| Campaign spending upped THE AMOUNT of money provincial candidates and their parties can spend in this riding and in other ones across the province leading up to voting day May 17, has increased from the last election in 2001. j »That’s because provincial elections officials merged their voter’s list with the one belonging to their federal counter- parts, adding 600,000 names to the list. And since spending limits are. based on voter number per: riding, if the numbers go up, so does the limit. The Skeena provisional limit is now $65,483.27 for each © | candidate of.cash or in kind expenses based on-19,628 reg- istered voters as of April 19. That’s more than the $59,627 based on 18,509 voters in 2001. The final arnount for this campaign could go up once a final voter’s list is prepared. Allowable spending for political parties has also gone up | and in Skeena this time it is $28,078. This money is typically "spent on large ticket province-wide items such as widespread television advertising and campaign travel. . But while there are limits after April 19, the day the elec- tion writ was issued, there were no limits beforehand. ‘It meant that any advertising, or other costs incurred prior to April 19-for items that won’t be used during the. cam- - - paign, do not come under the spending limit. - Roger Harris campaign manager Mona Nester isn’t say- Egzaqs ’- ing if the local Liberal budget will come close to the init » “But I do know we've got room [for donations},” ~ said. “We had a pre-writ budget and now we have a oat budget,” Nester added. The largest single expense item in the Liberal campaign , will be media advertising, Nester said. __- Re-elect Harris signs and other campaign material come | ‘in a package prepared by the Liberal central campaign office. atafixed rate. — “It has everything we need,” said Nester. If this election is anything like 2001, Harris won’t have any trouble collecting enough money. Total income of $89,157 was recorded that year in all - I phases of the campaign. Expenditures of $71,184 were re- corded for both the pre-writ and writ periods with $33,477 of that amount spent during the writ period itself. Election financing regulations require that a surplus be sent to the candidate’s constituency association. Last time Harris got substantial'backing from logging and forest products-related companies and from physicians. Richard Tones, of the NDP, doesn’t expect to collect or spend anything close to the allowable limit on the Robin Austin campaign. = * “If you look around we’re about bodies rubbing elbows. It’s about volunteers,” he said. “I suspect we'll be about $45,000 in cash and in kind,” Tones added. _the Canadian Union of Public Employees to one of its local * members who is working on the campaign. — . In NDP campaign speak, they’re called “union releases.” $16,230, finishing the campaign with $1.099 in the bank.» Unlike the case with Giesbrecht’s 1996 campaign, union donations were scarce in 2001. more modest budget than either the Liberals or NDP. As of late last week, he had about $600 collected and ex- pects to have in the neighbourhood of $1,000 to spend. :.“Most of it-will go to literature,” Hayes, said last week. businesses or unions. Relying only on personal donations is not official Green policy, but a number of its candidates have chosen to run their campaigns that way, said Hayes. , ‘Signs of election activity ANY ELECTION seems to become a battle of the signs and that’s rapidly becoming the case in Skeena. Unofficial observers have given NDPer Robin Aus-. tin’s campaign the nod for first out of the gate once the election write was issued April 19, but the Roger Harris . forces have followed suit when it comes to quantity. Harris forces have even placed signs on the fences surrounding the New Skeena/Terrace Lumber Com-. pany mill. Green party candidate Patrick Hayes ‘had trouble last week establishing his sign identity. The shipment containing them was waylaid some- place in Sechelt, the home base of Green party leader Adriane Carr. “But they found them in Gibsons and they’ re on their way,” said Hayes late last week, Party leaders not confirmed for Skeena visit LOCAL CANDIDATES often rely on visits by their party’s leaders to bolster their chances. As of late last week, there was no’ firm word on pending appearances by any leaders, but provincial fi- nance minister Colin Hansen is coming to town. . _ He’ll be making an appearance during the May 4-7 annual gathering here of the North Central Municipali-. ties Association convention here. | Hansen, from Vancouver, was a Liberal MLA in op- position before becoming part of the Liberal govern-_ ment in 2001 as Premier Gordon Campbell's health services minister. , He became finance minister late last year when Gary Collins stepped down to take the chief executive . ‘officer’s position of Harmony Airlines in Vancouver. MP helps provincial NDP CAN FEDERAL NDP. Skeena-Bulkley