Remembrance Day 2019: Where ceremonies are being held in B.C. Social Sharing

A list of ceremonies taking place across the province Nov. 11

CBC News · Posted: Nov 08, 2019 11:39 AM PT | Last Updated: November 8

There are dozens of Remembrance Day ceremonies being held throughout B.C. on Nov. 11. (Justin Tang/Canadian Press)

Across the province, people will gather on Nov. 11 to pay their respects at Remembrance Day ceremonies.

Here's a list of some of the events happening in B.C.'s bigger municipalities (all times PT). Similar services will be held in smaller communities across the province. 

Abbotsford

A Remembrance Day ceremony will be held at Thunderbird Memorial Square. The ceremony will include a parade starting at 10:30 a.m. and a moment of silence at 11 a.m.

Chilliwack

Chilliwack will host several ceremonies:

• At 10 a.m. at the cenotaph in downtown Chilliwack, by the Chilliwack Museum on Main Street.

• At 10 a.m. at the Vedder Crossing Cenotaph.

• At the Coqualeetza Longhouse at 10 a.m., in honour of Sto:lo Nation warriors.

Delta

A ceremony will be held at North Delta Social Heart Plaza beginning at 10:40 a.m., followed by a reception.

The Ladner Branch of the Royal Canadian Legion will host a Remembrance Day event at Memorial Park. A parade will begin at 10:15 a.m. from the legion the Memorial Park Cenotaph. A ceremony will be held at 10:45 a.m.

Kamloops

A ceremony and parade will begin at Riverside Park at 10:30 a.m. 

Kelowna

Downtown, a parade to the City Park Cenotaph will begin at 10:30 a.m., leading up to a ceremony around 10:45 to 11 a.m. After the ceremony, parade attendees will continue to march to Stuart Park. 

Another ceremony and parade will take place at Rutland Lions Park beginning at 10:30 a.m. 

The poppy became a symbol of remembrance following the First World War. (Justin Pennell/CBC)

Langley

A ceremony will be held at Douglas Park in Langley, set to start at 10:45 a.m. A parade will arrive at the event start time, followed by the ceremony at 10:55 a.m. Community members can order wreaths in person or over the phone which will be picked up by the city and delivered to the ceremony site.

The Township of Langley will hold three ceremonies across the community.

Aldergrove: A parade to the Aldergrove Legion will leave Old Yale Road at 10:45 a.m. PT. The procession will be followed by a service starting at 10:50 a.m. PT which will include a wreath laying and a flypast over the ceremony by the Fraser Blues. 

Fort Langley: A procession beginning at 10:25 a.m. will march through the Fort Langley Cemetery, past the graves of fallen soldiers, to the cenotaph. Following the procession, a service will be held which will include a flypast by the Fraser Blues at 11 a.m. 

Murrayville: A procession will depart from the south end of Murrayville Cemetery at 10:30 a.m. After the event, attendees can visit the Langley Golf and Banquet Centre or United Church for refreshments. 

Maple Ridge

A Remembrance Day ceremony will be held at Memorial Peace Park beginning at 10:30 a.m. A parade will march through the downtown core to the Cenotaph. A ceremony will begin at 11 a.m. followed by flags being lowered at 11:30.

Children sit quietly at a Remembrance Day ceremony in Kelowna, B.C., in 2016. (@ChristyClarkBC/Twitter)

Mission

A parade will begin at 10:15 a.m. at Clark Theatre, followed by a ceremony at 10:40 a.m.

Nelson

A parade will begin at 10:30 a.m. from the Nelson Royal Canadian Legion, leading up to a ceremony at Nelson City Hall at 11 a.m.

New Westminster

A parade will begin at 10:25 a.m., heading from Queens Avenue and Sixth Street to the Cenotaph on Royal Avenue. 

North Vancouver

A service will be held on the east side of Victoria Park at 11 a.m., followed by a procession. The North Vancouver Legion will host entertainment from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., and minors are invited to visit the cadet houses following the ceremony. Up to 6,000 community members are expected to attend.

