. In-person events like sports games and theatre productions will not exceed 50 per cent of site capacity and no outside spectators will be allowed, while all extra-curricular sports tournaments involving three or more teams are on hold.

B.C. K-12 schools’ reopening, originally

scheduled for Jan. 3, was delayed to give school districts time to implement additional protocols and public health officials time to assess the risks posed by the Omicron variant.

Schools remained open to children of frontline workers and those with special needs.

“Our school staff and our district staff spent the week getting ready, and big thanks to them,” said SD48 superintendent Chris Nicholson. “They really worked hard to ensure we opened on [Jan. 10] with our protocols in place, as well as did some planning so if we do have a potential school closure, that we’re ready to pivot to provide support for kids.”

Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside said on Friday, Jan. 7 that individual COVID-19 exposures in schools will no longer be reported to parents, as the more-transmissible variant continues to complicate COVID-19 contact tracing efforts. Instead, attendance will be closely monitored, and reported to public health officials if it falls below typical rates.

A dip in attendance could elicit an investigation by Vancouver Coastal Health, and a resulting “health closure” if the school’s case count is deemed concerning.

Nicholson said SD48 is currently “gathering information” to establish its attendance baselines. On Monday, “if we look

at across the district, I think it’s fair to say there was an increased number of kids away than is typical,” he acknowledged. “But not to the extent that ... [it] caused concern in terms of public health considerations.”

The school district has also been bracing for potential staff shortages.

SD48 administrators could implement a “functional closure” of a school if a lack of staff compromises its ability to provide the level of instruction, supervision, support, or custodial services needed to ensure students’ health and safety, Nicholson said.

During either type of closure, instruction would temporarily shift to online learning.

A functional closure, however, would be a last resort for SD48, said the superintendent.

“We’ve got a number of strategies ready to go,” Nicholson explained, from bringing in teachers on call to rotating educators and administrators into new roles, classrooms and even schools as needed.

“We’ll do what we can, safely, to keep schools open, and it would only be in the event that we feel we fully exhausted everything that we then make a connection with the provincial government to let them know that [temporarily shifting to online learning] is what we’re feeling we need to do,” he said.

In the event of a functional closure, schools would strive to stay open for children

of essential workers or students that need extra supports they can’t access at home, Nicholson added.

While other school districts have named a hard-and-fast number of missing students or staff that would warrant a health or functional closure in their schools, Nicholson said the scenario isn’t so black and white for SD48.

Because school sizes vary greatly across the corridor and “because we’re small, we’re able to know our schools really well,” he explained. “I think that gives us a little more flexibility in making decisions.”

In terms of student attendance, “we’re a little different here,” Nicholson added.

“We’ve got some amazing kids who are away [because they’re] competitive athletes. We don’t want to inadvertently say, ‘Oh gosh, we’ve reached this threshold,’ and find out it’s because we’ve got a group of kids training for downhill ski racing.”

The province has also committed to distributing rapid tests to B.C. schools in the coming days.

Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry acknowledged last week that concern among parents—especially those with vulnerable family members—is understandable, but schools are safe places to be because of the structure in place.

—With files from Jeff Bell, Times Colonist n

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JANUARY 13, 2022

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NEWS PEMBERTON & THE VALLEY

‘Unprecedented’ Pemberton snowfall creating challenges for crews VILLAGE OF PEMBERTON WARY OF POTENTIAL FLOODING AS SNOW TURNS TO RAIN

BY HARRISON BROOKS IN THE WAKE of what he calls an unprecedented amount of snow, Tom Cloutier, operations manager for Miller Capilano, which holds the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MOTI) contract for highway maintenance in the Pemberton area, wants to give a shout-out to his crew who have been working long hours to keep up with the snow-clearing efforts in Pemberton.

“It’s been a lot of work. I haven’t seen anything like this since probably 1998 or maybe even earlier throughout the area,” Cloutier said. “So it’s been a struggle for sure with that much snow and no relief in between storms, like back-to-back storms.

Our crews have been super busy, working long hours, working Christmas and New Year’s and Boxing Day, so we’ve got to give a big shout-out to those guys for making the effort to come in to work on those days.”

But despite the long days worked by the Miller Capilano crew, with multiple heavy snowfalls in a short period of time at the beginning of January, it has been a struggle to keep up with clearing all the roads in a timely manner, Cloutier said, which can then lead to more issues down the line as snow continues to accumulate.

“Typically, if we can clear the shoulders then the guys have more snow storage.

SNOW PROBLEM Crews in Pemberton have been working long hours to keep the roads clear after multiple major snow events this winter.

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28 JANUARY 13, 2022

But because we haven’t had a chance to do that, the snowbanks are becoming higher, and the road becomes narrower because we can’t throw it over the top of the snowbank,” he said.

And with Miller Capilano’s priorities being Highway 99, Portage Road, and Pemberton Meadows Road, another issue caused by the near-constant snowfall the Pemberton Valley has seen is some seemingly longer-than-usual waits for certain side roads to get cleared, which in turn has led to some residents having to take matters into their own hands.

burn down because fire trucks can’t get in, or someone’s going to die because the ambulance can’t get in.”

He knows the crews have their hands full, but given that Erickson Road is quite short, it wouldn’t take much to clear it, Hickinbottom said.

“They go by and plow the main roads, and ours is only a kilometre long,” he said.

“So if they actually turn down and kept the speed up, they can blow it open quite easy.”

While Cloutier appreciates the extra help and calls what Hickinbottom and others in the area do to help clear certain

“What concerns me the most is someone’s house is going to burn down because fire trucks can’t get in, or someone’s going to die because the ambulance can’t get in.”

- JASON HICKINBOTTOM

But after spending countless hours over many years clearing the road to his farm and all the neighbouring driveways himself, local farmer Jason Hickinbottom is just about fed up with how long it takes the highways crew to clear Erickson Road despite it branching off the high-priority Pemberton Meadows Road.

“I normally don’t like dealing with any of this kind of stuff, but I’m so sick of it.

Like, where the hell are all these guys? You see them sitting around half the time on the side of the road, what are they doing?” said Hickinbottom. “What concerns me the most is someone’s house is going to

roads a “welcomed relief,” he said the crew at Millar Capilano has been adhering to the response times outlined in their contract.

“There are some response times that we have to adhere to within the contract and a lot of times they’re not what people think they should be,” said Cloutier. “There’s also snowfall accumulation [guidelines saying] we don’t even have to go to the road if it’s not 15 or 20 centimetres of accumulation.

So sometimes they think it should be serviced better than it really needs to be in accordance with our contract.”

According to Hickinbottom, this year has been the last straw. And while he will

probably continue to clear his neighbours’ driveways and make sure they can get to Pemberton Meadows Road without any issues, he has also been keeping a tally of the hours he’s spent clearing the road for the highways crew and plans to send Miller Capilano a bill for his efforts.

Meanwhile, due to staff shortages and equipment failures, the Village of Pemberton (VOP) has also been struggling to keep up with its snow-plowing duties.

According to VOP operations and projects manager Tom Csima, not only has the amount of snowfall had the town’s snow removal crews playing catch-up and working overtime to clear the roads in a timely manner, but with the recent warm weather and rainfall of the last few days, flooding concerns have now taken over top priority.

“We’ve kind of put a halt to cleaning up because we’re expecting a lot of rain,” Csima said.

“And so one area of focus is making sure that all the drainage and storm systems like stormwater catch basins are clear so that the rain has somewhere to go, because that’s a problem in the winter when you get the rain-on-snow events.”

Heavy rain melts the snow, which adds to the volume in drainage and storm systems, leading to the potential for backedup drains and flooding, Csima said.

“So this week, that’s what we’re really focusing on,” he said.

“Unfortunately, as a result, that means that we’re not tidying up some of the streets as best as we normally would. But I think everyone knows that risk because it happens here fairly regularly, so that’s our big focus right now.” n

JANUARY 13, 2022

29

SCIENCE MATTERS

Rest is good, but resolving global crises means not looking away

THE 2021-2022 PEMBERTON GUIDE on stands now!

WHEN PEOPLE do things they shouldn’t, they often try to distract attention from their actions. Guardian writer George Monbiot notes that many corporations fuelling the planet’s destruction spend significant resources to shift attention away from themselves and onto us.

“The deliberate effort to stop us seeing the bigger picture began in 1953 with a campaign called Keep America Beautiful. It was founded by packaging manufacturers, motivated by the profits they could make by replacing reusable containers with disposable plastic,” he writes. “In 2004,

BY DAVID SUZUKI the advertising company Ogilvy & Mather, working for the oil giant BP, took this blame-shifting a step further by inventing the personal carbon footprint. It was a useful innovation, but it also had the effect of diverting political pressure from the producers of fossil fuels to consumers.”

“Greenwashing” is another way corporations divert attention from their true ecological impacts. As British psychology professor Steven Reicher points out, “One recent McDonald’s spot boasts of the way the company is recycling cooking oil into truck fuel, coffee cups into greetings cards, and plastic toys into children’s playgrounds. The problem is that it makes no mention of the fact that McDonald’s beef footprint alone constitutes 22m metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions a year.”

It’s hard to take on systems, but until we do, they’ll continue to grind up nature and spit out profit where rivers, forests and meadows once stood.

Systemic and environmental racism underpin these systems.

Systemic racism provides advantages (and inheritances), privileging white people in employment, education, justice and social standing. It enabled the mandate under which colonizers have invaded lands, occupied Indigenous territories and exploited nature for financial gain.

As a result of environmental racism, Indigenous and racialized communities have been placed at greater risk of living adjacent to land degradation and pollution from industrial activities and waste disposal.

Our economic system has strong hands upon the bellows. It promotes growth with no limits, which leads to such degradation of nature that about a million species are at risk of extinction—more than ever in human history.

This economic system also results in gross inequities. It’s possible for one person to make $36 billion in a day—more than the yearly gross domestic product of some countries. As Monbiot writes, “The richest 1 per cent of the world’s people (those earning more than $172,000 a year) produce 15 per cent of the world’s carbon emissions: twice the combined impact of the poorest 50 per cent.” He proposes “a new system, in which there is ‘private sufficiency and public luxury.’”

In his words, “While there is not enough ecological or even physical space on Earth for everyone to enjoy private luxury, there

[F]ocusing on the personal runs the risk of eclipsing our responsibility to also marshal systemic change.

AN OFFICIAL PUBLICATION OF

30 JANUARY 13, 2022

Facing the real issues often leaves us feeling anger, anxiety and despair. While these are reasonable responses to the environmental crises engulfing us, the multi-billion-dollar self-help industry has profited enormously by convincing us that fixing ourselves is the priority.

How do we balance the need for personal change with systemic change, when both are necessary?

Personal actions can create consumer demand for sustainably made products, model greener behaviours and foster empowerment. But focusing on the personal runs the risk of eclipsing our responsibility to also marshal systemic change.

As Reichler notes, “McDonald’s advertising approach is emblematic of the way in which companies seek to continue with business as usual, by distracting us from where the real problems lie. Its adverts represent just one of many strategies by which this is accomplished. One of the most common methods is to turn the climate crisis from a systemic into an individual issue.”

is enough to provide everyone with public luxury: magnificent parks, hospitals, swimming pools, art galleries, tennis courts and transport systems, playgrounds and community centres.”

It’s a lot to take on, and it’s good to check out at times—to find respite in bingewatching, books, self-care routines or nature—as long as we check back in. Change won’t happen until we demand it, and unless we face the flames (metaphorically and, increasingly, literally), there is little chance we’ll be sufficiently motivated to put them out.

