Friday - March 1, 2024 - What's up in March?

⛈️ High 6C

Good morning!

A couple weeks ago, I was chatting on the phone with a Fort St. John media guy (who happens also to be Grace's old boss) about depressing journalism stuff. While talking, I clicked over to his website, where I saw a story about a former reporter who left to take a job in Valemount and who then, within a couple months, bought the newspaper he was working at. Grace had introduced me to the guy, Spencer Hall, at an event last summer. Spencer seemed both nice and pretty smart—so why the hell was he buying a newspaper in this day and age?!? So I called him up to ask him (and what his parents thought about the whole thing).

It was not the first time Spencer had heard the questions and he has his stuff together as much as any reporter these days does. I continue to think Spencer is a smart guy and I’ll be rooting for the Rocky Mountain Goat. You can find our chat (and learn what Spencer’s mom thought about him buying a newspaper) in Saturday’s members-only newsletter. Become a member here.

– Tyler

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

Birds, boats, and big markets:
What’s up in the Fraser Valley

Spring is marching towards the Fraser Valley. 

Days are getting longer and the air—while it wasn’t exactly cold this year—is getting warmer. Blue sky begins to beam between pockets of dispersing storm clouds. And as it does, the mountains and vales and trails and streams that shape the region are starting to call to its residents once again.

There are plenty of things to do in the Fraser Valley this March. Lots of them involve either exploring the great outdoors or trying to prepare you for your own adventures.

• Today, Grace talks about what’s up in the Fraser Valley this March.

Need to Know

🎹 A 54-year-old man’s naked piano concert at a Mission seniors facility ended in an arrest—but not before he threw several chairs at RCMP officers [Mission Record]

⛳️ Cheam First Nation bought the Bridal Veils Golf Course [Chilliwack Progress]; It hopes to use the site to build an eco-tourism centre adjacent to its proposed gondola; negotiations began last year [Fraser Valley Today]

👉️ Experts say emergency measures funded in the new BC budget focus on reaction, not prevention [The Tyee]

🗳️ Chillwack school board trustee Heather Maahs will run in Chilliwack North for BC Conservatives [Chilliwack Progress]

🚸 More kids are growing up in poverty in BC, according to a new report [Global News]

🍖 Chilliwack’s Tydel Foods is preparing to open a second shop in District 1881 [Chilliwack Progress]

➡️ The BC Coroner’s office is investigating the death of a Langley man in RCMP custody four years ago [Langley Advance Times]

🗑️ A volunteer group picked up 3,200 pounds of litter from an Aldergrove road in just two hours [Langley Advance Times]

👉️ An Abbotsford man previously convicted of sexually assaulting children was arrested for re-offending in Kelowna [Abbotsford News]

🪦 Former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney died at 84 years old yesterday [CBC]

🎏 Fort Langley has unveiled new, freshly-designed street banners [Langley Advance Times]

👩‍⚖️ Pre-trial hearings continue in Langley manslaughter case [Langley Advance Times]

☺ CURRENT CAM: Congratulations to Theresa Williams, who was the first to correctly identify the location of this week’s Current Cam as the purple Beetle on 6th Avenue in Hope.

SPONSORED BY FESTIVAL DU BOIS

Come celebrate Festival du Bois, March 8-10

Say “bonjour” to the 35th Anniversary Festival du Bois, March 8-10 in Maillardville/Coquitlam’s Mackin Park. Come hear (and dance to) live Acadian, folk and world music, see fun shows for kids and families, explore the Métis Village Experience, sample delicious cuisine traditionnelle – and much more!

This year’s Big Tent lineup includes New Brunswick’s talented La Famille LeBlanc, carrying on their Acadian family heritage. From PEI and the Magdalen Islands, Vishtèn Connexions beautifully blends Acadian and Celtic music with rock and Indi-folk influences. La Famille Léger and Podorythmie, both based in Washington State, play the music and dance of French Canada – and introduce you to crankies! For kids, there’s Will’s Jams and Missy D.

Check out the lineup and schedule, and get tickets here.

The Agenda

Backyard chickens get permanent blessing in Mission

Mission’s backyard hens program won’t be tossed into the metaphorical deep fryer.

In 2021, Mission launched a pilot program that would allow residents to gain temporary permits to keep hens and bees in their backyards. The animals were previously prohibited in residential areas by the city’s bylaws.

Over the last two years, a dozen property owners got the go-ahead to start raising hens. (No one applied to keep bees.) Seven of the initial applicants stuck with the hens, while five gave up.

The pilot program has now concluded and Mission council was recently asked to decide whether to make hens permanently legal in residential areas.

Staff told council that one property generated two now-resolved bylaw complaints. The others didn’t garner the attention of bylaws, though requests for feedback from neighbours generated a mix of responses. Four neighbours of the seven properties said they disliked the new neighbourhood additions. 

Some expressed concern about avian influenza, including one person who worried the disease could be spread to nearby children. (Animal health experts say that backyard chicken coops can be vulnerable to avian influenza and facilitate its spread; at the same time, avian influenza doesn’t pose a danger to humans). One person blamed a mice and rat infestation on their local chicken coop, saying “this belongs on acreages and farms, not residential neighbourhoods.”

Others, though, were happy with the local addition, with two people saying they enjoyed occasionally getting eggs from their neighbours.

Mission council decided to make the program permanent.

No news about local newspaper chain

The future of Black Press remains unclear, even as timelines sketched out by the troubled newspaper’s administrators come and go. An auction of the company was set to take place this week, if multiple qualified bidders had submitted offers. (A deadline for interested parties to submit bids expired two weeks ago.) But no documents with significant new information have been released online since mid-February, when a US court ruled that it would oversee the distribution of the company’s US assets. As of Wednesday morning, no hearings were scheduled in BC Supreme Court.

If no auction took place, KSV Advisory, the company overseeing the sale of Black Press, had hoped to obtain a court order by May 1 allowing it to hand the newspaper to a group composed of two investment companies and a small US publishing company. In the event of an auction, the company had hoped to obtain a transaction order by March 6. 

KSV Advisory has not replied to emails from The Current and Black Press employees have been kept in the dark. But the US court’s ruling in mid-February may have forced KSV and Black Press to reconsider the future of the chain. You can read our story on that latest part of the saga here. 

💾 Flashback Friday

A 1924 advertisement for the Bella Vista Hotel in Agassiz, pictured here in 1890, enticed guests with the opportunity to hire automobiles for excursions to Harrison Hot Springs and the Government Farm. The experimental farm, created in 1886, had become well-known for its massive collection of different plants and trees and had become a tourist attraction—complete with a six-hectare English garden. The farm, now called the Pacific Agri-Food Research Centre, is still running today. Research areas include the less vacation-friendly topics of dairy cattle nutrition, greenhouse vegetables, and soil conservation, among others. The English garden was phased out in 1991. You can find a 2021 FVC story on one recent research topic here.

🗓 Things to do

🌱 Gardening workshop: Learn about seed-starting and kickstart your garden with Sage and Solace Farms’ seed-starting workshop in Langley on Saturday, March 2 and Sunday, March 3. Details online.

🪕 Concert: Acclaimed acoustic-guitar player Trace Bundy will play a concert at Kwantlen University in Langley on Saturday, March 2. Details online.

🏒 Hockey: The Vancouver Giants host the Seattle Thunderbirds on Sunday, March 3 at the Langley Events Centre. Tickets online.

Catch up

That’s it!

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