Pitt Meadows

A ceremony will be held at the Cenotaph in Spirit Square beginning at 10:45 a.m. A reception will commence afterwards at Pitt Meadows Family Recreation Centre. Community members who would like to include their wreath in the ceremony can drop it off at the event location from 9 to 10 a.m.

Port Coquitlam

The Port Coquitlam Royal Canadian Legion will host a Remembrance Day ceremony at Veterans Park beginning at 11 a.m 

Port Moody

A parade and ceremony will be hosted at 10:30 a.m. at the Port Moody Arts Centre. The event will be followed by entertainment at the Port Moody Legion from 1 p.m. to 8 p.m.

Prince George

A Remembrance Day ceremony will be held at the Prince George Conference and Civic Centre, beginning at 9 a.m.

Richmond

A parade will start at 10:20 a.m. leading up to a ceremony and wreath laying held at the cenotaph at Richmond City Hall. After the ceremony, community members can attend a reception at the City Hall Galleria.

Surrey

Surrey will host several Remembrance Day events, including a number of processions taking place throughout the city. The main official ceremony, hosted by the City of Surrey and Cemetery Services, will be held at the Surrey Centre Cemetery starting at 10:45 a.m.

Vancouver

The city's main Remembrance Day Ceremony takes place at Victory Square Park beginning at 10 a.m., where the Vancouver Bach Youth Choir and Sarabande Choir will be performing.

Community members are also invited to honour Chinese-Canadian military veterans and Chinese-Canadian pioneers at Chinatown's annual Remembrance Day Ceremony, starting at at 12:30 p.m.

A ceremony at the University of B.C. begins at 10:45 a.m. at the War Memorial Gym, including short readings, remarks from special guests and musical performances by the UBC Opera Ensemble.

Victoria

A wreath laying will be held at the City of Victoria Cenotaph beginning at 10:30 a.m., and a service will be held at Parliament Square in Victoria, beginning at 11 a.m. The service will include attendance by the St. John Ambulance Brigade, a wreath laying, and a special prayer offered by Rev. Andrew Gates. 

Event organizers are asking for community members' patience and understanding as space and seating will be limited this year due to construction in the area. 

West Vancouver

A ceremony will be held starting with a parade from the Legion to the West Vancouver Cenotaph, followed by an official service. Community members can attend a reception at the Legion following the ceremony, at 580 18th St.

White Rock

A ceremony will be held at the Cenotaph at White Rock City Hall, beginning with a parade from Johnston Road at Roper Avenue at 10:30 a.m. A service will begin at 11 a.m., and community members are invited to visit the White Rock Royal Canadian Legion for entertainment afterwards.

With files from Marwa Elgabry

Scammers spoofing more than a dozen federal government departments to defraud Canadians

It's a new version of a scam that has ripped off thousands of individuals

Elizabeth Thompson · CBC News · Posted: Nov 06, 2019 4:00 AM ET | Last Updated: 3 hours ago

Scam artists are using phone numbers from more than a dozen federal government departments to defraud Canadians — making it look as if the calls are coming from legitimate government agencies and police departments — CBC News has learned.

Some of the calls tell potential victims that their social insurance numbers have been compromised. Others are told that they owe the government money and are in legal trouble.

To deceive potential victims who examine the numbers on incoming calls, the scammers spoof their calls so that they display the phone numbers of the relevant federal government departments. In many cases, a scammer tells a victim they will be getting a call from a police officer — then spoofs the call that comes in a few minutes later so that it appears to be coming from local police.

"It's hitting lots of Canadians," said Jeff Thomson of the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre. His own organization has been hit by the scam, with fraudsters pretending to be calling from his office.

"It's inundating police departments and it's inundating us with a number of calls. So it's a huge impact. We've seen a huge spike in the reporting on this fraud."

Thomson said he received four scam calls on his own personal phone inside of one week.

Scam undermining work of federal departments

The scam is having an impact on the ability of government departments to serve the public because they are being bogged down with phone calls from Canadians checking to see whether the calls they're getting are legitimate.

