A4 - The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, March 26, 2003
S ,
ESTABLISHED APRIL 27, 1988
PUBLISHER: ROD LINK
ADDRESS: 3210 Clinton Street Terrace, B.C, * V8G SR2
TELEPHONE: (250) 638-7283 = FAX: (250) 638-8432
WEB: www.terracestandard.com
EMAIL: newsroom@terracestandard.com

Road needed
ONE OF the theories behind politics is that a
governing party ladles out the bad news in the
first years of its mandate followed by good
news in the years leading to the next election.

The expectation is that because people notor-
iously have short term memories, all the bad
stuff at the beginning of a mandate is forgotten
as the governing party gears up for another trip
to the polls. .

With the exception of the northeast, where oil
and gas revenues continue to provide jobs, the
provincial Liberals don’t seem to have a lot of
good news for the north as they enter the final
two years of their mandate leading to the May
2005 election.

It must be a heck of a thing to realize that the
only solid job creation prospect looming on the
horizon is more babysitting jobs for teenagers
on Fridays because of the school board’s deci-
sion to go to a four-day week this September.

The grand B.C. Liberal plan for the north-
west is to reduce the government’s presence in
the north when it comes to jobs and services.
While this would create some pain, the premise
is that private enterprise, buoyed by a business-
friendly government, would rush in to replace
those public sector jobs.

The problem for the provincial Liberal gov-
ernment is that the gap between the public sec-
tor economic influence and private enterprise is
wider than first forecast. That’s why, for in-
stance, Skeena MLA Roger Harris is busy tell-
ing people the B.C. Liberal plan is not about
today or tomorrow or even four or’five years
from now. It is very much a long térm vision
but it won’t carry much weight at the polls.

Enter the Stewart-Omineca resource road,
also called the Kemess road. The idea is that this
route north of here would open the country to
logging, mining and even oil and gas explora-
tion. If there is to be a northwest economic re-
vival, it could very well come from this road.

The road has the potential to create wealth,
establish Stewart as a viable commercial port
and boost the Terrace and area economy in
terms of industrial and other services.

To date, the road plan has the support of
northwest municipalities and has drawn interest
from several companies. Native groups are in-
trigued by the proposal, a key factor in any re-
source development project nowadays.

Some of the money could come from a plan
being promoted by Mr. Harris and other MLAs
~ regional investment funds made attractive by
offering tax credits.

Approval of this road is good business for the
northwest. It is also good politics for Mr. Har-
ris and other MLAs. They need something to
erase the bad memories of the past few years.

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_ poverty-stricken, and: drug-in-

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Sarving the Terrace and Thamhitl area, Published on Wednesday of each weak at 3210 Clinton Street,
Terrace, British Columbia, V8G 5R2.

Stories, photographs, illustrations, dasigns and typestylas in (ha Tertace Standard are the property of the
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Special thanks to all our contributors and correspondents
for their time and talents

aummaey

7

2

”
a

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AFTER FINALLY REACHING THE U.S. BoRD

ER TRUCK CROSSING,

BUT WHEN
l FIRST GOT
IN LINE, | M4S
CLEAN-SHAVEN/

PHIL FACES YET ANOTHER DELAY AT THE SECURITY CHECK.

It’s about health, and not the law

VICTORIA — There's a new
plan afoot in Vancouver to
make it safer for crack addicts
to use drugs by providing them
with equipment that would re-
duce burns and infection.

Crack is one of the. most
hideous drugs in the entire
array of substances: from hell,

The plan under considera-
tion by the Vancouver Coastal
Health Authority is -1o-distri-
bute “safe crack smoking ma-
terials.”

Tt is yet another manifesta-
tion ofa new approach to
dealing with drug abuse,
namely treating it as a health
problem, not a criminal one.