It’s not all work. Joy can be found in dreaming up creative responses (think of the many clever protest signs!) and joining in community. To paraphrase Joan Baez, activism is the best antidote to despair.

David Suzuki is a scientist, broadcaster, author and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Boreal Project Manager Rachel Plotkin. ■

RANGE ROVER

Being Anna NO ONE IS HARDER on Anna Segal than Anna Segal.

That much is clear of the skier who cut her teeth on the gum-tree-constellated slopes north of Melbourne, Australia; who represented her country in slopestyle at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia; who threw down in the 2021 Blank Collective film, Tales from Cascadia; and who copped

BY LESLIE ANTHONY a stylie grab for photographer Mattias Fredriksson on a recent cover of Sweden’s Åka Skidor (the shooter’s 500th it turns out). Though quick to condemn her own slow learning when it comes to sledding, picking lines or building “shitty jumps” that still somehow deliver photographic gold, she’s just as quick to question her selfflagellation on social media. “[It all] goes to show there’s no point in getting frustrated while skiing—maybe one day I’ll learn to live by these words.”

Maybe. But some part of getting frustrated, pushing through, and levelling up is clearly working for Anna Segal.

It goes back to her days on the Australian mogul development team, where she’d play around in “crappy little Aussie parks” after training. Following a major knee injury in

SLOPESTYLE QUEEN

Some part of getting frustrated, pushing through, and levelling up is clearly working for pro skier Anna Segal.

PHOTO SUBMITTED

moguls, she switched to park full-time, inspired by freestylers Sarah Burke, Kristi Leskinen and Marie Martinod. Landing in North America, Segal headed to Aspen and threw herself at the park. By 2006 she felt ready to enter her first premier women’s slopestyle event—Queen’s Cup—where she competed against her heroes. Her first big result came at the next year’s U.S. Open.

“It was a big, scary course but moguls had given me a good competition mindset.

Sarah, Kristi and Marie were there, and though I didn’t have some of their tricks— and was skiing with a cast on my hand, black eye and scrapes on my face—I was solid enough to win.”

The transition was neither quick nor easy. “It’s almost harder to bring tricks to the backcountry because there isn’t all the time for training on trampolines and in the park. I could throw 360s and backflips off anything, but time spent touring, learning mountain safety and sledding takes away some of that.”

As Segal persisted with her quest, she made another move. “At a World Cup in Colorado I was riding a lift with [fellow competitor] Yuki Tsubota. She asked what I was going to do after Sochi. I knew the fire was gone from competing, so I said ‘Probably just ski pow.’ Yuki told me Whistler was the best place in the world to do that.”

“It’s almost harder to bring tricks to the backcountry because there isn’t all the time for training on trampolines and in the park.”

- ANNA SEGAL

The next eight years on the international slopestyle circuit are a blur spun with glints of metal: gold, silver and bronze at the Winter X Games; gold at FIS Worlds; 2nd overall in the 2012 AFP World Tour; a 4th in the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.

Prior to the Olympics, nursing the chronic pain of multiple injuries, Segal already felt the urge to branch out, be a more rounded skier, and get in front of the camera. “I wanted to see what I could do in the backcountry because I enjoyed it and liked climbing uphill.”

The idea stuck. But having only attended Whistler’s World Ski & Snowboard Festival to compete followed by partying in the village, she knew little of the mountains or community. “I didn’t have any close friends here so it was a scary move. I was in Whistler five years before I bought a place in Pemberton; it was more affordable, friends were moving there, and that’s where my partner lived, so it made sense.”

She spent her first year in Whistler skiing a lot of park, then started filming with local director Jeff Thomas. Though mostly ad

campaigns, it was a stepping stone to Blank Collective. “The first season with Blank I went out a few days, then last year I got on as a main skier. Of course, I wanted to be charging right out of the gate, but I had to take a step back and learn a few skills. It was a struggle but a good experience.”

Segal is no stranger to taking things into her own hands. Along with younger sister Natalie—3rd overall on the 2013 Freeride World Tour and a 2014 National Geographic Young Explorer—Segal co-produced the 2018 film Finding the Line. “No one was knocking on our doors,” she says of the era when both were transitioning from their respective pro careers, “so we thought we’d do a sister project with a storyline. After six months of arguments and tears, we looked a bit deeper and it went from a one-season shoot to a three-year film that explored how each of us deals with fear in the mountains. It was like completing a master’s degree because it took every ounce of our knowledge and intelligence to finish. After that we just wanted to be athletes again.”

These days Segal is leaning into the opportunities of her new backyard and trying to be less hard on herself. She visits Natalie in Revelstoke, makes ski trips through northern B.C., and does outreach as an athlete ambassador for Protect Our Winters (POW) Canada. With all the uncertainty around travel, the upcoming winter remains an open book. “I’ve gotten used to not planning,” she says. “I’m happy to just stay around here and explore.”

Leslie Anthony is a Whistler-based author, editor, biologist and bon vivant who has never met a mountain he didn't like. ■

JANUARY 13, 2022

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FEATURE STORY

32 JANUARY 13, 2022

FEATURE STORY

CANADIAN RESIDENTIAL SCHOOL GRAVES FORCED THE WORLD TO LOOK. WHAT HAS CHANGED? In a year when nearly 1,400 unmarked graves were discovered at residential schools, a new report finds only 11 of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 calls to action have been completed. Is Canada at a turning point or will this ‘abysmal’ record continue?

“G BY

STEFAN

LABBÉ

ood fortune” is the way Ron Ignace describes his early years. As a young boy, his great-grandfather would show him how to burn grass and shrubs to heal the land around Deadman’s Creek Valley.

“Then I got pulled off to residential school,” he said.

“There’s only one in this area—that’s called Kamloops Indian Residential School.”

May 4, 1962, is still burned into Ignace’s memory: the day he ran away.

Ignace knew the school would come west to the Skeetchestn reserve to look for him.

So, at 16 years old, he fled to an aunt’s house 80 kilometres to the north.

He went to work in sawmills and on railways, ranches and apple orchards.

“You name it,” he said, describing his tortuous path to Simon Fraser University, where he studied Indigenous oral history. He eventually made it back to Skeetchestn, where he would serve as chief for 32 years until his retirement last spring.

Thousands of other children, including one of Ignace’s aunts, never shared his fortune—their stories cut short, veiled in church records and in the memories of those who survived.

That is, until a rib bone surfaced in an old apple orchard. Next came a tooth. The Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation brought experts to uncover what time and earth had

JANUARY 13, 2022

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FEATURE STORY buried at the site of the old residential school. in August, Ottawa pledged another $321 million to help On May 27, Kukpi7 (Chief) Rosanne Casimir told the Indigenous communities search residential school rural sites. world ground-penetrating radar had revealed the remains But a true reckoning has just begun. First Nations of 215 unmarked graves. across Canada are either actively searching or planning to “I’m hoping that now people will believe us when we dig up the past in at least another 16 schools. say that there was a policy of genocide against Indigenous What that means for reconciling Canada’s atrocities peoples,” Ignace said following the discovery. against Indigenous peoples is not as clear. Seven months From the 19th century to the 1970s, more than 150,000 after the discovery in Kamloops, how far has the country Indigenous children aged six to 16 were forced to attend really come? state-funded Christian schools designed to assimilate them into Canadian society in what the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) report has described as “cultural genocide.”

B.C. FINDS HEALING IN GRIEF Children were removed from their families, not allowed to speak their own language and forced to convert to Christianity. he graves in Kamloops instantly echoed in the lives of More than 38,000 children were verbally, physically and countless British Columbians, a void filled by public sexually abused, triggering lifetimes of trauma. According to displays of emptiness. the TRC report, at least 6,000 Indigenous children are thought Two-hundred-and-fifteen vacant chairs on a school to have died between the 1880s and 1996. basketball court in North Vancouver.

As experts in Kamloops hunted down more than 200 Two-hundred-and-fifteen cedar saplings planted in a “anomalies” on the 65-hectare property, across Canada, other Vancouver park.

First Nations began to question whose lives were quietly Two-hundred-and-fifteen pairs of shoes on the steps of snuffed out and buried on their own lands. an abandoned church outside Pemberton.

In late June, the Lower Kootenay Band said it had One Indigenous woman, herself a survivor of the ‘60s found 182 more unmarked graves at the former St. Eugene’s Scoop, was left speechless when a memorial sprung up on Mission School near Cranbrook; within two weeks, another the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery within 24 hours of 160 undocumented and unmarked graves were found near the announcement. the Kuper Island residential school on Penelakut Island.

Others took to the street. One Kamloops man committed As of mid-December, searches at seven former residential to run 215 kilometres to help those who survived residential schools in B.C., Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Nova Scotia schools. In the end, tens of thousands of dollars would pour in. have turned up nearly 1,400 suspected graves.

“It is definitely a pivotal point in history,” said Casimir.

By some metrics, the grisly discoveries have finally “After years of silence and disbelief, our Kamloops Indian spurred government to act. In July, the B.C. government Residential School survivors, their firsthand knowledge said it would provide $475,000 to investigate each of the about the deaths of children at the school feels like it’s been province’s 18 residential school sites and three hospitals; finally confirmed.”

Canadians, she said, have all been awakened since

T

the children were found, for the first time in Canadian history listening and understanding what residential school was all about.

“They want to know my story.

“They want to know what happened to my family.

“They’re looking at me differently.”

There are some remarks Casimir hears over and over as her community interacts with non-Indigenous people. Dark realities survivors had kept close for years started to reach the ears of non-Indigenous Canadians: residential schools were designed with cemeteries.

As Eldon Yellowhorn, SFU professor and principal investigator of a team identifying unmarked graves at Manitoba’s Brandon Indian Residential School put it: “It wasn’t secret that there were going to be deaths.”

RECONCILING

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CRISIS

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n a year dominated by one crisis after another, a deadly heat dome and wildfire season quickly consumed the public conversation in B.C. But like so much public policy in Canada, it was and is Indigenous people that often bear the brunt of government failure.

Here’s one example: the Canadian Wildland Fire Evacuation Database shows that roughly half of all wildfire evacuees in Canada over the past 40 years have been Indigenous, even though they make up less than five per cent of the country’s population.

In Ignace’s territory, it took the Sparks Lake wildfire threatening his band’s survival before firefighters found a way to work alongside the First Nation. For two days, current Skeetchestn Indian Band Chief Darrel Draney said Emergency Management BC failed to return his calls for help.

“We had no response to anything,” Draney told Glacier Media as a “great wall of fire” approached his community in July. “No red shirts anywhere. No aircraft. Not even a visit.”

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Truth be told.

FEATURE STORY While most of the band evacuated, 75 people stayed behind. Soon after Draney spoke out to Glacier Media, BC Wildfire Service firefighters and Skeetchestn members found a way to come together. Skeetchestn hunters acted as experts on the ground, guiding firefighters to water sources and roads, and warning of wind changes.

As the chief said at the time, “Skeetchestn is the brains of this fire. The ministry is the brawn.”

Ignace, a traditional fire keeper for his people, continues to push for and educate how to carry out traditional burning, both to stimulate the land and to prevent wildfires. Heal the forests, grasslands and waterways of British Columbia, and you go a long way to healing a relationship with First Nations. Not to mention, preventing what Ignace foresees as “the mother of all fires.”

The B.C. government has moved to improve forestry practices in the province, announcing in November it would defer old-growth logging in many areas to give it time to create a new industry paradigm.

As part of the process, on Nov. 4, the province gave First Nations 30 days to say whether they support deferrals, require further discussion or would rather work through existing treaties.

