A4 - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, August 23, 1995

TERRACE : -"

STANDARD

ESTABLISHED APRIL 27, 1988
ADDRESS: 4647 Lazelle Ave., Terrace, B.C. * V8G 158

TELEPHONE: (604) 638-7283 + FAX: (604) 638-8432.
' MODEM: (604) la

Curfew calling

OUR COASTAL neighbours to the west are get-
ting fairly serious about bringing back a form of
youth curfew. ,

Thousands of names attached to petitions want-
ing hours when young people won’t be allowed
on the streets. are flooding into Prince: Rupert’s
city hall.

A lot of that j is tied to the death earlier this year
of a Washington. State fishermen and the sub-
sequent charging: ‘of five young people with the
crime. =.

But there’s been a growing feeling for several
years that street life in Prince Rupert is getting
out of hand. It’s as if the city wants to relive one

‘glorious moment. from its past — a 1950s
downtown riot in which past mayor Peter Lester
had to read the Riot. Act,

The problem area with Prince Rupert’s push for
a curfew is that the legislative authority no
longer exists. So the city has been lining up
municipal allies to present a common front to the
provincial government. _

It is an idea worth exploring, In a lot of ways,
the idea of a curfew is very much a small town
kind of thing. Curfews in big cities could never
work unless the army patrolled the streets at
night. In smaller places, curfews affecting young:
people are more effective because there’s more
ofa chance 'they’ll be spotted by the police or by
older and more responsible family members. or
acquaintances... - .

The overriding consideration ‘of a. curfew
should rest .with each and every municipality.

What works well in one place might not neces- . .

irvine wee

sarily work well IL SemneP Ae €lse..,

Look around
“BOY. THAT'S a real pretty highway.”
“What highway?’’

‘The Stewart-Cassiar highway. ad
“Oh?”

The first and third lines were from a visitor ‘to
our parts while the second and.fourth ones were "
from a local. They met briefly at a. lake up =

Hwy37 near the Stikine River.

And that conversation pretty well sets out how
we sometimes view life in our own backyard and
how other people look at things while visiting
here.

It's no wonder visitors — even our B.C.
brethren — act in awe when travelling up here.
‘Where else, for instance, can you drive virtually
unimpeded on a first rate provincial highway.?

And where else can you be so close to civiliza-
tion yet be so far away from it all within a few
minutes?

But it sometimes becomes much too easy for us
to forget all of that, Those traffic tie ups during
the resurfacing of the Dudley Little bridges had.
drivers in knots. Yet that’s pretty well par for the
course every day on every highway on the lower
mainland.

The next time you’re out and around, look out
and around. Then consider the alternative.

GOW PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link
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ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS:
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CIRCULATION SUPERVISOR: Karen Brunette
MEMBER OF B.C. PRESS COUNCIL

Serving the Terrace and Thorntll area, Publishad on Wednesday of each week by Cariboo Press (1969)
Ltd. at 4647 Lazella Ava, Terrace, British Columbia.
Storles, photographs, illustrations, designs and typestyles in (he Terrace Standard are tha propery of tha
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agencies, -
Reproduction In whoa ‘olinj pan, without vate permission, Is speaioally prohibited, ;
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Special thanks to all our contributors and correspondents
for their time and talents

cv

veri
CIRCULATED

CONTROLLED

VICTORIA — ‘Had a phone
calf from a reader recently.
Would I consider writing a
column about his son’s work-
related death and his battle to
bring saicty to the workplace?

After listening to Hans
Jorgensen for a while, I had no
hesitation in doing so.

Jorgensen’s, son, Michael,
was. killed ‘in a work-related
accident in 1992. He was 25
years old, Michael was an ap-
prentice glazier. He lost his life
when he fell froma scaffolding
at a construction site in
Burnaby.

_ According to a coroner's in-

quest held in December 1993,
Michael slipped while on a

scaffold and feil 40 feet to the
wet concrete below. He ‘suffered
" massive. head: injuries and died: i
ee hg OM impact, _

The inquest concluded that
Michael would be alive today
if guardrails had been ‘in place.
They weren't, Workers’ Com~
pensation - Board’ regulations
notwithstanding. Here’s what
‘the inquest concluded:

“No malter how Mike
Jorgensen actually lost his

. balance and fell, it is very ap-

-parent that had irue.-fall ‘pro-
tection been in place, it would

~~ have been virtually ‘impossible

for him ‘to have been Killed. ”

Kew MighT AS Well
SNITCH OFF THE LI GHTS.
BEFORE WE GO ON THIS RUN.

“FROM THE CAPITAL.

HUBERT BEYER

_ contractors» and > workers that.

The jury recommended that
the WCB develop new
penalties and consequences for
general contractors,  sub-

will. ensure. -onipliance..
tegulations.

It- also recomuneided “that “

safety training and general
Safety awareness certification
be implemented; “New con-
struction workers, the jury
said, should receive certified
basic safety training before
going on a job site.

And finally, the jury recom-
mended that all scaffolding be
equipped for casily-altached

guardrails.
Since. his son’s death,
Jorgensen’ has conducted a

one-man campaign to compel

the WCB to not only enforce
its own regulations, but imple-
ment the recommendations of
the coroner’s: jury. He hasn’t
been very successful.

