a aa Se Tern Tor ak te, "SCHOOL BOARD MOVING TO OPEN GOVE! ‘Leaislative hak CO TY Porliament Buiidings Victoria Hat. NCU TFN De ED NESDAY,, DECEMBER 13,1989 Ss me ~ Vol. $, Issue No. 50°: Phone 635-7840 Fax 635-7269 - it was all a part of the Christmas magic. A Grade 1 E.T. Kenney class buried themselves ‘making Christmas decorations all week and then last Friday visited the B.C. Access Centre . to decorate the tree there. After singing a few Christmas songs the youngsters got a very - special treat... a visit from Santa. Above, industrial relations officer Roger Davis Is seen giv- ing a helping hand to a young student who was probably about the 20th wanting to decorate the top of the tree. | ‘Fitzpatrick named NHL Player of the Week Mark Fitzpatrick, the ‘former Kitimat resident who now plays goal for the New York Islanders, was chosen as the National Hockey League Player of the Week Monday. ee The Player of the Week award carries with it a cash prize of $500. Fitzpatrick is donating the. money to Kitimat Minor Hockey. For details of his recent performance on ice, see three shutouts in his last four games for the Islanders, pulling them out of a lengthy losing streak and cutting his own goals-against average to put him among the top net- minders in the league. Fitzpatrick has registered page 10. Peaks choose | ~ Thornhill » The Kitimat-Stikine Regional District board of directors has approved plans for the construc- tion of a Terrace Peaks Gym- nastics Club gymnasium com- plex on the Thornhill Communi- ty Grounds. In addition, the board has offered their support » ‘for a Lottery Grant application made by the club and asked regional district administration to draft any necessary legal documents required for the pro- ject. The current gymnasium plan ‘is a scaled-down version. of the original idea drafted over a year ago, but once completed, it will offer similar facilities. Accord- ‘inig to club president Erica Neves, the gymnasium will be built in two or three stages, . depending on available funding: .- The first stage will consist of an 80x70 foot gymnasium at- tached to the south side of the Thornhill Community Hall. The outer wall of this stage will be temporary’ and will allow a 34x70 foot addition to the south side during Stage II. During this stage, change rooms and an of- fice would also be added to the front of the building. The third and final stage, says Neves, would consist of exterior finish- ing work. The original plan for a free- standing complex of their own, says Neves, simply involved too much money and too much time. Club members wanted something they could use now, not five years from.now, and their current plan not only con- forms with all the requirements of the regional district but also allows a construction start date as early as next spring. | _Another problem with their original plan, says Neves, was the. acquisition of land. Along with a request for.land, she says, the club put their original pro- posal before Terrace city council but, ‘“We never heard from Ter- race council at all.’’ | Regional district director Les Watmough is pleased with the current plan. He says that Thornhill first gained a central focus. within the community when the community center was built, but the gymnastics project will greatly enhance that focus. He explains that traditionally Thornhill youth have ‘had to ‘travel to Terrace if they wanted to participate in sports, but soon If Terrace kids want to par- ticipate in gymnastics, they’re going to have to drive out to Thornhill. ‘“We have a lot of land available there for all these kinds of things,’? says Wat- mough. ‘This is the first one . and I hope we can continue to . get these types of things built. If . someone decides they want a hockey rink over there, that. would be great.”” He admits that amalgamation with the City of Terrace could happen one day, but. that doesn’t really matter. ‘It’s just like East and West Hastings (street in Vancouver),’’ he ex- plains. ‘‘What’s the difference? It’s a big place and if the popula-: tion is there you build another . rink.”” But this is a story for an- other day. First, the Peaks Gym- nasium. Vacancy rate less than 1% According to a Canada Mort- | gage and Housing release, rental vacancy rates in northern B.C, are at their lowest level since 1982. The report states that in northern communities larger than 10,000, the rental vacancy rate dropped to 4.1 percent in October, compared with 4.9 per- cent in April of this year. Prince George, Williams Lake and Kitimat are said to have } shown the greatest decline while Prince Rupert registered the largest increase in rental vacan- cies of all northern communities listed. Terrace is shown as drop- “ping from a 3.7 percent vacancy tate in October, 1988, to only 0.6 percent in October, 1989, Another point of interest in what mayor Jack Talstra de- scribes as some interesting statistics is the fact that rent in- continued on page 23 : " . wk igh ema Ba et et ee ROS CANIS a ese sae OF