AA - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, February 26, 2003 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 WEB: www.terracestandard.com EMAIL: newsroom@terracestandard.com Go for gold IF WE are to be swept up in the tide of Olym- pic fever, then let’s do something completely different. | Let’s make this a moral Olympics, Specifical- ly, let’s make this an Olympics about food and literacy for our young people. To date we’re being sold two bills of goods about the 2010 Winter Olympics bid — it’ll make us feel good and it'll be one big commer- cial to showcase the province to the world. What better way then to make us feel good is to ensure that every schoo] child has a hot breakfast and a lunch. What better way to show the world we care about our people then to im- prove the literacy and high school graduation rates of our young people. Take a look down the alley that one week a month where people line up for food being dis- tributed by the good folks of the Terrace Chur- ches Food Bank. The numbers are appalling. Talk to teachers who will tell you children can’t concentrate and can’t learn when they are hun- gry. . Consider the graduation rates of the local school district. Three of every 10 high school students don’t graduate, less than the provincial average. Just four of every 10 aboriginal stu- dents finished high school last year. Although up over previous years, these are horrible sta- tistics for a province such as ours. Olympic detractors are absolutely correct in pointing out it is difficult to justify the kind of costs needed to put on this elite display of alleg- edly amateur athletics when pressing and im- mediate social and economic needs ‘go begging. — So let’s change that. The province talks about ~ legacies the Olympics will bring. What better legacy than full stomachs and full minds. Expensive? Premier Gordon Campbell talks about $600 million in direct Olympic costs. He talks about a further $1.2 billion to come from the sale of TV rights and the such. Divert even five per cent of all that money for food and li- teracy. It’s $90 million. That’s a lot of oatmeal. How does this sound? Using the winter games buildup as a springboard, establish a volunteer corps of Olympic tutors across the province. All of this should attract corporate sponsors inasmuch as providing food and education would be tied to the overall Olympic buzz. And how could anybody not want to be seen to be providing food and an education. Skeena Liberal MLA Roger Harris has been asking people to give him the benefits to B.C. of not winning the Olympic bid. Turn that state- ment around. If we make food and literacy benefits of winning the bid, then it’s worth it. Gold medal for the first school district to provide a breakfast program. Gold for improv- ing graduation rates. Medals worth winning. Pe = Tere PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link ADVERTISING MANAGER: Brian Lindenbach PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edouard Credgeur NEWS: Jeff Nagel ‘NEWS/SPORTS Sarah A. Zimmerman WINNER NEWS/COMMUNITY: Jennifer Lang CCNA BETTER FRONT OFFICE: Darlene Keeping & Carol McKay NEWSPAPERS CIRCULATION SUPERVISOR: Terri Gordon COMPETITION ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS: Bert Husband & Stacy Gyger TELEMARKETER: Stacy Gyger COMPOSING: Susan Credgeur AD ASSISTANT: Sandra Stefanik SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY MAIL: $57.94 (+$4.06 GST)=62.00 per year; Seniors $50.98 (+$3.57 GST)=54.55; Out of Province $65.17 (+$4,.56 GST)=69,73 Outside of Canada (6 months) $156.91(+10.98 GST)=167.89 MEMBER OF 8.C, AND YUKON COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION, CANADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION AND B.C. PRESS COUNCIL (www.hepresscouncll.org) PCNA sete Serving tha Terrace and Thornhill area, Published on Wednesday of each week at 3210 Clinton Street, Terrace, British Columbla, V8G 5R2. Stories, photographs, itustalions, designs and typestylas In the Terrace Standard are Ine property of the copyright holders, including Cariboo Press (1969) Ltd., its Hlustiation repro services and advarilsing agencies. Reproduction in whole of in part, without written permission, is specifically prohiblied. Authorized as second-class mail panding tha Post Offica Dapartment, for ent of postage in casi. Special thanks to all our contributors and correspondents for their time and talents oN pon't care, /“\ Dor | DON'T CARE 1F — ie THERE 15 No THE INSPECTORS DON'T FIND ANY WEAPONS. a EVIDENCE OF WEAPONS yacu | i] \ DON'T CARE IF IT Costs A fh BAZILLION, LASTS 10 YEARS AND PESTABILIZES THE MIDEAST CAUSING wwOr STitt GONNA START A WAR WITH [RAQ yu wea a) - = se Se oe ef fat arn . a ft oreees AN” : VED a) J wT Sawa —_— APPARENTLY THEY BASED | THER FINDINGS). Gov't tackles deficit and forestry VICTORIA — Thanks to the government’s relentless re- lease of information prior to Feb. 18, concerning the great job it is doing for British Co- lumbians, there were no sur- prises left when reporters ex- amined the 2003-04 budget in the Feb, 18 media lockup. Gary Collins, the finance minister, told reporters what he would tell the B.C. Legisia- ture a few hours later: “We are on track towards a bal- anced budget in the fiscal year 2004-05,” Mind you, until then things don’t look quite as rosy. The anticipated deficit for the cur- rent fiscal year is estimated at $3.8 billion, lower by $600 million than originally fore- cast. The 2003-04 budget tabled Tuesday, calls for a deficit of $1.8 billion plus a $500 mil- lion “allowance” for unfore- seen circumstances, pegging the total anticipated deficit ‘at... $2.3 billion. The budget. after, . “..that is. supposed to. be bal- anced. We won't get there without some pain. In the interest of what the minister likes to call “staying the course,” the goy- ernment will dig further into our pockets. The major initiatives aimed at parting British Columbia taxpayers from their money had been announced earlier. Starting March 1, motorists nas fo be a bet SOME NEWS stories make you wonder what’s wrong wiih people these days. In Duncan a young couple left a candle burning on a liv- ing room table when they went to bed. They were using the candle for light because Hydro had cut off their power for lack of payment. Each intended to blow the candle out. Both thought they other had snuffed it. A few hours later, their third floor one-bedroom apart- ment caught fire. Nine fami- lies in the 60 unit wooden building were burned out. Why did the candle set the apartment on fire? Was is not sitting in a safe dish? Was it left in front of an open window where a curtain could blow across it’s flame? 