Ad - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, October 7, 1998

TERRACE.

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
EMAIL: standard@kermode.net

Worthy goal

TWENTY YEARS ago, when the Skeena Mall

was first built, the city realized it had a problem.
With shopping now concentrated in that part of
the city, the area east of Kalum, toward the old
bridge, became stagnant.

To counter that, the city took action. It would
ease up on the requirement for businesses to pro-
vide on-site parking in the hope this would spur
development in the area. At the same time, con-
siderable monies were spent in restoring the
4600 Block of Lakelse.

A decade ago, when the area had been built up
to some extent, the city once again required
businesses to provide their own parking.

This kind of incentive is not all that uncommon
as municipal governments strive to ensure the
lands under its jurisdiction are fully used.

And now, city officials have returned with an-
other idea to perk up the downtown core. This
time they are keying on the development poten-
tial of the vacant Terrace Co-op property and
generally, on the commercial possibilities ex-
tending past that property east on Greig.

What’s suggested is a continuation of the street
and sidewalk work that has turned the intersec-
tion on Greig and Kalum into a showcase.

If that happens, the reasoning goes, it just might
be enough of an inducement for a company to
develop the Co-op property and spur a revival of
Greig Ave.

While the city is not saying businesses can’t de-
velop outside of that core, it believes a good mix
of retail and commercial opportunities will
benefit the business community and consumers.
As well, a healthy downtown will enhance the

city’s tax base and solidify Terrace as the place

to do business in the northwest.
Sometimes, ‘governments can do good things.

Give it back

NOW HERE’S something you don’t see every
day. We’re paying slightly less in employment
insurance taxes than we were a year ago but still
the federal government is racking up enormous
surpluses.

Estimates are that the employment insurance
bank account will top out at a surplus of nearly
$20 billion by next March and, for this year
alone, post a surplus over expenditure of $7 bil-
lion.

There’s no question of the need for a surplus as

ae

the intent of the employment insurance program’

is to have sufficient money should there be an
unforeseen demand by workers who are sudden-
ly out of work.

But the surplus is way over what is needed. The
excess is parked in the government’s general
revenue account. And that’s wrong for all the
federal government is doing is taking the money
it is getting from overtaxing us to then convince
us it is doing a good job in running the country.

Better the feds should cut EI premiums and
return the money to those who sweat blood to
earn it in the first place.

PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link
ADVERTISING MANAGER: Brian Lindenbach
PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edouard Credgeur

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AND
6.C. PRESS COUNCIL

Serving the Terrace and Thomhill area. Published on Wadnosday of each weak at 3210 Clinton Street,
Terrace, British Columbia, VAG 5R2,

Stovies, pholographs, illustrations, dosigne and typastyles In the Tarraca Standard ara the proparty of the
copyright holders, Including Cariboo Press (1969) Lid., ite illustration repro services and advertising
agencies. . ;

Reproduction in whote of In part, without written permission, is specifically prohibited.

Authorized a3 second-class mall pending tha Post Offica Department, for payment of postage in cash.

Speclal thanks to all our contributors and correspondents
for thelr thme and talents | .

~ a NY COUNTRY DOESNT
UNDERSTAND HE...

VICTORIA — Pssst! Wanna
buy some savings bonds. B.C.
Savings Bonds, that is? They’re a
good investment, according to
Premier Glen Clark, backed by one
of the highest credit ratings in
Canada.

Wait a second. I thought B.C.’s
credit rating had been reduced from
AAA to AA and might go another
notch down, unless the above-men-
tioned premier gets the province's
debt-management under control.

[also was under the impression
that British Columbia is in some-
what of a recession. At least, that’s
what finance minister Joy MacPhail
has been telling us. Speaking of
MacPhail, fellow columnist Jim
Hume mentioned the other day that
more and more people believe the
finance minister’s name should be
spelled with an F rather than a Ph.
There's something to that.

Back to the savings bonds.
They are, no doubt, still a safe
investment, but for a premier who
has been complaining about media
bias, he should make sure that he’s
not overdoing the sales pitch. Stick
to the facts, premier. If I can do it,
you can.

For instance, what happened to
those 40,000 jobs your Jobs and
Timber Accord was to create? I was
pretly impressed when he premier

IN 1968 when my parents
retired from farming, Mom’s
dearest friend was an 80-year-old
widow who lived alone on the
homestead next door where she
and her husband had raised four
fine children.

Minnie was a wizened ver-
sion of Olive Oil, less than 80
pounds in her prime. Yet when
one daughter-in-law had died of
cancer leaving a two-year-old
son, Minnie had raised him as
her own until his father te-mar-
ried 10 years later.

By 1968 the grandson was a
husky 20-year-old who visited
his grandmother only when her
monthly pension arrived. If she
Tefused to hand the cheque over
willingly, he used his superior
size and strength to persuade her.