Federal government officials were unable to say just how many departments and agencies have been affected to date by the scam. But CBC News has identified a dozen — including bodies like the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre, local RCMP divisions, the Competition Bureau and the Cybersecurity Centre which are supposed to help protect Canadians.

The calls spoofing the phone numbers of several different government departments appear to be part of a newer, more sophisticated version of a scam that has been running since at least 2014. That older scam involves fraud artists claiming to be agents of the Canada Revenue Agency, while the newer scam impersonates more government departments.

In 2018, a CBC Marketplace investigation into the CRA phone scam tracked the calls to a call centre in Mumbai, India.

Since 2014, the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre has received 78,472 reports from across Canada of scammers pretending to represent the CRA or Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. The centre said 4,695 people across Canada have lost more than $16.7 million to the scam.

That doesn't include people like Andrea van Noord of Vancouver, who lost $6,000 last week to the scam.

The series of events that cleaned out her bank account started when she picked up her cellphone to hear a recorded message claiming to come from the CRA.

'I was panicked'

"I do owe them a small sum of money ... so when I heard that not pressing one would be tantamount to not showing up in court to deal with that issue, I was panicked," she said. "So I pressed one."

A woman asked her to confirm her identity, then told her that her social insurance number had been used in a $3 million fraud involving 25 credit cards. When the woman asked if her personal information could have been stolen, van Noord thought immediately of the laptop filled with personal information that had been stolen from her car a year ago.

The unknown woman then volunteered to help by contacting Vancouver police and starting a process to clear her name. Minutes later, when van Noord's phone rang, it displayed the Vancouver police department's phone number, spoofed by the scammers.

A separate woman, claiming to be a Vancouver police officer, told her that a 1998 Toyota Camry registered in her name had been abandoned in North Vancouver with bloodstains on the back seat and the trunk. A house, also registered in her name, was found with 22 pounds of cocaine inside, the phoney officer told her.

"It all just seemed very plausible to me and very scary," van Noord said. "They said at this time there was a warrant for my arrest and I was currently being charged with drug trafficking, money laundering and fraud against the Canada Revenue Agency."

The fake police officer claimed there was a series of bank accounts in her name and asked van Noord about her actual bank accounts and how much money they contained.

'I felt like an idiot'

The fraudster told her she had to withdraw her money within the hour to protect it before the account was frozen. Keeping her on the phone the entire time, the scammer instructed her to take a cab to her bank and coached her as she withdrew the money., then told her to take it to a café with a bitcoin machine (described as a "government wallet safe machine") that would "protect" her money.

It was only later in the day, after she talked with her partner, that she realized she had been robbed.

"I felt like an idiot," she said. "I felt completely invaded. I felt kind of dirty. I felt that this was very much my fault and that I should have recognized the signs."

Van Noord said both of the people she spoke with had accents that suggested they were based in India.

Police told her there wasn't much they could do.

Thomson said van Noord's experience is not unique.

"These calls are very alarming," he said. "The callers will present themselves as a government official. They will sound very official. They will use a badge number. They will say they are an officer or special agent or an official-sounding title to give themselves some credibility.

"They will sound very formal and they will come across as very threatening and ask you to act right away."

Thomson said the centre is still getting reports of scammers claiming to be from the CRA but, increasingly, they have been posing as representatives of other government departments.

He said those behind the scam are based overseas.

• MARKETPLACE

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"If you have fraudsters operating in one country, targeting consumers in another country and money going to yet a third country, they're clearly organized," he said. "It's organized crime and it's international in scope."

Isabelle Maheu is a spokeswoman for Employment and Social Development Canada, which includes Service Canada. She said the fraudulent calls are affecting the government's ability to provide services to Canadians.

"Wary Canadians who receive a suspicious incoming phone call frequently disconnect the call and call the government to verify the legitimacy of the call," she explained. "This can result in an increase in call volume and caller wait times. Additionally, legitimate phone calls from government departments can be dismissed as fraudulent, leading to the recipient of the call not receiving important information."