The Ministry of Forests wouldn’t say how many First Nations have responded to the 30-day ultimatum. Grand Chief Stewart Phillip of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs has slammed the timeframe for such a complex analysis as “totally unreasonable.”

When asked where the B.C. government has made the most progress on reconciliation this year, a spokesperson for the B.C. Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation pointed to a number of bills. They range from amendments to statutes that confirm Indigenous peoples as full partners in sustainable forest management to bills that recognize Indigenous jurisdiction over education and child and family services.

The province predicts it will finalize an action plan in early spring 2022 to create a “whole-of-government road map over the next five years to advance reconciliation.”

“The residential school findings have increased the

importance of reconciliation activities in B.C. and Canada and therefore increased public interest and government accountability in reconciling with First Nations,” wrote a spokesperson in an email.

Reconciliation demands such action, say all sides, but symbols of support and the words that come with them matter too.

A

SERIES

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overnor General Mary Simon was sworn into her position in July as the first Indigenous representative of Queen Elizabeth II in Canada. When she delivered her throne speech in Inuktitut, she was the first to do so in an Indigenous language, kicking off Parliament this fall with reminders of the “deep wounds” opened by the discovery of the Kamloops gravesites.

This was a year when Canada stayed home to commemorate the country’s first-ever National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. On a day meant for reflection, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau ignored invitations to visit the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Nation in Kamloops, instead opting to quietly vacation in Tofino, B.C. Two weeks later, when the prime minister finally visited the First Nation, Chief Casimir slammed Trudeau for squandering a chance to heal.

“The shock, anger and sorrow and disbelief was palpable in our community. And it rippled throughout the world to say the least,” said Casimir as Trudeau sat beside her.

Today, Casimir said it was never too late for the prime minister to make things right. When he did eventually show up, spending the whole day with the nation’s leadership and residential school survivors went a long way to carrying on a mandate toward reconciliation.

Casimir also pointed to the importance of establishing a healing centre, museum and elders’ lodge over the next five to 10 years—three things the Canadian government has acknowledged with “meaningful gestures” but that still lack action, according to Casimir.

Within weeks of Trudeau’s visit, political missteps were once again braided into disaster. When November’s floods ravaged the southern half of the province, several First Nations communities were cut off from the world as their territories slipped into the river along Highway 8.

Again, those First Nations were left off Trudeau’s itinerary when he came to visit a province in another state of emergency. Shackan Indian Band Chief Arnold Lampreau said a lot of his community spent nights sleeping in cars waiting for a call from Emergency Management BC. “The prime minister has gone to Abbotsford. He flew right over top of me and I’m pissed off,” said Lampreau, speaking to Glacier Media after evacuating to Merritt.

“He should have stopped off. If he doesn’t want to come here, I’m going to go pound on his door.”

CHURCH APOLOGY, STUDENT RECORDS A PRIORITY

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here politicians have floundered some have expressed hope the church could offer some closure.

Casimir said her nation is looking at pursuing criminal investigations related to the findings at the Kamloops Indian Residential School. But a more urgent priority is ensuring student records held by the Roman Catholic Church and federal government are released to survivors.

Federal Minister of Justice David Lametti assured Casimir student records from the school—now in Ottawa’s hands—will be released to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission within the next 30 days or so, according to the chief.

With “complete and full disclosure,” Casimir said those school documents must be made accessible to survivors.

But they are also crucial sources of information to identify buried children, the circumstances that led to their deaths and to help repatriate their bodies to their home

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FEATURE STORY

A D I S P L AY O F C H I L D R E N ’ S S H O E S on the steps in front of the New Westminster cenotaph pays tribute to the discovery of 215 children’s remains, revealed to the world May 28, 2021, on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School. Julie MacLellan/New West Record

communities—thought to stretch across B.C., and as far away as Washington state, Alberta and Yukon.

“How do we heal?” said Casimir. “We’re still all grappling with the truth.”

The discovery of the graves has already pushed the Catholic community to levels of contrition never seen before. A week before the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a national apology to residential school survivors, acknowledging “grave abuses” committed by “some members of our Catholic community.”

Three days later, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops said it would commit $30 million over five years to advance reconciliation at the local level across Canada.

“We hope and want that to be meaningful,” said Casimir, with a caveat. “There’s never been an apology from the highest level of the Roman Catholic Church.”

That could soon change. Pope Francis is scheduled to host an Indigenous delegation from Canada in 2022; he’s also expected to make a trip to Canada in the new year, a pilgrimage that would answer the TRC’s 58th call to action.

“We at the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc want to be that host community that he visits,” said Casimir. “We do want to see the Holy See issue an apology.”

MEASURING NATIONAL PROGRESS ON RECONCILIATION

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t a national level, progress on the Truth and Reconciliation’s 94 calls to action has seen mixed results.

According to the CBC’s Beyond 94 project, which seeks to track progress on the TRC’s recommendations, only 13 have been completed. Another 29 calls to action

36 JANUARY 13, 2022

have been met with “projects underway,” while 32 have had “projects proposed” and 20 have “not started.”

There has been some progress in 2021.

Roughly two weeks after the graves in Kamloops were discovered, Ignace was appointed the first Indigenous language commissioner of Canada. A position independent from the Government of Canada, the posting answers the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 14th call to action.

“Our languages will no longer stand in the shadow of other languages here in our land,” he’s quoted as saying at the time.

But advancing Ignace into his new position is one of few bright spots on reconciliation’s national stage.

Eva Jewell, research director of the First Nations-led think tank the Yellowhead Institute, said counting proposed projects gives “a false sense of advancement” on reconciliation.

In a report released Dec. 15 tracking progress on the TRC recommendations throughout 2021, Jewell and co-author Ian Mosby found only 11 of the 94 calls to action have been completed to date. Of those, three of the recommendations—appointing Ignace as language commissioner, establishing a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation and replacing the Oath of Citizenship to acknowledge “the laws of Canada including Treaties with Indigenous Peoples”—were advanced this year.

In a period of three weeks, all in the month of June and all after the 215 graves were found, more was accomplished on the TRC’s calls to action than in the previous three years, according to the report.

Two days before the report was released, the Government of Canada said it would provide $40 billion in compensation to Indigenous children

wrongfully caught up in an underfunded child welfare system and to “implement long-term reform so that future generations of First Nations children will never face the same systemic tragedies.”

“Historic injustices require historic reparations,” read a statement from Indigenous Services Canada.

As the latest chapter in systematic discrimination against Indigenous children, it’s not clear when or how the money will be paid, or if ongoing litigation will be dropped as a result. Further details, said Ottawa, would be made public on the last day of 2021.

The federal Ministry of Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs did not respond to Glacier Media’s request to account for its progress on reconciliation since the discovery of the unmarked graves in Kamloops.

But zooming out on the past year, and using what Jewell and Mosby describe as the CBC’s “most generous measure on calls to action,” Canada moves into 2022 with an “abysmal” 14 per cent completion rate on the TRC’s calls to action. Under their own metrics, that completion rate falls to under 12 per cent, a pace of progress so slow Jewell and Mosby question whether they will continue their work into the new year.

“Canada has demonstrated time and again—in its intent, policy, and political culture—that Indigenous peoples are a project to complete or a ‘problem’ to be solved,” wrote the researchers.

“To the question, ‘When will it be enough?’ we say: it will be enough when the systems of oppression no longer exist.”

The Indian Residential Schools Crisis Line (1-866-925-4419) is available 24 hours a day for anyone experiencing pain or distress as a result of their residential school experience. n

Step One: Parents and Guardians will be asked to fill out an online webform through the school district website. This will include basic contact information such as name, email address, physical address and student name and grade.

Parents will be walked through the process within the webform to either register as a new student to the district, or a current student registering for French Immersion.

Step Two: Make an appointment to complete your registration at your English catchment school by booking online through our district website, or by contacting the school directly.

Note - French Immersion registrations must be completed through your English catchment school, not the French catchment school. For Cultural Journeys and Learning Expeditions, complete your registration directly at St'a7mes School.

Please Note the Following Important Information: The order in which registrations and/or transfer requests are received have implications for placement in a program or school where space and seats may be limited.

A time and date stamp will be provided for your registration with the completion of the webform. This time and date stamp will be valid for 10 business days and will be confirmed at the completion of your registration during your school appointment.

Parents and guardians who miss the availability of the webform can register by contacting their English catchment school to book an appointment. The completion of the registration during this appointment will serve as the time and date stamp.

More detailed information on the registration process and SD48 program information can be found on our District Website: www.sd48seatosky.org or contact your English catchment school principal for further assistance. We encourage parents and guardians to register as soon as possible to help schools plan for September, 2022.

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There will be two key steps:

n.o tio

School District No.48 (SD48) is welcoming registrations for the upcoming 2022-2023 school year starting January 18th, 2022 at 8:00am and ending January 21st, 2022 at 4:00pm.

sp a on ding With C

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Responding With Care

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Kindergarten, French Immersion Programs, and All New Students to the District

Whistler Health Care Foundation

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School Registration for the 2022/2023 School Year Opens January 18th-21st, 2022

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DO YOU KNOW A NON-PROFIT O R G A N I Z AT I O N I N T H E S E A T O S K Y C O R R I D O R T H AT H A S A H E A LT H C A R E R E L AT E D I N I T I AT I V E I N N E E D O F F U N D I N G ?

A P P L I C AT I O N S A R E N O W B E I N G A C C E P T E D F O R T H E W H I S T L E R H E A LT H C A R E F O U N D AT I O N S G R A N T F U N D I N G P R O G R A M .

CALL FOR FUNDING APPLICATIONS F O R M O R E I N F O R M AT I O N , E L I G I B I L I T Y REQUIREMENTS AND TO DOWNLOAD A GRANT A P P L I C AT I O N P L E A S E V I S I T:

WHISTLERHEALTHCAREFOUNDATION.ORG THIS FUNDING IS MADE POSSIBLE THANKS TO THE SUPPORT OF THE G O U D G E FA M I LY F O U N D AT I O N A N D T H E W H I S T L E R C O M M U N I T Y. DEADLINE:

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15,

2022

Resort Municipality of Whistler

Zero Waste Select Committee of Council Are you interested in advising RMOW council on issues focused on rethinking, reducing, reusing, repairing and recycling waste in Whistler?

One position is available to serve on the Council-appointed Zero Waste Select Committee. This committee provides long-term thinking for solid waste & resource management for the whole resort community while promoting effective partnerships that support waste reduction & diversion. The committee meets on an as-needed basis with the Citizen at Large appointment to serve a two-year term.

Find the terms of reference and expression of interest application form by clicking on ‘Current committee opportunities’ at whistler.ca/committees.

Email completed application form to zerowastewhistler@whistler.ca.

Phone 604-938-3776 for more information.

Submission deadline is January 20, 2022 at 4 p.m.

Resort Municipality of Whistler whistler.ca/waste JANUARY, 13, 2022

37

SPORTS THE SCORE

Reid Watts focusing on working out the kinks before the Olympic Games WHILE RESULTS HAVEN’T BEEN THERE FOR THE WHISTLER LUGER, WATTS HOPES TO PUT IT ALL TOGETHER WHEN IT MATTERS MOST

BY HARRISON BROOKS JUST

BEFORE the 2010 Winter Olympics came to town, then-10-yearold Reid Watts and his father headed up to the Whistler Sliding Centre to check out the new facility and see where the athletes would be competing just a few short months into the future.

That simple father-son activity was Watts’ first exposure to the sport and sparked an obsession that he has carried with him to this day.

“I was blown away by watching the sleds and the speeds they were carrying at the bottom of the track. I thought it was the coolest thing ever,” said Watts, who convinced his dad to sign him up for the brand-new development program that was being started at the Sliding Centre.

