A4- The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, June 21, 2000
ESTABLISHED APRIL 27, 1988
ADDRESS: 3210 Clinton Street Terrace, B.C. * V8G 5R2
TELEPHONE: (250) 638-7283 * FAX: (250) 638-8432

PUBLISHER: ROD LINK
EMAIL: standard@kermode.net

Digging a hole

PITY POOR Steve Scatt.

The city’s parks and recreation superintendent
would probably rather take on any number of
tough assignments than have to continue to tell
widows and their children they can’t put above-
ground ornaments, fences and flowers around the
graves of their loved ones, .

Yet there he was on June 9th doing what bur-
eaucrats do oh so often — watching their political
masters pass the buck and dump a messy pro-
blem back on the paid staff.

City councillors - who have dealt with the ce-
metery issue only sporadically compared to Mr.
Scott — twisted, dodged and weaved in every ef-
fort to get out of making a decision.

The compromise Mr. Scott presented allows
for a new area to be created with concrete side-
walks near the grave markers where memorial
items could be placed without interfering with
lawn-mowing operations.

That, however, would only apply to new graves
purchased in the future.

To satisfy the presently irate bereaved, council
must also face the question of whether to increase
the cemetery groundskeeping budget so existing
graves can be custom-trimmed.

It is, as councillors noted, simply a matter of
money, Right now a large driving lawn mower is
able to efficiently drive over most of the cemetery
where headstones are flush with the ground. Staff
would instead have to use a smaller mower and
weed trimmers around many graves.

And that makes it an issue of setting priorities,
a job the people elect council to do.

Council must decide whether the money is’ best :
spent being more sensitive to those in the griev-
ing process, or any number of other possible
ways to spend it — for example enhanced snow
clearing to eliminate the windrows across drive-
ways.

Rather than hash out a dollar figure of how
much more they’re prepared to spend to solve the
cemetery problem, council looked for every pos-
sible exit.

Mayor Jack Talstra led the push to find a way
to submarine the issue at least temporarily and get
his councillors away from the troubling gaze of
one loca] widow and her two children.

Maybe the city should privatize the cemetery,
he suggested. Or perhaps the city’s facilities soc-
iety, which now runs the theatre and Heritage
Park, should take it over.

In the end, they decided, the issue deserves a
complete re-think that looks at all the options.

That means referring it to the lucky volunteers
of the city’s Parks and Recreation Advisory
Commission.

And who gets the job of coming up with a re-
commended solution?

Step forward, Mr. Scott.

. ow

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_ eracy at its worst.

IT SNOT THE
“MILEAGE...
H'S THE PERFORMANCE
THAT COUNTS Me

&
=

Health care woes of a small town

VICTORIA ~ Calling all cabi-
net ministers, especially Ujjal
Dosanjh, the premier, and
Mike Farnworth, the minister
of health.

That something is wrong
with Canada’s and, therefore,
British Columbia’s health care
system is well known. The
premier knows it, Farnworth
knows il, I know it, everybody
knows it.

But to find out just how
sick the system is, one must
go north, away from the urban
centres.

“Cariboo Health is ailing”
Says a recent headline of the
Williams Lake Tribune. “Tatla
Clinic in Crisis Again” says
the Chilcotin Telegraph.

In this case, the shortage of
money isn’t what’s causing the
crisis. It’s entrenched bureau:

<= Fatla isa: ‘small
ity; about 210 kilometres west
of Williams Lake, which puts
it about 700 kilometres north-
west of Vancouver. -

Tatia Lake offers excellent
fishing and kayaking, the
beautiful countryside is a
paradise for hikers.

And with that unmistakable
pride of small. communities,
Tatla proudly presents web
surfers with a list of its last
Christmas Craft Fair,

In many ways, Tatla has it

ommiune"~

FROM THE CAPITAL

HUBERT BEYER

all. What it may soon no long-
er have is its two nurses. And
that spells potential trouble,
not only for the town’s year-
round residents, but for visitors
who may find themselves in
need of a nurse.

The Tatla Lake Clinic was

faker... over, by the Province

last: "Oétober. The two nurse
practitioners, Ruth Kuehl-
Venn and Penny Sharp, deci-
ded to stay on, taking a 30-
per-cent cut in pay.

The two women had to take
the cut in pay because the
Province has no job descrip-
tion for nurse practitioners.

Unlike regular nurses, nurse
practitioners are allowed to
diagnose patients and pre-
scribe treatment and, accord-
ingly, command higher salar-
ies.

The federal government re-
cognizes this, the province
doesn’t.

The province has had eight
months in which to come up
with a job description that fits
the work the two women do
and compensates them accord-
ing to the federal scale. Eight
months for a lousy job descrip-
tion and nothing to show for.

The two nurse practitioners
say they soon will have no
choice but to leave.