Member of Parliament Nathan Cullen help his provincial counterparts? Although occupied with the growing prospect ofa federal election stemming: from the Gomery inquiry revelations, Cullen has been in the area as much as possible. He was in Kitimat several weeks ago when provin- cial Skeena NDP candidate Robin Austin opened his campaign office there and last weekend, was on the Queen Charlotte Islands with North Coast NDP candi- date Gary Coons. Cullen parlayed, an extensive door-knocking cam- paign during his election campaign last June into a.win over incumbent Conservative Andy Burton and Liberal Miles Richardson. re ee ee ee ae ee Twwrer, That in-kind will include a salary being paid Tones by the. B.C. Federation of Labour and another salary being paid by . Last time out, NDP candidate Helmut Giesbrecht spent: — Green party candidate Patrick Hayes is working on a far ' He’s only taking money from individuals and not from. : Election Notebook | election, don’t worry. ~ sees elections in this prov-. LIBERAL election volunteer workers Donny Van Dyk (above left)-and Kristin Nester . ' show Roger Harris's campaign is‘on the move outside the incumbent MLA's office - on Kalum St three days after the election officially kicked off. DUSTIN QUEZADA PHOTO - be.ndp.c: TAKING a rest from shooting for their show, -Dare to be Stupid, members of the. Kitimat Komedy Troupe raise the arm‘of Skeena NDP election hopeful | Robin Austin. - during the first official week of provincial campaigning last week. DUSTIN QUEZADA PHOTO ‘| Voter registry how-to By MARGARET SPEIRS IF YOU missed yesterday's deadline:to register to vote | for the May 17,provincial . Elections B.C., the non partisan agency which over- ince, wil! let you register at advance polling stations be- fore the May 17 voting date or at main polling stations on the election day itself. Two pieces of identifica- tion are required; one with your name and signature and one with your name and address. - ~ Photo LD. isn’t required but is helpful: to have for electoral officers. eee meg aon foe a" = MARJORIE Phelps, serves the. Skeena riding as the district’s Kitimat- based electoral officer. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO Acceptable identification ‘includes a driver’s licence, car insurance, credit card, utility bill, rent re- ceipt, BC Care card, social insurance card or Canadian passport. Advance voting goes May 11 to 14 from noon to 9 p.m. at the Elks Hall on Tetrault. Regular voting takes place at the Terrace Arena, Thornhill Junior Secondary School, Kitsumkalum Community Centre, Mount Layton Hot Springs and Rosswood Commu- nity Association Hall on May 17. Absentee ballots, for those who know ‘they will be away on both advance polling. days and election day, can be cast from now on. To date, three candidates have declared for the Skeena riding, incumbent Liberal Roger Harris, NDPer Robin Austin and Pat- rick Hayes of the Green party’s. The last date for candidates to file nomi- nation papers is May 4, so there may be more choices on voting day. District electoral officer Marjorie Phelps, who, has her main office in Kitimat, says about 24,000 people are eligible to vote in the Skeena riding. The numbers haven’t officially changed yet despite the population shifts, she says, because a new list of voters hasn’t been re- leased yet. The Skeena riding is regarded as one of — the more fluid in the province because of the number of people moving in and out. If you have any voting questions, call the elections office in Kitimat at 1-250-632- 6551. The toll-free number for the Elections B.C. headquarters in Victoria is 1-800-661- 8683. 2 The Terrace Standard, Wednesday, April 27, 2005 - AS eee CORRESPONDENCE FOR THE TERRACE STANDARD The Mail Bag Stop raw log export Dear Sir: _ This is in response to Brian Downie’ s letter to the edi- tor of April 20, 2005. It has been stated that I felt that ‘forestry is dead’ in Skeena. Nothing could be further from the truth. While speaking to students at Northwest Community College I. acknowledged that forestry is the economic backbone of _ our community and is part of our identity in the north. The last four years have shown that there can be.hard times in the forest industry and we must be prepared for that. I expressed my commitment to expand our economic ’ horizons in the service, tourism, ‘and light manufactur- ing industries so that they may carry us through the hard» times. ° Forestry isn’t dead i in our community, however it might - be if Gordon Campbell continues to export raw logs. Un- der Gordon Campbell’s poor leadership our logs are being " exported at record levels. What kind of message does that send to the people of Skeena? Our community banded together, business and work- ers alike, to try and get our mill in Terrace running again. ‘Where are we going to get the fibre to run that mill if Gordon Campbell does nothing to stem the mass exodus of our resources? Gordon Campbell hasn’t lifted a finger to help our community in four long years. THat is why New Demo- . crats, like myself, are committed to stemming-the tide of raw log exports from public lands. ‘ Robin Austin, NDP. Candidate for Skeeria,. os os Terrace, B. Cc. "Schools left out Dear Sir: - ae _ We recently received one eof the many education minis- try news releases stating “Province Approves Three Year. School Capital Plan.” It proudly declares that “the 2005- . 