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- Kona Sankey |
If the Pet-Friendly Penticton project has made one thing clear, it's that this community is passionate about their pets – Pets are family!
Do you share that passion? Tell us about the pets in your life!
If you don't have pets at home, let us know how animals have been important in your life.
I'm a big softie when it comes to pets in our family, we have a little Chihuahua Jack Russell mix named Chloe, a cat named Gemma, my mother-in-law & me had a dog named Oscar for last 13 years he just passed away a couple months ago. We just recently adopted a new puppy Shihtzu name Penelope.
Penticton's pet-amenities are a regular point of contention due to issues around
maintenance, safety, and design/materials. Many Penticton residents regularly travel to surrounding communities across the Okanagan Valley for their dog parks and beaches rather than going to our local places due to these issues.
If elected, what solutions might you propose to address the concerns of residents local pet-amenities?
Like many other world class assets in this community there hasn't been much in the way of reinvestment… I would like to see a newly formed board with stake holders formed and come up with a wish list of what is most needed for upgrades as well what we don’t have currently in this community of ours and what we can do to add for Pet amenities.
What are your thoughts on the economic impact of non-use on our local pet-amenities and residents regularly commuting for preferable options?
Well again with the creation of a new Pet forward board we can look at as to why people are community to other communities for more per friendly amenities. I would like to compare and dive into why that is currently happening.
Ontario's Residential Tenancy Act, Section 14, states that a Landlord cannot prevent a tenant from owning pets. Meanwhile, pets are being surrendered daily, all over BC, because their owners cannot find pet-friendly housing. Penticton faces additional pressure for housing as we have some of the highest rent rates in Canada, and a severe shortage on long-term and year-round rentals of any variety.
While a change to the Residential Tenancy Act is a provincial government matter, municipal government can still move to include/promote similar clauses on a local scale, and has the ability to push in support of such a change if a Bill were proposed.
What are your thoughts on revising the Residential Tenancy Act in BC, to be like that of Ontario, in regards to pets and rentals?
Housing and rentals in this community are at a shocking 0% rental rate even more specifically I and my family have first hand experienced the lack of rentals we spent four months this year living up apex due to the fact that we couldn't find anything here in town… but more importantly the one or two that we did find wasn't pet friendly and there was no chance we were given up her family members like our girl Gemma are Kitty cat and Chloe are dog, so I would like to sit an indefinitely look at this and see if this is something a municipal level we can integrate we have to be very cautious to the fact that we need to find housing and balance for this entire community but with respect to the tenancy act with rentals and pets definitely it's something we need to look at.
Penticton doesn't have an emergency veterinary clinic!
If something happens and an animal needs to see a vet in the evenings, on weekends or on holidays, residents need to drive an hour out of Penticton in order to reach help. Many pets do not make it, and many more don't because their human doesn't have access to transportation.
Were you aware of this situation?
Our family dog Jasper of 15 years passed away about six months ago and we got woken up around 2:00 o'clock in the morning with him bleeding from his nose and in in serious distress. We had to drive to Kelowna to have him put down and it was one of the hardest things I and my wife I've ever had to do. I was fortunate enough to be able to drive there, but I've seen first hand many times through posts on different social media platforms really how difficult it has become for people that are in the same situation with their pets, to first be able to get have a vet after hours more specifically the financial incurred costs of going to the vet in Kelowna not only just driving there but you're paying extremely expensive pricing based on the fact that you're going to those 24/7 veterinarian clinics. We need to find a way to incentive one or two local vet clinics in Penticton to offer after hours pet care for this community no doubt.
When vital and time sensitive services are missing from a community, what do you feel are a City Council's responsibilities in regards to communication and/or action?
I believe it's this councils responsibility to look into regards to the fact that there isn't services that can alleviate these time sensitive services so I think it starts and ends there we got to first acknowledge that there's a problem with respect to the lack of after hours vet care in our community so my action again we've touched on it a few times is we need to create a new board a stake holders in this community and it really get the message out there loud and clear that there is a need for this and we need to get on top of it.
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