Friday - April 25, 2025 - More baseball diamonds proposed for Walnut Grove

🌤 High 24C

Good morning!

My daughter’s kindergarten class has been learning history through artifacts found in each of their homes. Each student was told to find an object, bring it to class, and share what it could tell them about the past.

I was very excited for this particular homework assignment, since our house is full of old stuff. Would my daughter want to take the full set of encyclopedias? Our plethora of records? The VHS tapes we still watch? The adding machine hidden somewhere in the basement?

Ultimately, she chose the typewriter: a 1946 Smith-Corona I received as a gift sometime in my teen years. It’s beaten and battered, and the ribbon has holes worn through. But it still works, and my daughter got a crash course in how to use it before demonstrating her knowledge to the class. According to her, the kids enjoyed pressing all the buttons.

– 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

Sumas Prairie protections ignored by parties

Less than four years after one of Canada’s most devastating natural disasters, none of the country’s federal parties have promised to spend money to prevent another Sumas Prairie flood.

Local candidates say they’ll advocate for infrastructure that could address the regular flooding of the Nooksack River into Canada. But none could promise that their party would act.

That is consistent with each party’s platform, none of which suggest investing money in Sumas Prairie flood management would be a priority—or even on the radar of a future government.

• Today, Tyler reports on what the election campaign says about the potential for federal action to avoid or mitigate the damage from a future Nooksack River flood.

Related

Need to Know

🚒 Langley firefighters were on scene for several hours after an Aldergrove garage caught fire Wednesday [Aldergrove Star]

🚓 Abbotsford police have said a sexual assault that took place in Downes Park earlier this month was targeted [Fraser Valley Today]

🚗 A Langley woman was arrested after driving an uninsured vehicle in the HOV lane with a fake permit [Fraser Valley Today]

🚔 Construction on the first phase of Abbotsford’s $87.1 million police department expansion is now complete [Abbotsford News]

🐴 A Chilliwack equestrian club is celebrating 90 years in the community [Chilliwack Progress]

🎶 Mission singer Carly Rae Jepsen is bringing her songwriting chops to Broadway with a production of 10 Things I Hate About You [Mission Record]

🚀 Gain skills that get you hired! KPU’s practical programs prepare you for the workforce with the confidence to thrive. Make your next career move.*

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🗳 Election 2025

The federal election campaign continues until election day on Monday, April 28. 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

👉 Abbotsford—South Langley’s Conservative candidate Sukhman Gill was absent from Abbotsford’s Chamber of Commerce debate Wednesday [Abbotsford News]

👉 Liberal leader Mark Carney held a rally in Cloverdale—Langley City just days before the election [Cloverdale Reporter]

👉 Candidates in Mission—Matsqui—Abbotsford and Abbotsford—South Langley shared their thoughts on the two biggest issues facing their ridings [Abbotsford News]

👉 Elections Canada explains how it keeps your votes secure on Election Day [CBC]

👉 With diplomatic relations fracturing between the Liberals and the Indian government, Conservatives are looking to win over South Asian voters [The Local]

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The Agenda

New baseball diamonds proposed for Walnut Grove

The Township of Langley is planning to add more baseball diamonds to Walnut Grove Community Park in an effort to keep some games and practices away from Fort Langley.

North Langley Diamond Sports has been running youth programs for baseball and softball in Langley since the 2000s. Its baseball programs are largely based out of parks near local schools: Dorothy Peacock Park, Topham Park, Walnut Grove Community Park, and Fort Langley Community Park.

In 2022, residents near Fort Langley Community Park began to complain about the noise and conduct of the baseball players. Field times at the park were reduced in 2024, with the number of weekend games going from four to three. Township staff purchased two portable baseball mounds so the teams could move some games and practices to Dorothy Peacock instead.

As a long-term solution, the Township is looking at options to expand field capacity at Walnut Grove Community Park. The park, located next to Walnut Grove Secondary, currently has three baseball diamonds and a sandlot, as well as a running track, tennis courts, a soccer field, and a spray park.

Design work for the reimagined park and additional diamonds is currently underway. Once the design is complete, it will be brought forward to council for discussion.

More than 120,500 advance voters in the Fraser Valley

Over the Easter long weekend, more than 120,500 Fraser Valley voters submitted their ballot for the upcoming federal election.

The numbers, released by Elections Canada yesterday, show nearly a third of all voters in the Fraser Valley cast their ballot ahead of time. The riding with the highest proportion of early voters was Langley Township-Fraser Heights, where nearly 34% of all electors submitted their ballot. In Chilliwack-Hope however, only 20% of voters took advantage of the early polling opportunities.

Across Canada, roughly 7.3 million people participated in advance voting, an increase of 25% from the 2021 election.

Charts showing the breakdown of early votes by riding can be found on our election results page for each community: Langley | Abbotsford & Mission | Chilliwack & the Eastern Fraser Valley

(You can bookmark these pages and come back to them on election night; we’ll be updating them with local results as they come in.)

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🗓 Things to do

Clean-up day: Residents in the Township of Langley can participate in garbage cleanups across the region on Saturday. Details online.

Compost presentation: The Fraser Valley Conservancy hosts a free composting presentation at All Saints Hall in Mission on Saturday at 9am. Novices and seasoned composters are welcome. Details and registration online.

Concert night: The Fraser Valley Community Winds perform Yesterday's Joy at the Matsqui Centennial Auditorium on Saturday at 7pm. Details and tickets online.

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