7 And why didn’t one or both of the. adults make sure the candle was out? In: pioneer days, dozens of families depended upon can- dles. Their cabins didn’t burn down every day. How is it “today’s adults don’t have sense cnough to use a candle safely? . In an entirely different | PROTECTION. Bea iagvest | monitor | ‘FROM THE CAPITAL HUBERT BEYER will pay an additional 3.5 cents for a litre of gasoline at the pumps. The gocd news about that tax hike is that it will not go into general reve- nue but pay for infrastructure projects. The measure is expected to raise $650 million over the next three years, money that will be spent on northern and interior roads, airports ,and . “ports,,.. porder crossing .infra-. "| structure and highway corti- dors, By far the largest portion, $225 million, will be spent on northern and interior roads, suddenly referred to as “heartland” roads. Another $30 million will go towards port and airport impro- . vements, including expansion of the Cranbrook Airport. ff you roll in federal contri- butions, the total to be spent “will get better-soon, "7° 2) ~ Annual ‘stumpage ‘revenues ‘THROUGH BIFOCALS CLAUDETTE SANDECKI story, a woman is feeding her cat all manner of tidbits to make it gain weight. Her aim is to have her cat in the Gui- ness Book of World Records for being the heaviest feline. The cat, approaching 50 pounds, is the shape of a bar- ‘rel set on four stubby sticks. Because of it’s massive weight, the animal can scar- cely walk. ; Obviously the woman doesn't care about her pet, only publicity, Another news story fes- tooned with question marks FREE ACCESS WLOAG TERM EXPLORATION / FeenGGLins We | ECONOMY! - for the “Transportation Invest- ment Plan” over the next three years will come to about $1.7 billion. Smokers will not be pleased with the budget. Having al- ready been hit with massive increases in the price of tobac- co products, they will have. to fork out an additional $2 for a carton of cigarettes. Total government spending over the next year is estimated at $27.8 billion, total revenue at $26 billion. Spending for health and education will be maintained at previous levels. In fact, when anticipated additional federal contributions kick in, the budget for health will in- crease. The bleakest aspect of Brit- ish Columbia's economy is still the ailing forest industry, and even the finance mini- ster’s budget speech, tradition- ally an up-beat document, holds out. little hope that, things : z ihat support vital services such as health and-education, he said, fell to $1.2 billion from $1.8 billion five years ago. “And during those five years, almost 13,000 people who worked in the forests lost their jobs,” Collins said. To offset some of the de- vastating effects of the current softwood lumber dispute, the government will set aside $275 Ike million from the current budget “to assist in the transition to a revitalized and sustainable for-- est sector.” So far, the government has announced no details of how that money will be spent, but the finance minister told repor- ters that legislation — “crystallizing” the program will be tabled in the legislature before the end of the current fiscal year. He also said the government will make the “largest changes to the forestry sector that have | ever been made to a large in- - dustry in British Columbia.” Asked what they would be, Mr. Collins replied, “wait and see.” . The long-range outlook for British Columbia’s economy, the minister said, was positive. ’ B.C., he said, had the smallest personal income tax rate in Canada. Business taxes are competi- €,-Mr. Collins added. tiv of ge is ee aga ae _. a Consumer, ‘and business . confidence is building and new ” investment is beginning to flow | into our province. and last year, almost 78,000 new jobs were created for British Colum- bians.” If no nasty surprises a good budget make, this one’s not too bad. Beyer can be reached at: E-mail: hubert@coolcom.com; Tel (250) 381-6900 , has to do with the police in- vestigation into a local Jan- uary 2002 traffic death. Because the investigating RCMP officer died soon after the investigation began his files were handed over to a second officer. The second officer under- stood that the collision report had been dealt with. Only later did he learn the investigation had yet to be completed. Tt was well into June before the second RCMP was able to start reviewing the file, De- cember when a charge was was finally laid against the driver, I find it inexplicable that the RCMP, known for its spit and polish, doesn’t have a standard foolproof way of indi- cating whether or not an in- vestigation file had been com- pleted: , This can’t be. the first and only file in the RCMP's his- tory to be turned over to a suc- cessive investigator. So why hasn’t the force de- vised a clearcut, regulation system for turning over files to, another investigator without a wishy-washy limbo status that delays, in this case by many months, an end lo the invest- igation. Everyone affected by the accident deserves better treat- ment and a quicker resolution. Did the RCMP call in the movers to empty the deceased investigator’s office and unload everything in the second in- vestigator’s office with the files topped by the sticky note, “Look through these when you can get around to it."? Has the RCMP not heard of ink stamps that can be made to order, that read INCOMPLETE. Or maybe the RCMP needs to keep a list of pending cases,” the way an upholsterer keeps track of the jobs ahead in her shop... : - With the aid of computers, advanced education, informa- tive TV programs, including OPRAH, who not only uses candles by the dozen but te- - peatedly warns about’ using them safely, how can a couple burn nine families out of house and home, and RCMP let an investigation vegetate for months? _ Indeed, truth is stranger than fiction. : Y WHAT ARE THEY DOING? THEY THINK THEY RE MANAGING- US!!