Tea & Two Slices is a long-running local news round-up by NEEDS frontman and veteran dishwasher Sean Orr, who lives and works in Gastown, deeply aware of his privilege.

Kennedy Stewart is the best mayor the NPA’s ever had: Housing advocates not pleased with Vancouver mayor moving empty homes tax to backburner. Yet another spineless neoliberal breaking an election promise. If we are ok with prices going up astronomically in the last decade we should be ok with scaling some of that back. We want housing prices to go down. If you’re rich enough to own a house and not live in it and not rent it, then you’re rich enough to have your property values drop a little. The Empty Homes Tax generated $38 million and tripling it would generate revenue that could be used to build social housing.

But we’ll probably just build more luxury units: 8 Out of 10 New Apartment Buildings Were High-End in 2017, Trend Continues in 2018. Please show me where building luxury condos has had a trickle down effect on affordability. I’ll wait.

Oh, and just like his buddy Justin, Kennedy is also backing down on electoral reform: One year in, Kennedy Stewart is as much Vancouver’s lobbyist-in-chief as he is mayor. “I have to recognize too that my job is to do what the citizens want. They’re not clamouring for electoral reform.” Oh, really? Because 2018 mayoral candidate Kennedy Stewart begs to differ: “Our elections also need to be fair and democratic. For too long we have operated under an at-large system that lacks community representation and disenfranchises racialized people. I promise that this election will be the last under the at-large system.” Hypocrite.

Fore! Time for Vancouver to Turn Its Golf Courses into Homes. Or…you know, we could piss off rich people by taxing their mansions. Also, I’m pretty sure Patrick Condon got this idea from George Carlin…

This West Side development could be home to Vancouver’s first jamspace in a residential building. Oh, I can just see it now: A glass-walled closet big enough for Blues Lawyers to wank in.

If you wanna see us pay the Sahotas one dollar each for the Regent and Balmoral, come to city council next Wednesday, November 6th at 9:30am: Approval of Expropriation and Advance Payment for 159 East Hastings Street and 160 East Hastings Street.

At first I thought this was a map of ridings that voted for Scheer: Sea level rise may be ‘3 times worse’ than expected. Here’s how it could impact Metro Vancouver. Well, it’s a good thing that nobody will be flying in the future because our airport is now a boat launch.

Meme of the day:

Another week another racist outburst caught on camera: ‘Speak English in Canada’: B.C. woman’s ‘racist’ tirade at Shoppers Drug Mart. I mean, not that we should be surprised…we just elected a guy who did blackface three times. Also, why is the word racist in scare quotes?

Canadian-made ‘invisibility shield’ could hide people, spacecraft. OK, but can it hide my student loan debt?

Petition of the day: Support the demands of TransLink workers going on strike.