DON’T BLAME BEAVER, CITY SAYS
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LOUGHEED READIES FOR MAKEOVER
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A LITTLE OPPOSITION HEALTHY FOR CITY
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FRIDAY
JANUARY 17 2014 www.burnabynewsleader.com
So you’re single? Why not have some fun and check out these five fun coupes for the single life? See Page A12
Local man charged in lesbian assault
WANDA CHOW/NEWSLEADER
Burnaby North Liberal MLA Richard Lee shows on a map the vegetable farm his grandfather co-founded on the Musqueam lands in Vancouver, after immigrating in 1913 and paying the $500 head tax. He is supportive of plans for the B.C. government to formally apologize for past legislation that discriminated against people of Chinese heritage.
Head tax touched Burnaby-North MLA’s family Lee supports the effort to apologize for historical discrimination Wanda Chow
wchow@burnabynewsleader.com
Kwong Quai Lee
Richard Lee first learned about the head tax as a teenager in 1971. Today he’s the Liberal MLA for Burnaby North but back then, he was a recent high school graduate who had just immigrated with his parents to Canada after more than a decade of trying. A week after arriving, and meeting his paternal grandfather for the first
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time, the elder Lee took him aside and showed him an aging folded document—the certificate showing he had paid $500 in head tax to enter Canada in 1913. Until then, Lee never knew such a tax existed. Now in his fourth term as MLA, Lee has been part of the provincial government’s efforts to formally apologize for its role in discriminating against the Chinese community in B.C.’s past. Last spring, Lee himself drafted an apology but ran out of time to get approval from the New Democrats
before the legislative session ended to make way for the provincial election. Now Teresa Wat, the Minister Responsible for Multiculturalism, is taking the reins, but Lee continues to watch with keen interest. After all, his family’s presence in British Columbia started with his grandfather, Kwong Quai Lee. At age 24, Lee’s grandfather left his home in Zhongshan, China—now also known as Burnaby’s sister city— during the turbulent and unstable years after the 1911 Chinese Revolution that overthrew the “Last Emperor” Puyi.
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A Burnaby man has been charged with the assault of two women in Vancouver last fall that the victims claimed was due to their sexual orientation. The women were on a bus Sept. 18 when they kissed, which may have triggered a reaction in the male suspect, who had earlier boarded the bus in Burnaby, according to Metro Vancouver Crime Stoppers. When they got off the bus at East Hastings Street and Commercial Drive, the suspect followed them. Then, without provocation, he assaulted the women, punching one in the face. Several people came to help the women and chased the suspect, who fled. Photos of the suspect, taken from bus surveillance cameras, were published through Crime Stoppers which led to a number of tips helping Vancouver Police Department identify and arrest the suspect in November. The allegation that the assault was due to the victims’ sexual orientation is being reviewed by the VPD’s Hate Crimes Unit. Andrew Joseph Walko, 45, of Burnaby is charged with assault and assault causing bodily harm.