What a year

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The local business community
went through more than its fair |
share in 1997\NEWS A9

Proud parents welcome the
community’s first born baby on
Jan. L\COMMUNITY B1

Having a ball

Cold weather did little to hinder -
the enthusiasm for outdoor .
soccer\SPORTS B3

WEDNESDAY .
January , 1998

-STA

El R R CE.

NDARD

VOL. 40 NO. 39 ”

ov’t hears creditor help plan

THE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT is
petting the bad news today on how many
businesses are being hurt by the Skeena
CeHulose crisis.

It’s coming from Ralph Torney, a past
president of the Truck Loggers Associa-
tion, who is also to submit an interim
report by Jan. 15.

Tomcy was named Dec. 31 to travel
the northwest to speak to small and mid-

sized businesses owed money by Skeena *

Cellulose.

Torney is to draw up specific options
-that the government could use to assis!
those struggling businesses, many of
whom won’t have their debts fully cov-
ered by the Skeena Cellulose restructur-
ing plan.

Tormey visited Prince Rupert, Terrace,
‘Smithers, Hazelton and Stewart.

Premier Glen Clark said Torney’s

terms of reference to not mandate him to
address the restructuring plan being
voted upon this week.

Skeena Cellulose creditors were voting
for a sccond time yesterday on whether
to accept an offer of $10,000 plus 10
cents on the dollar, with the possibility
of more in years that pulp prices are
high. The results of the vote were not
known at press time.

Clark said the region needs help
regardless of the outcome of the vote.

“They didn’t want this to be perceived

as trying to influence the outcome of the”

vote,” Skeena MLA Helmut Giesbrecht
said of the premier’s statements.

‘Hither way if the vote passes or fails
we've gol challenges. If the vote passes
we've got major challenges with respect
ta timber supply and fibre flow,” he
said. “If it doesn’t pass we've got major

challenges in all sorts of areas.’’

Tomey is a former director of Forest
Renewal B.C,, is currently president of
Canadian Air Crane, and has broad expe-
.tience in the industry, including estab-
lishing one of B.C.’s first heli-logging
firms.

Because the recommendations will
come from a respected businessman,
Giesbrecht said, they may be more
defensible against critics who say the
NDP government has spent too much
preventing the collapse of Skeena Cel-
lulose,

Giesbrecht said the announcement is in
keeping with employment and invest-
ment minister Dan Miller’s pledge to
find further ways to assist those hit hard-
est after the restructuring plan is in place,

He said Miller’s pledges were ‘‘rcla-

tively vague’’ at the time, but that
Tomey’s job will be to flesh out possible
options.

Justin Rigsby, who speaks for a group
of creditors, endorsed Tomey’s appcint-
ment, saying it makes him more op-
timistic the government will provide the
assistance needed,

“Tf there was anybody I was going to
trust this would be the man,’’ Rigsby
said of Tomey, “It’s a positive move on
the part of the government to do this.
They’ve in effect appointed someone
people can trust and who will hear their
concerms.”’

Rigsby said be was anticipating a yes
vote when creditor ballots are counted.

‘‘My hope is that there’s resolution one
way or another. This is wearing on
people to have it stay this way.”

kk kkk

Skeena Cellulose extended the holiday
shutdown of its sawmills to Jan, 12,

Vice-president Rudy Schwartz said the
move was made because of the schedul-
ing of a second vote of creditors and be-
cause the company’s operating line
didn’t permit further expenditures.

The Prince Rupert pulp mill’s B mill is
presently down for two weeks to help
control inventory.

Schwartz was also defending the com-
pany’s action of buying: pulp chips from
Alaska last week.

He said the deal to buy the low-grade
Alaskan cedar chips was made Dec, i
because the pulp mill needed the extra
supply, the chips were very cheap and

the purchase fit in with the company’s

efforts to control costs,

Workers get dinged

by pension

plan hike

93¢ PLUS.7¢.GST... ...

bag? Michael Pine and his siblings
the arena hill, just behind the tennis

w Look out below

WHO NEEDS A SLED when you have a garbage

a great slope there, but you have to make sure you
stop before you hit the mesh fence. Garbage bags

were sliding at
fet the youngsters slide at just the right speed.

courts. There's

Fur flies over secrecy of

NAMES OF people who sign the recall
petilion will become public even if the
campaign to unseat Skeena MLA Hel-
mut Giesbrecht fails.

. That's the latest word from Elections
B.C, officials and it’s a further blow to
recall organizers’ efforts to keep secret
ihe names on the petition.

