Ad - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, July 21, 1999 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 First step THE INEVITABLE happened last week when the Terrace-Kitimat airport society announced a new fee structure for airlines using its facility. Beginning in mid-August, the society will charge the airlines $8 for each arriving and departing passenger. In turn, the airlines will pass the fee to its passengers as a separate item. The airport already charges airlines two fees — one for landing based on the aircraft’s size and weight and a second based on the number of seats the aircraft contains —- which are now in- cluded as part of the ticket price. This new one replaces those two charges and adds a bit extra so the society can build up its bank account for minor and major capital projects. While the good part is that passengers will now know what they pay to use the airport, the bad part is the amount they will pay for minor and major capital projects is the consequence of the federal government abandoning small airports. Call it downloading, offloading or whatever, the result is that where once your federal taxes went to supporting small airports you will con- tinue to pay those taxes and be charged a bit more to fly. In essence, the user fee is simply an extension of your tax bill. So the next time the federal government pats itself on the back for reducing the deficit think of the reason why. ON TOP of raising money to provide for minor and major capital projects at the airport, its gov- erning society faces a new problem due to of- floading from the federal government. Proposed changes to federal regulations requir- ing on-site firefighting services could add hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to the cost of running the facility. The irony is that just three years ago the feds got rid of firefighting services at airports the size of the one here after after deciding they weren’t needed. This happened just in time for the turn- ing over of small airports to local authorities. But now, in partial response to a near disaster when an aircraft landed badly at the Fredericton airport, the feds have resurfaced with proposals to re-instate firefighting and rescue services. For the local airport, it would mean having a trained firefighter with a truck on duty whenever a large passenger aircraft takes off and lands. The catch? Local airport authorities would probably have to carry the full economic cost. That’s prompted a massive protest on the part of local airport authorites across the country and the possibility of a lawsuit. And should some kind of firefighting service be someday required, it would be doubtful there’d be any help from the feds, The cost would most likely be passed along to the airport passenger in the form of another user fee. And the crime is that the feds would be isolated from a situation of their own making. PUBLISHER/EDITOR: Rod Link ADVERTISING MANAGER: Brian Lindenbach PRODUCTION MANAGER: Edoward Credgeur NEWS Jeff Nagel * NEWS/SPORTS: Christiana Wiens NEWS/COMMUNITY: Alex Hamilton FRONT OFFICE: Darlene Kecping ON CIRCULATION SUPERVISOR: Carole Kirkaldy ADVERTISING CONSULTANTS: Sam Bedford, Bunnie Cote, Mark Beaupre TELEMARKETER: Tabatha Orange DARKROOM /COMPOSING: Susan Credgeur AD ASSISTANT: Julie Davidson, Andrea Malo SUBSCRIPTION RATES BY MAIL: $57.30 per year; Seniors $50.75; Out of Province $64.39 Outside of Canada (6 months) $158.25 (ALL PRICES INCLUDE GST) MEMBER OF 6.C, AND YUMON COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCLATION. CARADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPERS ASSOCIATION AND B.C. PRESS COUNCIL Serving the Terrace and Thornhill area. Published on Wednesday of each wack at S210 Clinton Street, Terrace, British Columbia, Y8G 52. Stories, photographs, IIlustrations, designs and typestyies in the Terrace Standard ara the property of the copyright holders, including Cariboo Press (1969} Ltd. its illustration repra services and adverlising agencies. Fen in whele of in pat, without written permission, is spectically prohibited. Authorized a¢ secord-clase mail ponding tha Post Otfice Department, for payment ol postage in cash. Speciat thanks to all our contributora and correspondents for their time and talents .. YOU WENT THROUGH A RED LIGHT, . AND YOUR. PHONY WIG , EAR RINGS DRESS AND HLIRTATIOUS «SMILE DOESN'T FOOL ME MAG! eent @G©® Zalm heaves TO on horizon VICTORIA —- Bill Vander Zaim wants to be back in the Political fray so bad he can taste it. To his credit, he didn’t immediately try to fill the vac- uum left by Fred Gingell who died a week ago. In deference to Gingell’s family, Vander Zalm said, he wasn’t going to announce just yet whether or not he'll run in the byelection. Wise mave. Fred, the Liberal MLA for Delta South, was the most respected and gentle- manly and, at the same time, one of most effective Members of the Legislature in quite some time. His shoes will be hard to fill, no matter who runs for his seat. To rush for the spoils would be most unseemly. Assuming, however, that Vander Zalm will contest the byelection, he stands a good - chance. of winning: - peed What about Vander Zalm’s resignation as premier “in dis- grace,” as the media are fond of pulling it? Isn’t he bogged down with too much baggage? You tell me. Eight years have passed, and the public will be hard-pressed to explain to themselves and others just what it was thal Van- der Zalm did wrong, He was against abortion. So are a lot of people. He wore religion on his sleeve. Well, FROM THE, CAPITAL. HUBERT BEYER what’s wrong with that? Better than a bunch of atheist wanting to take God out of the Constita- tion. And what was {hat about conflict of interest? Right, he wanted to sell his Fantasy Gar- «dens, -business.. and _ tried to. «impress some potential buyer: to -., the lieutenant- “povernor - of