Socreds’ <
underlies school §

record

board elections

“The right wing wants to make
fundamentalism — back to the bas-

_ ls — into the main issue in the elec-
tion,

_._ ‘But the real issue is the provin-
Clal government’s lack of support
Or the education system. That is
the issue which candidates must de-
Clare themselves on.”’

The real issue, the quality and
8eneral standard of education is
What voters ultimately will respond
‘0 when they go to the polls, Co-
quitlam school trustee Eunice Par-

€f says with confidence, and those
Standards are set chiefly by the bud-

LORRAINE HOCKING...the op-
Position on right wing Rich-
Mond school board.

8et dictates of the provincial gov-
ment. In 1972 the province paid
Per cent of education costs; last

Year it was only 46 per cent.

._ Last year they told us that a

Proposition, 13’ style tax revolt was

Imminent in B.C.,”’ she said. “And

€ demand was on to cut taxes and

Cut back education. But the election
didn’t bear that out. People showed
‘ at they. want to maintain educa-
‘nal standards.”?

Wiromerent version, but essential-
tbat, same, demand for cutting ed-
this 10n spending: is being pressed
3 feenens only now it is tied to de-

a Mg enrolment and the funda-

Ntalist movement.
€y both come back to the same

Question, Parker says, ‘‘the level of

8 :
UPPort given to the system by the.

Ministry of education.”’
aie education minister Pat
in ee has been more than subtle
thet Statements that school dis-
$ Should close schools because
bach ening enrolment. And the
Digans Riiesbasics movement
€ss electives, less options

for students, and less teachers —
just what McGeer wants,”’ she says.

With the support of McGeer, the
right wing will have some impact in
the elections, Parker predicts, but it
won’t necessarily go their way this
year any more than in the last elec-
tion.

Her own race in Coquitlam is an
example where the possible closure
of schools has become the chief
election issue. Coquitlam has suf-
fered a drop of 4,000 in elementary
school enrolment this year, and an
administration report is recom-
mending that accommodation for
1,200 be closed. That could be the
equivalent of four entire schools.

The response from the public,
however, has been just the opposite
than that from McGeer. A public
meeting in early October drew more
‘than 500 on the ‘issue, and since
then 28 written briefs and submis-
sions have come to the board — and
there is an almost unanimous de-
mand to keep the schools open.

“Closing the schools would re-
duce taxes by .37 mills, about $3.50
per year on the average, and people
are saying, ‘so what,’ ’’ she ex-
plained.

Her response to the excess space
and fewer students expected next
year is the suggestion that the
pupil/teacher ratio should be lower-
ed by another half a point.

Parker and her running mate
with the Association of Coquitlam
Electors (ACE), Lorna Morford,
could very likely take both of the
open seats on the Coquitlam school
board. A trustee for seven of the
past eight years, Parker headed the
poll two years ago, and Morford,
president of ACE, was runner-up a
year ago, and won’t be facing an in-
cumbent this year.

But Parker, an executive member
of the B.C. School Trustees Asso-
ciation, warns against minimizing
the danger posed by the right-wing
attack on the education system.
“Progressive education has been
destroyed in many parts of the
United States, and it could happen
heres?

Much of the ultra-right move-

ment in education emanates from _

Langley, she said, where funda-
mentalists have firm control over
the local Board and have caused
deep divisions in the school system
and the community over their at-
tempt to establish an alternative

school system rigidly structured
along ‘‘Judeo-Christian values.’’ A
newly-formed citizens group is giv-
ing the Langley board a stiff con-
test, and some changes could be in
the cards.

In North Vancouver, fundament-
alists are running a very noisy cam-
paign to wipe out the incumbents
from the District board. A so-called
‘‘committee of concerned citizens,’’
based on the Socred organization
on the North Shore, has moved
from demands for tax cuts to typi-

cally emotional issues of course

content, the latest being a program
in the schools to combat racism and
prejudice.

A broad-based citizens group, the
North Vancouver Voters Associa-
tion (NOVA) has formed in re-
sponse to the campaign, and has en-
dorsed the two incumbents on the
district board, Frank Worburten

gd

Parker at municipal hall as nominations close...a
tion system, she is expected to win handily in the November $7 vote in Coquitlam.

ae roa

and V. Smelowski.

In Richmond, a similar brand of
right-wing fundamentalism domi-
nates the school board, but it could
lose ground to progressives in this
election.

