Funny when I was asked at the Provincial if I had voted before …well, (the look on her face at first) …in the municipal.

Anyone near Nelson/Imperial hear a sound like an engine? It's been going on most of the day today and I can't find the source

The communication about the security incident includes an attachment that we can mail our child's SIN for transunion credit monitoring. Do yall think this is worth doing? I am paranoid that the SIN isn't exposed yet and that the act of providing it to Transunion makes it even more vulnerable. I believe Transunion itself had a data breach in 2019 and 2025. Any analysis would be appreciated

As reported by Freshet News, they sent candidate profiles to all parties for publishing. See which party consistently did not even reply...

Today is the last day to vote for the Burnaby Municipal Elections.

Here is a review of Richard T. Lee, the most experienced politician running in the Burnaby municipal election.

Here are links to Official Biographies**

MLA Bio: Served four terms as the BC Liberal MLA for Burnaby North (elected in 2001, 2005, 2009, and 2013) and as Deputy Speaker from 2015 to 2017. No private members bills introduced.

Legislative Assembly of BC Official Profile

City of Burnaby Bio: Elected to Burnaby City Council in 2022 under One Burnaby and currently running with the New Burnaby party.

City of Burnaby Councillor Profile

*3 Issues with articles for reference *

1. $1,000,000+ MLA Pension After leaving provincial office in 2017, the Canadian Taxpayers Federation estimated Lee's lifetime MLA pension at $1,167,657 ($67,520 annually). This followed a 2007 vote by the BC Liberals to reinstate the pension plan and allow sitting MLAs to buy back time from earlier terms, increasing his estimated lifetime payout by roughly $800,000.

Canadian Taxpayers Federation: Outgoing BC MLAs to Collect $13.3 Million in Pensions

2. $12,000 Spent Fighting a Recall Campaign In 2015, Lee faced a recall petition organized by Burnaby families, teachers, and nurses over Burnaby Hospital and public schools. Lee's campaign spent nearly $12,000 (out of over $26,000 provided by the BC Liberal Party) to fight JUST the recall petition, compared to approximately $2,000 raised by the recall organizers from individual donors. This was to hire a campaign manager and lease office space while the public was collecting signatures.

Burnaby Now: Richard Lee supporters outspent recall campaign

Times Colonist: Two Liberal MLAs targeted for recall campaigns

3. Shelter Plan Approvals and Subsequent Protests Lee was part of Burnaby City Council when they unanimously approved the city's shelter plan with BC Housing. Following public pushback over the proposed BC Housing project at 5389 Imperial St., Lee opportunistically attended anti-shelter protest and introduced motions against advancing the project, which received no seconders on council.

Freshet News: More protest against proposed BC Housing project in Burnaby

Burnaby Beacon: Council unanimously approves 24-hour shelter operations

Source: The Tyee: A Burnaby Supportive Housing Project Goes Down

Just saw it.

Hi New West ans Burnaby, walked around these areas at 7 pm Oct 16 and lost a scarf that's really important to me. If you ever find it please let me know!

Hello, I just moved here and I’m looking for Calamansi extract/concentrate/juice that would be either frozen or as fresh as possible. I’ve had the Inday’s best, it’s not quite what I’m looking for. I had gotten a plastic bottle in the frozen section from Hen Long in Surrey a few months back that was fantastic, but was sadly told they no longer carry jt.

Any leads would be appreciated! Thank you :)

Hey hivemind

I have a friend coming to visit, whos never been to canada before and would love to try poutine!!

The only issue is i cant have gluten- i know NYF is apparently gluten free, but would you say their poutines are good for a first timer?

Any recommendations would be appreciated !!

Just if you're wanting to go to Eileen Daily, don't go now even though online it says it's closed at 10pm today. There was a medical emergency and everyone has been told to evacuate. There were a good number of paramedics in response to the emergency.

Please stay safe in pools and be aware of your surroundings, everyone!

Order made by mistake for Teo. Free to pickup. Tim’s near Metrotown mall

Hey all, ive come to a road block

Ive posted before about a dog that barks from 7 am to late in the night, all day, everyday, for the past year (garden village area)

Im convinced no one is ever home to take care of this dog, but often times the dog begins yelping and screaming, then continues barking, back to yelping and screaming. I truly believe this dog is significantly neglected and it gets rather depressing.

Ive recently had work done for cancer, and i am meant to be home recovering for the next wee while, i cant sleep or rest now due to this dog barking, yelping and whimpering

Ive called the SPCA , the city, and even non emergency , each call results in them telling to call the other

Spca says call the city > the city says call the spca > and repeat this cycle. Nin emergency was really kind about the call and informed me if this is a neglect case, that it is up to the city to locate the house and figuring out where the dog is to report it to the spca.

