Author: Stuart Mackinnon

January 3, 2013  The Vancouver Park Board’s annual Lifeguard School begins January 8 at the Vancouver Aquatic Centre. The program provides lifeguard certification and recertification to update qualifications. Now in its 77th year, the school provides comprehensive training for prospective and returning lifeguards interested in summer employment at Vancouver’s nine beaches and all

Here is a letter the President of the Chicago Botanic Gardens sent to her staff. I thought it was worth sharing:  As you know, last Friday we enjoyed a wonderful afternoon together—celebrating our colleagues’ years of service and achievements.  As we left the party that day, we learned that yet

November 1, 2012, The Province It will be, arguably, the single biggest change in governance in Vancouver since the decision at the first meeting of the city council in 1888 to create a park board. A fundamental shift in governance is happening behind closed doors that some say is a

Point Grey Foreshore advocate Sal Robinson spent a little time in Vancouver Public Library’s Northwest History Room with an old city planning report… POINT GREY WATERFRONT PLANAdopted by City Council December 7, 1976 Policy 4: The beach area should remain in its current “natural” condition. This stretch of beach provides

FOR THE RECORD: A couple of weeks ago I wrote that the Riley Park/Hillcrest Community Association has applied to the park board to replace Vision Vancouver park board vice-chair Aaron Jasper as its liaison, claiming he appears a tad too busy to do the job properly. At the time, Jasper

For those of us who love the Vandusen Botanical Gardens, this was a bit of a disappointing year. The gardens just weren’t as beautiful as they have been in the past. They were a little frayed around the edges. This is not surprising as, like every other garden and park

Poor Park Commissioner Aaron Jasper. It seems he just can’t get a break. In the Vancouver Courier, columnist Sandra Thomas writes that one of his liaison responsibilities wants to jettison him. Thomas writes in her Central Park article Lazy Liaison? that the Riley Park/Hillcrest Community Centre Association wants to dump

As autumn approaches and the leaves start to change colour and fall to the ground you might wonder what happened to all the city gardeners this past summer. Parks and boulevards looked shabby again this year. The fine folks who maintain our parks and public spaces were around, but there

A group of neighbours have recently formed the Fraserlands Community Gardening Group with two goals: 1.      To work towards establishing a community garden in our neighbourhood; 2.      To complete reclaiming and beautifying the pedestrian/cycling pathway that runs along Kent Avenue parallel to the train tracks between Kerr and Elliott streets.

 Developers, and the city itself, would like to see affordable housing, rather than affordable golf, on the publicly owned land by Emma Teitel Maclean’s Magazine , Tuesday, July 10, 2012  VIEW IN CLEAN READING MODE » WHAT IS THIS ?   Rebecca Bollwit/Flickr Vancouver’s publicly owned golf courses—Fraserview, Langara, and McCleery—are

By Matthew Burrows, Straight.com Publish Date: July 25, 2012    A former Green park board commissioner by night and a schoolteacher by day, Stuart Mackinnon admits he’s “a bit of a process wonk”. Having served one term on the board, from 2008 to 2011, Mackinnon told the Straight he finds

First it was housing on the Langara golf course, now paving the last natural foreshore on English Bay. Where are the Vision Vancouver park commissioners going? Do they even know? If you look at the their ‘policy’ statements from the past two elections you would see that they really stand