Editor,
Full marks to visiting Corporal Douglas Morgan for his kind efforts in helping the man with a diabetes-related disturbance of consciousness on Government Road (Chief, July 22nd).
It is disturbing if indeed "dozens" of cars passed him by, although I find it hard to believe that he was wandering near the Brackendale General Store for "four hours."
If he was indeed running low on blood sugar, it is likely that he would have been in very serious condition after four hours. One important symptom of hypoglycemia is often a disturbance of mental processes, and I suspect that the victim's perceptions of time may have gone awry.
This is certainly not to excuse any motorists who may have driven around the unfortunate individual. But my experience of Brackendale has been quite the opposite. I developed a weakness of the leg muscles about a year ago. Twice when walking with a stick, I had the misfortune to fall over in Brackendale, and on both occasions I was unable to get to my feet. Once, I was on the footpath immediately across from Judd Road.
Almost immediately, a small truck heading north on Government Road spotted me; the occupant quickly turned around, stopped and came running down the footpath to assist me.
The second occasion, I was on Kingswood Ave., and again the first car to pass me stopped, with the driver getting out and dragging me gently to my feet. Both drivers graciously offered to drive me home, if I so wished.
I now use a walking frame, so I am a little less dependent on the generosity of passing Samaritans.
But I am pleased to report that there are many good Samaritans in our community, including those who still go out of their way to drive me to local events.
Roy Shephard
Brackendale
Whatever happened to good service?
Editor,
If the customer is king he deserves a few more servants.
Sooner or later people will get wise to the fact that low cost goods may not be as cheap as they appear.
I blame supermarkets; before they came along the general idea in commerce was that the more service you could provide customers with, the better, because it increased the amount you could charge but supermarkets turned that idea on its head by making customers pick the goods from the shelf instead of employing clerks to do it for them. This way they reduced the amount of service they provided and used the savings to charge less. After that came self serve restaurants and self serve filling stations, then a lull.
But recently the idea of making the customer do the work has turned into an epidemic. We perform our own banking services.
When phoning company help lines we navigate endless menu options to find the answer to our questions instead of talking to employees.
We go online to book our hotel rooms and airline reservations and if we shop at Ikea we spend more time manufacturing the furniture we buy than the manufacturers themselves. This could be argued as cost reduction but I think its cost transference from company to consumer. A recent British study estimates that adults spend about 30 minutes per day doing tasks that were previously undertaken by business.
Applying that to the British minimum wage means Britons are supplying $61 billion (US) worth of unpaid labour per year.
I had previously thought that the increase in material wealth we enjoy came not just from growth in income but also from reduction in the cost of goods. Indeed many things are cheaper now in real terms but when you factor in the extra cost in time and effort now being imposed on customers you begin to wonder if our rise in living standards is really as great it seems.
But a bigger factor behind the trend, I believe, is the death of the middle market, meaning the way in which consumer demand has become polarized favouring either cheaper goods or premium products and not much in between.
People love a bargain and take pride in getting the best value for their money. They also loved spoiling themselves from time to time by buying up-market products or luxuries.
These two desires now reinforce one another because savings people make on low cost goods provide the means of financing the treats.
The middle market by comparison is much less favoured so companies position themselves towards the ends of the cost spectrum, and those that that have adopted the low-cost model have done so by outsourcing as much work as possible to the customer.
I wonder at what point the consumer rebellion sets in. Sooner or later people will get wise to the fact that low-cost goods and services may not be as cheap as they appear if the cost of the customer's time and effort are taken into account.
I confidently await the declaration that the middle market is on the way back that people have realized it is often worth paying a little bit more in return for a hassle-free experience and proper consumer service.
Rob Green
Squamish
Keep garbage bears away from playgrounds
Editor,
I am very happy to note that Squamish has begun to make steps in bear proofing our community.Fewer bears will be destroyed each year and our children will be that much safer.
I totally support the new Bear Attractant Bylaw which asks that we keep our garbage in at night, keep our fruit trees clear, etc. I am sure the citizens of Squamish will be happy to comply once we all get used to the changes.
I'm looking forward to seeing more bear-proof garbage containers in our municipal parks. My local park, Eagle Run, has two containers, one on each end of the children's play area.
I have made enquiries and learned that these bins (the suspended type) are not bear proof.
With my new understanding of bears and what attracts them into our neighbourhoods, I'm seeing this as a delicious invitation to wildlife to come and feed. Since I noticed this particular case, I have seen many such examples throughout Squamish.
I understand that Squamish will slowly be changing all their garbage bins over to bear proof ones but in the interim can these cans be moved away from play sets as to not attract bears to where our children play? Somewhere near the road would make more sense.
Jude Goodwin
Brackendale
Save Nature
Editor,
Hi, our names are Lucy Bogle and Stéphanie Davis. We live on Greenwood Way. Our concern is for a pond that contains lots of frogs, turtles and snakes. We wish to help this pond survive because construction workers are destroying the habitat all around it.
Lucy Bogle, 8, and Stéphanie Davis, 9
Garibaldi Highlands
