Ad - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, February 16, 2005 _ STANDARD, ESTABLISHED APRIL 27, 1988 PUBLISHER: ROD LINK © ADDRESS: 3210 Clinton Street Terrace, B.C..° V8G 5R2 _ TELEPHONE: (250) 638-7283 © FAX: (250) 638- 8432 WEB: www.terracestandard.com EMAIL: newsroom@terracestandard.com Our 15 minutes THE ANNOUNCEMENT that Terrace will be the home this fall of a Bachelor of Science in Nursing ~ program is huge news for the northwest. ‘Add the 18 positions in’ this joint Northwest Community College-University of Northern Brit- ish Columbia effort to the 24 spots in the college’s three-year-old licensed practical nursing program _and that works out to an annual intake of 42 stu- dents, a significant number for this city and for the northwest.- _ Combined, these two programs will do much to. relieve the existing northern nursing shortage and better enable the health care system to replace the growing number of nurses who will soon retire.: They also’ mark the beginning of redressing a shortsighted-decision by policy makers a decade ago to shelve an earlier nursing program at the college. ~ What’s interesting is that the Bachelor of Sci- ]. ence in Nursing program is not expensive, at least by health care budgetary standards. Consider that the health ministry will spend in the neighbour- hood of $12 billion this year. That’s $32.877 mil- lion a day, $1. 369 million an hour. The annual running cost of the Bachelor of Science in Nurs- ' ing program is roughly $300,000 — equivalent to about 15 minutes of overall health spending. - ‘It’s a pretty cheap invéstment given the benefits - that will result. Not only will there be more-nurses but both the licensed practical nurse and bachelor programs add to the north’s growing capacity to train its own health care professionals. | - Officials at the Feb. | bachelor program an- ,,.gouncement made.much. of this need to develop. our own people. With health care. professional “ shortages existing éverywhere, the ability and de- sire to foster homegrown talent is crucial. They also said the establishment of nursing ' programs brings with it a cadre of instructors, a base upon which to build for the future. MLA Roger Harris termed the bachelor’s pro- gram the start of a “health care centre of excel- lence.” He forecast the day when Terrace and the northwest will attract’students from elsewhere, providing more stability for this area and more “reasons for growth. ’ It could mean the start of an export industry for Terrace and the northwest. It may sound fanciful, but the prospect of an economic generator of this type should not be overlooked. ’ The last word belongs to Martha Richards, the Northern Health Authority’s senior official in Terrace and Kitimat. Speaking at the official an- nouncement, Richards welcomed the opportunity to help train nursing students. ‘She brought everything into perspective when she closed her remarks with this sentence, “Pa- tients will benefit as a result.” PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link » ADVERTISING MANAGER: Brian Lindenbach NEWS: Jcff Nagel NEWS/COMMUNITY: Jennifer Lang _. NEWS/SPORTS: Margaret Spcirs ~~ FRONT OFFICE: Darlenc Keeping E PAPERS COMPETITION _ ~ CIRCULATION SUPERVISOR: Alanna Bentham ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS: Bert Husband. Debbie Stmons AD ASSISTANT: Sandra Stefanik PRODUCTION: Susan Credgeur ‘SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY MAIL: ~ $57.94 (+$4.06 GST)=62.00 per year; Seniors $50.98 (4$3. 57 GST)=54.55; Out of Province $65.17 (+$4.56 GST)=69.73 Outside of Canada (6 months) $156. P1410. 98 GST)=167.89 MEMBER OF B.C. AND YUKON COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION, ‘CANADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION . AND B.C. PRESS COUNCIL (www.bcpresscouncil. org) Serving the Terrace and Thornhill area. Published on Wednesday of each week at 3210 Clinton Street, Terrace, : British Columbia, V8G 5R2. Stories, photographs, illustrations, designs and typestyles in the Terrace Standard are the properly ofthe copyright & ue holders, including Caritioo Press (1969) Ltd . its illustration repro services and advertising agencies. Reproduction in whole’or in part, without written permission, is specifically prohtoited. Authorized as second-class mail pending the Post Office Department, for payment of postage in cash. Special thanks to all our contributers and correspondents for their time and talents | \ { PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edouard Credgeur y’ WELL, _ THAT'S WHAT THEY GeT FoR SKATING IN CIRCLES ON We SHOULD THROW | THEM A LINE? - VICTORIA - I feel like a bit of a grinch, raising doubts about Christy Clark’s pitch for tax sub- sidies for parents who sign their _kids up for hockey or art classes. It’s obviously appealing, and the goals make sense. 