Neighbours for 60 years,
Mom and Minnie had regularly
shared daily happenings by

You ARE LIKIAK
2EE GELGIAN
VAFFLES7

wetne s2

me

‘FROM THE CAPITAL
HUBERT BEYER

stood at that podium, announcing
the accord, surrounded by industry
big-wigs.

Alas, no jobs, And the premier
can’t blame it all on the Asian flu.
The bureaucratic nightmare created
by ihe over-zealous implementation
of the Forest Practices Code has as
much to do with the decline of B.C.
forest industry as the financial tur-
moil in Asia,

The mayors attending the
recent convention of the B.C, Union
of B.C. Municipalities could be
excused for expecting some words
of hope and encouragement from
the premier, Instead, he pitched the
Nisga’a Treaty to them.

I, too, support the treaty, and it

THROUGH BIFOCALS
CLAUDETTE SANDECKI

phone. Mom might well have
been the only soul Minnie told
about her grandson’s battering,
It’s likely Minnie feared report-
ing her grandson to his father or
to the RCMP fearing embarrass-
ment, criminal charges against
her grandson, and perhaps
retaliation from him.

Elder abuse went unrecop-

UNT ZEEE
BAVARIAN
CHOCOLATE
CoeFeE mire
SPRINKLES ?

is an important issue, but that was-
n’t the message the mayors of B.C.’s
suffering municipalities want to
hear right now. They want to know
what plans the government has to
turn the economy around. They
want to know what the premier is
going to do about the resource-
dependent communities’ slide
towards economic abyss.

The Clark government has
received a lot of bad news coverage

’ Jately, bul contrary to the premier’s

belief, there is no conspiracy media
to report the bad and embarrassing
news only,

A government’s vibrancy, its
ideas, its capacity for innovation is
invariably reflected in the news cov-
erage it generates, If it runs out of
steam, there’s little good to report.

Clark go exactly the coverage
he wanted when he stood up.top the
Americans during last year’s fish
war, threatening to close down the
U.S. military training site at
Nancose Bay. At least, [ didn’t hear
any complaints from the premier
then.

Stories such as the Jobs and
Timber Accord got big headlines. So
did the premier’s promise to bring
another aluminum smelter to B.C.
It’s hardly the media’s fault that

“there’s been no movement on either.

The premier has got to learn to

nized until the 1980s. -That’s
when the government asked citi-
zens to watch for and report sus-
pected cases. Recently, almost
every issue of both Canadian and
American women’s magazines
runs articles on elder abuse.

Now Terrace has an advo-
cacy service for abused adults.
Organized by the Community
Response Network and funded
by a grant from the Public
Trustee, this referral service is
teady for contact from anyone
who is being abused.

The service also needs
volunteers-preferably seniors or
anyone interested in seniors’
well-being-to talk with would-be
consumers, to find out what serv-
ices they need, and how they
would like the services to be
delivered,

Similar pilot services exist in
Castlegar, Duncan, Kamloops,

Clark can’t have it both ways

take the good with the bad. Did he
really expect the media to ignore his
government's involvement in the
tecent recall campaigns?

The moment his spin doctors

~ Qe

portrayed the efforts to unseat some
of his MLAs as battles between ,

loyal local folk and self-serving out-

side forces, wanting to bring down .

the government, he ought to have

made sure that no outsiders from his .

camp were involved,

Instead, we found out that the °
“locals” helping the MLAs keep ;

their jobs included B.C. Federation

of Labor members and some lumi- .

naries from the premier’s office.

The long and the short of itis -
that Clark can’t have it both ways. -

He can’t, on the one hand, have his

armies of spin doctors turn reality ¢

into fiction and then complain when -

the media is on to his little games,
Before he accuses the media of
embellishing facts and sensational-
izing what he calls minor issues, he
should get his own house in order.
And that includes creating the
impression that British Columbia’s

credit rating has never been better, .

regardless of how good an invest-
ment B.C, Savings Bonds may be.
Beyer can be reached at: Tel:
(250) 920-9300; Fax: (250) 356-
9597; E-mail:
hubert@coolcom.com

Abused elders have a friend

Matsqui-Abbotsford, and
Vernon. Operating since 1994,
Vernon's office receives about
two calls for help each month,

How prevalent is abuse of
dependent adults?

In B.C. one out of 12 senior
citizens has reported financial
abuse over $20,000. One of
every 20 seniors living in a pri-
vate dwelling has suffered seri-
ous abuse at the hands of a fam-
ily member. In institutions and
care facilities, one in 10 staff
have admitted to physically
abusing people they care for.

Among disabled adults, a
third of men suffer sexual abuse
at some time in their lives and
more than half the women expe-
rience abuse of some form.

By dialling 635-1150, callers
will be referred to someone who

can confidentially help them deal

with their abusive situation,

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