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When I saw the latest news release from the NPA, my first thought was, "Oh my God, does Kirk LaPointe have a secret agenda to close some library branches?"

The party is trumpeting a Fraser Institute report noting that Vancouver spends $305 more per capita on public services than the regional average.

It's no secret that Vancouver has the best public facilities in the region.

Whereas the Lower Mainland's third-largest city, Burnaby, has four library branches, Vancouver has 22.

Whereas the region's second-largest city, Surrey, has six community centres, Vancouver has 24.

Whereas the Surrey RCMP says on its website that it has 661 police (the number has increased somewhat since then), Vancouver has 1,327, according to its last annual report.

Whereas Surrey had 25 murders in 2013, Vancouver had only six.

Whereas Vancouver has a plethora of shelters and drop-in facilities for the homeless, B.C. Housing lists no such services in Burnaby or Coquitlam, which is the fifth largest city in the region.

In the NPA news release, LaPointe claimed that Vancouver residents don't receive 78 percent more services than Surrey, which spends the lowest per capita on public services.

Based on the statistics listed above, I would question LaPointe's assertion.

He's now calling for keeping spending under control.

Since LaPointe has declared himself to be the king of transparency, I invite him to fill in the comment form below to identify which libraries and community centres he'll close and how many police officers he'll lay off to bring Vancouver's spending down to the regional average.

Politicians who rely on Fraser Institute research are often politicians who value markets over anything else.

The NPA campaign has taken an increasingly right-wing turn in the past couple of weeks, perhaps because this helps fill party coffers from right-wing businesspeople.

However when the last NPA mayoral candidate, Suzanne Anton, took a hard right turn, she ended up alienating the party's more progressive wing.

With LaPointe relying on Fraser Institute dogma to buttress his mayoral campaign, he appears doomed to make the same mistake.