]

FOURTEEN CANDIDATES NOMINATED

aa the November 20 Van-
| a Civic elections only eight
iS S away, the Committee of
Ae tve Electors (COPE)
Ted the race last week with a
et of candidates and per-
thin; Wes for an immediate
ae housing program, a new
° Jon system, and an over-all
eet master plan for the
Opment of the city.
ane out of a highly successful
held ce nominating convention
a a weekend in the Iron
Drogr TS union hall, COPE has its
aay adopted, candidates
4 ated and campaign
Parations well under way.
atone pe yas a confident mood
came le 85 COPE members who
ecisi to finalize the policy
i and nominate can-
S. The mood was captured in

e
| ‘opel of alderman Harry

> when he said, ‘‘We have the
8 am, excellent candidates, a
ee position for unity of the
Stand es vee the tone has been
0 sto e time is short. It is time
Sno. > talking to ourselves and to

Prog

i to the people of this city.”
COPE» Meeting carried through
q aa pledge to lay the basis for
Nomins a reform slate and
idates ed a half ‘slate of can-
and § for aldermanic positions

9r school and parks boards.
halt ay later, meeting in the same

' Re Vancouver Area Council
While New Democratic Party,
Uni -ctaining their official anti-
ee on, nevertheless

ae only six for city council,
a Slates for the school and
‘S boards,

'th or without unity, the COPE
@ as emerged as the strongest
dit; ne inated. Two new ad-

Sto the aldermanic

Irene Cavaliero and
obson, are expected to
Support out COPE’s electoral
esidert Mrs. Cavaliero is
L a 4 of the Consumer Action
mon 5 and a long time activist
Btouns Welfare and anti-poverty
Teastin Robson is secretary-
the €r of the provincial council
Seong Carpenter’s Union and
loca) ry of the union’s Vancouver

“ 4€ was nominated by the
wa of his union local.
ut ¢ Previous candidates round
by paidermanic slate, headed
Yorke E president Bruce Yorke.
Britigy Who is also president of the
aris. Columbia Tenants
tow, ation, will be joined by
aldep Planner Sol Jackson and
rong Rankin.
are i parks board candidates
Greeny by Donald ‘‘Dusty’’
% nae for years an active
Mastin, hity worker in Vancouver’s
Cleoy. East and just recently
Sun a President of the Hastings
Will he resource board. With him
to the Mike Wallach, also elected
and 5 source board; pharmacist
Shelton COPE president Sid

eat and engineer Sam Vint.
the Vic board candidates include
Teacha, President of the Parent
es Association, Betty
ang Vell; students Fred Lowther
Telep Phillip Rankin; B.C.
Helden n° employee Frank
the br » and a former member of
De Ocal council of the New
Ning. Fatic Party, David Man-

"Xecutiy

Hous;
One oe. “Vancouyer’s number
Num pul problem” is likewise the
8 Go, One campaign issue so far
OUSing 1S concerned. COPE’s
Mdonteg Policy had already been
tin, lm special workshop
The ,. © held earlier this month.

mM
for ty, Plank of the policy calls

pes. . “onstruction of a minimum
the city Units annually, owned by
lang of Vancouver, built on city

Cop,» 2 City o
: oration. Lee development

rented at

reasonable rates to serve lower
and middle income families.

A majority of the monies needed
for such a program are available
under existing programs of the
federal government and the city
already owns land enough for
10,000 units. “All that is needed is
action at city hall,’ the housing
statement declared.

Taxes, going higher every year
for homeowners, while standing
still or declining for developers, is
also shaping up to be a major
election issue. COPE termed the
present tax base — the .real
property tax — as “un-
satisfactory” and ‘‘inadequate”’.

The present tax consists of two
parts, one a school tax and the
other a general tax. COPE stated
that the school tax should be
eliminated completely within five
years while the general tax should
be divided into a residential and
corporate tax. Residential taxes
should be based only on the costs of
municipal services directly to
residential properties and not
general municipal costs . or in-
dustrial service costs. All the
remaining costs should be borne
through industrial or corporate
taxes.

Underlying all of COPE’s civic
policies is the call for a 20-year
master plan for development of the
city.

