Eyes in the crowd were wet with tears as Burnaby Mayor Mike Hurley apologized to Chinese Canadian families during a special city council meeting Saturday.
The mayor called the official meeting to allow members of the community to see their councillors unanimously pass a motion to repeal three discriminatory bylaws. It’s been four years since city staff discovered these inactive policies and began working towards a process of repealing them. The outdated bylaws prohibit the city from employing Chinese and Japanese workers. They also place restrictions on land ownership and voting rights for people of Chinese descent.
“Please accept our appreciation for the contributions your parents and grandparents made to our community and their efforts for change,” Hurley said.
“Our actions made life harder for them and for all community members of Chinese descent. For that, we are deeply sorry today.”
He said it’s difficult to understand how people could do these things to each other.
“But it happened, and it’s up to us to ensure it never happens again,” he said.
Chinese Canadians in the audience said the apology shows continuing reconciliation efforts and updating bylaws are a part of paving a new way forward for the community.
“As I was laying the wreath today, I was thinking about Richard Lee, the first Chinese [person] hired by the City of Burnaby, so I stand on his shoulders and the legs of his,” said Elwin Xie with the Burnaby Village Museum.
“This apology is long overdue, but it was important that they got it right. And they got it right.”
Event attendee Will Wang says every city should be reviewing its bylaws and following Burnaby’s example.
“As a new Canadian, I also want to teach my kids, we want to have equal opportunity for all people,” Wang said.
“I think that’s a key point of reconciliation for different historical issues.”
The city says it hasn’t found other discriminatory bylaws in its work so far, and it will build on this work by promoting awareness of Chinese-Canadian contributions to Burnaby’s history, providing cultural competency training to city staff, and providing core community safety programs in Chinese languages.