08 capital Plan totals $700 million, including $217 million in new funds.” Once again Coast Mountains School District 82 _ will not be receiving any capital monies for the next three years. Let’s not forget that we have not received capital monies from the government since 2002/2003, at’ which — time we received money to purchase a bus — $110,000. “~~ Two of our schools are in need of some major capital work, Mt. Elizabeth in Kitimat — more than $1 million - — and Thornhill Elementary - approximately’ $750,000.” We wrote all three MLAs in our area asking for their as- . sistance in lobbying the government for capital monies... We also wrote education minister Tom Christensen, who by the way, was the only one to actually respond back to:. us. for seismic upgrading to Thornhill Junior, we were told in- ‘no uncertain terms was this money to be used for any proj- ect except for.seismic upgrading (contrary to the state- -ments made by Roger Harris). ; The second part of the news release shows the annual facilities grants budget that we will receive for 2005/06 is $1,519,392 which is a reduction from the $1,604, 186 we received in 2004/05. That’s $84,794 less. - So meanwhile our children sit in schools that ‘get older ‘and older and every year need.more repair work. And in. -addition to not receiving capital monies, our annual grant to do yearly maintenance gets reduced. We have some of the oldest schools in the province. So while the govern- ment is giving away copious amounts of money to special projects, how about some money to make. sure our chil- dren aren’t sitting in schools that are falling apart around them. And just because I don’t know when to quit, andt haven’t got rid of all my anger yet, here’s a novel idea — what about money for jobs?) We were recently out at -Kitwanga for a board meeting, and heard that about 90 per cent of the population in that region is unemployed. - Thirty of the children in that school have no phones at home, 37 children come from: families without vehicles _ (which means that if they miss the bus they cannot get to school). — . So while I’m very happy that the cities of Terrace, Smithers, and Kitimat can now improve their recreation ~ centers (how many millions’), did the government give . any consideration on how this money could have been . used to get our many friends and neighbours back work- ing? Shame on them. — “Lorrie Gowen, Chair, School District 82, _ Terrace, B. Cc. tos ras - tt 's our power Dear Sir: — I am responding to a paid advertisement in The Ter-_ race Standard of April 13 that was sponsored by vari- _ous Terrace businesses. As a resident of Thomhill it gives ‘Me great concern that those supporting the advertisement which promotes the selling of power by Alcan just don’ t get it. I do however acknowledge the community pride ¢ as to comments referring to Terrace as a dying community. However, having stated that the lobbying to allow Alcan to sell power on the open market may certainly leadtothis : eventuality. It is no secret that Paul Henning, Alcan’ s Kitimat — Works: manager, has stated that any ‘modernization of. - the Kitimat smelter will result in a possible net loss of over 600 jobs. These jobs are well paying unionized jobs, which will have a devastating impact not only on Kitimat but also on the Northwest as.a whole. Currently approxi-: : mately 300 workers in Alcan reside in Terrace. What is being promoted through these advertisements e “possible” small businesses, paying commercial rates for power and allowing Alcan to prosper as an indepen- dent power supplier. © ~ To the people of Terrace, Kitimat and the surrounding region, I say don’t buy into the crap being pedalled, read the information from Save the Northwest which is com-. prised of a diversified group both politically and of small business interests, attend various venues to discuss this _ issue. Be prepared to stand up to the B.C. government and Alcan to ensure that the resource of power, which belongs to the people, stays under the control of the public and not a multi- national company such as Alcan. "Ross Slezak, Terrace, B. c. About the Mail Bag The Terrace Standard welcomes letters. Our address is 3210 Clinton St., Terrace, B.C. V8G 5R2. You can fax us at 250-638-8432 or e-mail us at newsroom@ terracestandard.com. No attachments, please. Name, address and phone number required for verification. While we have received 2 a 1 substantial amount of money" Me eth