For the past two years the opposi-
tion on the board has come from
the Richmond Electors’ Action
League’s (REAL) Lorraine Hock-
ing. Most of the time Hocking has
had trouble even garnering a sec-
onder for any motion of substance
from the right-wing block opposing
her.

Hocking is REAL’s only candi-
date, but she may be joined on the
new board by one or more of the
five school board candidates of the
Richmond Independent New Dem-
ocrats (RIND).

Richmond school district doesn’t
have declining enrolment, Hocking
points out, and it puts the lie to the

Swann acclaimed in Alberni |

leading spokesperson for progressives in the educa-

— Fred Wilson photo

Socred’s blanket policy of cost cut-
ting. Major areas of the District
have rapidly increasing enrolment
which has forced the board to make
extensive use of ‘portable class-
rooms. Meanwhile, the Socreds
have cut the District’s $15 million
capital -budget to just $3 million
not enough to make any serious ap-
proach to the problem of lack of
school space.

The other major contest in the
Lower Mainland is in Burnaby
where the labor-backed Burnaby
Citizens Association hope to regain
control of the board from thé right-
wing Burnaby Voters Association.

Leading the BCA campaign are
incumbents Elsie Dean and Barry
Jones, but the BCA’s third trustee,
June Williams, won’t be running
this time. (A closer look at the cam-
paign in Burnaby will be carried in
next week’s Tribune.)

Labor in 15 civic contests

With only two weeks of intensive
campaigning before the November
17 election day, labor-backed, pro-
gressive candidates are challenging
in at least 15 cities, districts, towns
and villages throughout B.C.

The key contest on Vancouver
Island will be in Port Alberni where
the labor movement is attempting
to regain a position of strength on
municipal council. Leading the
campaign in Alberni will be alder-
‘man George McKnight, expected to
finish near or at the top of the polls
again. Along with McKnight, the
Alberni Labor Council has endors-
ed Bill Young, president of CUPE
in Alberni, and Len Nelson, a mill
worker and executive member of

the Canadian Paperworkers Union,
for council seats.

In school board elections, labor
scored a breakthrough with the ac-
clamation of Gary Swann .o a two-
year seat, restoring labor’s presence
on the board which had been miss-
ing since the retirement of Mark
Mosher. Swann was the Communist
Party candidate in Alberni in the
last provincial election.

In Victoria, Victoria Labor
Council secretary Larry Ryan will
be stepping down from his alder-
manic seat after seven years, but
labor council president John
Shields will attempt to maintain
labor’s seat on the council. NDP
researcher Gretchin Brewin will also
have labor support in her bid for a
aldermanic seat.

In Alert Bay, Gilbert Popovich
was returned unchallenged to the
mayor’s office when nominations
closed. A member of the United
Fishermen and Allied Workers’
Union, it will be Popovich’s third
consecutive term as mayor of the

_ working class fishing community.

Upcoast, United Fishermen and
Allied Workers Union northern
organizer Mike Darnel has been
nominated to challenge for a one
year aldermanic seat on the- Prince
Rupert city council. Backed by an
ad hoc trade union committee,
Darnel is campaigning on a pro-
gram to bring jobs to Rupert
through the establishment of secon-
dary industry, and to build an In-
dian Cultural’ Centre to serve the
needs of the area’s 40 per cent
Native population.

Labor candidates are contending
in two interior cities, Vernon and
Trail. Vernon and District Labor
Council secretary Bert Nilsson is
trying for a second time to nail
down an aldermanic seat on Vernon

- council, and is expected to finish

strongly.

MIKE DARNEL...UFAWU
organizer challenges for Rupert
council seat.

In Trail, smelterworker and
United Steelworkers’ executive
member Elmer Pontius is running
for council to give the labor move-
ment a toe hold on that city’s right
wing local government.

In the Lower Mainland, pro-
gressive candidates include Ed
Widmer and Marjorie Houghton in
Maple Ridge, each vying for alder-
manic positions; aldermanic candi_
date Jim Ormerod in White Rock:
the Association of Coquitlam Elect-
or’s Larry Whaley, trying for a
council spot in Coquitlam; shipyard
worker and tenant activist Ernie
Crist in North Vancouver District,
who is challenging for an alder-
manic seat; and IWA official Bruce
Elphinstone is seeking a seat on the
New Westminster city council.

The New Westminster and Van-
couver Labor Councils: have en-
dorsed the full slate of the Surrey
Alternative Movement (SAM), the
Burnaby Citizens Associations
(BCA), and Richmond Independent
New Democrats in their respective
races.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE—NOVEMBER 2, 1979— Page 3

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