Monday - April 21, 2025 - Mission to consider legalizing e-scooters

🌦 High 12C

Good morning!

We lied—but not intentionally. Last week we promised the second part of our Q&A series on the federal government this morning. That story is ready to go. But in journalism, sometimes schedules change.

That’s why below you’ll find Tyler’s interviews with local candidates, rather than the Q&A. We want to make sure everyone gets enough time to really digest what the candidates said, and what their parties want for Canada, so we can all make informed decisions on election day.

The federal election has also thrown off our History Edition schedule. Normally it would arrive in your inboxes on Friday, but since we want to give you the most up-to-date information before Election Day, our History Edition will be arriving this Wednesday (probably). There are lots of moving parts, so thank for your flexibility!

– Grace

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Traffic & Weather

🌤 Local forecast: Langley | Chilliwack | Abbotsford | Hope 

🚘 Driving today? Check the current traffic situation via Google, and find DriveBC’s latest updates.

🛣 Click here for links to road cameras across the Fraser Valley, including those for the Coquihalla, Highway 7, Hope-Princeton, Fraser Canyon, and Highway 1 in Langley and Abbotsford.

News

Your candidates answer

For the 2025 federal election, we asked each of Canada’s major parties* to connect us to a local candidate to talk about their policies and offer their perspective on issues of relevance to voters in the Fraser Valley’s five ridings between Langley and Hope.

We spoke to Brad Vis (Conservative, Mission—Matsqui—Abbotsford), John Aldag (Liberal, Langley Township—Fraser Heights), Teri Westerby (NDP, Chilliwack—Hope), and Melissa Snazell (Green, Abbotsford—South Langley).

We asked each candidate questions pertaining to their party’s specific policies and approach to voters. Each candidate was also asked: whether Canadians should boycott American products, their response to calls for federal funding to protect Sumas Prairie, how they reconciled their positions on resource development with the desire to respect First Nations’ traditional territory, and why they personally are running for office.

The Fraser Valley has one riding (Abbotsford—South Langley) in which the presence of a strong independent candidate creates a unique voting dynamic. We have invited every candidate from the riding for an interview. Watch for those later this week.

• You can find the interviews with each candidate here: John Aldag (Liberal) | Melissa Snazell (Green) | Brad Vis (Conservative) | Teri Westerby (NDP)

*In inviting a candidate from the Green Party but not others, we originally took our lead from the commission overseeing Canada’s federal debates, which defined a major party as one that held at least one seat in Parliament and was running candidates in 90% of ridings. After we had invited candidates, the commission rescinded its debate invitation to the Greens. We decided to proceed with our interview.

Related

Need to Know

🔥 A massive fire destroyed a large portion of a Chilliwack apartment building Saturday [CTV]

🚔 Homicide investigators have been called in after a body was found in a Langley building following a fire Friday [CBC]

🚑 Three people were hospitalized after a serious crash in Abbotsford Sunday morning [CityNews]

🎣 Advocates worry anglers are flouting fishing regulations on Langley’s Salmon River [Langley Advance Times]

📢 Ethics hearings for Abbotsford school trustees will remain secret—even if the accused wants the matter to be public [Abbotsford News]

⚖ The young man convicted of killing Langley’s Carson Crimeni will need to serve his full sentence in prison [Langley Advance Times]

🚒 Mission firefighters extinguished two fires at local homeless camps in one day [Mission Record]

👉 The province wants to take possession of a Langley property where a drug lab exploded earlier this year [Yahoo/Vancouver Sun]

🗳 The last advance voting opportunity for the Hope by-election is this Wednesday (April 23) [Hope Standard]

🗳 Election 2025

The federal election campaign continues until election day on Monday, April 28. Advance voting ends today at 7pm. Find everything you need to know—including where to vote—by visiting one of our local election hubs:

Chilliwack & the Eastern Fraser Valley | Abbotsford & Mission | Langley

The latest

👉 Chilliwack—Hope candidates shared what they thought was the most important issue facing Canada [Chilliwack Progress]

👉 More than half of the Liberal and Conservative candidates in BC have never held office before [Castanet]

👉 CBC breaks down six key takeaways from the English-language leaders debate [CBC] / Global News has the full debate available online [Global]

👉 A social media disinformation tracker says the federal election will be shaped by online narratives more than it ever has been before [Macleans]

The Agenda

Mission to consider legalizing electric scooters

Mission council will decide Tuesday whether to legalize electric scooters on its roads.

Despite the scooters being technically illegal, electric-powered scooters are widely used around town. A traffic survey on the 7th Avenue Greenway last summer found that electric scooters comprised nearly a quarter of all wheeled transportation vehicles.

The provincial government has an ongoing pilot program that allows municipalities to effectively legalize e-scooters on their roads by passing a bylaw that regulates where and how the vehicles can be used. The provincial program began in 2021. Mission council is set to decide at its Tuesday meeting whether the city should join 26 other municipalities and begin participation in the program. City staff have recommended council pass a bylaw that would create a set of rules mimicking province-wide regulations.

The rules would require e-scooters to be operated in a cycle lane if possible. E-scooters would be banned from sidewalks, as well as roads with no bike lanes and those with speed limits greater than 50 km/h. On city roads with no bike lane but slower speed limits, e-scooters would be required to be operated "as near as practicable to the right side of the road." Legalized e-scooters would have a maximum speed of 25 km/h, and weigh no more than 45kg, have no seat or enclosure. Operators would need to wear helmets and be at least 16 years old.

Enforcing the rules would be another matter. Mounties have told the city they don't have enough staff to enforce additional e-scooter rules. Staff say that without additional changes to the city's traffic bylaw (which are not proposed), bylaw officers wouldn't have the authority to enforce the new traffic rules. But city staff note that E-scooter lawlessness already exists, given the number of e-scooters that operate illegally in the city.

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🤝 Now hiring

• Medical office assistant at the Urgent Primary Care Centre in Abbotsford

• Finance clerk at the Chilliwack Community Police Office

• Server at Chuck E. Cheese in Langley

• Aqua Fit instructor at the City of Mission

• Farm program coordinator at Earthwise Agassiz

Hiring in the Fraser Valley? Reply back and let us know!

🗓 Things to do

Earth film: The Chilliwack Library hosts a film screening of Losing Blue, a 23-minute documentary on climate change’s impact on mountain lakes, on Tuesday at 1pm for Earth Day. After the film, participants can engage in fluid form art therapy. The event is open to adults. Details and registration online.

Stand-up comedy: Comedian Jerry Seinfeld comes to Abbotsford Centre on Friday, April 25. Tickets range from $80 for a limited view seat to $1,000 for a front-row view. Details and tickets online.

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