Id go out looking to see if i can figure out which house, but im unable to walk long distances until im fully recovered. I just want this dog to be properly taken care of and checked in on :(

Nova Med in Burnaby Heights is accepting new patients. Good luck!

https://novamedmedical.ca/

Looking for anyone who may have caught a car accident on their dashcam last night at 9:58 PM (Wednesday, October 14th).

Location: Kingsway (BC-1A), between Earles St and Rupert St (right by the Dairy Queen and Chili Pepper House).

Time: 9:58 PM

Vehicles involved: Grey KIA EV6 and White Range Rover (don't have a model yet).

What happened: Range Rover was speeding heavily behind my friend. My friend tried to swerve out of the way to avoid getting hit, but the Range Rover slammed into his back left side anyway, causing his car to spin completely out of control.

The driver who caused the crash has a dashcam but claims it "didn't have a memory card inside," so we are left with no footage as of now.

If you were driving by at this time and your camera recorded anything, or if you witnessed the crash happen, please send me a DM. It would be a massive help for my ICBC claim. Thank you!

I’m currently planning to take a couple of Grade 12 prerequisite courses (Anatomy & Physiology, Physics) through Burnaby Community and Continuing Education (CCE).

Since I need to do their English assessment first to qualify for Grade 12 level courses, I was wondering what the test is actually like! Is it super strict, or more of a general placement test? What kind of format should I expect (reading comp, essay, etc.)?

I’d super appreciate it if anyone who’s taken it could share their experience or any quick tips. Thanks in advance! :)

Do any of you know anything about CentreBC candidate Vikas Gautam running in Burnaby Centre? Aside from the limited information on the CentreBC web site, I can't see much about him except that he's the founder of V4U Entertainment Association that appears to do very little.

There is some communication from school administration but it looks like student's and guardians personal information was stolen. How can one know if their records were comprised?

Anybody else having negative experience or annoyed with political soliticitation and door hanger brochures?

I can understand the party wanting to skip the mailbox that is located outside of the fence to avoid the party's brochure being mixed up with other mail and to increase chance of the party's brochure being read, but at least close the fence!

I can understand the campaigning and advertising, but to stick the brochure on my door viewer instead of between the doors or under the door mat?!

I can move on with having to close the fence, but on top of that, I also have to rip off your party's brochure and remove any glue residue before I can even use my door viewer again? Unbelievable.

This brochure was from Paul Choi's team. Either intentional, or poorly communicated/trained staff.

Regardless, good learning opportunity for all political parties coming across this...unless no one else have similar experience...in that case, I must be the issue, and I will learn to come to terms with that.

Anyone notice a difference in the taste of your tap water in the past day? It almost tastes like the smell of a new plastic mug or something. I've drank straight mouth to tap and still can taste it so its not my cups.

I recently attended a meet-and-greet at Metrotown Library with mayoral and council candidates for Burnaby’s 2026 municipal election. Housing affordability was the central theme.

Conspicuously absent from the candidates' introductions was any mention of Burnaby’s Inclusionary Housing Policy. Just four years ago, Council touted this framework as an important step toward tackling affordability and countering gentrification in Burnaby's town centres.

Born out of the 2019 Mayor’s Task Force on Community Housing - which was itself a product of the 2016–2018 Metrotown demoviction protests - the policy required developers to provide permanent inclusionary housing equivalent to the greater of the number of rental units demolished or approximately 20% of the new market units, whether strata or market rental. Rents were capped at 20% below CMHC median market rents.

Supported by substantial density bonuses, the Inclusionary Housing Policy aimed to preserve affordability after years of losing low-cost housing to the bulldozer.

That was then.

Over the past two years, Council has substantially dismantled this policy. While they highlighted their consultations with the Urban Development Institute (UDI) and developers, renters were absent from the conversation. The detailed financial analyses cited in planning documents were not made public.

What remains is a shell of the social policy developed in 2019 with a diverse range of stakeholders to provide housing for Burnaby residents with lower incomes.

What Has Changed?

