A4- The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, November 16, 2005 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 The big issue IT’s CLEAR from the various statements made ‘by Terrace city council candidates leading into this Saturday’s vote that the plan for a sportsplex/ ~ second sheet of ice remains as complicated and as controversial as ever. As matters now stand the current council re- ceived two tenders when it put its latest idea, a. _ pared down second sheet of ice, out for bid this. summer. But both prices were beyond the financ- ing now in place. So council decided to re- tender early i in 2006. The theory i is that the city will get more competi- _ tive prices in the dead of winter rather than later on when companies are busier. _- Yet that plan isn’t as rock-solid as it might se seem. Two incumbent city councillors, Rich McDaniel » . and Marylin Davies, now appear to be leaning to- _ ward re-thinking the whole idea of what council should build. | Mr. McDaniel says he is in favour of what he calls. “the full shot multiplex,” which is far more . _ than a second sheet of ice. And Mrs. Davies says she is morally opposed to using money already raised to build a second sheet of ice when those who contributed the money in the first place did " so on the basis that the project would include oth- er facilities. ~~ | More than anything, these statements by two of * council’s more veteran members reveal the quan- .. dary facing the city and, by extension, its resi- -dents. of ice, meeting rooms and the like has been around | for years and was the subject of two referenda in e-1990s. Generally speaking, city residents fa- ‘voured this idea back then. And may do so now except that costs have far outstripped the ability to build one without raising taxes. A second sheet of ice only is the result of coun- _cil seeking to reduce the project’s scope in order to close the gap between costs and available mon- ey. Yet that gap is as large as ever. ' Far too much time has now passed for council to once again consider a mutliplex without asking: | for residents’ approval. And the second sheet of ice only plan has never been put to a referendum to test its acceptance. . _ Council hopeful Glenn Kelly put. it best at the , Nov. 1 all candidates meeting. “There’s quite a _bit of difference between a second sheet of ice, a sportsplex, and a multiplex. What is it that we are after here?” he asked. ~ Tt’s a valid question. It’s also one that c can’t be : answered as voters go to the polls this Saturday. _ | Instead it’s going to take aiot of work by the - new council to develop a coherent vision of what it wants which can be understood by residents. ' And that vision, whatever it is, must then be test- ed in the form of a referendum. PUBLISHER/EDITOR: » Rod Link ADVERTISING MANAGER: Brian Lindenbach . PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edouard Credgeur . NEWS: Sarah A. Zimmerman COMMUNITY: Dustin Quezada , NEWS/SPORTS: Margaret Speirs FRONT OFFICE: Darlene Keeping, Carolyn Anderson _ CIRCULATION SUPERVISOR: Alanna Bentham - ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS:. > Bert Husband, Susan Willemen 2005 WINNER AD ASSISTANT: Sandra Stefanik NEWSPAPERS | COMPETITION PRODUCTION: Susan Credgeur 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 B.C. AND YUKON COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION, CANADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION AND ‘B. C. PRESS COUNCIL (www.bepresscouncil.org) Serving the Terrace and Thomhil area, Published on Wednesday of each week at 3210 Clinton Street, Terrace, British Columbia, V8G 5R2. Black Pres s Stories, photographs, illustrations, designs and typestyles in the Terrace Standard are the property of the copy- Tight holders, including Black Press Ltd., its illustration repro services and advertising agencies. Reproduction in whole or in part, without written permission, is specifically prohibited. Authorized as second-class mail pending the Post Office Department, for payment of postage in cash. Special thanks to all our contributors and correspondents for their time and talents ‘ “ \ CG Con ervati TANGA DECK me’ HALIS WITH fy CAMPAIGN 1 Poste LeP aK: A ; ft Were eect WE COME. A WAFFLING AMONG A SPENDING SPREE... {liberal s 7a ON BEGINNING = ON RIE The idea of a multiplex, that j is; a second sheet | Office lottery pools made easy — THE OFFICE lottery pool | _ seems as Canadian as hockey, . doughnuts, and Thanksgiving ~ in October. As the folks at an A&W outlet discovered recently, it is also fraught with potential for legal squabbling. -Given the amount of money. at stake it’s surprising how little attention is given to. the organization and administra- tion of the pool. . The typical situation this: some unlucky person i is stuck with the weekly task of collecting money and ,buying “ tickets; anyone and everyone _ who wants to contribute a few ~ bucks is allowed in the pool. In most cases there’s never an issue because the winnings never amount to anything sig- nificant. It’s all fun.and games until - someone hits: the jackpot. The thing about: lotteries is that while your group’s chances of winning may be (really) re- mote, eventually someone al- ways wins. As long as you are purchas- ing tickets, there’s a chance you’ ll end up facing a mob of ‘ poolies demanding their share of the winnings. There are several problems: with the typical office lottery pool. Here’s why: in an ideal world, there would be one per- son buying one ticket for one’ draw. In the event of a winning’ ticket there would be no com- peting claims for the money. In the real world, the situ- ation is complicated by the presence of numerous pool _ themselves free tickets in a future draw) | ship, others join up, old tickets and small cash prizes gener- ate more tickets (which may eam additional ROBERT SMITHSON members and multiple tickets . ‘for draws taking place over an - extended period of time. Existing’ ‘poolies abandon . minute they find themselves with a winning ticket). First, the office lottery pool should not be a single, long- running, continuous