I went to Monday night’s council meeting with the expectation that the prison issue in the South Okanagan is over. Surprise, surprise, Mike Pearce had his plan B before even announcing the public vote.
They purposely left out voters in the Regional District of Okanagan Similkameen for two reasons. First, those in the regional district outside Lumby voted against the prison, so best to leave out the RDOS to stack the deck in their favour. Second, by leaving out the RDOS in the event they lost the vote, they could then promote to have the prison right outside city limits or as close as possible to the city. And this is exactly what they said they will do, encourage the province to put the prison as close as possible to Penticton, with no regard or respect to the wishes of the citizens on Penticton.
I am shocked at the slippery cowboy politics that came from City Hall. The public would and should expect the city to honour the wishes of its voters, but they have zero respect for its citizens’ wishes.
The only politician that deserves to be re-elected is Gary Litke for standing up to the rebel politicians we have at City Hall. If someone at Corrections B.C. is reading this, we will fight this to the end. Prisoners don’t deserve the sunny Okanagan or to be in our back yard, so stick your prison where the sun don’t shine. This is far from over.
To Dan Ashton and Mike Pearce, I would highly speculate your political career is over and should be — shame on you.
Clifford Martin
Penticton