4 Clark, once a cabinet minister and now a backbench MLA who isn’t running again, lined up an launch her effort, some two dozen- reps from sports associations, arts groups and health organizations. Parents are out there spending _ hundreds or thousands of dollars - ayéar on programs that keep their children active and creative, she says. | tesy of other taxpayers, and may allow. more families to get their children involved. But there are a couple of is- sues, both flowing from the basic best way of achieving the admi- rable goal of helping kids grow up happier and healthier. ’ The most obvious one is how you make sure that this isn’t just a tax break for people who are already able to put their children into these kinds of programs. There’s not much need to give a family with a household income of $250,000 a $100 tax break be- cause they’ ve enrolled their chil-. dren in soccer and ballet. - If the policy goal is to ensure WE HAVE laws to protect chil- ‘dren from abusive parents who ~ would neglect them, molest them, or whip them with belts and electrical cords. Yet we allow parents who smoke to force their kids to breathe secondhand = smoke. ’ Kids have no choice, no filter., is never casy. Cigarettes are manufactured with built-in ad- ditives. smoking is less about willpower and more about stripping your surroundings or temptations. Willpower surges when you fecl up, wanes when down. “You don’ quit a bad habit", Dr. Phil says, “you replace it with a good behaviour.” And you bolster your willpower by whatever allows you to indulge your bad habit. If you want to quit smoking, rid your home, car, and pockets of every cigarette and tobacco _ flake. Don’t buy tobacco products. Don’t beg smokes from oth- ers. Without tobacco, you can’t | aaa a "impressive group of backers to | ‘A tax credit would give them . -some of that money back, cour- - *™ question of whether this is the.’ «huge sacrifices, anyway.)*: ©" : ‘finance minister Colin Hansen is ‘Granted, giving up smoking © Like dicting, quitting . you feel ridding your environment of ’ ~ceed you must want to quit. No - which make tobacco smoke to $6? po we Ge Clark says she’ s leaving the details up to the finance ministry and the health ministry to sort out. ; Her aim is to get the issue on the agenda, and push the Liberals to include some similar tax credit May election. ’ The cost could vary wildly, depending on how extensive and and the important thing is to take a first step. But say the credit is designed to cover 25 per cent of the regis- tration costs for these programs. My best guess —-wildly rough ~ puts the cost of providing that - aid to hockey parents across the province at $4 million. (Based on 40,000 players, at registration costs of $400.) So say $50 mil- lion, when you include registra- tion fees for dance and piano and tennis and all the rest. FROM THE CAPITAL PAUL WILLCOCKS that more children participate, then any tax credit should only gc to those parents who can’t afford to provide the opportunities for their children now, (Or making - what-else could you do with that money. It would be enough to give school. districts across B.C. an extra $2,500 per class for arts and recreation programs, or launch a massive after-school program aimed at every ‘child under the age of 12, or an even larger pro- gram focused on kids most at-risk of inactivity. Full marks to Clark for rais- ing the issue, which should lead to some sort of government re- Fewer. recipients: would. allow - a larger tax break for the families who really needed it; and mean more children were active. My sense was that the people supporting the idea weren’t really thinking about a program only for people with incomes under $40,000, for example. The other question, the one interested in, is whether this is re- ally the best, most cost-effective way to work toward the goal. notice the stench of her habit. Yet while walking, if I meet a vehicle, that brief whiff is ing drivers. And when a smok- er’s sofa comes. in for repair, - | smother’ it in plastic while it waits. The stench clings even to plastic, like secondhand phones. she says will be labeled med- ‘dling. Advising the child to “Break your Mom's cigarettes!” could lead to a spanking. Still, spankings will sting for only an hour or two. Second- q TH ROUGH BIFOCALS CLAUDETTE SANDECKI smoke. It’s that simple. Some quit at their first heart attack, Others: quit when they gasp playing backyard games with their youngsters. To suc- the child’s health forever. My dad was born in 1908, long before scientists suspected nicotine might be deadly. He smoked from his teens and al- Ways regretted starting. Many times,.as he tamped, his pipe, he’d say, “I wish I could quit. Don’t you ever smoke.” We never have. And as adults we shared Dad's vigil, spooning method will work otherwise. Some succeed cold turkey. Some use the patch. Zyban pills, . vile to tolerate, stop others. A six-year-old complained to her Grandma, “Mom’s smoking stinks!" Mom probably doesn’t program in their platform for the — generous the program is, she says, ' enough to identify the smok-. How can Grandma support . her granddaughter? Anything ° hand smoke damage could ruin’ . out his morphine, as hardening | Healthy tax breaks beckon sponse. _ Children aren ‘t active enough, to the point that this generation will actually live shorter lives than their parents. according to Bobbe Wood of the BC Heart and Stroke Foundation. Preventable diseases — diabe- tes, heart and lung problems ~ are going to take more lives, and add huge health care costs, unless we take action now. Clark also deserves credit for . demonstrating how a backbench- er, admittedly a. highly experi- enced one, can advance an issue publicly. It’s an opportunity they make use of much too rarely. Only this effort, Lorne Mayencourt’s safe streets bill and Steve Orcherton’s push for alternative medical treat- ments come to mind. ’ People elect MLAs to speak -="Phe.“question' then becomes! OUt: publicly. on the issues that matter, not just behind ,closed ’ doors in caucus committees. © Clark showed how effective that.can be. Footnote: Clark plans a private member’s motion urging support ‘for her plan. She said a “bizarre” rule in the B.C. legislature bars MLAs from introducing any actual bills that deal with the collecting or spend- ing of money. _ willcocks@ultranet.ca Deadly second-hand smoke of the