VANCOUVER, B.C.: Over the weekend, the No TransLink Tax campaign successfully used a crowdfunding campaign to raise enough money to have an airplane tow a banner over the Vancouver Marathon on Sunday, May 3rd.

“We can’t compete with the YES side’s $7 million of taxpayers’ money and buy expensive advertising during Canucks games, so we decided to take our message directly to the people with a banner in the sky,” said Jordan Bateman, spokesperson for the No TransLink Tax campaign. “We asked our supporters to chip in, and were blown away by the response.”

The first goal of $1,417.50 to pay for three hours of a plane pulling the banner over the Lower Mainland was reached in less than five hours on Friday. A stretch goal of $1,890 was set to buy an additional hour of flight time. In the end $1,955 was raised from 63 donors. That’s an average donation of $31.03.

“I want to thank all our donors who chipped in to help get our message out. We couldn’t do it without them. We have to raise every nickel of our campaign from everyday people – and we have to make every nickel count – because our budget is less than $40,000 while our opponents waste millions of dollars and the resources of local government to try to raise taxes on families in our region,” said Bateman.