Since 2024, Council has rewritten the Inclusionary Housing Program. Among the most consequential changes:

• Eliminated the 20% rent discount. Inclusionary rents are now capped at the full city-wide CMHC median market rent.
• Raised income eligibility thresholds. The new income criteria effectively exclude the lower half in Burnaby’s renter income distribution - the demographic the original policy was intended to serve.
• Slashed inclusionary housing requirements. Permanent inclusionary housing targets have been reduced to 0% for market rental redevelopments and developments in R1–R4 districts. For strata developments in high-density R5–R8 districts, requirements have dropped to 5% in eastern Burnaby and 10% in western Burnaby. Under these rules, a 50-unit lower-cost rental building in Metrotown can now be demolished and replaced by a luxury market rental tower without the developer having to provide a single permanent inclusionary unit.
• Weakened affordability in rental replacement buildings. Replacement units for displaced tenants beyond the reduced inclusionary requirement - which for rental redevelopments is now 0% - revert to market rents when tenants decline their Right of First Refusal to return or later vacate their replacement unit.
• Applied policy rollbacks retroactively. Council allowed developers to resubmit active rezoning applications under the new regulations. City staff estimate that 23 projects involving approximately 1,100 units could see committed affordability reduced or eliminated entirely. Critics rightly labelled this a “bait-and-switch”: density grants remain while affordability commitments disappear.

These changes affect affordability in two ways: they raise the rents eligible tenants will be charged, and they change who qualifies in the first place. Even a unit rented below market rates offers no relief to a lower-income household if the eligibility rules demand an income far higher than what they earn.

The Income Test Turned Upside Down

Under the former Rental Use Zoning Policy, eligibility was based on BC Housing’s Housing Income Limits (HILs). For a one-bedroom unit, annual household income could not exceed $58,000. The policy was designed to help lower-income renters.

The 2026 Zoning Bylaw fundamentally changed that approach. With the 20% rent discount eliminated, inclusionary rents are now capped at the full CMHC median market rent. (While providers could charge less, that has yet to be seen in the real world.)

Under the new eligibility rules, a household must earn enough for the rent to represent between 20% and 30% of gross household income. For a one-bedroom apartment, that translates to a required income range of $64,520 to $96,780.

Using the CMHC median rents cited by the City:

The result for future applicants is striking: Households that previously qualified for one-, two-, and three-bedroom units are now turned away for earning too little. (While the policy accounts for four-bedroom inclusionary units, none have actually been built to date.)

The income test has effectively been turned upside down. Where the former policy set a ceiling to prevent high earners from taking affordable housing (earn too much and you do not qualify), the new rules add a floor (earn too little and you are excluded).

The Median Rent Trap

As Burnaby demolishes older, lower-rent housing and replaces it with more expensive buildings, overall market rates rise - pulling the city’s median market rent up with it.

If newer developments eventually account for more than half of Burnaby’s purpose-built rental stock, the median rent for a one-bedroom unit could easily exceed $2,100 per month (even without factoring in inflation), reflecting rates at the lower end of newer market rental buildings.

Under the new policy's 20%–30% income test, a $2,100 monthly rent will require an annual household income between $84,000 and $126,000 just to qualify for an inclusionary one-bedroom unit of approximately net 500 square feet.

This creates a troubling feedback loop: as older, more affordable housing disappears, the income required to access "inclusionary" housing scales further out of reach for lower-income renters.

Affordable for Whom?

The campaign rhetoric about affordability is significantly out of step with the reality of Burnaby’s housing policies.

The Inclusionary Housing Policy has lost its former 20% rent discount, drastically scaled back its housing requirements, and raised income eligibility to levels that effectively shut out the lower half in Burnaby’s renter distribution. For these households, the issue is not simply that the rents are unaffordable; it is that the rules prevent them from applying in the first place.

Inclusionary housing labelled "affordable" is now tailored to households far better off than those the 2019 Housing Task Force's social policy initiatives were intended to help.

Up next: We take a closer look at Council’s campaign for family housing under the Burnaby Housing Authority, where a familiar pattern is emerging: affordability benchmarks that sound generous in press releases, but fail lower-income families on the ground.

A little earlier this morning coming down Burnaby mountain the traffic lights were not working correctly and traffic heading down University Drive East was not getting a green light, the light rotation was passing us by. I just want to say a big thank you to the man who got out of his truck and ran over to push the pedestrian button, that caused the light to finally go green allowing us to go. Thank you and I hope you have a great day!

I manually reviewed every single candidate and party from most sources I could find (Internal Government Profiles, Freshet Q&A, vote4tomorrow Questionnaire, Heights Merchants Association Questionnaire, Financial Disclosures, "Transit Hero Pledge", Society to End Homelessness in Burnaby Questionnaire, HUB Cycling pledge, Reddit AMAs...

If anyone wants to add or correct information that's fair. I'm not going to individually list all 60+ candidates, just give a bit of info on some that I found interesting. Personal bias disclaimer (I've historically voted for Liberal/Green/NDP candidates). Still, it was helpful to go through everyone to figure out who I'll vote for.

