B.C. BUDGET DEFICIT AND THE OLYMPIC COSTS

Even after offloading the Olympic costs to other levels of government the Provincial government is having to spend millions if not billions on Olympic costs. The problem being that they will not admit to most of the spending being Olympic costs. I fail to understand why they refuse to tell the truth about the true overall costs of the games. It’s not as if there is any viable alternative to them in government making them sure to re-elected in May.

The fact is that projects such as the sea to sky highway improvement project would not have been done if the Olympics were not coming. Meanwhile other badly needed projects throughout the province had to be put on hold or cancelled to put resources to Olympic priority projects. Olympic organizers and government officials chose to ignore the people warning of the inevitable cost overruns and forge ahead, I believe knowing full well they would be over budget. When putting a cost for security of $175,000,000 without any consultation with the RCMP is a ridiculous way to do business. Now they are hoping to provide the required security for one billion, that’s not much over just a whole bunch more zero’s.

Not that I have any interest in going to the games anyway but the tickets have been priced out of ordinary working people’s ability to pay. Even events being held now, a year before the games, at venues paid for by taxpayers they are not allowing the public to attend. So much for all this expense being for the benefit of all citizens. 

Meanwhile Gordon Campbell has repealed the law against running deficits so they can borrow enough to pay for it all. 

The homeless are still homeless and I’m curious as to where and how the government plans to hide them from the world.

The drug lords are still doing business freely and openly on every downtown street corner. 

The gangs are still having their gang wars with daily shootouts in mall parking lots and street corners, putting the general public at some considerable risk. I’m sure these gangs have all registered their weapons just like the rest of us have been forced to do.

Hiding all this from the world for two weeks, a year from now will be very expensive but of course will not be considered an Olympic expense, if it can even be done at all.

Trivia - In Washington state, you can’t carry a concealed weapon that is over 6’ in length.

B.C. BUDGET DEFICIT

B.C. will have a Budget Deficit  this year and next at least. How fast he can turn around and recall parliament and repeal the balanced budget law of 2002 that was passed with much fanfare. 

We are stuck with billions of dollars of expense to host the Olympics, we won’t even know how much until the Olympics are finished. I expect the government will never admit to most of it being other than a normal run of the mill infrastructure cost. I don’t yet know how they will disguise the cost of Games Security but I expect they will come up with some story. Being upfront with the public in the first place would have been more palatable, at least in my view.

The Liberal government doesn’t have to concern themselves with not getting re-elected, simply because there is no viable alternative to them. 

The embarrassment of breaking his own budget law doesn’t seem to faze Mr. Campbell in the least. I expect his biggest regret is there will be a $9,000.00 holdback on his salary, unless he repeals that part of the legislation as well.

Trivia - It is illegal to wear spurs while walking through a hotel lobby in Phoenix, Arizona.