Many of the departments whose numbers are being spoofed have put notices on their websites warning Canadians.

Meanwhile, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has given telecommunications providers until Dec. 19, 2019 to implement a system to block calls in their networks to crack down on nuisance and illegitimate calls.

Here's a list of some of the federal departments, agencies and courts whose phone numbers are being spoofed:

• Service Canada

• Justice Canada

• Federal Court

• Federal Court of Appeal

• Department of National Defence

• Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre

• Canada Revenue Agency

• RCMP detachments in Kingston and Cornwall

• Correctional Service of Canada

• Canadian Centre for Cyber Security

• Privacy Commissioner's Office

• Competition Bureau of Canada

• Financial Consumer Agency of Canada

• Canada Border Services Agency

• Parole Board of Canada

Elizabeth Thompson can be reached at elizabeth.thompson@cbc.ca

‘It’s important they see us’: Surrey RCMP hold safety fair amid rising crime

BY ROBYN CRAWFORD CKNW
Posted November 2, 2019 5:14 pm

Surrey RCMP were in Clayton Heights Saturday for a Public Safety Fair. Robyn Crawford/ Global News

After a recent spike in crime in the area, Surrey RCMP were in Clayton Heights for a public safety fair Saturday.

The detachment launched National Crime Prevention Week at Ecole Salish Secondary school from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

The fair had victim services information, community outreach program brochures, and information on how to combat auto-crime.

Surrey RCMP’s officer-in-charge, Assistant Comm. Dwayne McDonald, says it comes after two violent crimes in Clayton Heights over the past two months.

READ MORE: IHIT deployed to fatal targeted shooting in Surrey’s Clayton Heights neighbourhood

“Any time a neighborhood in the city sees a spike I think it’s important they see us and engage with us,” he said at the event.

The family-oriented area saw a shooting at a Mobil gas station along Fraser Highway in September. A week later, there was a stabbing outside another gas station a block away.

“I think Clayton represents one of the quickest growing areas in the city, a lot of young families here,” said McDonald.

“A lot of people are interested in community engagement, so we thought it was the perfect opportunity to reach people who may have questions about public safety.”

It’s not just Clayton seeing a rise in crime. According to the latest Surrey RCMP crime statistics released this week, criminal offences increased by six per cent in the third quarter of 2019. As for property crimes, they rose by 10 per cent.

The third quarter also saw five homicides, compared to three in the previous quarter.

READ MORE: Latest Surrey crime stats spark war of words over policing

Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum said Thursday he’s disheartened by the recent spike in crime, but not surprised.

“Our RCMP members are doing the best job they can, but it is clear from what I have heard from our citizens that Surrey would benefit from having its own police department,” the mayor said then.

“I continue to urge the Solicitor General to make this a top priority and that we work as quickly as possible to establish the Surrey Police Department.”

READ MORE: Surrey mayor announces members of new police transition advisory committee

McCallum has continued to say he’s expecting the city’s police force to launch in the spring of 2021.

Meanwhile, McDonald says the fair had nothing to do with a looming civic police force.

“If we do our jobs to the best of our abilities and provide the most efficient, protective, and effective police force we can, that speaks for itself,” he said.

He says RCMP officers will be giving presentations in schools and at community events throughout the following week.

Multiple charges laid against 69-year-old in Surrey collision that left woman dead

Janet Dudgeon, 61, was killed and her mother Barbara, 84, was injured in a crash in Surrey last March

Jesse Johnston · CBC News · Posted: Sep 27, 2018 4:29 PM PT | Last Updated: September 27

Collision investigators photograph the scene of the hit and run on 72nd Avenue. (Gian-Paolo Mendoza/CBC)

The family of the woman who was killed in a crash in Surrey last year says they're relieved an arrest has finally been made in the case.

Janet Dudgeon, 61, and her mother Barbara, 84, were travelling through the intersection of 72 Avenue and 152 Street in Surrey on March 22.

