I don’t normally rush to judgement but after reading the mayor’s comments on crime in Penticton I felt the need to.
Mayor Andrew Jakubeit, I spent 27 years living in Surrey. Not one break-in to report, sorry.
I moved to the Okanagan on retirement in 1998. I lived on Young Street for 18 months (three thefts, one reported, got file number from the usual, didn’t bother reporting others as nothing was ever resolved). Sold and moved to Dauphin Avenue.
Two thefts in less than one year (previous experience told me not to bother reporting as all you get is filthy fingerprint dust on doors and windows and a file number). Sold out there to. I have moved a little further away (I know, people think why do you stay? Answer: weather).
I mentioned in a previous letter about how our council seems determined to make Penticton the armpit of the Okanagan, by giving subsidised housing to dead-beat (18 to 35 year old) able-bodied males allegedly with problems (I believe that are 99 per cent self-inflicted). Meanwhile senior citizens in our midst are ignored and left to wallow in poverty after working and being productive all their lives but have fallen, mostly, through no fault of their own, on really tough times and are trying to survive on day-old hand-outs from charities.
When I lived on Dauphin I heard guys saying loudly from their subsided digs “this is Utopia.”
I rest my case, Mr. Mayor. I will not be voting for you, though I did the last time.
Tom Keogh
Penticton