“It was super cool. It was unlike anything I’d ever really done, and it was just the speed that kind of drew me in. Of course, they start you in a lower starting position, but it was still good enough to get speeds of up to, like, 70 kilometres an hour, and I was just hooked with the speed.”

From there, Watts started competing in local events around Whistler and in Calgary until the age of 14 and 15, when he began competing in more serious international

CRUNCH TIME Whistler’s Reid Watts hopes to head into next month’s Olympic Games feeling confident in his sliding.

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38 JANUARY 13, 2022

competitions with the Canadian Junior National Team. He graduated to the full National Team when he was 17.

Now 23, Watts is in line to represent Canada for the second time when the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics roll around next month.

In his first Olympic appearance at the 2018 Games in PyeongChang, Watts, at just 19 years old, was able to navigate the new high-stakes experience—and all the added pressures and nerves that come

there was just this feeling that wasn’t like your normal race-day nerves. The only way I can really describe it was electric. And it was just such a great feeling, so I’m really glad I could pull through and have a great performance when it really mattered.”

Watts describes the four years since PyeongChang as having “more downs than ups.” And with this season’s World Cup results not living up to what he was expecting of himself, Watts finds himself in a similar situation to the lead up to

“We’ve had to learn a few lessons, some the hard way. I’ve seen speed in one run, made mistakes in the other, [and] there’s been some sled setup issues I’ve been battling with.”

- REID WATTS

with it—into a 12th-place finish, which is something he still considers to be his best performance ever.

“That was an unbelievable experience, and it was super special being able to put it all out there when the pressure was really on,” he said, looking back on the different energy an Olympic race day has versus any other race.

“I remember going to bed [the night before] and I was just in a good place. I had really good training runs, I was feeling confident, thinking it was just going to be another race. But as soon as I woke up,

the last Games, uncertain about his sliding but hoping to piece it all together when it matters most.

Luckily for the Whistler native, there are two more World Cup stops before the Games where he can focus on working out the kinks in his sliding before stepping into the Olympic start gate.

“With the World Cup tour kind of being a travelling circus with a new race every weekend, that’s always been a good way to reset. That track is behind you, take the positives out of the mistakes and you hit the reset because every new track presents new

challenges, new opportunities, so that’s kind of the way I’ve been going about it,” he said.

“We’ve had to learn a few lessons, some the hard way. I’ve seen speed in one run, made mistakes in the other, [and] there’s been some sled setup issues I’ve been battling with—but this is all just big picture right now. These next two World Cup races are going to decide the starting order for the Olympics. So it’s time to really put it down, feel good in my sliding, feel confident, pull the best starts I can and get ready for the show.”

At the start of the season, Watts had his Olympic sights set on being firmly within the top 10. However, with the start to the season he’s had, his mindset has shifted from rankings-based goals to simply enjoying the moment, trusting his training and sliding the best he can when the opportunity arises in February.

“It’s all about just trusting the process of the last four years and really just coming in with a mentality of ‘the work is done, now it’s time to stay calm, be in the moment, and just enjoy it the most I can,’” said Watts.

“The whole target I’ve really been looking at [is] these Beijing Olympics. So the end result is the same—just go out there, put my best effort forward and really show the world what I can do.”

This article is part of a series of profile stories highlighting athletes heading to the 2022 Beijing Olympic Winter Games, or those who hope to make it there. For others go to piquenewsmagazine.com. n

SPORTS THE SCORE

Changes afoot in Whistler’s triathlon community SPORTS BRIEFS: LOCAL ATHLETES RESULTS ROUNDUP; LOCAL COMPETITIONS HIGHLIGHT WHISTLER’S YOUTH ATHLETES

BY HARRISON BROOKS HEADING INTO 2022, the Whistler X Triathlon will be under new leadership.

Dale Tiessen, founder and director of the triathlon for the three years it’s been running, is stepping aside and handing the reins to Kristian Manietta, who has helped Tiessen organize the event since its inception and also organizes the Comfortably Numb Trail Race.

According to Tiessen, this change brings with it an exciting new opportunity for the Whistler X Triathlon.

“I’m actually really excited that Kristian is taking it on,” he said. “He’s taking it … into a more professional domain and is really trying to expand the event and make it into a full weekend festival and really [hoping to] entice broader, more diverse participation.”

However, this doesn’t mark the end of Tiessen’s involvement in the town’s triathlon community, as he is moving into a new position as president of the Whistler Triathlon Club.

While he doesn’t have any major changes to the club in mind, Tiessen says this is the year the club returns to business as usual, with coached swimming classes happening each week at Meadow Park and coached cycling classes hosted virtually for now. For more information on how to get involved, visit whistlertriclub.com.

As for the Whistler X Triathlon, the date is set for June 12 and registration is now open. Visit whistlertriathlon.com for more info.

LOCAL ATHLETE RESULTS ROUNDUP After a short break for Christmas, Whistler’s athletes were back on their respective competition circuits over the last couple weeks.

Leading the pack was Simon d’Artois, who managed to secure a bronze medal at the Freeski Halfpipe World Cup in Calgary on Dec. 30. d’Artois finished behind Calgary native Brendan Mackay—who won backto-back golds at the event—and American Alex Ferreira.

On the women’s side, North Vancouver’s Cassie Sharpe had a seventh- and fourthplace finish over the same three-day event.

Meanwhile, a snowboarding slopestyle World Cup also took place in Calgary from Dec. 31 to Jan. 1, which saw Mark McMorris narrowly miss the podium, finishing fourth, and a 25th-place finish for 18-year-old Whistlerite Finn Finestone, who is in his first season with the Canadian National Team.

About a week later, on Jan. 8 at Mammoth Mountain, Calif., Whistler local Darcy Sharpe took home a fourth-place finish in men’s slopestyle at the U.S. Grand

Prix of Snowboard and Freeski.

The next day the skiers took centre stage.

While it wasn’t a podium finish, Whistler resident Teal Harle skied to his best result of the year, cracking the top 15 in men’s freeski slopestyle with a 14th-place finish.

Pemberton’s Brenden Kelly also picked up his two best mogul finishes of the year with 10th- and 13th-place finishes at the World Cup stop in Mont-Tremblant, Que. Over in the world of luge, Pemberton’s Trinity Ellis slid to a top-15 finish at the World Cup stop in Winterberg, Germany on Jan. 2. That finish proved to be the high mark for Sea to Sky lugers at the last two World Cups.

For those looking to keep tabs on all the local athletes, some upcoming events include the Ski-Cross World Cup in Nakiska Jan. 13 to 15, aerial and mogul World Cup in Deer Valley, Utah Jan. 12 to 14, Slopestyle World Cup in Laax, Switzerland Jan. 13 to 16, and the luge World Cup in Oberhof, Germany on Jan. 15 and 16.

LOCAL COMPETITIONS HIGHLIGHT TOWN’S YOUTH ATHLETES Whistler Blackcomb played host to a couple ski and snowboard events in recent weeks.

First was the International Freeskiers and Snowboarders Association’s (IFSA) Junior Regional event that took place from Dec. 29 to 31.

In the U12 category, Freya Turner narrowly edged out Natalie Uskoski to take the top spot on the podium, while Owen White, Emmett Guy and Lachlan Simmons finished one, two and three on the men’s side.

Guy’s older brother Floyd took the top spot in the men’s 12-14 category, followed

by Charlie Turner in second and Tannen DesBrisay in third. Meanwhile, Brooke Hemstead, Mhairi Smart and Sophie Hancock each claimed a spot on the podium on the women’s side.

In the 15-18 category, Marcus Goguen and Kayla Constantini claimed the top spots in men’s and women’s, while Kane Gascoigne and Kieren Ferguson rounded out the podium for the men and Drea Dimma and Sakura Lord for the women.

The second event, a provincial level slopestyle competition, took place the following week on Jan. 8 and 9 on Whistler Mountain.

Whistler local Truth Smith rode to second- and third-place finishes across the two-day event in his first competition in nearly two years.

Whistler’s Keenan Demchuk also found the podium, grabbing the third spot on Jan. 8.

On the women’s side, Whistler’s Amalia Pelchat narrowly missed the podium on day one with a fourth-place finish. n

Whistler Nordic Ski Club Exciting News!

• Thursday Youth Programs Available to register - ages 6-12

• Toonie Schedule: Jan 13, 27, Feb 10, March 3 • 1st Toonie: Jan 13 Register: 6pm Race start: 6.30pm Sponsors: Get your membership at www.whistlernordics.com Email: admin@whistlernordics.com

Matthew Spencer Corey (Matty)

Matthew S. Corey, “Creekside Matty” as his friends affectionately knew him as, passed away peacefully on December 16, 2021, after a courageous and humble three-year battle with cancer.

He was born in Ottawa on June 21st, 1968, the son of Wayne Corey and Jill Devlin. Matty left the Ottawa area for the 1990/91 ski season in Whistler and became a local figure, particularly around his local Creekside hood, soon after arrival.

Matty was at heart a kind, gentle and loving soul who cared deeply for his family and friends. Many will remember Matty’s smile from his years at “Food Plus” where he was a constant with the late-night crowd. Over the years, jobs included his colourful stints as the Cable Guy, and the Whistler Taxi dispatcher, but his home base was always back working with his second family at Creekside Market.

Matty’s favourite past times included skiing on Whistler Mountain, endless hours on the frisbee golf course with Jordan, watching football with his buddies and cheering on The Cowboys, contently strumming on his guitar, relaxing with some late-night gaming and of course, enjoying Rosie’s delicious meals wherever she served them!

Matt was sadly predeceased recently by his father Wayne, who Matty helped support in his dad’s final days. Matty is survived by his mother Jill Devlin (Roger Verdun), his stepmother Kitty Carson, his brother Joey (Alicia) and their children Hailey, Brooke, and Wesley as well as many aunts, uncles and cousins. Matty returned to Ottawa last year to continue his chemotherapy treatments with the support of his family close by.

Matty also leaves behind his large extended Creekside family in Whistler. Unfortunately, we did not get to say a proper goodbye to our good buddy, but the night he passed, Whistler experienced a truly spectacular alpine glow, which seemed a perfect tribute to Matty’s many years in our mountains. We know Matt is now at peace walking around Heaven with his dog Bubbles at his side, a coffee in his hand, and a smile on his face while chatting casually with those who went before him. At Matt’s request, his ashes will travel to Whistler this summer with his brother Joey, to join Jordan and the rest of his Creekside friends, for a celebration of Matty’s life in the mountains he loved. We hope to honour Matt on Summer Solstice, his birthday, and of course include an epic round of frisbee golf. We will really miss you Matty, more than you could ever know.

JANUARY 13, 2022

39

FORK IN THE ROAD

Why couldn’t we find any cornstarch?

AND OTHER FOOD-RELATED MYSTERIES IN OUR SUPPLY CHAIN THERE WE WERE, three of us, baffled, searching up and down the baking supplies aisle in my mom’s neighbourhood SaveOn—a big store, a very big store—scrutinizing the shelves, high and low, and way off track in the nuts and dried fruits section, even the cereal zone.

We couldn’t find any cornstarch—you know, the thickening agent you can use to add structure to sauces, stews, baked goods, fruit compotes, you name it.

BY GLENDA BARTOSH In fact, we couldn’t even find a telltale spot on the shelf for it with the product name and price on a little shelf tag, the alltime give-away that the store does carry it, but the truck just got stuck in an A., road wash-out; B., snowstorm; or C., fill in the latest B.C. extreme weather event. That, or there were other supply-chain issues, so they’re temporarily out of stock. (In the grocery biz that’s known as an OOS: “out of stock.”) But not even a hole on the shelf for it? That seemed pretty weird.