affair. It . needs to have clear breaks. , One way to do this is to halt the pool once a big jackpot has been.won. Use up any re- maining free tickets, distribute - any accumulated winnings, and allow a clear break in time before the next pool makes a fresh start. - This. allows existing play- ers to abandon the pool ‘and new ones to enter without ever muddying the waters of en-- titlement to winnings. Second, the group of poo- lies must be clearly established - at the outset of a pool and dili-’ gently controlled throughout. The pool administrator must keep accurate records of which co- workers have entered each The pool administrator much keep accurate records of which:co-workers have entered each pool. and the whole thing goes on endlessly. The result is a situation in which it is virtually impossible to distinguish which poolie in- - vested in which ticket. There is no obvious way to determine precisely who ‘should share in the eventual winnings. So, here are some basic rules for poolies aimed at eliminating squabbles (and the need to start hiring lawyers the pool. Third, once the pool has commenced, no new poolies should be allowed to join un- til the current pool ends and a new one is commenced. _I call this the “no Johnny- come-latelies” rule. . This prevents late-arriving players ‘from laying claim to winnings to which they did not contrib- ‘ute. Fourth, a poolie entering the pool must commit to stay- ‘ing in for whatever number of weeks it takes for the jackpot to be won and the current pool — to wrap up. I call this the “Hotel Cali- fornia” rule (fans of the Eagles will understand why). This prevents poolies abandoning ship and then claiming a share of winnings — obtained. after they left. Asa lawyer; can’t help but . recommend that you establish ‘the rules in writing and have ‘each player sign on at the out- set of each session. - Realistically, I don’t expect — | that to occur. But, at the very least, the pool administrator . should communicate the rules’ to each poolie at the outset of each new pool. Follow these rules and you’ ll be well on your way to a: dispute-free- ‘jackpot experi; ence. #4 i I can’t do anything . about the poor odds of hitting the jackpot, but following these rules will definitely decrease the chances of having to pay a chunk of your winnings to lawyers. Robert Smithson is a part- ner at Pushor Mitchell LLP in Kelowna, practicing exclu- sively in the area of labour. and employment law. _ If you have a labour or employment question that ° could be answered in a fu- ture column, email him at smithson@ pushormitchell. com. This subject matter is pro- vided for general information- al purposes‘only. How the little ones learn To read READING STORYBOOKS to ' your preschoolers before bed- time won't necessarily teach them to read words unless you do something more explicit ' than merely read the story, conclude researchers follow- _ing a French language study in - Moncton, New Brunswick. Preschoolers were fitted with lightweight headbands supporting three cameras po- - sitioned to .record the move- ments of the kids’ pupils. Five | i storybooks ranging from 12 to 16 pages each were scanned into a computer. Two books were English - The ' Happy Egg and The Carrot Seed. The other three books were in French. Three books had bright colourful illustra- tions; two had only black and white drawings. Then while the child sat. in Mom’s lap, Mom -read each book ‘once. Calibrating head- gear recorded exactly. where the children were looking, whether at the illustrations or the text, on the left page or the right, at the top of the page or the bottom. The children focused on the illustrations, seldom looking THROUGH BIFOCALS CLAUDETTE SANDECKI at the text. When they did fo- “cus on text, it was for five sec- onds or less. Well duh! as kids say. Since this was the kid’s first look at these books, he would be... bound to check out the pic- tures first. And if some of the words were new to him, his eyes would flit over the drawings in search of clues to tell him what the new vocabulary meant. He’d have no time to hunt for familiar text and still keep up with Mom’s story. Listening to someone read .a story can be hard work. It takes practice to succeed. I recall attending my first author’s reading at the Terrace Public Library with my grand- daughters when they were 10 and 11. Margaret Thompson read one of her, children’s books. The girls had no trouble -following her words.'I did. I attribute my difficulty to years of reading to myself. I had to close-my eyes and listen hard to imagine the . scenes and actions she de- scribed. I hadn’t done that since I was a teenager listening - to Lux theatre of the radio. No wonder kids sit rapt while Mom reads to them; their little brains are working mightily to transpose her voice into Disney images. The more unusual the story as compared to their everyday lives, the more work they must put into constructing the scene. No mention is made of ask- ing the kids whether. they pre- fer stories read from a book, or from a computer. But my money is on books. We all know when a kid finds a book they truly like, they tote it around the house, climb. up in a chair, or on a bed, or ~ stretch out on the rug to leaf through, lingering over any page that particularly snags their interest. No kid can de-— velop such a partnership with a computer. Each storybook has its own. size, heft, and texture from the crisp new book with pages yet to be turned to the dog-eared volume preserved by transpar- ; ent tape. , I wouldn’t be surprised if books even have individual smells to a sensitive wee nose, depending upon the strawberry _ jam or peanut butter left by the last pair of little hands. The report of this study ap- pears in the latest issue of Psy- chological Science. , Psychology professor Mary - Ann Evans at the university of Guelph, co-author of the study, concedes even if your child doesn’t grasp text, reading to him will teach him vocabu- lary, how a:story is construct- ed, and you’ll share a pleasant interlude with your child. What more can you expect from a 3 year old?