- Fraser Valley Current
- Posts
- Wednesday - Jan. 22, 2025 - Local school district hits Microsoft payday
Wednesday - Jan. 22, 2025 - Local school district hits Microsoft payday
Tyler Olsen
January 22, 2025
⛅ High 3C
Good morning!
Working from home when you have kids is a challenge. Or at least it was. There was a time when a sick kid who couldn’t go to school or daycare would doom any hope of work. This week, though, my children have both been wracked with colds that have left them at home. The result? Soft pretzels and fudge. My daughter has returned to baking, and it’s tremendous. Now I just have to get my boy to start delivering me hot chocolate to my desk.
– Tyler
Keep local journalism alive by supporting The Current. Become a Current Insider member today and help bring local stories to life.
Traffic & Weather
🌤 Local forecast: Langley | Chilliwack | Abbotsford | Hope (We have had to temporarily change our forecast links to the Weather Network due to a technical error.)
🚘 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
Why are so many Fraser Valley downtown buildings listed for sale?
Across the Fraser Valley, numerous properties in old downtown cores are listed for sale. 📷 Tyler Olsen
For sale: your local downtown.
The Fraser Valley’s historic downtowns are more vibrant than a decade ago, but as 2025 dawns, prominent chunks of property in Chilliwack, Abbotsford, and Mission’s cores are waiting for new owners—and potentially setting the stage for development and change.
Among the properties listed for sale are a series of multi-tenant buildings on either side of downtown Abbotsford’s busiest road, a Five Corners landmark and historic hotel in Chilliwack, a multitude of storefronts on Mission’s First Avenue, and three major commercial properties in Hope.
Related
Need to Know
💰 Langley entrepreneur says US tariffs could impact everyone from yoga studios to mortgage brokers [Aldergrove Star]
🍩 A developer hopes to build a drive-thru restaurant next to Abbotsford’s airport [Abbotsford News]
👉 A farmer is seeking the federal Conservative Party nomination in Abbotsford-South Langley [Langley Advance Times]
🧶 A new sewing and yarn shop has opened in downtown Hope [Hope Standard]
🏈 Abbotsford football player Bo Lokombo announced his retirement from the CFL [3DownNation]
❓ The provincial government is seeking the public’s feedback on the proposed Bridal Veil Mountain resort [BC Government]
🚔 A young driver was arrested after his SUV crashed into a streetlight pole [Mission Record]
🥋 An Abbotsford judo athlete is seeking the public’s help to finance her Olympic ambitions [Abbotsford News]
🐶 Many Kent dog owners aren’t picking up poop or keeping their pooches leashed [Agassiz-Harrison Observer]
Enjoying our newsletter? Help us make it even better!
Become an Insider member and help keep local journalism and storytelling alive in the Fraser Valley.
SPONSORED BY NOVEL BIOME
Yes, you can sell your poop!
Turn your gut health into life-changing treatments and get paid while doing it.
Novel Biome is on a mission to harness the power of gut microbes to save lives—and your stool could be the key. Healthy individuals aged 10–40 in the Fraser Valley can donate and earn compensation. It's easy, impactful, and yes, it’s real!
Not a match? Refer someone and earn money through our referral program.
Sell your poop. Save lives. Feel awesome.
Ready to join the mission? Learn more about becoming a stool donor.
The Agenda
A Fraser Valley school district is getting more than $100,000 from the proceeds of a class action against software giant Microsoft. 📷 FellowNeko/Shutterstock
Microsoft lawsuit ends in six-figure payday for local school district
The Fraser-Cascades School District has had a financial windfall thanks to a major tech lawsuit.
The district will receive over $100,000 from Microsoft as a result of the settlement of a class action lawsuit. Nearly half the money, $49,000, arrived last year. The $51,000 remaining has been listed in the district’s budget for next year.
The settlement seems likely to be related to one of the largest lawsuits in Canada, which began against the computer company in 2005. The suit, which claimed Microsoft illegally inflated prices for its software in violation of anti-competition rules, was settled four years ago for $517 million.
Awards from the lawsuit range from the fairly small (up to $13 per software purchase made) to much larger, with bigger organizations seeing larger payouts. Funds left over after the settlement process were earmarked for education grants.
Other districts in the Fraser Valley have received funds as well, but none have reported a settlement the size of that coming to SD 78. The Mission School District will receive a check for nearly $5,000. Other school districts in the Fraser Valley didn’t respond to the Current’s emailed request.
Share
You can share this newsletter by forwarding it or copy and pasting this link—https://fvcurrent.com/p/january-22-2025/—into a social media post.
Community journalism needs the entire community for it to succeed.
As part of a membership, you get our special weekend roundup of all the things you might’ve missed each week!
📸 Current (Satellite) Cam
Can you find the location depicted in this satellite image? You can use Google here, if you need help. If you find the location, copy the URL and paste it into the form here. Or just tell us the location in your own words. We’ll share the location in tomorrow’s newsletter.
🗓 Things to do
Art openings: The Reach Galley Museum in Abbotsford opens two new exhibitions with a free reception on Thursday, Jan. 23. Details online.
Fun-gicide: Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Langley hosts an integrated pest management workshop on Wednesday, Jan. 22. The workshop goes from 8:20am to 3:30pm and covers fungicides, common plant diseases, and application technologies. Details and tickets online.
Have an event to tell us about? Fill out this form to have it highlighted here.
That’s it!
Thanks for reading Fraser Valley Current today ♥️
If you found something useful, consider forwarding this newsletter to another local.
Reply