Such a master plan, COPE said,
would include the planned con-
struction of secondary industry,
the development of the waterfront
and the port of Vancouver, strict
controls on downtown develop-
ment, a quick start on a rapid
transit system, and a com-
prehensive land banking system
that would place in one central pool

Lorne Robson, carpenter’s union
leader, has been nominated by
COPE as an aldermanic candidate
in the upcoming civic election.
Robson is seen here speaking at a
mass labor rally.

all land owned by the city and the
two senior governments.

Other COPE policies include the
longstanding demand for a full
ward system to extend civic
democracy and the development of
False Creek so as to provide low
cost housing with adequate

facilities.
On the University Endowment
Lands, presently “disen-

franchised” since they are part of
no municipality, the plan calls for
amalgamation with the city of
Vancouver with about one third to
be used for housing for university
students and university em-
ployees.

On the special question of the
proposed winter Olympics COPE
came out firmly against the games
saying that present housing and
transportation facilities were
inadequate.

In addition, three present city
councillors, aldermen Massey and
Linnell, as well as the mayor
himself, all stand to make con-
siderable personal gain from any
such games owing to their in-
vestments in Grouse Mountain

Resorts Ltd.

COPE outlines civic

Shelton and Sam Vint, (parks board).

a

Candidates nominated last Saturday by COPE for the Vancouver civic election Nov. 20 ar .

5 a . i e sho

They are left to right, Ald. Harry Rankin, Sol Jackson, Irene Cavaliero, Bruce Yorke (lfcmerscs ee
Greenwell, Fred Lowther, Phillip Rankin, Frank Helden and David Manning, second from right edit!
board); Donald Greenwell and Mike Wallach (parks board). Missing are Lorne Robson, (aldermanic): and Sid

—Sean Griffin photo

Ground beef price unjustified

Amidst the continuing debate as
to whether ground round steak is
round steak ground up, the dismal
fact still remains — a product that
is a staple food in most working
people’s diets still sells at an un-
justifiably high price.

The assorted kinds of ground
beef vary according to fat content,
meat content — even water content
— but they always share one thing
in common — a hefty price tag.

That fact didn’t emerge too
clearly from the Food Prices
Review Board’s report on ground
beef, published in June, but several
other facts did. And while the
report cost several thousand
dollars, it was little more than

endless excuses for high meat

prices.

After discovering that ground
beef accounted for more retail
sales than any other item or single
cut of meat, the report went on to
analyze the content of the various
products that were being sold
under the general name of ground
beef. It concluded that 70% of all
ground beef was derived from beef
trimmings — with the remaining
30%, in most cases, made up of
imported frozen boneless beef,
brought in from Australia and New
Zealand.

The report also concluded that it
was the imported beef content in
ground beef that ‘‘determines both
the value that the retailer puts on
his carcass trimmings, and the
retail counter price of ground beef
mixtures.”

Following that line of reasoning,
it would seem logical to assume
that retail prices for ground beef

should reflect fluctuations in the-

price of frozen imported boneless
beef. And since boneless beef from
Australia and New Zealand has, as
the report pointed out, declined in

I would like anybody buying
ground meat of any kind at any
supermarket anywhere in B.C.,
including Vancouver Island,
clip the price tag sticker and
mail it to me at P.O. Box 24866,
Station C, Vancouver 10, B.C.

Beryl Plumptre in her report
on ground beef has come up
with such a bunch of untrue
prices that I would like to
gather as much material as
possible.

You need not identify your-
self. Just identify the store, and
the area, and give the date.

H. K. WARREN

price since August, 1973 because of
surplus stocks in Britain and a
softening market in both the U.S.
and Japan, the retail price of
ground beef should also have
declined considerably.

_But, as most shoppers can af-
firm, it hasn’t — except, perhaps,
ina few isolated instances. But the
Prices Review Board balked at
drawing the conclusions that it’s
own investigations had led to.
Where the report did not console
consumers with the illusion that
“retail ground beef prices have
begun to decline,” it made it clear
that, in its view, retail stores were
not to blame: “‘In periods of rapidly
rising boneless beef prices, the
report insisted, ‘‘retailers tend to
absorb some of these price in-
creases through reduced gross
margins, but increase margins
during periods of declining
boneless beef prices.”

In laymen’s language, the report
was Saying that profit margins
would, in the long run, end up at
about the same rate. But that
certainly hasn’t happened and
unless some action is taken against

See GROUND BEEF, pg. 11

x)

0

Still trying to keep pace

—The Commonwealth

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 1974—Page 3