Monday - Nov. 27, 2023 - Big signs, big backlash

☀️ High 8C

Good morning!

My roommate and I found an electric fireplace in our apartment’s storage locker. It’s a big, heavy thing but we lugged it down the hallway and set it up in our living room.

It’s not the same as a wood-burning stove. And while I could say that the wood fireplace is better, that there’s nothing like the heat and the smell of the wood on a cold winter night, I also like being able to turn the fire on with a button. I think people who love wood stoves unequivocally have either never scarpered across a snowy deck barefoot to bring in an armload of chopped pine, or are simply made of stronger stuff than me. Or, perhaps, they were just smart enough to wear shoes and mittens when their moms asked them to fill the woodbox.

– 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

Realtors signs, big backlash, and a new bylaw

The Maharaj Brothers’ distinctively large gold and black signs are impossible to miss in downtown Chilliwack.  

Which may have been what doomed them.

Earlier this month, the City of Chilliwack changed its sign bylaw specifically to force the prominent realty company to downsize its signs, with one councillor declaring the need to change the rules due to a “couple bad apples.”

But Rickneel Maharaj doesn’t feel like a bad apple. He says he and his brother followed the city’s rules—even if some took umbrage at the scale and success of their marketing efforts. 

• Today, Tyler writes about a real estate marketing strategy that became too effective for its own good.

Related

Need to Know

🧥 Why do teenagers not wear winter coats in the freezing cold? [CBC]

🗳 Dusty Smith won Hope’s by-election; Smith previously served on council [Hope Standard]

🚑 One person was hospitalized after a multi-vehicle crash that also brought down power poles [Langley Advance Times]

❌ Shelters in Abbotsford are already full, even before winter begins in earnest [CBC]

🚔 Video shows a tractor rolling spectacularly after a police chase in Surrey [Global]; the driver is from Chilliwack and posted videos prior to the accident saying he was protesting SOGI [Chilliwack Progress]

🎂 A Mission woman recently celebrated her 104th birthday; her motto is ‘eat chocolate and everything is better with butter’ [Mission Record]

🚨 One person died in a crash on Chilliwack Lake Road Saturday [Fraser Valley Today]

🔎 Langley Mounties are seeking help to find a missing woman [Langley RCMP]

✈ Fog caused a WestJet flight to circle the valley for more than an hour Friday [Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows News]

🗳 A Tesla Cybertruck is now on display in Langley [Tesla]

🏠 An upcoming Official Community Plan amendment will enable Abbotsford Tech District to build affordable housing for young people and families alongside high-quality education and well-paying jobs.*

*Sponsored Post

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The Agenda

Abbotsford heritage conservation efforts win national participation prize

While those seeking to restore Abbotsford’s Turner House didn’t win a $50,000 prize earlier this year (read our original story here), the Abbotsford Heritage Society isn’t walking away from the competition totally empty-handed.

The Turner House, a historic building in Abbotsford that was home to a Royal Engineer family and constructed in part by local Indigenous groups, was located on the area’s first co-operative farm. Several years ago, it was moved to Clayburn Village. The Abbotsford Heritage Society entered the site in the National Trust for Canada’s Next Great Save, a country-wide competition to garner attention and public support for different competing heritage sites. 

The 2023 winners were announced last February. A train station in Duncan, BC, won the $50,000 grand prize. The $10,000 second prize went to La Vieille Maison in Nova Scotia. Third prize landed closer to home, though: the Hope Train Station, in Hope, walked away with $5,000. Winners were selected by public vote, 200,000 of which were cast throughout the competition.

All 10 contestants in last year’s Next Great Save, though, were presented with a national participation prize in the form of the National Trust for Canada’s Governor’s Award. Abbotsford’s Heritage Society was part of the group awarded for their enthusiastic pursuit of the prize and the attention and excitement that pursuit helped garner for conservation efforts nationwide. 

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🗓 Things to do

🎶 Carolling: The Annual Rotary Carol Festival will be on Wednesday, Nov. 28 at the Clarke Theatre in Mission to raise money for the Mission Christmas Bureau. Details online.

🎅 Run: The Salvation Army’s annual Santa Shuffle, a series of run/walk fundraisers, is taking place in Abbotsford, Chilliwack, and Langley on Saturday, Dec. 2. Details online.

🎄 Historic Christmas: Heritage Abbotsford is holding a Christmas open house at Tretheway House on Saturday, Dec. 2. Details online.

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Catch up

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