It was around 6:35pm when an eastbound van smashed into their sedan, killing Janet and leaving Barbara with serious injuries.

"We miss her terribly," said Janet's daughter, Melissa Gambone.

"My grandmother, too. We miss the way she was before the injury."

On Tuesday, police arrested Iqbal Singh Sidhu, 69, in Surrey.

Sidhu appeared in provincial court in Surrey on Wednesday to face 15 charges, including manslaughter, criminal negligence causing death and impaired driving causing death.

"It was definitely a long, complicated investigation," said Sgt. Chad Greig with Surrey RCMP.

"We hope the charges being laid will bring some solace to the family of the deceased."

Sidhu was released from custody on several conditions.

Serious charges

Gambone says her family is pleased to see the accused has been charged with manslaughter, which carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.

"It means that our society is looking at impaired driving with a little more seriousness," she said.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/multiple-charges-laid-against-69-year-old-in-surrey-collision-that-left-woman-dead-1.4841884

Linda Hepner delivers final State of the City address as Surrey mayor

Hepner announced that the city plans to hire a director of housing to come up with and execute a "made-in-Surrey" housing strategy.

JENNIFER SALTMAN Updated: September 19, 2018

The City of Surrey plans to hire a director of housing to develop and execute a housing strategy for the growing municipality.

“I think a housing director, at this point in Surrey’s history, is going to be critical,” Mayor Linda Hepner said on Wednesday, following her fourth and final State of the City address.

Hepner said a lack of affordable housing was not only a Vancouver problem — it’s a problem for the entire region. Surrey needed to have a strategy that looks at what kinds of projects were needed, she said, and it had to be tailored to the city.

“I think that what we’ve always been is a place where people can see themselves and their families growing, so I think as we’ve grown that now is the right time for a housing director,” Hepner said, pointing out that most big cities had such a position.

She couldn’t say whether the position would be filled before the municipal election takes place on Oct. 20, but she expected the process would be underway by then.

Housing was one topic Hepner touched on during her wide-ranging speech, which for the most part read like a love letter to the city she has served — first as city staff, then councillor and finally as mayor — for more than 30 years.

After one term as mayor, Hepner is not running for re-election.

She reflected on the changes that had taken place over the past three decades, including skyrocketing population and more festivals and park space, as well as the development of post-secondary institutions.

Hepner touched on achievements during her tenure. At the top of the list was the removal of a tent city on 135A Street and the rehousing of its residents, the recent release of a report from the Mayor’s Task Force on Gang Violence Prevention, and the addition of 134 RCMP officers along with the hiring of a public safety director.

On policing, Hepner said it’s time to have a broader discussion about policing in the city, and what kind of police force Surrey should have.

“When you have episodes of tragedy in your community, there’s a lot of emotion and during an election period it escalates into fear mongering. I would just hope that everybody is prepared to look at it with a full-on study with facts and analysis, and let’s make the best decision for a growing community,” she said after her address.

Another hot election issue was the debate over whether Surrey should ditch its plan to build at-grade light rail in favour of SkyTrain, even though LRT was fully funded and procurement had started. She called it a done deal and said she found the debate incredibly frustrating.

“I think elections are always driven by different points of view — and that’s healthy — but I think that sometimes we get lost in the minutia of language and we don’t settle into what is the reality of fact,” she said.

Hepner said in her speech that she hoped the next mayor and council would work together and lead the city into its “next great chapter.”

If Hepner were to leave a note for the next mayor, it would be “short and sweet and in big, bold letters,” she said, becoming tearful.

“Be good to this city, because it is headed for greatness.”

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/linda-hepner-delivers-final-state-of-the-city-address-as-surrey-mayor

Mike Smyth: More crime, fewer cops — What is wrong with Surrey's picture?

The spasm of gang violence in Surrey has triggered an outpouring of concern in a community worried about flying bullets and the seductive lure of gang life on impressionable kids.

But it’s also re-ignited a debate in a city that always seems to get the short end of the stick compared to its Metro Vancouver neighbours.

