British Columbia So Union demands action on PGB danger News that dangerous PCBs have been stored in a wooden shed in Stanley Park has underscored the anger and upset members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees feel at the shoddy handling of the carcino- genic chemical in B.C. The union, which represents municipal and school board employees around the province, has found the agent stored in paint tins near a gas furnace in one instance, and is advising its workers to refuse to han- dle inadequately stored PCBs. Mike Dumler, president of CUPE’s B.C. Division, said locals are reporting storage sites not included on a recent federal list of PCB stockpiles. The union is demanding meetings with school board and municipal officials to dis- cuss the storage and disposal of the chemi- cal. The Vancouver parks board said it would establish a 24-hour guard around its storage shed in Stanley Park following publicity about the site by CUPE Local 1004. But sources, who declined to be named because management has imposed a clampdown on workers’ comments to the media, said at press time they had yet to see a guard at the site. Local secretary-treasurer David Foster reported at the Vancouver and District Labour Council last week that he had com- plained about the site for one month. The PCBs, some in barrels without lids, had been removed from a regulation concrete storage bunker and left outside. They were later moved to a wooden shed with a dirt floor after Foster complained to a supervi- sor, who claimed nonetheless that the out- side storage was safe. He said removal of the chemical “should have been done a month ago, if they’d bloody well listened. We’ve been frustrated at every turn.” Foster charged that the flammable shed was also dangerous, but WCB inspectors he called twice in the past month did not show up. Additionally, a call from the local’s bus- iness agent to the board two weeks ago failed to produce an investigation. “It should be called the Management Compensation Board,” said Foster. The shed is located in the public works yard adjacent to the rose garden near the entrance to the park and close by the heavily ‘populated west end of the city. Barrels of PCBs and PCB-contaminated soil have also been stored in the open at the city’s Cambie works yard, following a clean-up four years ago when the chemical started leaking from abutments on the Bur- rard Street bridge onto the Burrard Marina at False Creek. Ken Davidson, Local 1004's second vice- president and a shop steward, worked on the cleanup which involved workers empty- ing the toxic chemical from the abutments, where they served as lubricants for the bridge’s expansion bearings. He said workers used hand pumps and then wiped down the walls of the holding tanks with rags, wearing no special protective gear. The barrels were subsequently stored on the asphalt pavement in the yard, and were later kept behind concrete guards when the union pointed out the danger of spillage through truck collision one year ago, said Davidson. The four to five 40-gallon drums later disappeared — with top management saying they have no idea where they were taken — but the yard still contains the bar- rels of contaminated soil removed from the marina. Davidson said PCB oils are still in the Civic unity threatened, » Coquitlam’s ACE warns Special to the Tribune Since provincial legislation now requires three-year terms for all elected civic offices, this election year will be especially impor- tant. The three-year term will lengthen the time span between elections and make it more difficult for new people to upset the present well-heeled incumbents. The Association of Coquitlam Elec- tors (ACE) has an almost 20-year his- tory in civic work and sponsoring can- didates for council and school board. It } 4 supports a broad } program to unite Coquitlam residents, regardless of parti- san association, around the needs for services for our resi- dents, fair taxation, and so on. ACE has elected several aldermen and school trustees. In this context ACE approached the Coquitlam Civic New Democrats — an organization with exclusive NDP member- ship — with an appeal for unity and co- operation. The aim was to avoid a situation where both organizations run candidates for all positions and thus ensure the election of the present right-wing incumbents, while dividing our traditional supporters on parti- san lines. The response from representatives of the civic NDP organization was a most crude and arrogant refusal to co-operate in any way, and a failure to recognize ACE’s long standing role in the community. The fact that many of the successful ACE candidates have been NDP members — and have found no conflict or disagreement with the well-defined civic program that ACE has worked out — is apparently PARKER 2 e Pacific Tribune, October 3, 1988 irrelevant to this new group. Eunice Parker, a three-term ACE alder- man, points out that there are many far- reaching’ changes taking place in the municipality. Many will be irreversible, including: ® . The sale of municipal land. @ The development of the Westwood Plateau which will see 5,000 housing units built on Crown land with no land desig- nated for affordable housing — the most crucially needed type of housing. @ The push to develop the Class A, 600- ‘acre agricultural area now known as Col- ony Farm as a race track. @ The plan to loga crucial area of Burke Mountain that should be preserved as park land, and other pressing environmental issues that face all municipalities. @ The taxation polices of the provincial government and the relentless movement to shift the tax burden more and more onto the local homeowner while reducing taxes for business and industry. For all these reasons the need for unity is so important, not only at the civic level, but provincially and nationally as well. It becomes crucial with the Free Trade Agreement threatening our sovereignty, and the attack on the living standards of working people through privatization pro- grams. In their response the Civic NDP repre- sentatives also suggested ACE could ‘“‘co- operate” by not participating in the election at all, except for those members who would