This approach found its
most ardent supporter in Larry
Campbell, a former coroner,
who became Vancouver's
mayor in the last municipal
elections. oe

Campbell's platform inclu-
ded providing free drug injec-
tion sites inthe city's Down-
town Eastside, one of the most ,

fested neighbourhoods. in. Ca-
nada. eT
The new plan under. consid-
eration is to provide crack -ad-
dicts with free rubber tubing
that would be placed. onthe
tips of crack pipes. ;
At first glance, [ am temp-
ted to dismiss this approach as
somewhat ghoulish, like provi-
ding pedophiles. with rubber
dolls that resemble children,
Then again, ] can offer no
better alternative.
One does not have to be a
rocket scientist to conclude

Will he know Ww

BY THE end of this year
Campbell's Libcrals plan to
compartmentalize trades ap-
prenticeship training. Trainees
will earn Scout badges for
specific skills, doorknob in-
stallation, wiring doorbells,
combing hair to the lett.
Certification will take years
longer, and finding work will
be difficult, especially. in
Northwestern B.C. where ver-
satility is a must if you want
to be a valuable employee and
earn a living year round.
Training a carpenter ap-
prentice to frame, an electri-
cian to pull cable, or a pluni-
ber to solder. copper pipes
might save wages for Vancou-
ver employers with major pro-
jects thal can be done as-
sembly line style, but it limits

apprentices employment po-

tential.
Trades people also predict

more workers-will:be injured ~

on the job, not being aware of
the all-round hazards: More
worker injuries translates into
higher medical casts.

“Giving young workers only
enough skills ta do a-portion of
the work that a skilled jour-
neyman is able to do, is sim-

WELL VICTOR BEING oug
By COMMUNITY COORDINATOR
By YOU HAVE ACHOICE OF
Bee EITHER DEVELOPING AN
ACTION PLAN FoR THE
SPRING CLEAN-UP. -.

FROM THE CAPITAL
HUBERT BEYER

that the enforcement approach
has not worked in the past and
isn’t working now.

Even in the U.S, the drug
problem is bigger than ever, in
spite of the government's ruth-
less war on drugs, perhaps be-
cause of it.

When, as recently hap-
pened in Alabama, a kid gets
sentenced to 26 years in prison

for selling three joints to an be ett, oc Lagha
i andergayer, agentiat misshools inn i. ine SCY OF injection drug. ,
you Know symethjng. isn’t

working.

“The renlity is that people
are still going to smoke drugs
and inject drugs whether we're
there. with safe equipment or
not, so our aim is lo allow that
to happen in as saf a situa-
tion as possible,” sc ys Viviana
Zanoceo, spokeswoman for the
health authority.

“I's incumbent on us as a
health authority to ensure that
harm-reduction. measures are
introduced to make = sure
pecple are as safe as

FHROUGH BIFOCALS
CLAUDETTE SANDECKI

ply wrong,” says a spokesper-
son for the B.C, & Yukon Ter-
ritory Building & Construction
Trades Council.

B.C. has 167 trades and oc-
cupations. Of those, 156 are
voluntary trades. Training is

‘done in the workplace, a

classreom, or a combination.

Bakers, cooks, and food ser-

vers are voluntary trades.
Compulsory ‘trades require

_-trainees to complete a regis-

tered apprenticeship, pass ex-
aminations and receive a cer-
tificate before being allowed
to work in their field.

PAIRONMIER woResHoP
ATASOUTHERN RESORT!

possible.”

The question is: will the
drug users take advantage of
the harm-reduction help of-
fered? At the moment, the au-
thority is talking to community
groups that might be willing to
distribute the rubber tubing.

Among the effects of using
the rubber tubing would be a
reduction in lip infections.
“People don’t get them looked
at right away. They get worse
and worse,” Zanocco said.

The same authority that is
now floating the rubber tubing
idea for crack users, already
presides over the city’s needle
exchange program, which was
very controversial when first
introduced.

To get an idea of the scope
of Vancouver’s drug problem,
one has only to consider that
last year, 2.7 million needles
were distributed by authority-
supported organizations in
Downtown Eastside.