-Parties:

• The BCA is affiliated with the Provincial NDP. The main incumbent party.
• The Greens are not affiliated with the Provincial Greens but are ideologically similar enough. Some YIMBY members, some members who seem more neutral.
• New Burnaby is small-c conservative, indirectly affiliated with the BC Conservatives and former BC Liberals. Incumbent Richard T. Lee is the most important person in this party. He was an MLA for the BC Liberals from 2001 to 2017. He partnered with David Xie (Conservative) and four other candidates this year. Party is a pretty big tent, ranging from relatively more liberal (Morgan Nicholsfigueiredo) to relatively more conservative (Sabrina Yang).
• Restore Burnaby is conservative, but with a very vocal plank for parks/green space. NIMBY end of the spectrum. Almost running a full slate of candidates. This was the only party where many answers were identical between candidates. (tight leash) They were seemingly by far the least likely party to respond to third-party questionnaires, even relatively conservative ones such as the Heights Merchants Association.
• Burnaby First is conservative. Phase 1 of their response plan for homeless youth is "Immediately prioritize permits for religious groups and non-profit organizations". They are the only party running a non-Independent mayor (Heymann Yip). Also NIMBY end of the spectrum. Only four candidates, somewhat diverse responses between them. Daniel Chen appears likely to be a Trumper.

Candidate fun facts:

-Tom Tao (Independent) lists "breeding for the young" as one of the three most important issues facing Burnaby.

-Shoutout to Joel Gibbs (Green) for probably having the most thorough responses of any candidate. It's actually a bit crazy how much more detailed his responses were from his three Green co-candidates (whether you agree with him or not). His answers to questions tend to be triple the length of Martin Kendell (Green)'s, and (imo) more wonkish as well. He did an AMA.

-Kiran Singh (BCA) was most likely of the BCA members to provide natural feeling responses (i.e. non-politician-speak). He also did an AMA.

-Like all Green party members, Tara Shushtarian signed the "Movement transit pledge". Except, she specficially (and uniquely) precludes approval of the Burnaby Mountain Gondola. Why? My theory: she lives in Forest Grove Area according to her HMA interview, the neighbourhood that the Gondola would pass over.

-Akmal Bazarov (Independent) did an AMA on Reddit where he was obviously using generative AI for his responses.

-Gulam Firdos (Independent) and Konstantine Roccas (Independent) are two independents who both got 2200-2400 votes last election. They were short of the ~10000 they needed, but they're both trying again this year. Roccas responds to questions like he's a redditor. You'll know what I mean if you read any of his questionnaire responses.

-Joe Keithley is one of the longest-serving council members. He switched parties from Greens to BCA in advance of this election. This does not really surprise me: his answers seemed to me to be the most "community preservationist/slow growth" vs the more "eco-development" approach of other Green members, even in 2022.

-Daniel Chen (Burnaby First) seems to be a supporter of the U.S. Republican Party. (Reposts X posts related to anti-Ukraine, cultural Christianity, "Trump Derangement Syndrome", "Climate Hysteria").

-David Xie is not running even though he is on the ballot for New Burnaby. He decided to instead run for the BC Conservatives in Burnaby South-Metrotown. But, if he won the Burnaby council seat while losing the provincial seat, I wonder if he would sit in Burnaby council anyways?

-Jessica Cai (Restore Burnaby) is an "Acupuncturist, traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner". Make of that what you will.

-Mayoral candidate Sabina Hsu (Independent), from my perspective, looks to want to turn Burnaby into a sort of technofuturist hub. Her responses tend to be detailed, that's for sure.

-Mayoral candidate Hanzhi Wang (Independent) is definitely the most "YIMBY/urbanist/strong towns" candidate of anyone in the running. He was not hesitant to tell the Burnaby Heights Merchants Association that he did not agree with their opposition to the potential bus lane. (unlike many candidates, who agreed with them or at least tried to tiptoe). I'm not going to say he exactly subscribes to the "housing theory of everything" (like I kind of do) but his responses certainly sound like he does. His AMA is here.

-Mike Hurley (Independent) is the incumbent mayor. He ran unopposed last time. My impression is he tends to align himself with the BCA on most issues. He is competing against 5 others for mayor this time.

-A couple School Trustee candidates came out fairly strongly against AI in schools: Haini Xiao (New Burnaby) said: "I support banning AI in core areas so foundational skills like math and writing remain strictly human-led". Jasmine Nicholsfigueiredo (Green) said "AI should not be used in elementary schools. In high schools, students need to learn critical thinking and enhance their literacy and numeracy skills among other things." Most other candidates gave fairly neutral responses (except for the Restore Burnaby candidates, who did not respond). Diane Pearce (Independent), conversely, supports it.

If anyone else has specific candidate info to share that would be neat.