B16. Terrace Review — Wednesday, February 13, 1991

week. Mayor Jack Talstra

- told Skeena MLA Dave Parker that

the city would be lobbying for a
truck route in the coming year.
CFTK television was to provide

- the ammunition: a video tape of
- past accidents on Sande Overpass.

Parker responded by saying the
provincial government was current-
ly looking at alternate routes, and
between the two levels of govern-

- ment the beginnings of something

good might take place later in the
year. No one held their breath, but
a few waited patiently with fingers
crossed.

In 1988 other ideas were being
discussed; primarily privatization,
stumpage rates and the disposal of
hazardous wastes. The province’s
Special Waste Advisory Commit-
tee had selected the Envirochem

Group to build a state-of-the-art
hazardous waste system in B.C.
and the next step was to find a
site.

Why not here, asked alderman
Ruth Hallock? Swan Lake, Alberta
had a "prototype" waste site, she
said, that was proving to be a great
economic success. Hopes were
dashed before the idea could even
be explored, however. According
to B.C. Special Wastes Inc. direc-
tor Dr. Frank Henning, we get too
much rain here, we’re susceptible
to earthquakes, and transportation
to our area would be far 100 ¢x-
pensive. .

As far as stumpage was COn-
cerned, the city was considering
talks with local forest companies
to determine the effect of recently
inflated: stumpage rates. The idea
for the talks came from a letter
written by Prince George mayor
John Backhouse, who claimed that
in some cases costs had risen by as
much as 1,000 percent in the
interior of the province.

On privatization, city council
opted in mid-January to support
the BCGEU in their opposition to
the privatization of highways
maintenance. Council added one
stipulation to their support, how-
ever. They gave the province until

Feb. 8 to answer some specific -

concerns, and if the answers were
acceptable council’s support to
BCGEU opposition would be
withdrawn, But on Feb. 8, how-
ever, council hedged; the province
hadn’t yet answered their ques-
tions, so they tabled the matter
until Feb, 22.

One reason, perhaps, for the
province’s failing to respond, was
the fact they were busy talking
privatization with employces of the
local tree nursery. Talks there,
however, were broken off abruptly

: by the province. This was a com-

plete surprise to the employees
group, who believed they were
close to a deal, and left doubt in
some minds as to what
privatization was all about.

, n the legal scene, the
O Victim’s Assistance Pro-
gram received a $1,667

grant and a promise for an addi-

tlovial $10,000 in April during this

eek in 1988. And in 1989 we

iioved towards the “"™)s with: a
controversy over the treatment of a

TLooking back...

here was hope of a new prisoner suffering from AIDS.
| overpass a year ago this

being held in local RCMP cells.
The prisoner claimed he had been
mistreated and subjected to dis-
crimination; the RCMP and
Sheriff's office said he hadn’t.

And a year ago this week, the
regional district asked the govern-
ment for street lighting at a "hazar-
dous" intersection; Highway 37
and Lakelse Lake Lodge Road. A
Terrace man was killed in a colli-
sion between a pickup truck and a
motor home on Old Lakelse Lake
Road. And fire extensively
damaged two Thornhill mobile
homes in separate incidents.

In regional news, a question from
a government lawyer to a witness
in the Gitksan Wet’suwet’an land
claims case in Vancouver
prompted the blockade of a log-
ging road near Little Oliver Creek.
in 1988. The lawyer, Alan Bunjan,
asked one of the tribal council’s
witnesses why, if the group claims
owner ship of the land, they had
done nothing to protect the
resources they claim to own.

While all this was going on,
MLA Dave Parker visited Stewart
to announce approval of the $19
million, 138-kilovolt hydro exten-
sion to Stewart, and federal minis-
ter of Fisheries and Oceans, Tom
‘Siddon, visited Terrace to say he
had a solution in mind for the
decimation of wild Skeena
steelhead stocks by the commercial
marine fishery, but wouldn't say
what it was. Perhaps this was
because it wasn’t the real purpose
of his trip. At a Chamber of Com-
merce luncheon, all Siddon talked
about was the Tory-engineered
Free Trade agreement with the
United States.