No cornstarch. No cornstarch OOS. Not in the baking supplies aisle; not in the bulk section; not in the organic department, although they did have potato starch. But

CHAIN REACTION Like grocery stores across the country, Nesters Market manager Bruce Stewart has had to weather disruptions to the supply chain.

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mom nixed that. (More on potato starch later.)

As for our intrepid search—we’ve gotten used to such searches in these unusual times—even other customers, who were helping us as earnestly as if we were all on a reality game show, were puzzled there was no trace of such a basic product. Finally, a manager confirmed our suspicions: No cornstarch, and he didn’t know when there would be any.

So goes the world of grocery shopping these days, approaching our third year of the pandemic. After we all got over yeast and flour shortages in the early days as people went mad for baking during lockdown before they went mad (we were forced into buying such a ridiculously large bag of flour it was a joke), we’re still facing unpredictable and unknowable shortages.

And these days they’re being accompanied by higher prices.

Personally, I’ve hunted for, and couldn’t find, all sorts of favourites, including dates, coconut, salsa, a certain detergent, and tinned tomatoes and pears. Those last two were likely OOS due to the tin shortage, which has seen tin prices nearly double, and impacted all kinds of other production lines where tin is critical, including solar panels and cars.

Anything in aluminum cans, like your favourite beer or soda, has suffered a similar fate with aluminum supply challenges happening after China cracked down on energy-intensive industries like aluminum production. Ditto for glass containers, apparently due to the high demand for alcohol (seriously), raw materials getting redirected to vaccines, and the shipping-container crisis.

Even supplies of my favourite porridge, good ol’ Sunny Boy, proudly produced in Camrose, Alta. since 1929, have been spotty for ages. But its 1924 Manitoba-made rival, Red River Cereal, suffered a worse fate. It was permanently nuked around this time last year by Smucker’s, which bought out the brand a while back. (Note to self and fellow Canadian consumers: Beware when U.S. multinationals buy out your favourite local brand.)

While the reasons behind the porridge shortage aren’t totally clear, pandemicrelated food supply holes have spurred researchers and policy makers worldwide into planning how best to manage and restore future food supply disruptions caused by similar crises or natural disasters.

According to a report in ScienceDirect, even though we may not have been as conscious of food shortages during other pandemics, like the H1N1 in 2009, or even the 1918 influenza one, these also saw food supply disruptions due to interferences with transportation and other networks as workers got sick, or worse. The big difference today are the further negative impacts from lockdowns on commercial and economic activities, plus the disruptions to our personal routines. Add in a few road washouts, and you get even more uncertainty.

“Before Christmas, before the floods, generally about 25 per cent of our grocery and produce items were shorted, meaning orders weren’t being fulfilled. We could get some of it, or some of the order would be different items, but not the whole line,” says Bruce Stewart. He’s the store manager at Nesters Market, which stocks 15,000

unique items, and remains not only my favourite grocery store, but apparently a lot of other people’s, too. It was, once again, voted best grocery store in Pique’s 2021 Best of Whistler reader poll.

Today, that 25 per cent “shorted” figure is still pretty much holding true.

As for the MIA cornstarch, it’s nothing new. Early on in COVID, hubby and I resorted to tapioca flour, or starch, as it’s variously called. Not bad, once you get used to it. You need about twice the amount, but the bonus is you can add it in powder form without making a slurry, something I’ve never been able to do with cornstarch without getting all those slimy little globs.

In the potato starch vs. cornstarch department, I turned to one of my favourite suppliers of all things grainy, Bob’s Red Mill.

According to Bob’s, you can pretty much use them interchangeably in things like soups, gravies, and pie fillings. But there are exceptions. Cornstarch works well in dairybased recipes, but not so much with acidic or high-sugar things. Meanwhile, potato starch can be better at holding up under higher temperatures but if they get really high, it will actually get runny. Nor is potato starch good with long cooking times.

BTW, if you need to replenish your cornstarch right now, Bruce happily reports that Nesters has plenty.

As for that ol’ Sunny Boy, and who knows what else, it’s still touch and go.

Glenda Bartosh is an award-winning journalist from Alberta who has totally let go of any expectations about what she’s going to find on store shelves. n

MEADOW PARK SPORTS CENTRE SWIM • SKATE • SWEAT • SQUASH OPEN DAILY: 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Proof of vaccination and government photo ID required for entry

By order of the Provincial Health Officer, the fitness centre will be closed and all group fitness classes cancelled until January 18, 2022.

The pool, arena and squash/basketball courts remain open.

All passes will be extended for the full duration of the closure.

Closure notice Meadow Park Sports Centre will be closed to the public from Monday, Jan. 17 at 6 a.m. until Tuesday, Jan. 18 at 4 p.m.

whistler.ca/notices

Thank you for your patience as we continue to adapt to changing public health orders.

Visit whistler.ca/notices for further details.

Starting January 9 for adults aged 18+

ARENA SCHEDULE THU 13 Drop-In Hockey 8:15-9:45 a.m.

FRI 14

SAT 15

SUN 16

MON 17

TUE 18

Thursday 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.

Women & 50+ Drop-In Hockey 10-11:30 a.m.

Public Skate 12-2 p.m.

WED 19

Drop-In Hockey 8:15-9:45 a.m.

Drop-In Hockey 10-11:30 a.m.

Public Skate

Public Skate

Public Skate

Public Skate

12-3 p.m.

12-3 p.m.

12-3 p.m.

12-3 p.m.

Public Skate

Public Skate

Public Skate

6:30-8 p.m.

6:30-8 p.m.

6:30-8 p.m.

POOL SCHEDULE

Please see whistler.ca/recreation for daily pool hours

whistler.ca/recreation | whistler.ca | 604-935-7529 @RMWhistler |

@rmwhistler |

@rmowhistler

NEW!

ARTS SCENE

Whistler Pride returns with reimagined lineup LONG-RUNNING LGBTQI SKI WEEK FEATURES A COVID-FRIENDLY LINEUP OF EVENTS FROM JAN. 23 TO 30

BY BRANDON BARRETT THE ORGANIZERS behind the 2022 Whistler Pride and Ski Festival have a mantra they’ve stuck to throughout the past year or so.

“The thing we keep saying is we’re a small team climbing a very tall mountain,” says Tom Fedechko, communications and creative lead for the festival.

The mountain Fedechko is referring to is one event organizers across the globe have had to climb for nearly two years now: the winding COVID-19 pandemic and its everchanging health measures, making any kind of long-term planning virtually impossible.

For the core team behind one of North America’s largest and longestrunning LGBTQI ski weeks, that has meant completely reimagining an event that has for years been known for its welcoming social atmosphere, packed dance floors, and vibrant nightlife.

“Nothing is paste and repeat. Everything

PRIDEFUL Attendees at a past Whistler Pride parade hold the transgender flag. This year’s trimmed-down festival is set for Jan. 23 to 30.

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42 JANUARY 13, 2022

feels like the first time we’re doing it,” says Fedechko of the 2022 program. “We’re really proud of the work we’ve done and what we’ve put together, but we really had to rethink the festival and it’s going to be a different experience this year.”

With a 50-per-cent capacity limit (at least until Jan. 18, but possibly beyond), organizers have trimmed down the schedule

Also new this year is Snowma-Get-‘em on Jan. 28 at the Whistler Racket Club, where guests can duke it out in a snowball fight, try axe-throwing or take part in a roller disco.

“It’s something that people would think attendees would not necessarily be keen on, but anybody I say it to is like, ‘Yes, please,’” Fedechko says.

“We all want to see this week happen, everybody, We’re also equal stakeholders in the success of this festival and it feels incredible to us to have that level of support.”

- TOM FEDECHKO

and added a number of new events that fit in with the current health restrictions, like Lit! A Night at Vallea Lumina on Jan. 24, which, after a multimedia night walk through the forest, will culminate in an outdoor DJ, cocktails and dancing under the stars.

“It’s a really fun way to capitalize on a great new experience that is available to people that even our returning guests might not have experienced,” Fedechko says.

Other festival mainstays have been tweaked to fit with health measures, like Spa-Lash!, a reimagined version of Pride’s Splash pool party on Jan. 27 that will be held outdoors at Scandinave Spa instead of its usual home at Meadow Park Sports Centre. Snow Belles on Jan. 28 is another take on a Pride favourite—Snowball, historically the festival’s massive closing party. With COVID uncertainty in the air, several performer contracts are still being

finalized, but confirmed is Vancouver’s own Kendall Gender from Season 2 of Canada’s Drag Race. The festival’s grand finale at the Whistler Conference Centre will feature an evening of performances as well as a still-tobe-confirmed comedy headliner.

Guests will also be able to book daily guided ski outings from Jan. 24 to 29, which are free to join with a lift ticket and form the “social core of the festival,” organizers say.

The Pride team was left “heartbroken” after having to cancel last year’s festival, Fedechko says, but a blessing in disguise has been the opportunity to renew connections with longstanding festival partners as well as forge links with new ones.

“We all want to see this week happen, everybody,” Fedechko says. “We’re also equal stakeholders in the success of this festival and it feels incredible to us to have that level of support.”

Whistler Pride and Ski Festival is scheduled for Jan. 23 to 30. The charity ski race is set for Jan. 27 from 1 to 2:30 p.m. at Blackcomb’s Race Centre. This year’s charitable recipient is Whistler Animals Galore. The signature ski parade and Pride march through Whistler Village will set off from Skier’s Plaza around 3 p.m. on Jan. 28.

For more information and tickets, visit whistlerpride.com. Pre-registration is required for all events. n

MUSEUM MUSINGS

Come on down to Roland's to watch all your favorite sports!

NFL playoffs start this weekend! Come cheer on your team wearing your colors!

Come in for brunch on Saturdays & Sundays to enter to win Canucks tickets.

Stay safe & healthy out there :-)

604-932-5940

Call for Artists The Resort Municipality of Whistler is requesting proposals for a creative theme and the visual expression of the theme on banners installed on street light lampposts throughout Whistler For more information please visit: whistler.ca/bids or bcbid.gov.bc.ca Resort Municipality of Whistler whistler.ca

WHISTLER BEAR ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEMBERSHIP OPPORTUNITY Are you interested in advising RMOW Council on issues related to bear management, conservation and protection around Whistler?

One 2-year term position is available to serve on the Council-appointed Whistler Bear Advisory Committee. You should have a background in conservation, ecology, biology and/ or environmental management, and a knowledge of the Whistler area. The committee meets once per month for 2 hours during business hours.

Please submit a short information sheet describing your qualifications and interest before 4:30 p.m., January 19, 2022.

Committee Information: whistler.ca/wbac Please email applications to tschaufele@whistler.ca

Resort Municipality of Whistler whistler.ca

44 JANUARY 13, 2022

A look back at 2021 for the Whistler Museum

BY BRAD NICHOLS THE YEAR 2021 was one of fluctuation for the Whistler Museum. Despite a few COVID restrictions on occupancy and mask mandates, we were able to keep our exhibits open to the public six days a week throughout the year.

Over the course of 2021, the museum welcomed 6,513 exhibit visitors. This is an increase of 28 per cent over 2020, but still down 55 per cent over pre-COVID numbers in 2019. In addition to exhibit visits, we also held several events and programs online and outside the museum, which attracted approximately 13,232 people. In total, the museum provided direct services to approximately 19,745 individuals. We also had increased traffic and intersections throughout 2021 on our social media accounts including Instagram, YouTube, and our online Whistorical blog.