choose to join the NDP or support. the organization’s electoral pursuits. ACE considers that there is no alterna- tive but to continue on with its plan to hold ' nominating meetings and to contest the election as always. ACE hopes that before too long reason will prevail and co- operation, rather than partisan division, is achieved. footings of both the Burrard and Granville Street bridges, but the city has said it plans to remove them. CUPE researcher Blair Redlin said PCBs stored at identified job sites consist of bar- rels, containing contaminated debris or liq- . .» New regulations issued by Environment uids such as PCB laced oils, caches of PCB light ballasts removed since 1979, and trans- formers and capacitors at major schools and hospitals. He said Stanley Park and a large amount of PCBs stored in New Westminster were not on the list the union obtained from the federal government. On the list are the municipality of Delta, Simon Fraser University, Cowichan Valley, Cariboo College, Nanaimo, Nelson, Prince George, Prince Rupert, the Greater Van- couver Regional District, Surrey and the Vancouver school board. PCBs have been found stored in Killarney, Vancouver Technical and Churchill secondary schools. Dumler said the union is “very upset, because we had to chase around to get the list and because that list is obviously incom- plete.” The B.C. Division is urging all locals to ensure that PCBs are secured according to Peace movement's effort ‘sinking subs’: Jewett — The Canadian peace movement, and par- ticularly the British Columbia branch, can take full credit for the federal government’s decision to place the purchase of nuclear- powered submarines on the back burner, Pauline Jewett told a news briefing Sept. 28. “T think the Canadian peace movement and above all the British Columbia branch had a lot to do with the prime minister and the government, and (Defence Minister) Perrin Beatty particularly in deciding not to proceed with the nuclear submarine con- tract prior to the election,” she said. The Burnaby MP and New Democratic Party defence critic said Prime Minister Brian Mulroney should announce cancella- tion of the Conservative government’s plans to purchase the submarines, intended to put a military presence in the Arctic. Jewett, who was set to give the keynote address at a weekend conference of End the Arms Race, charged that the submarine purchase represented the Tories’ militariza- tion of the economy and that it violated the new spirit of detente. But she expressed optimism that disar- mament is catching on, predicting the demilitarization of Europe and the dissolu- tion of “superpower military blocks” within a decade, and calling for a revitalized peacekeeping role for the United Nations. Mulroney was slated to address the UN General Assembly Sept. 30, and Jewett suggested several ways in which the prime minister could improve Canada’s peace role in the world. The PM can live up to his pledge of imposing total economic sanctions against South Africa, or at the very least, down- grade the Canadian embassy in Pretoria, Jewett said. And the PM could declare an end to the submarine program, pledge to work for “the de-nuclearization and ultimately the de-militarization of the Arctic,” and end cruise missile testing and the defence pro- duction sharing agreement with the U.S., Jewett said. Charging that the Tories have “‘used mil- itary spending as a form of regional indus- trial expansion,” the NDP defence critic said that military expenditures, along with energy, is one of the few items the United States won’t oppose subsidies for under the Free Trade Agreement. Although there will likely be progress in world disarmament, the peace movement new federal regulations or are removed altogether. He said the union is insisting that the WCB be brought back in to investigate the PCBs in Stanley Park, and termed the stot age shed “less than acceptable.” Minister Tom McMillan following the dis- astrous and scandalous PCB warehouse fire in St-Basile-le-Grand, Que., gives PCB storage sites 30 days to conform and 180 days for “full compliance.” _ Dumler said a much touted solution for disposal is a controversial incinerator pro- posed for Cache Creek. But he said that solution not only poses environmental risk for the community, but additional risks tO workers and the public through handling; shipping and stockpiling of the chemical. Instead the union calls for the use of mobile PCB incinerators, which he said have been used and found safe in the United States. The federal government is mulling 4 plan to rent the U.S. incinerators, buf CUPE says Canadians have the expertise t0 build their own, Dumler noted. ““We’ve had the technical know-how fot years. What has been as is the politi will,” he charged. e can’t relax, Jewett cautioned. ‘ She noted the United States is oroceedinil with developing bacteriological and chemi- cal weapons, and warned that the Arctic and the north Pacific Ocean are being deve- loped as war zones for a nuclear conflict. Letters New anthem C.E. Patterson, Duncan, writes: Here is the new version of national anthem, if the Reagan-Mulroney deal is imposed on us. ! made up the first verse and a friend of mine made up the second verse. We evel managed to sing it on Cross-Country Checkup for John Crosbie, who was the guest on the program. O Canada, no more our native land, True patriots alas For the U.S.A. they stand. With heavy hearts we see thee fall The true north strong and free And in its place we’ve Joined the arms race To end all history. O Canada, once glorious and free O. Canada, we’ve lost our sovereignty O Canada, betrayed by Mulroney. Best to Rankin Nels Dean, Nanaimo, writes: I notice Bill Campbell from Kamloops would like more letters to the editor, so here goes: . I notice Harry Rankin is running fof office again and wish him the very best, and I hope he has no trouble with the kid mayor and his clique. I heard the mayor say he had no use for Rankin, so Harry; you have a hard time before you start. When 85,000 people lose their privilege to vote because of the Non-Partisan Asso- ciation, it should be placed on the front page of the local papers in big headlines. = .