Does Surrey have enough cops? And is the RCMP the right force to patrol mean streets plagued by some of B.C.’s highest crime rates?

Tom Gill, the city councillor considered the frontrunner for mayor in this fall’s municipal election, said the city’s RCMP detachment has added 100 more cops with plans to add more.

“The number is unprecedented,” Gill said. “No other municipality has made as significant an investment in such a short time.”

But it’s not enough to match the per capita number of police officers deployed in neighbouring cities.

According to Statistics Canada, Surrey has just 139 police officers for every 100,000 residents. Compare that to Vancouver, which has 191 cops for every 100,000 residents.

Neighbouring Delta has 163 officers per 100,000. New Westminster has 153.

Now compare the rates of serious crime in those four cities for an even starker contrast.

Surrey has a crime severity index of 117, while Vancouver, New West and Delta have severe-crime rates of 114, 79 and 54 respectively.

The bottom line: Surrey has more crime, and less cops, than its neighbours. What is wrong with this picture?

“It’s actually quite shocking,” said Stuart Parker, a candidate for city council running for the Proudly Surrey party. “The thing a gang possesses is turf. If you don’t have the personnel to compete for that turf, then you’re ceding it to the gangs that do. We need 30 to 50 per cent more officers in Surrey.”

There are also growing demands for the city to dump the RCMP and create a local municipal police force, like the ones in Vancouver, New West, Delta and several other B.C. cities.

“The RCMP has multiple levels of bureaucracy and hierarchies and a backlog of unfilled vacancies,” Parker complained. “A local force will be less top-heavy and allow us to retain police officers in the community where they were recruited.”

But the ruling Surrey First party shows no interest in replacing the RCMP.

“The party is over,” insisted Mayor Linda Hepner, who is not seeking re-election. “We are going to make life (for gangsters) as miserable as we can legally in the city of Surrey.”

Hepner made the comments while releasing a new anti-gang strategy following a rash of deadly violence, including the daylight shooting death of 47-year-old hockey coach Paul Bennett, gunned down in his driveway on June 23.

The report includes recommendations to expand anti-gang youth programs and double the size of the RCMP’s gang enforcement unit in the city.

“It will give us more boots on the ground that will get in the face of gangsters and get them out of our city,” Dwayne McDonald, Surrey’s RCMP assistant commissioner, told Global News reporter Janet Brown.

“My message is, ‘You’re not welcome in Surrey. We are coming for you. You can run. You can hide. But we will find you, we will arrest you and we will put you in jail.’”

But McDonald said the additional anti-gang officers will be moved into the unit from other duties, not new hires. And he declined to say how many officers are actually in the gang unit now for “security reasons.”

“Disappointing,” responded Gurpreet Sahota, the community leader who fired up 5,000 protesters at a recent Wake Up Surrey anti-gang rally. “We need more police officers. And everybody in Surrey is talking about the need for a local police department. Neither was mentioned in the report.”

He questions why a promise to double the size of the city’s anti-gang unit is supposed to reassure anyone when police won’t say how many officers are in the unit to start with.

And why wasn’t the promised “Inadmissible Patrons Program” to ban gangsters from bars started years ago, when a similar program has been running in Vancouver for a decade?

Watch for these issues to heat up as the campaign for mayor gets closer — especially if Liberal MLA Rich Coleman, a former police officer, decides to challenge Gill for the job.

“That recent shooting (of hockey coach Paul Bennett) happened 10 blocks from my house,” said Coleman, who called for more street cops and increased gang surveillance.

“You need intelligence-gathering,” Coleman said. “You need to be visible on the street. You need to use statistical models to know where the hot spots are, target your resources and then push back on crime.”

But Gill said Coleman’s previous controversial oversight of casino gambling — the subject of a scathing recent report on money laundering — should disqualify the former solicitor general from the mayor’s job.

“You really have to rethink whether you can support an individual like that,” Gill said.

It’s clear that gang warfare, and political warfare, are both on the rise in Surrey.