Our popular Speakers Series was delivered completely online in 2021. These events shifted from in-person events held at the Museum to 20-minute minidocumentaries that were streamed live to an online audience and followed by a Q&A with the speakers. The first of these was with Dean Nelson, a longtime organizer of the Whistler Pride and Ski Festival, exploring the history and evolution of Pride in Whistler, including Pride House during the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, the first such LGBTQ+ space at an Olympic Games. Our next discussion was on the history of journalism and publishing in Whistler and featured speakers Paul Burrows (founder of the Whistler Question), Charlie Doyle (co-founder of the Whistler Answer), Bob Barnett (co-founder of Pique Newsmagazine), and Clare Ogilvie (theneditor of Pique Newsmagazine).

Our third Speaker Series event looked back at one of Whistler’s most endearing races, the Great Snow Earth Water Race that was held from 1975 to the mid 1990s. Race organizer Bryan Walhovd was accompanied by race participants from the first year of the race including Trudy Alder, Nancy Greene Raine and Joe Csizmazia. Recordings of these Virtual Speakers Series events can be found on the Museum’s YouTube Channel and on our social media platforms.

As we were not able to host many of our in-person family programs, we also adapted these to be delivered remotely. Our popular Crafts in the Park program continued as a video series and was developed by our summer programming student. Each video explored an aspect of Whistler’s history and was accompanied by a craft that families could complete at home. This program was presented in partnership with the Whistler Public Library.

Developed at the end of 2020, our Kids Après Activity Booklet was designed to replace our in-person Kids Après program.

This activity booklet features colouring

BOOK IT The Whistler Museum’s free Kids Après Activity Booklet was designed to replace its in-person Kids Après program.

PHOTO SUBMITTED.

pages, mazes, crosswords, and various other activities. The 20-page booklet is still available (for free!) at the Whistler Museum. This program was made possible with funding from the Province of British Columbia.

In terms of in-person programs, we were grateful to be able to offer our longrunning Heritage Walking Tours through Whistler Village (June through September), and our Discover Nature program at Lost Lake Park (July through August). These ongoing programs are staples of our everexpanding program lineup; they contribute to community and visitor outreach and education that are essential to our mandate.

We are currently developing our program schedule for 2022. We hope to see the return of our Mountain Bike Heritage Week in 2022, as we have been unable to produce it over the last two years. More details on these programs will be available in the coming weeks.

I would like to take a moment to thank our funders and supporters: the Resort Municipality of Whistler; the Province of British Columbia; the Community Foundation of Whistler; Canadian Heritage; British Columbia Museum Association; and our museum members for their continued support over the years.

I would also like to say a special thank you to everyone who has visited our exhibits, attended our events, read our Pique column, followed us on social media, and otherwise helped spread the word about Whistler’s fascinating people and history. Your support helped us make it through a very challenging year! n

PARTIAL RECALL

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BLUEBIRD VIEWS Whistler Mountain and Black Tusk were in full view from 7th Heaven on Sunday, Jan. 9, after the sun finally made an appearance. PHOTO BY HARRISON BROOKS. 2 SUNDAY SKI Aliya Shahrestani and mom Radka SNOW DRIFT Snow pile-ups reached new heights on this Gondola Village deck after last week’s storm cycle. PHOTO BY JESSLYN GATES. 4 SLIPPERY STROLL The ice-covered Village Stroll caused more than a little slipping and sliding on Tuesday, Jan. 11, after the rain started falling. PHOTO BY EMMA STAPLES. 5 GOGGLE GANG There’s no better place for friend-group gatherings than outside on the mountain these days. PHOTO SUBMITTED. 6 PEPPER SPECTATOR Pepper the puppy keeps an eye on a few skiers heading downhill. PHOTO BY GEORGIA BUTLER. 7 SNOWY STEPS Creekside was a full-blown winter wonderland 1

Prihodova enjoyed the sunshine during a Sunday ski day on Blackcomb on Jan. 9. PHOTO BY AMIR SHAHRESTANI. 3

on Sunday, Jan. 9 when Michel Chartrand tried out his new snowshoes. PHOTO BY CATHERINE POWER CHARTRAND.

SEND US YOUR PHOTOS! Send your recent snaps to arts@piquenewsmagazine.com

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ASTROLOGY Electoral Area C Agricultural Advisory Committee - Call for Volunteers

Free Will Astrology WEEK OF JANUARY 13 BY ROB BREZSNY

ARIES (March 21-April 19): The coming months will

WHAT? The SLRD is looking for interested residents of Pemberton and Electoral Area C to serve on the SLRD Electoral Area C Agricultural Advisory Committee (AAC).

WHO? Anyone with an interest or expertise in agriculture and related matters is welcome to apply. Applicants should: • Be a land owner and/or permanent resident of Electoral Area C or Pemberton • Have an interest in preserving the viability of farming in the Pemberton Valley and surrounding area • Be from the farming and ranching community (optional) • Posses a clear understanding and knowledge of topics affecting agricultural land • Be available to commit to roughly 4-6 meetings per year, for a one year or two year term HOW? Application forms can be obtained on the SLRD website, or by contacting the SLRD office. Please submit your application no later than 5pm on January 28, 2022.

For additional information please contact: Alix MacKay, Planner Squamish-Lillooet Regional District Tel: 604-894-6371, ext. 224 E-mail: amackay@slrd.bc.ca

Whistler Valley Housing Society’s Notice of Annual General Meeting Who:

Notice to Members

When:

January 28th, 10:00am - 11:00am PT

Where:

Virtual via Zoom Please email WVHS.info@gmail.com for Zoom call in information, a copy of the agenda and the proposed Bylaws to be adopted at the AGM.

The Whistler Valley Housing Society is a not-forprofit established in 1983 and is the owner of Whistler Creek Court, a 20 unit affordable rental housing project for Whistler employees.

Our Vision

To provide, and advocate for, a broader spectrum of housing opportunities for the Whistler community.

be an excellent time for you to explore the art of Soulful Bragging. Do you deserve any of the titles below? If so, feel free to use them liberally throughout 2022. 1.

Practical Idealist with Flexible Strategies. 2. Genius of Interesting Intimacy. 3. Jaunty Healer with Boisterous Knowledge of the Soul’s Ways. 4. Free-Wheeling Joker Who Makes People Laugh for Righteous and Healing Reasons. 5. Skilful Struggler. 6. Empathy Master with a Specialty in Creative Compassion. 7. Playful Reservoir of Smart Eros. 8. Purveyor of Feisty Wisdom and Cute Boldness. 9. Crafty Joy-Summoner.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Most people who use tobacco products are at risk of having shorter lifespans than they might have otherwise had. Smoking is detrimental to health. Those who smoke in their 20s and 30s may cut 10 years off their longevity. But here’s some good news: If you kick your tobacco habit before age 40, you will regain most of those 10 years. I bring this to your attention because I’d like it to serve as a motivational tale for you in 2022. According to my analysis of the astrological omens, you will have more power than ever before to escape any harmful addictions and compulsions you have—and begin reclaiming your full vitality.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): In May 1974, the Grateful Dead introduced a new wrinkle to their live musical performances. Playing at the Cow Palace in San Francisco, they amplified their music through a “Wall of Sound”: 604 speakers piled high, together channeling 26,000 watts of energy. Had any band ever treated their fans to a louder volume and crisper tones? I’d like to make this breakthrough event one of your top metaphors for 2022. According to my analysis, it will be a great year for you to boost your signal. I invite you to distribute your message with maximum confidence and clarity.

Show the world who you are with all the buoyant flair you can rouse.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): Philosopher Emil Cioran said he despised wise philosophers. Why? Because they practice prudent equanimity, which he regarded as empty and sterile. In Cioran’s view, these deep thinkers avoid strong feelings so they can live in cool safety, free from life’s nerve-wracking paradoxes. I agree with him that such a state is undesirable. However, Cioran contrasted it with the lives of the normal people he admired, who are “full of irreconcilable contradictions” and who “suffer from limitless anxiety.” My question for Cioran: Are there no other options between those two extremes? And my answer: Of course there are! And you can be proof of that in 2022, Cancerian. I expect you’ll be full of deep feelings, eager for new experiences, and infused with a lust for life—with less anxiety and fewer irreconcilable contradictions than ever before.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): In 1838, 29-year-old naturalist Charles Darwin was early in his career. He had not developed his theory of evolution, and was not yet a superstar of science. He began ruminating about the possibility of proposing marriage to his cousin Emma Wedgwood. If married, he wrote: “constant companion and a friend in old age; the charms of music and female chit-chat—good things for one’s health.” If not married: “no children; no one to care for one in old age; less money for books, loss of time, and a duty to work for money.”

I bring this to your attention, Leo, because I suspect that in 2022, you may be tempted and inspired to deeply interweave your fate with the fates of interesting characters. A spouse or partner or collaborator? Could be.

Maybe a beloved animal or spirit guide? Have fun making your list of pros and cons!

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): What were your favourite toys when you were a child? Now would be a good time to retrieve fond memories of them, and even acquire modern versions so you can revive the joy they gave you.

In my astrological analysis, you’ll be wise to invite your inner child to play a bigger role in your life as you engage in a wide range of playtime activities. So yes, consider the possibility of buying yourself crayons, Legos, dolls and puppets, video games, squirt guns, roller skates, yo-yos, jump ropes, and board games. And don’t neglect the pleasures of blanket forts, cardboard boxes, mud pies, and plain old sticks.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): In his novel The Story of a Marriage, Andrew Sean Greer asks, “Does love always form, like a pearl, around the hardened bits of life?” My answer would be, “No, not always, but when it does, it’s often extra sweet and enduring.” One of my wishes and predictions for you in 2022, Libra, is that love will form around your hardened bits. For best results, be open to the possibility that difficulty can blossom into grace.

Look for opportunities that are seeded by strenuous work.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): “It is worth living long enough to outlast whatever sense of grievance you may acquire.” Author Marilynne Robinson wrote that, and I recommend her thought as one of your uplifting meditations in 2022. According to my reading of the astrological omens, the coming months will be a favourable time to dismantle and dissolve as many old grievances as you can. This could and should be the year you liberate yourself from psychic grunge—for the sake of your own mental, physical, and spiritual health as much as for the sake of others’.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Some critics view author Diana Wynne Jones as a genius in her chosen field: fantasy novels for children and young adults. She had a generous spirit, asserting, “I have this very strong feeling that everybody is probably a genius at something; it’s just a question of finding this.” If you are still unsure what your unique genius consists of, Sagittarius, I believe 2022 will show you in detailed glory. And if you do already know, the coming months will be a time when you dramatically deepen your ability to access and express your genius.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): Capricorn biologist Robin Wall Kimmerer wrote a meditative book about moss. It was her response to questions she had been wondering about: Why has this inconspicuous plant persevered for 350 million years? While so many other species have gone extinct, why has moss had staying power through all the Earth’s climate changes and upheavals? And what lessons does its success have for us? Here are Kimmerer’s conclusions: Moss teaches us the value “of being small, of giving more than you take, of working with natural law, sticking together.” In accordance with astrological omens in 2022, Capricorn, I believe moss should be your role model. (Kimmerer’s book is Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses.)

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): Author Joyce Carol Oates has been very successful and has won several major awards. But she describes her job as arduous and timeconsuming. “I work very slowly,” she testifies. “It’s like building a ladder, where you’re building your own ladder rung by rung, and you’re climbing the ladder. It’s not the best way to build a ladder, but I don’t know any other way.” I wouldn’t always recommend her approach for you, Aquarius, but I will in 2022. As long as you’re willing to accept gradual, incremental progress, you’ll get a lot of fine work done.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): I’ve selected a quote for you to use as one of your guiding principles in 2022. I urge you to undertake a specific action in the next 24 hours that will prove you mean to take it seriously. Here’s the wisdom articulated by Piscean rabbi and philosopher Marc-Alain Ouaknin: “People must break with the illusion that their lives have already been written and their paths already determined.” It’s reinvention time, dear Pisces.