‘The penaltics for not com-

plying with WCB regulations, .

Jorgensen says, are ridiculous.
At present, the maximum fine
is $7,500, but if a company has
a generally good safety record,
the fine is often waived, But as
Jorgensen points out, all a
good safety record means is
thal a company never got
caught ignoring the rules. .
And ignoring the rules isn’t
that difficult, because WCB in-.
spectors usually call the com-
pany before an inspection.
Jorgensen would like to see

sfines fors.violations of WCB:
Jegulations increased Aramati- :

it’ -
would ultimately be cheaper
far companies to enforce the
regulations. Put the fines into
the hundreds of thousands of
dollars. Hit them in the pocket
book, [t has to hurt them be-
fore it gets better,” he says,
His point is more than well-
taken, When an oil spill of a
few hundred gallons into a
waterway can cary a $100,000
fine, but flagrant violation of

safety rules with” resulting

ICB polic icies ey casted

death
something is terribly wrong. °

Recently, Jorgensen saw ia. * -
glimmer of hope that his mes- ;
eventually be. -
heard. When labour minister:
announced the
firing of the entire board of the '

sage might
Dan = Miller

WCB, Jorgensen sat in the

public gallery of the: legislative ;

chamber.

~“Very heartening, Some-

thing had to-be done. Finally, :
someone had ihe guts to say~ -

it,’’ Jorgensen said afterwards.

In his battle to make some’
sense out of his son’s death,: .°

Jorgensen didn’t have a lot of

help from the elected officials —
When he approached:
his MLA, Margaret- Lord. -.

‘either,

(NDP) shortly after Michael’s

, death and asked her assistance.”

is virtually ‘ignored: woe

_ in quickly getting a statement ~~
‘to | thén-labuor minister Moe. .

Sihota he got no response.
Weeks later, Lord’s office
admitted that they had forgot-

ten about it and would get right.

to it. But by then, Sihota was
off on some trip, and his as-
sistant - mailed  Jorgenscn’s

Slatement te the WCB, includ-* —

ing some confidential romarks
aboutihat body, =|

Over to you, Dan ‘Miller. 7
Make - _Jorgensen’s day. He. ~

deserves it.

Hot line gets a cooling off

DESPITE A a mayor and six
councillors elected to listen
and respond to the wishes of
the electorate, Terrace council
Muses about instatling a talk-
back style answering machine

‘and bot line to get public feed-

back.

Gollllly,

The city won't necessarily
respond to the calls, says the
mayor, so citizens shouldn't
rely on the hot line as a way of
getting the city to do some-
thing.

So whal’s the point?

“Hassle your-elected repre-
sentatives, Watch their every
move,” advises Stevie
Cameron, auihor of ‘On the
Take: Crime, Corruption and
Greed in the Mulroney Years.’
“Demand ethics and accoun-
tability.””

Letters and faxes, with proof
of your correspondence, do the
job better than a hot Line coun-
cil doesn’t plan ta respond to,

: r 10
THROUGH BIFOCALS

CLAUDETTE SANDECKI

Td SIGN THIS ©

WOULD YOU CARE PT.
(NST
GUNS AND HUNTING ? .

PETITION AGA

Besides, the hot line could
waste a typist’s day, dozens of
photostatic copics — one for
every councillor and depart-
ment head —- plus everyone’ s
reading time, Last spring city
hall pared the budget phasing
out three senior staff positions,
Now they want to create a new
one, someone to decipher the
rantings of callers wilh lots to
say, anonymously,

If city council persists with
the hot line, they would do
well to fit their answering ma-
chine with a foul’ language
censor.

Figuring out what's said by
callers lacking speech training
won't be as easy as a flippant
councillor supposes. The result
could be like listening to coun-
cil meetings broadcast live
{that’s as much -an oxymoron
as jumbo shrimp) on Channel

I want to yank councillors’
chins out of their collars, un-
wire their jaws, and disabuse
them of the belicf their belt
buckles are, in reality, micro-
phones, ,

I worked 14 years transcrib-
ing surgeon’s dictation. Oc-
casionally a recorded passage
WAS So unintelligible I had to

conference with senior secre- ©

taries, passing the headphones
around like drunks draining a
flask.

} 2 Guess NOT

Frustration spurted me ‘to be«
come a verbatim shorthand

writer, Then when I couldn't.

grasp what a, doctor. said, J
could have him clarify it in-
stantly,

' Council’s toying with notion
of having night shift
firefighters transcribe the
tapes! Sure, city hall can ex-
pand firefighters’ job descrip-
tions to take in typing and ma-
chine transcription, but dous-
ing flames, dispatching Search
and Rescue, and conducting

safety inspections already cuts . -

inlo their TV time, as council
night discover,
Nor is CUPE likely ‘to stand

" for firefighters usurping ‘their

type of work. The city could be
culangled in union squabbles

before B.C, Tel assigns the hot.

line a number,
Council admits this hot line
idea escaped. from a Think

‘Tank, It’s still a tadpole. Drop
“it it the tank to mature,