The food truck festival is happening in the Mission district today. The sun is briefly shining. The Cindy Sherman exhibit is here for the moment. We’re off to explore.

As always, this is your opportunity to bring up city issues that are burning. I’ll be posting a couple of things next week but, in the meantime, have fun here.

There’s already a back and forth going on about the business mission Mayor Gregor led to London recently, but here’s the story I wrote, belatedly.

These kinds of missions are becoming more popular among the mayoral set, it seems to me. This is Gregor’s second. Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts led one to India not too long ago. It appears to be part of a world-wide trend to connect more city to city, which is the way some economists think the world’s trading systems really work.

But these efforts are difficult to judge, since cities can’t offer the kind of tax credits or other incentives that a federal or provincial government can. And how do we judge their results? If a mayoral mission goes over and gets deal signed while there, it seems as though the actual trip was just for show because surely no company decides on the spot to commit to a complex and expensive deal. But if there are no deals or announcements made for months, how are we to judge whether the actual trip had anything to do with the ultimate results?

Obviously, business people think these trips are worthwhile because they keep pushing for them and are willing to pay their own way to go along. (That was the case with both Robertson and Watts.) But how shall we measure their cost-to-benefit ratio and success?

There have been rumblings about making changes to Vancouver’s unique system of negotiating with developers on the money they will hand over, per project, to cover some of the costs of catering to the new residents that will be housed in their projects.

That money isn’t just used for the obvious things like community centres or sewers, however, which those residents will use, but also theatres and galleries and heritage preservation and affordable-housing projects and much more.

But so far, we’ve heard about it mostly as some kind of tiff between developers and the city, rather than what’s really at stake, which is the kind of system that helps pay for community benefits but also doesn’t leave developers guessing in the dark about how many thousands or millions they’re going to have to contribute.

My today story sketches out the beginning of the debate that is going to happen over reforming that system. For those wondering where I got my numbers from, they come from this recent report on the 2011 calculation of community amenity contributions, which were calculated as $180 million, along with the 2011 total of development cost levies, which was calculated to be $55 million.

(So weird, I have to add in passing, that when you google these reports, you get a link that then leads you to the city’s web page, where you’re told “Oh no, that page doesn’t exist any more.” You then have to do a search within the city’s website to find the same report. Was there no way to ensure the old google link went to what turns out to be the same report?)

It must be summer when not-so-young men’s fancy turns to talking about litter and city maintenance. I hate to sound like an old codger here, but do you know how many rounds of complaints bout this I have heard in my almost two decades of covering the city.

With stunning regularity, there are uprisings of grumbling about wheatfields growing on city boulevards, overflowing trash cans and the like. Pretty much always in the summer, when things grow more and there are people out and and about than usual.

I must be very unobservant, because the city doesn’t seem any dirtier to me than usual. We here in the east side have our usual complement of abandoned mattresses and furniture, no more, no less. The grass is growing to harvesting height on the boulevards, as I have seen it so many times before, especially in crunch years when money is tight.

And yet, we seem to have a squadron of people out saying it’s all a lot worse than it used to be.

May I acquaint you with some history, culled from the 1,000-plus stories on the news database with the words “Vancouver” and “litter” (which hit a high point in 2008, with 72 stories on same just in that year, though admittedly some involved kitty litter) or “Vancouver” and “poor maintenance” and a few other combos.

Vancouver needs a good spring cleaning; A city’s cleanliness speaks to the pride of its residents, and controlling litter is an aspect of urban life we can do something aboutGeller, Michael. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 16 Apr 2009

Woman says yes we can solve street litter problem; She did the job herself after city refused to install garbage bin in KitsilanoEustace, Chantal. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 30 Apr 2008

Without anti-litter law, streets becoming dumps, resident says: [North Shore Edition]Bohn, Glenn. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 20 Jan 2000

Crusader urges clean sweep of litter:: [Final Edition]Fralic, Shelley. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 14 Apr 2005

An idea to end the litter: [Final Edition]The Province [Vancouver, B.C] 23 June 1996

Let’s get behind a spring makeover of our litter-prone city: [Final Edition]The Province [Vancouver, B.C] 15 Apr 2005

Litter rally to clean up this town, literally: [Final Edition]The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 24 May 2002

Litter-filled beaches a disgusting sight: [Final Edition]Carsky, S. The Province [Vancouver, B.C] 11 Aug 2000

Don’t blame homeless for messy parks: [Final Edition]Gregson, Ian. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 30 Mar 1998

Taking back the neighborhood: Wet condoms and dirty syringes litter the school yard. Predatory johns and drug dealers roam the streets. Addicts shoot up in broad daylight. Finally, Strathcona residents are fighting back with neighborhood patrols: [1* Edition]Sarti, Robert. The Vancouver Sun [Vancouver, B.C] 25 Apr 1992

Parks department to review field maintenance: [Final Edition]The Vancouver Sun[Vancouver, B.C] 26 Jan 2005: B2.