Homework: What’s the most important thing for you to get rid of in 2022? Newsletter.FreeWillAstrology.com.

In addition to this column, Rob Brezsny creates

Contact WVHS.info@gmail.com for additional information.

46 JANUARY 13, 2022

EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES In-depth weekly forecasts designed to inspire and uplift you. To buy access, phone 1-888-499-4425. Once you’ve chosen the Block of Time you like, call 1-888-682-8777 to hear Rob’s forecasts. www.freewillastrology.com

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14JANUARY 6, 2022 ISSUE 29.01 15 RMOW shares some details of the cyber attack

RANSOMWARE

FITNESS FIASCO

Gym owners question

new COVID-19 restrictions

62

SKI AND BOARD GAME Whistler kid Snakes and Ladders for mountain

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50 JANUARY 13, 2022

2021

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Please note that Hilton Grand Vacations (HGV) acquired Diamond Resorts International (DRI) as of August 02, 2021. If you apply to work at a Diamond Resorts company you will be an applicant of a subsidiary of HGV. A transition to HGV will occur as we integrate technology, systems and branding but it will take time until our separate operating systems, employment policies and benefits are fully integrated. As a result, for a period of time, employees will receive correspondence and messaging from Diamond Resorts as well as from HGV and related entities.

Email your resume with the position you wish to apply for to: embarc_hr@hgv.com

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51

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52 JANUARY 13, 2022

To apply for this opportunity, please specify the position and email your resume and cover letter to: paul.globisch@vacasa.com VISITORS’ GUIDE 2017-2018 FREE

We thank all applicants for their interest but only those selected for an interview will be contacted.

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Email your resume with the position you wish to apply for to:

embarc_hr@diamondresorts.com Hilton Grand Vacations (HGV) acquired Diamond Resorts International (DRI), and its subsidiary companies, such as Diamond Resorts Canada, Ltd. (DRCL), as of August 02, 2021. If you apply to work at Embarc, you will be an applicant of a subsidiary of HGV. A transition to HGV will occur as we integrate technology, systems and branding, but it will take time until our separate operating systems, employment policies and benefits are fully integrated. As a result, for a period of time, employees will receive correspondence and messaging from Embarc as well as from HGV and related entities. *Eligibility and conditions based on DRCL policies and practices set out in general terms and conditions of employment. 2112-1001

Employment Opportunities: Guest Services Agents Maintenance Helper Apply to: jobs@pembertonvalleylodge.com

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is now hiring for

Maintenance Person

The Pinnacle Hotel Whistler has the following positions available:

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Please reply with a cover letter and resume to hr@listelhotel.com

Thank you for your interest. Only those applicants being considered for an interview will be contacted.

piquenewsmagazine.com/ local-events/

Please reply by email: parmstrong@pinnaclehotels.ca JANUARY 13, 2022

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Submit your resume to: elle.boutilier@araxi.com 54 JANUARY 13, 2022

JOIN THE MONGOLIE CREW!

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HOSTS

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Whistler’s premier visitor magazine is on stands now!

Look for our Winter 2022 Issue!

Find it on select stands and in Whistler hotel rooms.

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DISPATCHER/ DELIVERY DISTRIBUTION DELIVERY SUPERVISOR DRIVER

DRIVER

Seeking a reliable individual to oversee the dispatching and package distribution for a large Seeking reliable individuals delivery operation in Function Junction.

for package Seeking reliabledelivery individualsservice The person best suited for the position… for Whistler package delivery service in in and Pemberton.

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Potential to have a driver route as well, with reliable vehicle

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Call or email mail@wplpmedia.com Email Kyle at lunalogistics20@gmail.com mail@piquenewsmagazine.com or 604-815-3685 to see if this is the right or call at 604-938-0202 604-902-1237 x44223 opportunity for you.

for more more information information and to apply. for

Whistler’s award-winning publication is seeking a

Reporter Pique Newsmagazine has a rare opportunity for an experienced and committed journalist to cover local news, politics and mountain culture in North America’s premier mountain resort.

You are passionate about news and politics, and have a sense of what makes a compelling local news story. You seek to engage and inform your community in print and online platforms, and use social media effectively. You are selfmotivated, efficient and deadline driven, with a curious, critical mind and an acute attention to detail. You are able to work well both on your own and with a team.

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apply by sending a cover letter and resume to hr.whistler@scandinave.com

Located in the mountain resort town of Whistler, British Columbia, Pique Newsmagazine is the unequivocal leader in reporting, interpreting and understanding the culture of the Coast Mountains and what it means to those who live, work and play in Whistler. At 27 years young, we’ve established ourselves as the locals’ publication that’s inquisitive and edgy, provoking conversation and building community. With our peers we’re acknowledged perennial winners at the BC & Yukon Community Newsmedia Awards (BCYCNA) and Canadian Community Newsmedia Awards (CCNA) for general excellence and reporting categories, as well as several Webster Awards honours over the years.

We’re known for our unique artsy design, weekly long-form features and comprehensive news coverage, but of course our reach is global, with loyal readers from Vancouver, Seattle, Toronto, Hong Kong and all over the world who come to piquenewsmagazine.com daily for the best Whistler storytelling and news source.

To apply, send your resume, clippings, or other relevant materials, as well as a cover letter making the case for why we should hire you to Braden Dupuis, bdupuis@piquenewsmagazine.com Application deadline: January 20, 2022

WHISTLER PUBLISHING Limited Partnership

JANUARY 13, 2022

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PUZZLES ACROSS 1 6 11 16 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 34 35 38 41 43 44 45 47 50 53 54 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 66 67 68 69

Tailless marsupial Songlike Deduce Use a curling iron Disney site Irritate Effrontery Eagle’s nest Burst forth Twangy, as a voice Did field work Thick board After a while Russo or Magritte Had lunch Comatose Finger’s opposite Wavering Ravel opus Four-baggers The nearer one Cowboy -- Maynard New Zealand language Spa treatment Bedouin Go slowly 27th president Take a loan Loose-fitting Kuwaiti leader Prefix for “classic” Association Women’s quarters Like some debts Culture medium Vitamin monitors Galahad’s weapon Prince Charles’ sister

70 72 74 75 77 78 80 81 83 86 88 89 93 95 96 97 98 99 101 102 104 105 106 107 108 110 111 112 113 115 116 117 120 123 127 128 130 131

133 135 137 139 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149

Most gloomy Zippy Woeful cry Arcane Blows a circuit Popular ski resort Hot dog topping Spy mission Vote Rub against BLT dressing Scoff at Liberty Belonging to us Neap and ebb Apron part Strains, as an engine Rose Bowl feature Got wrong Queen of the Misty Isles Spinks defeater Network Swain Compact Monsieur’s pate Spider traps Screams and shouts Government “-- turn is it?”

Contractor’s figure “Sting like -- --” In a row Yeast Prudishness -- -- whim Dolphin’s home Prefix for “cycle” Oodles (2 wds.)

Adjusted Men, slangily Lucky break Sentimental Sarcasm Broil Jockey Come next From Oslo A bit creepy La Scala production Not gentle Pitcher Shawn --

DOWN 1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 33 36 37

Faint, with “over” Winfrey of TV Brainy Strides along Wearing down by friction Med. staffer Wishes for Remote button A Karamazov Glitterati member Got some air Put in order Young chicken Day before Perform again Conqueror Family mem.

In a foul mood Petty Small dogs, briefly “Oops!” (hyph.)

Unbend Be under the weather

39 40 42 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 55 56 57 58 59 60 63 64 65 66 68 69 71 73 75 76 79 80 82 83 84 85 87 88 90 91 92

Thumbs-up (var.)

“-- vincit amor” Cambridge univ.

Pungent Henry, Jane or Peter Diva’s renditions -- -Magnon DEA agents Curved molding Movie studio Oblige High dudgeon Sumptuous repast Legal wrongs Polish with a soft cloth Tropical fruit Listlessness Sound in body Dad’s brother Nightclubs In with Type of computer Metal eaters Electrical unit Untruths Chicago airport Merchant Instant lawn Tanker cargo Took a gander Musical key (2 wds.)

As -- -- (usually) Authentic Marina sights Gets stuck Construction piece (hyph.)

Please, to Fritz Online auction site

94 96 100 101 102 103 106 107 109 110 111 112 114 115 116 117 118

Colt mothers Easy gait Insurgent Long, long time Buenos Aires resident Luau memento Play in the kiddie pool Be rife with Meadow browser Had on Jet set destination Batter’s stat Give a hard time Carnival worker -- Conan Doyle Find quarters Habituate

119 121 122 123 124 125 126 129 132 134 136 138 140

Low point Liszt opus Appoints Outlaw pursuers Spanish bread?

Bull’s noise Touch or taste Frizzy coif Theater name Textile colorers Yalie Sass Ginza money

LAST WEEKS’ ANSWERS

Enter a digit from 1 through 9 in each cell, in such a way that: • Each horizontal row contains each digit exactly once • Each vertical column contains each digit exactly once • Each 3x3 box contains each digit exactly once Solving a sudoku puzzle does not require any mathematics; simple logic suffices.

LEVEL OF DIFFICULTY: VERY EASY

9

6

7 5 6 3 9 4 1 8 4 9 4 8 5 3

2 3 9 1 4 7 8 1 3 5 7 6 6

2 3 5 2 7

6

4

V. EASY Solution, tips and computer program at www.sudoku.com # 6

ANSWERS ON PAGE 49

JANUARY 13, 2022

57

MAXED OUT

More tales from the inbox LATE IN NOVEMBER I celebrated the unremarkable milestone of my fifth anniversary since I last darkened my cheery outlook by wading into the morass of social media. Neither knowing nor caring what I’ve missed, I now rely on email from readers to berate and congratulate me for some piffle I’ve written.

Even that is a limited universe since I relegate all anonymous emails or those bearing obvious noms de plume to the spam filter, being generally unwilling to engage with those who prefer to do so without revealing themselves. The others I answer, especially from those who disagree with me

BY G.D. MAXWELL or give me credit for being far more supple than my aging body allows, suggesting I’ve managed to insert my head into a patently improbable part of my anatomy.

Many of those who write frequently open with, “Hey, you ought to do a column about…” I generally have no desire to take their advice, either because I already get enough hate mail and don’t need to get more to satisfy their itch, or because what they’re suggesting can’t, even by me, be stretched into a column of this length.

But weeks like this, well, it’s just too tempting to not answer some in print. And so...

Hey Max. What gives? It’s been weeks since you’ve had anything to say about the unvaccinated polluting our midst.

Meanwhile, Omicron has swept through town and resulted in exactly the things you used to write about. How about revisiting this?

Still Masked Dear Masked: I was once trying a wrongful injury case back in my former life as an ambulance-chasing lawyer in the U.S. My client was blameless and it was a pretty easy exercise to prove negligence on the part of the defendant. But I was counting on a lucrative payday so I may have been overdiligent marshalling the evidence, calling multiple witnesses to prove and reprove the point. Finally, with glazed eyes, the judge hearing the case asked me to approach the bench. Bending down and whispering to me, he said, “Son, you’re beating a dead horse.

Rest your case and let’s move on.”