They can return to the fed-
eral Medical Services Branch
until the end of September
without losing their seniority
benefits and higher rate of pay.

“We have layoff status and
can walk back into our federal
jobs as if we never left,” says
Sharp.

The real culprits appear to

»‘be-.the Hospital. Employers:As- —
“-ssociation of British Columbia’:

and the Nurses Union of B.C.,
both of which would have to
approve the new classification
and are not very eager to do
50.

It seems to me that this is a
job made to order for our
brand-new premier who has
been talking up a storm about
the need to fix the health care
system.

“We're putting more money
into health care but money
alone won’t be enough to save

and renew Medicare,”
Dosanjh said recently.
“Our health care system has
to find new ways, innovative
ways, to deliver this care to se-
niors more efficiently to take
the stress off our hospitals.”
Right on, premier, especial-
ly that part abut innovative
ways. Innovate away.
Tell those pig-headed union
and government bureaucrats to
produce a job description for
nurse practitioners or die trying,
The whole health care sys-
tem may be on the. ropes, but
in the province’s urban centers
you still have your choice of
hospitals and numerous walk-in
clinics. Our nurses may be
overworked and underpaid, but
not all have given in to the lure
of higher. salaries south of the
border and are hanging in there.
. In small communities such

Ujjal

“eas! Tatlay anurse practitioner:

can make the difference be-
tween life and death, and if |
were premier, 1 wouldn’t take
that chance, not if the outcome
hinged on a job description.

Then again, maybe the pre-
mier is too busy trying to keep
his party from imploding, in
which case the job of rectifying
the abysmal Tatla situation
falls to Farnworth, the minister
of health,

A small town up north is
waiting for action.

Little det

BECAUSE LAW forbids pub-
lication of young offenders’
names, it was news to dis-
cover we can attend court, sce
young offenders, learn their
names, hear the charges
against them, and watch the
guilty sentenced.

Youth Court happens every
second Tuesday.

The Tuesday | attended, 35
names appeared on the day's
docket. Several failed to shaw.

Most were ordered to reap-
pear in two weeks,

The few whoa pleaded Not
Guilty were assigned Septem-
ber trial dates. Three pleaded
guilty and were sentenced
within two hours.

All three were ordered to

serve six months probation,

write a letter of apology, and
do 20 hours of community ser-
vice. A $100 fine was tacked
on for altering a driver’s il-
cense, another was to take
temper-curbing counselling.

A little ingenuity on the

THROUGH. BIFOCALS
CLAUDETTE SANDECKI

part of the Crown counsel,
who suggests sentences, would
boost them above their per-
functory level:

For instance, permit the
victim of bicycle robbery to
help himself to any one item
from the thief’s prized posses-
sions whether that might be a
Stereo, an electric guitar, or a
skateboard.

Besides the $100 fine, order

the teen who altered the birth-
date on his driver’s licence in
hopes of buying beer to buy a
copy of Jean Auel’s 760-page
novel, The Plains of Passage,
and turn every “o” into an “8”,

So far I’ve attended only
one Youth Court, but 1 expect
it was typical.

Astonishing immediately
was the upbeat atmosphere in

the parking lot reminiscent of

prad night at the R.E.M. Lee,

You’d never guess the
young folk heading into court
were there to.answer charges
of theft, shoplifting, mischief,

false accusations, or uttering
bomb threats.

In court utmost respect and

civility greeted the miscreants,

Court scrupulously avoids
belittling anyone's self esteem
by explaining the seriousness
of the crime, except for the
one 16-year-old who was told
had she been an adult she
would face jail time. No adult

even frowns at them.

errence in youth court

Neither the vapid sentences
nor the sluggish progress
through court offer any deter-
rence.

If a mother took equally
long to discipline a three-year-
old for running out into traffic,
the toddler would be dead be-
fore suppertime,

But trivial sentences and
protracted court proceedings
are only two faults of our court
system. Another shortcoming is
the absence of uninvolved
Spectalors.

Everyone there now, except
for the accused and their fami-
lies (and many teens show up
with foster parents), are paid
cogs in the system, fram judge,
Crown counsel, defense law-
yers, sheriffs, case workers,
and probation officers.

So rare is the individual who
attends court just to see what’s
happening, you might even be
asked “What are you doing
here?” as though you' re an in-
terloper.

$54-85(+83.85681) per year Seniors $48.62 eS340687); MY LIFE'S So WHAT ABOUT THE [99-54 | AND THE BEAR.
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MEMBER OF meet SY REPORT ON!! CRASH LANDED ?
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B.C PRESS COUNCIL GC aan CRASHED THERE

BEFORE !!

Sening the Terrace ard Thomhill area, Published on Wednesday of each week at 3210 Clinton Street,

Terrace, British Cohmbia, V8G 5R2.

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