How do you feel about living in your newly named neighbourhood?

What’s new and welcome? What’s missing. Some of you have already commented under the previous post, especially about meeting minutes being missed for the Development Permit Board and the Downtown Eastside Local Area Planning Process.

www.vancouver.ca

Inspired by the recently celebrated B.C. Day, which came with attendant essays on what makes this province unique and worth bragging about, I’ve decided we need a Vancouver Day, with guidelines on how you can tell a true Vancouverite (whether here for five days or five generations) from a mere visitor.

Plus, we all need a chance to be silly.

Here is my kickstarter and highly idiosyncratic list about what defines someone as a Vancouver native:

– Knows the difference between West Vancouver, the West End, and the west side of Vancouver

– Never bothers to carry an umbrella in any weather. What are Gore-Tex jackets with hoods for?

– Pronounces Vancouver as “Vangcouver,” a strange but true Canadianism I’ve noticed.

– Has a strong opinion about cycling, one way or the other

– Does not think there’s anything strange or unusual about butter-chicken poutine.

– Has waited more than four hours in a ferry line-up, at some point.

– Knows where there is a decent wild blackberry patch

Additions?

Here’s the bumph from the City. Tell me what you think when it comes out.

The City of Vancouver will unveil its new website Wednesday, August 8.

More than a website refresh, this is a completely new website—built from the ground up with modern tools and methodologies to create a new, user-centred City and Park Board web presence.

The highlights of the our site start with its radical redesign. We started with a vision for serving citizens better—whether they are looking for information or services, or wanting to engage with us online.

Staying true to that vision meant conducting extensive user research into what information people want and need. We also analysed great government sites from around the world and looked at best practices for user experience and content strategy. Using all this knowledge and understanding, we developed the new vancouver.ca as a our new platform to build and improve over time.

We hope our citizens and site users will discover a site that is easy, intuitive and enjoyable to use. We think people interested in how we’re making it happen behind the scenes will want to know we’re:

Employing a robust content management system to stream information to different sections of the site with minimal intervention,

·       Incorporating the Google search appliance, and working with an SEO analyst to optimize the findability of our content,

·       Adding social media components, starting with Facebook events and Flickr accounts, to create more integration of community information,

·       Using our own Open Data catalogue to produce consistent, easy-to-use Google maps,

·       Integrating all our recreation programs into one database—searchable by time, type, location, age and date, and

·       Working closely with 311 call centre to ensure people have access to the consistent information and services regardless of the channel they choose.

Little-known fact for the amusement of council-meeting-starved urban wonks: The mother of Michael Mason, who is competing in the high jump in London, is the just-hired chief administrative officer for Metro Vancouver, Carol Mason.

She’ll be starting her new job shortly after the Games are over.

This is a note from Laurie Best, who is overseeeing this, which I’ve pulled up from the previous string. I’ve asked Laurie, but don’t have an answer yet, what it means when it says there is a “snapshot” of all the previous pages. I’m not sure if that means there are pages and types of information that will be still available but not updated any more or what. I’ll post her answer when it’s available or perhaps she will do so here herself.

Yes, we are launching a new website soon– one based on user research into what most people are looking for most often when they come to the site – things like recreational programs, garbage schedules, job posting, bid opportunities and permit applications. We’re also making it easier to find other information – equally important – that a smaller number of people seek out, like past financial reports or completed rezoning applications.

In fact, a snapshot of our entire current website – with more than 60,000 pages on it—will continue to be available to anyone who wants to look through it, while the new site will be focused on trying to help people complete their desired tasks more quickly and easily.

Director, City Of Vancouver, Web Redevelopment Project

This was Laurie’s answer about what happens to the pages that are saved as snapshots.

It’s “frozen in time”. With the exception of some pages that will be subject to some ‘behind the scenes’ manipulations (something easier to show than to try and describe!), new information will get posted to the new site.

Check the left side of the screen for this Q and A, folks. Comments re the exorbitant cost of green paint, the mollycoddling of cyclists, the city’s shameful lack of action on green painting, etc., should be posted over there, not here