: "The petition has to be submitted to ©

this office within 60 days of the date it
was issued regardless of whether they
reach the sufficient number of signa-

WE'LL BE paying more for the Canada
Pension Plan this year but some of the
bite will be reduced because of employ-
ment insurance premium reductions.

Workers will pay a maximum $10.32 a
month more — $89.07 compared to

$78.75. — to help, finance, an expected
strain on the Canada Pension Plan as baby
boomers begin to retire.

Premiums will increase each year until
the end of 2003 when they’il be capped at
9.9 per cent of earings or a maximum
$174.90 a month. The current take is 5.85
percent of earnings.

Government officials

do say that

new scheme will pay $10,075 — a reduc-

employment insurance premium cuts
from $2.90 for each $100 of insurable
earnings to $2.70 will ease this year’s
pension hikes.

The staged hikes in the pension plan re-
place an earlier version which would have

Seen increases each sYEAT. iatil 2030 with |

14.1 per cént of éarnings being deducted.
Yet while workers will pay more, ‘the
same won't be true for the benefits they'll
collect upon retirement,
The earlier version called for maximum
benefits of $10,515 a year by 2003 but the

tion of $440,

ONE LEFT last week, one leaves today, -
and by Jan. 18 there won't be any
firefighters left at the Terrace airport,

They have all been declared ‘'surplus’’
by the Canadian government.

The four airport firefighters received their
walking papers Dec. 15, but most remained
and continued to work over the Christmas
holidays. Their final pay is mid-January.

One has since gone to work for the Ter-
race fire department. But the other three are
going for good, including Chief Gord
Bentham whose last work day is today.

“One 14, one eight, and one 19-year
careers are coming to a screaming halt,” he
says. ‘‘But the government has made their
decision. Whether it’s right or wrong, only
lime will tell.”’

Bentham says he thinks Transport Cana-
da, the government agency responsible for
airport fire protection services, should have
cross-trained existing airport workers to
fight fires and perform other duties, as op-
posed to simply removing fire protection
altogether.

“T think it’s sad that they went this
route,”’ he says,

But Bentham points out that the money
saved by canceling the service will help
bring airport budgets into the black. That
makes them much more appealing to the

tures,’’ Elections B.C. registration opera-
tions manager Ken Maskell said Friday.
Crash Helmut organizer Lorne Sexton
at the outset of the campaign had vowed
fo keep completed petition sheets in a
safety deposit box and then destroy the
petition if the campaign doesn’t reach
the.7,558 signatures required for success.
“That. would not be appropriate,’’
Maskell said. ‘The act requires them to

be returned. To not submit it and destroy -.

‘it would be a contravention of the act.’’

But Sexton says there are ways to get
sround that rule, The recall proponent
has the authority to remove names from
the petition prior to filing it with Blec-
tions B.C,

Sexton says the campaign could file an
unsuccessful petition with all the names
blacked out. Or, he said, there could be a
"legal challenge to Elections B.C,’s inter-
pretation of the privacy rules... .

Maskell couldn’t explain. why. the act
requires even unsuccessful petitions to

be filed. “E can’t speak to intent,’’ be
said.

Sexton says Elections B.C, wants the
lists to help officials there update the
voters’ list.

“They've got some big time problems
with their list — guys on it that have
been dead for 10 years and stuff like
that,’’ he said, “They want our work is
basically what they want, And they’re
not going to get iL”?

He said recall organizers in Prince

Airport firefighters
gradually disappear
from their posts

“The government has made
their decision. Whether It’s
right or wrong, only time will
tell.”

municipalities which inherit them from the.

Canadian government, who is getting out of
the airport business.

‘“*No one wants ta operate something that
has a deficit,” he says.

Bentham admits that there hasn’t been a
survivable crash at the Terrace airport in
many years. But he says the fire department
also handled first aid emergencies — like
heart altacks in the terminal building. And
the fire crew was the first to respond to car
accidents on the airport hill.

“Strictly being here wailing for planes to
crash isn’t- cost effective,’ he says. ‘‘But
not having the service isn’t a good idea ei-
ther. Ideally the new airport authority will
recognize that.”

Bentham says he hopes the Terrace air-
port authority will work out a deal with the
city fire department to have some level of
protection at the airport. One possibility is
having city fire fighters go out to the airport
for regularly scheduled flights. .

recall petition list

George have told him they’ll go to jail
before giving up the signatures if they’re
unsuccessful, ‘We are going to be suc-
cessful, so we say it’s a moot point
anyway,” Sexton added.

He emphasizes thal the petition’s
names can only be used for authorized
electoral purposes, and says he'll per-
sonally make sure anyone who uses the
names for intimidation or retribution {s

- prosecuted, -

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