I have nothing new to say about the unconscionable unwillingness of Saint Bonny and/or Vail to take simple steps to make Whistler a safer place to live and play. I have nothing new to say about the chowderheads who clog up the health-care system because of their unwillingness to get vaccinated or their fatuous rantings about personal freedom, by which they mean personal licence. I have no hope any level of government will change this calculus and no hope the infected unvaccinated will be refused care so other people with more legitimate health issues can get the surgeries they need. I beat that horse

58 JANUARY 13, 2022

ADOBE STOCK IMAGE

dead and I ain’t beating it no more. But thanks for asking.

GD, I recently sold my home in Whistler. I was tired of being house-rich and cash-poor, having been lucky enough to buy a lot here for $5,000 back in the early 1970s but dumb enough to have poor-paying Whistler jobs since then. The home I built largely myself on the cheap lot I bought with borrowed money sold three days after it was listed for $3.4 million! My wife and I moved to the Island and have enough to live comfortably for the rest of our lives. The only person happier is the real estate agent whose

Dear Still... retired: I feel your pain. Just kidding. I live in WHA housing so I don’t personally feel your pain and never will. But I know people who do and it won’t surprise you to hear yours isn’t the only email I get questioning the value proposition of realtors’ commissions and the total lack of competition or market forces in setting them.

Unlike the previous inquiry, going after the realtor cartel would not be beating a dead horse. It would be more akin to beating a horse that won’t die, is impervious to pain and has super powers lesser mortals simply can’t begin to comprehend. In my

I have nothing new to say about the unconscionable unwillingness of Saint Bonny and/or Vail to take simple steps to make Whistler a safer place to live and play. commission on the sale was a cool $105,000.

What did they do to earn it? Got someone to take a few pictures, listed it on MLS, held an open house and brought me an offer they said was the best they’d received. Ironically, it was from the client of another agent who worked under the same company’s banner.

I’d contacted five different realtors in town to see if any of them would take my house on a reduced fee. Nada. It’s a cartel with absolutely no competition. Maybe this made sense when houses sold for a couple of hundred thousand dollars. But a hundred grand for a few hours of work?

Still pissed, but retired.

experience, saying anything negative about realtors unleashes a backlash of indignation, even if said humourously or facetiously. Even acknowledging your question in print is probably unwise. I’ll find out after this Thursday, no doubt.

Sorry, but I’d rather fight city hall.

The following was forwarded to me by Pique’s editor: Please forward this to G.D. Maxwell. I don’t have his email address.

Dear Mr. Maxwell: Someone told me they’d heard I might be eligible for U.S.

Social Security because I’m married to a U.S. citizen. I’m Canadian and have never lived or worked in the U.S. and find this hard to believe. But as an American, I thought you might know whether this is true. Is it?

Skeptical Dear Skeptical: Given your salutation I’m pretty sure you’re old enough to qualify for Social Security. You must even be old enough to remember writing formal letters!

First things first. My email address appears every week right under the horrible picture on my column. I understand why you might not want to look at the picture but there it is. Second things second. I’m no longer an American. Only Canadian. If you prick me, I bleed maple syrup. I gave up my citizenship about the same time I gave up social media, not that one had anything to do with the other.

But as weird as it may sound, your friend is correct. Assuming your spouse is collecting Social Security, and not one of the Americans I know who hope they can fly below the IRS radar for the rest of their lives, you too can get U.S. dollars from the U.S. government every month for simply having the questionable taste to marry an American. And who said theirs wasn’t a socialist government.

Alas, had you done so earlier, you would also have received handsome Covid bonus cheques, er, checks, from both Donald Trump and Joe Biden to help ease the sting of whatever disruption the pandemic made in your life. If you need more specific instruction, just drop me a line.

I don’t know. Maybe I ought to change Maxed Out to a help column. ■

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604-616-6933 Allyson Sutton

CHEAKAMUS CROSSING 1201 Cheakamus Lake Road 1.17 Acres of uniquely zoned LR1 land and buildings on the banks of Cheakamus River. Think outdoor recreation school, tourist, hostel and staff accommodations. Helicopter in/out permitted. Many possibilities! $4,999,000

604-905-8199 Rob Boyd

Angie Vazquez *PREC

604-932-8899

NEW TO MARKET

UNIVERSITY HIGHLANDS, SQUAMISH 2934 Huckleberry BUILD YOUR DREAM HOME on this 9,344 sqft vacant lot, located in the sought after University Heights subdivision. With outdoor recreation at your doorstep, Squamish offers the perfect work - life balance.

Only 45 minutes to Whistler and Vancouver. $1,298,000

778-318-5900 Valerie Phillipson

604-932-7609

BAYSHORES 2809 Clifftop Lane All day sun with vaulted ceilings and huge windows. This home offers a spacious living room on the main floor and a large family room on the second floor.

4 bedrooms plus an office, pantry room & 1 bedroom suite makes this the perfect Whistler family home. $3,200,000

604-935-9172 Nick Swinburne *PREC

NEW TO MARKET

BRENNAN CENTRE 39241 Falcon Crescent Ravenswood Home! 3 bed & 3 bath close to Brennan Park rec centre. Lovely open plan, lots of upgrades: kitchen aid appliances, window blinds, custom closets & many more! Close to all hiking & biking trails. $1,689,000

WHITE GOLD 7453 Ambassador Crescent Amazingly bright, open and versatile property that sleeps 22, enough room for the entire family, completely reno’d in 2014. Turn-key property and is ready for your entire family to all have space to enjoy their Whistler Sanctuary, making this a hidden gem! $5,800,000

PEMBERTON 1414 Pemberton Farm Rd W Voila! .921 acre south facing flat lot with a 5bed/4bath estate home and pool located at the end of a quiet road, close to town and steps to the Lillooet River walking trail/beach. Double garage with a selfcontained suite above for nightly rentals. $3,140,000

604-698-5899 Suzanne Wilson

Whistler Village Shop

Whistler Creekside Shop

Squamish Station Shop

36-4314 Main Street · Whistler BC V8E 1A8 · Phone +1 604-932-1875

325-2063 Lake Placid Road · Whistler BC V8E 0B6 · Phone +1 604-932-1875

150-1200 Hunter Place · Squamish BC V8B 0G8 · Phone +1 778-733-0611

whistler.evrealestate.com

whistler.evrealestate.com

whistler.evrealestate.com

Engel & Völkers Whistler *PERSONAL REAL ESTATE CORPORATION ©2019 Engel & Völkers. All rights reserved. Each brokerage independently owned and operated. Engel & Völkers and its independent License Partners are Equal Opportunity Employers and fully support the principles of the Fair Housing Act.

604-966-8454

3D Tour - rem.ax/510pan

#510 - 4320 Sundial Crescent

$495,000

This is a fabulous recreational property with exceptional rental performance.

This 5th floor studio has a fully equipped kitchen, living/dining area, gas fireplace, sundeck, beautiful bathroom and sleeps 4 comfortably with a queen size murphy bed and queen size pull-out couch.

Sally Warner*

.5

604.905.6326

7580 Taylor Road

This beautiful 1/3 acre property on the Pemberton Fringe allows for low taxes and access to municipal services. The current home has 3.5 bedrooms and 1 bathroom and the two story shop on the property allows for additional living space. This ideal location is close to the village of Pemberton and is prime for a new build.

Alexi Hamilton

3D Tour - rem.ax/1565khyber

1565 Khyber Lane

$3,850,000

4

604.905.0737

3.5

604.935.0757

9337 Warbler Way

7063 Nesters Road

Ann Chiasson

604.905.8855

604.932.7651

3D Tour - rem.ax/208snowbird

$2,788,000

Located between Nesters Plaza and Whistler Village with the Valley Trail and public transit within meters of your doorstep. Enjoy the peaceful setting from the covered rear deck or relax by the wood-burning fireplace in the spacious living room with a vaulted ceiling.

Dave Beattie*

$1,300,000

Only 5 lots remain in this Estate Property Subdivision. Homes can be 4629 or 5920 SF plus 2150 SF Auxiliary Buildings allowed. 5 Minutes from Grocieries, Gas and Liquor Store. Best Value in town!

3D Tour - rem.ax/7063nesters

This One-Of-A-Kind Mountain Home is located in the exclusive Spring Creek residential neighborhood and shows off its quality with soaring vaulted ceilings accented with large heatsaving low e windows. The open floor plan and large deck invite you to enjoy a cozy feeling while entertaining or just relaxing at home.

Bruce Watt

$999,000

4

#208 - 4865 Painted Cliff Rd

$149,000

Owning a 1/10th share in the 1350 square ft condominium on the Benchlands near Blackcomb is great way to insure that you family has year round access to Whistler and an Ownership position that will last in perpetuity. Each year you have access to 2-3 ski weeks and/ or 2 or more summer weeks.

Dave Sharpe

604.902.2779

2

3D Tour - rem.ax/305fourseasons

#305/306 - 4591 Blackcomb Way

$1,625,000

#301 - 4280 Mountain Square

$2,500,000

99 Highway 99

$4,500,000

This luxurious 2 bedroom suite is an end unit featuring two spacious, ensuited master bedrooms. Two private patios to enjoy a main living area with a pull-out sofa. Enjoy the Four Seasons Resort Whistler including 9000 square foot spa, outdoor pool, health club, in-house restaurant and lounge, room service, and ski concierge.

Carleton Lodge – one of Whistler’s most iconic buildings – a small boutique condo. Located at the base of both Whistler/Blackcomb gondolas you can’t get any closer to ski-in/ski-out. Unit 301 is an end unit, 2 bed/2 bath facing the slope. This unit is in the absolute centre of it all.

A very rare, once in a lifetime opportunity to own a legacy estate property within the RMOW. This 26.2 acre parcel along the Cheakamus River is for sale for the first time ever. Bring your vision for the future, because this large property is the perfect place for your dream home. The location is just off the Maguire Service Road right off Highway 99 across from the Callaghan.

Doug Treleaven

Laura Barkman

Madison Perry

2

604.905.8626

#413 - 4369 Main Street

$449,000

Best Price in Alpenglow! This 4th floor studio with views of Sproat Mountain is a perfect little getaway and revenue generator. Located in the middle of Whistler Village, steps from Olympic Plaza, food and shopping, and a short walk from the ski hill. Complex includes a pool, hot tub and exercise room, and secure underground parking.

Matt Chiasson

604.935.9171

.5

604.905.8777

9333 Warbler Way

2

$1,275,000

778.919.7653

1457 - 4308 Main Street

$288,000

Welcome to Wedgewoods, a master planned community of 108 beautiful properties. Phase Six includes the final 19 estate lots which allow for luxury homes plus a carriage house. Stunning mountain views and sunshine make Phase 6 a very special offering. Only 12 minutes north of Whistler with hiking, and biking trails at right at your door and snowmobiling close by.

A rare studio with balcony and beautiful views to Whistler Mountain. Full service hotel property with a Marriot Hotel affiliation. Provides personal use as well as revenue/ income for Owner investors. Enjoy owner benefits even when not occupying the unit.

Delta Whistler Village Suites prides itself with a friendly high service standard.

Meg McLean

Michael d’Artois

WHISTLER OFFICE 106 - 7015 Nesters Road, Whistler, BC V8E 0X1 604.932.2300 or Toll Free 1.888.689.0070 *PERSONAL REAL ESTATE CORPORATION

If you are a home owner, buyer, tenant, landlord, or small business in need of help during this time, please see our updated list of resources at: remax-whistler.com/resources

604.907.2223

604.905.9337

.5

PEMBERTON OFFICE 1411 Portage Road, Pemberton, BC V0N 2L1 604.894.6616 or Toll Free 1.888.689.0070