RD CLE iy,

users, has been tracking 1,400 |

drug users.

The study suggests that be-
tween 1996 and 2000, crack
smoking increased by 22 per
cent among participants, rising
from {8 per cent to 40 per
cent,

Meanwhile, Vancouver city
council is waiting for the fed-
eral health department to ap-
prove the city’s participation
in a national research project
that would supervise addicts
who inject their drugs.

Drug abuse results in horri-

Nat he’s

'The eleven compulsory

trades are plumbers roofers,
electricians, power line tech-
nicians, refrigeration mech-
anics, sprinkler system instal-
lers, steamfitters and pipefil-
ters, sheet meta! workers, auto
collision repair technicians,
autobody refinishing techni-
cians.

Oddly, automobiles rate tip
top care. Yet hairdressers, car-
penters, motorcycle service
technician and elevator mech-
anics will be voluntary trades,

A government handout says,
“Tt will be up the to the custo-
mer to choose whether they
want services from a_ fully
trained and certified trades
person.” More Liberal down-
loading.

How can I know whether
the elevator in the Park Ave-
nue Medical building has been
serviced by a certified repair-
man? I'd like to be sure the
carpenter building my house
knows more than how to pound
a nail, and that my son-in-law
is riding a motorcycle serviced
by a certified technician. But
the Liberals don’t seem to
care,

“This will make things eas-

GEE MARTEN) T'D LOVETO
DO THE CLEAN-UP BUTA
NORTHERNER StpUlP Go

SHOP!

—

OP. KeQuHAakT-
Ls

TO THAT WOR

ieee

COPS £ FORGOT THAT
“TRAVEL GRANT NEVER
CAME THROUGH! OH WELL,
GLAD TO HEAR You'RE
GUNG-HO FORTHECLEAN)

fic health and social costs. A
woman addict, at once horri-
fied by her addiction, yet. un-
able to become clean, has
gone as far as to put up a web
site describing her own agony
and warning others to avoid
drugs.

In Tamie’s Addiction, giving
only her first name, she says:
“T want people to know all
about it and how it screws up
your world.

“I'm not going to go into all
the other drugs that I've done
on this page, mainly because
no other drug I’ve done, has |
controlled my life like freebase -
does. It's the first thing I think
about when I wake up in the .
morning and it’s the last thing J
think about before I go to sleep,

“When I want to get high,
which is all the time. The only
thing I think about is getting
high , | don’t think about my
kids or how much money I’m
going to waste, and it’s the
same for all freebase addicts.

, When;: we: want to:-get. high,
that’s; the. only thing on our
minds. Everything else gets put
on the back burner so to |
speak.”

Asked what they thought
about the city’s new approach
to dealing with drug abuse, po-
lice said they had no comment,
It was a health problem, not an
enforcement issue.

If the cops are tacitly sup-
porting the idea, I have no pro-
blem doing so, too.

Beyer can be reached at:
E-mail: hubert@cooicom.com;
Tel (250) 381-6900

doing’?

ier for people,” says the gov- .
ernment. How will it do that?
And easier for which people?
Certainly not for apprentices,

Few are aware of the gov-
ernment’s intention, though it
did post a discussion paper on
the web for two months ending
February 28. Who knew?

The Liberals also held by-
invitation-only meetings around
the province including Prince
George, Prince Rupert, and
Terrace.

Apprentices, employers,
trade reps, trainers, and school
district superintendents were
invited,

Coast Mountain's superin-
tendent was out of town Febr-
uary 11, Media were excluded
from all eight meetings.

Currently, certified journey-
persons can qualify for a red
seal which allows them to work
in another province or in the
United States. ,

The Liberals new plan to
compartmentalize trades train-
ing will limit and postpone
workers’ ability to earn a red
seal. [s Gordon Campbell's se-
cret intent to keep British Co-
lumbians in the province?

eect

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