the. day. What’s wrong with that? And so it will go. In retrospect, Vander Zalm’s transgressions will have faded — into obscurity. What will be on the voters’ minds is the likelihood ‘ofa completely lopsided victory by Gordon Campbell’s Liberals. Certainly, the voters want change, but maybe not that much of achange, — Vander Zalm’s undeniable charm, underestimated by his detractors at their own risk, and the public’s refusal to crucify a man twice for sins they no longer clearly remember will give hima better than average chance to carry. the day in the byelection. — Lets’ us assume then, for argument’s sake, that he will win the byelection, which will put him in the legislature as the only member of the ‘B.C, Reform Party, a party af which he is not even the leader, just the president. In true ‘and tried polilical fashion, the Reform Party will then schedule a leadership con- vention in fairly short order, and the result will be a corona- . tion, Being Vander Zalm, he will be able to dominale the head- ~clines, and T'can'see it now::Van-: . der Zalm Stages ‘Coméback’”.. =~ ¢ Vander Zalm vows to: take on Campbell... Even without an elected member, the Reform Party has the support of more than 22 per cent of the voters, far ahead of the governing NDP. With a voice in the legislature, particu- larly Vander Zalm’s voice, that support is bound to grow. And it will grow al the expense of the Liberals. At present, the Liberals own a good chunk of the former Social Credit vote, but with the second coming of Vander Zalm, that vote may well shrink, ~ Aside from Campbell’s probable victory, two other pos- sibilities should be considered, as we move towards the next _ election: Vander Zalm splits the _tight-wing vote enough to allow the NDP to come up through the middle for a third term or Vander Zalm musters enough support to stage a comeback as premier. Both latter scenarios may sound unrealistic and a little off-the-wall, but if I’ve learned one thing writing about politics for nearly 40 years, it’s that in British Columbia anything can happen. Pundits were nearly unani- mous in their prediction that the Sacreds would be defeated in 1975. Many of the same pundits “were sire that the NDP would go down to defeat in 1996, The yoters proved them wrong on both occasions, and if you think that Vander Zalm has- n’t got a snowball’s chance in hell to become premier again, or that the NDP can get re- elected, you, too, may live to eat your words. Beyer can be reached at — Tel: . (250) 920-9300; e-mail: hubert@coolcom.com; web: hitp./Avww hubertbeyer.com,/ Grieving, history being lost 1 BLAME golf for the ban of flowers, fences, and any other obstacles to grass mowers at city cemeteries. Until golf courses with their acres of velvet grass became as common as paved. parking lots, cemeteries were restful places where we honoured our dead in any way families chose, from inexpensive borders of babies breath to six-foot high marble columns costing several thousand dollars. {OF course, that was before van- dalism became a clandestine team sport.) In my home town Saskatchewan cemetery, grass grew hip high through- out. Those who visited regu- larly pulled the brome grass to make way for fresh flow- ers in vases, pots of gerani- ums, or borders of purple and white alyssum, Here and there, like bears peering over bush, stood a marble head- ‘stone carved to tell the deceased’s name, birth and death dates, and a line sum- DAD? WHY Do SOUTHERNERS BUILD FANCY HouSES JA! THROUGH BIFOCAES CLAUDETTE SANDECKI mary of their life. Each grave, by its style of remembrance, hinted at the survivors’ devotion to and respect for the departed rela- tive, and the family’s finan- cial circumstances. Walking from gravestone to gravestone you could trace. a family lineage, reconstruct the population of the area, consider the toll taken by disease, such as the scarlet ‘fever epidemic of 1920. Touring even so small a cemetery. took time. You Ml FORT DOGGEREL? BECAUSE To GET THAT RiCH THEY WRECK THEIR SUN ENVIRONMEAST !! ) SOTHEY HAVE To FIND APACE WHERE THAT WASN'T HAPPENE D/ automatically geared down to a contemplative pace in the face of somber history and personal loss. Coming unexpectedly upon a white slab gravestone carved in relief with a reclining lamb encircled by flowers, and the name of a child who never saw her first birthday, you couldn’t help shating her family’s sorrow. Then golf arrived, Most incongruous event I’d ever seen, But there, among gopher mounds, along a creek, on a course shorn weekly by a farm tractor with a power takeoff mower, the doctor teed off against the Massey Ferguson dealer. When my folks passed on in 1978 and 1982, cemetery fashion called for covering each grave with a concrete slab. A $500 slab. Guaran- teed ta shut out weeds for- ever, - But last fall the edict went ‘oul:- remove all concrete slabs. At further expense. Only slab gravestones lower Hey! I MIGHT BE FooR iN THE KCKET Book BuT rm ALREAPY RICHIA THIS LANP AND my FREE Dom than the mower blades are allowed. The restrictions of identi- fication and beautification in cemeteries to shave a minute or two from weekly lawn care bothers me. Not only are we depriving families of their right to grieve in their own way. We are denying our communities of a visible history. Are we afraid to acknow!l- edge death will come to us, tao? And what benefit comes from the few dollars saved by mowing fence to fence, unimpeded by reminders of a life well lived? Cemeteries reduced to sheep meadows dotted by concrete bricks have all the . personality of cobblestoned Fifth Avenue. Where will poets go for inspiration? Look for Elegy in a Golf Course Cemetery! Besides the indefinable loss to our grieving families, we will be saying goodbye to another skilled trade - stone carving. AND WEVE SEComE A CAR ETAKER : OMMuUN! THEY Pay €oR THE GiG Houses AND WE BUILD ANI> MAKE CARL OF THEM!