A year ago this week, B.C.
Hydro held it’s second public
meeting in four months on the
Kitimat/Terrace hydroelectric trans-
mission line. After a question and

answer session, though, few locals

agreed with hydro’s preferred route
along the west side of Lakelse
Lake, At the same time, Alaska
was talking about a B.C. electrical
connection; this wouldn’t happen
ifor a while, though, according to a
jocal B.C. Hydro spokesman.

Hydro connections, however,
were somewhat overshadowed by
GST contempt. The regional dis-
trict board said: the tax would
discriminate against those in the
north. Mulroney was missing an
important point: the majority of
Canadians live within 100 miles of
the U.S. border but, "We can’t go
across the border... except to Hy-
der," said director Les Watmough.
"And what’s in Hyder?"

And there were a few other
regional peeves around the board
table, The province had announced
that ‘Thurber Consultants of
Vancouver had been sclected to
head a $75,000 study seeking a
feasible route to the Iskut Valley.
Most agreed with another provin-
clal plan, to monitor logging prac-
tices more closely, like they used
to, but there was a bit of a prob-
lem with a road into the Iskut gold
reserves.

It would be a private road, built
partly with taxpayers money, said
Watmough, that would be closed
1o the public and only offer fishing

'

and hunting access to executives of
a few mining interests. And a final
note on roads: since privatization
took over, no one seemed in-
terested in the.winter maintenance
of remote airstrips, and the
regional district asked the Ministry
of Highways to address the situa-
tion.

was the year a judge in Cran-

I n the business world, 1988

brook county -court ruled
mandatory Sunday store closures
was unconstitutional. In some
religions, Saturday was a Holy day
and Sunday was just another work-
ing day. A spokesman for the
Attorney General’s department said
they would be launching an appeal.
This was also the first week of
service for Skylink Airlines, and
for Northern Native Broadcasting
the week marked the beginning of
a study on satellite radio communi-
cations in remote regions of
Canada.

In 1989, Terrace city council
-wrote a letter to Attorney General
Bud Smith requesting a "workable
solution" to the Sunday shopping
nightmare. In that letter was 4 fact
of life offered by alderman Ruth
Hallock. In 1987 two-thirds of the
Terrace voters rejected Sunday
shopping here.

And a closing note for 1989. MP

Jim Fulton took exception to an.
inflation theory apparently spouted
by Bank of Canada’s governor
Crow — the best way to control
inflation is to keep unemployment
at eight percent. Good plan? "Pre-
posterous,” said Fulton. Fulton’s
comment was apparently wasted
air, though. The feds, he said,
where determined to keep interest
rates, and thus the number of
unemployed people, high.

A year ago this week, the B.C.
Yukon Chamber of Mines "Cordil-
leran Rourid-up" was "definitely
worthwhile", said city economic
development officer Peter
Monteith. It offered an opportunity
for mining companies to find out
who we are. .

And mining was an industry we
just might need to survive. A
Skeena Sawmills “permanent lay-
off" shut down the mills third shift
at a cost 46 jobs. Timber prices
were to blame, said mill manager
Don Chesley. Higher stumpage
rates, a 15 percent export tax and
raw log exports where a provincial
formula that apparently offered
poor results.

eading the sports news a
L year ago this week were
Shames Mountain con-

struction manager Mark Grabow-
ski, who had just arrived in town,

and few members of the Skeena -

Junior Secondary basketball team,
who were eaming their own way.
We caught up to the Skeena stu-
dents on the old Skeena bridge,
where they were shovelling snow
off the sidewalk for North Coast
Road Maintenance to earn $350
for their travel fund.

Speaking of basketball a year ago
this week, the Skeena junior Tsim-
psean boys took three straight

‘games in a local meet, Skeena
. girls lost a pair in Kitimat, and the

Caledonia boys, well, a first class

effort fell a little short; they lost

two in Terrace to the top-ranked
North Delta Huskies in Terrace. At
the same time, Caledonia girls
placed fifth in a Delta meet.

In Kitimat’s eighth annual Fun
Hockey Tournament, the Houston
Deans downed Norm’s Auto in the
*A’ final, the Ocelot Oilcans edged
out Freill Lake for 'B’ honours,
the North Coast Wranglers
outscored Stewart for the ’C’
trophy, and JHW nipped the
Raiders in an all Kitimat battle for
the *D’ side. In curling, one loss
too many cost Larry Burke and his
RCMP foursome a shot at the
Legion men’s B.C. curling title in
Hope.

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