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editor
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 Posted: Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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From Education - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
| Quote: | The Hampton Journal
Earnest Neighborhood Tab
Crisis at University Hill Secondary School
Top school suffers from dreadful conditions
Parents press school board for overdue change
at school Premier Gordon Campbell attended.
Hundreds of students squat on floor to eat lunch daily.
Some smell rat feces while eating in school corridors.
By John Tompkins
Feb. 25/08
| Quote: | ... I was able to witness how the regrettable lack of a cafeteria at U Hill results daily in hundreds of students being forced to sit on the floor of two long corridors that run through the school in order to eat packed lunches brought from home.
... "On the days when it rains, we have to find places to sit on the floor where it is dry," the student said.
... "The worst is the smell of rat feces in the corridors when we're eating lunch on the floor." ...
A total of 560 students attend U Hill with another hundred or so who live at UBC or on the University Endowment Lands (UEL) forced to attend school elsewhere because its buildings - including nine aging trailers - are not enough to house them.
The school, referred to as a 'trailer park' by some students I talked to, was built to house only 325 students and is suffering from severe overcrowding. (-- p. 1) |
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Yes, and then in the March 10th issue:
| Quote: | The Hampton Journal
University Hill Secondary School
Students smell mold in portable classrooms
Keeping portable classrooms clean is impossible.
Keeping them at the right temperature is impossible.
Some students wear several layers of clothing to keep themselves warm in winter at the school Premier Gordon Campbell attended.
By John Tomkins
| Quote: | Students smell mold in the portable classrooms which make up so much of University Hill Secondary School that some students call their school a 'trailer park.' ...
Problems with the portables persist not only in regard to the smell of mold and travails of keeping them clean; it also persists in regard to keeping the portables properly heated. (-- p. 1) |
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editor
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| Posted: Fri Mar 28, 2008 8:39 am Post subject: |
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From Definitely not the choirboys:
BC Business
Magazine Subscription
Fear factor
It's no secret that the Vancouver Police
Department is stretched to the limit. With
gang-style shootings and meth labs keeping
public officers busy, business is exploding
for the local private security industry - almost
double the size of the VPD - which is picking up
the slack, assisting in arrests and even going
undercover to hunt down bad guys.
By Andrew Findlay
January, 2008
| Quote: | On the corner of Hastings and Cambie streets, another emaciated male exhibits the jerky spasmodic contractions of someone in the throws of cocaine psychosis. He sips on an extra large 7-11 cup and dips constantly in and out of the alley between Cambie and Abbott streets to cut crack deals behind a dumpster. Two of his customers, sad, greying 50-somethings, emerge from the alley. They park it on a retaining wall in the middle of the square (Victory Square) and spark up a crack pipe. Less than 10 metres away, a well-dressed woman sits on a bench and obliviously taps away on a laptop - or prerhaps she is simply resigned to this carnival of corruption in downtown Vancouver. In 15 minutes Goertzen, 30, and 28-year-old Mota have identified at least a half dozen people by first and last names, mostly drug- and alcohol-addicted thieves on the perpetual treadmill of chronic repeat offending.
... Goertzen and Mota switch into active surveillance mode, then make a call to the District 2 dispatcher at the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) to report a suspect in possession of a bag of stolen property. Mota is put on indefinite hold by the dispatcher as Clint (perp) heads east and out of their beat. Goertzen and Mota observe him for a few minutes then, shrugging their shoulders, decide to drop it. Clint vanishes with his wine.
It would take a veritable army of people to tag, monitor and trail the dealings of these seedy characters and the numerous petty and more serious offenses that occur on an average day in downtown Vancouver. (emphasis added) ...
... The private security industry is booming in B.C. Its foot soldiers are everywhere, and for the most part it's far from glamorous work - riding mountain bikes around Granville Island, keeping a lonely midnight vigil over desolate industrial parks, working the nightclub doors and going nose-to-nose with intoxicated patrons, monitoring closed-circuit TV from windowless rooms, sniffing out insurance fraud and unearthing evidence for civil litigation. They could be the guys and gals in the bright banana-yellow jackets or dressed, like Goertzen and Mota, as skater kids, carrying out cover surveillance in the downtown core while you and I go about our daily business. ...
In 1991, we had a mere 4,084 licensed security workers. By 2005, boosted partly by new licensing requirements, had ballooned to 11,684, greatly outnumbering the public force, which currently sits at 7,678 members. ... police officers are outnumbered by a factor of two to one. And this ratio is only expected to spike with the Olympics, when private firms will line up at the 2010 trough and take on the mundane but necessary details of site security and crowd control. ...
One thing is clear: issues around conduct, misrepresentation and use of force by private security are starting to surface. In 2006 inspectors with the Security Programs and Police Technology Division responded to 214 complaints against private-security workers and issued 63 violation tickets, mostly for individuals working without a valied licence. ...
Also up for discussion is the possibility of authorizing security personnel to carry restraining devices such as handcuffs and chemical spray, something current legislation does not permit. (emphasis added)...
In 2006, recognizing that the character and nature of law enforcement in Canada was evolving, the Law Commission of Canada (which lost its federal funding in September, 2006) turned its microscope on the topic of private security, churning out a 200-page discussion papert entitled In Search of Security: The Future of Policing in Canada. ...
"Private-security personnel are acting more like police in public spaces and that worries me," (Murray Mollard of the largely ineffective and unresponsive B.C. Civil Liberties Association unlike many of its counterparts in other jurisdictions throughout North America) Mollard says. "Although I think the new legislation (the Security Services Act, Bill 15) is a good step, I don't think it goes far enough in terms of conduct, competency and accountability." |
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| Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2008 11:47 am Post subject: |
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From Protecting the environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
British Columbia Magazine
Magazine Subscription
Wilderness warrior Betty Krawczyk
Why British Columbia's feistiest great-
grandmother is willing to go to jail
for nature.
By Brian Payton
Spring, 2007
| Quote: | Betty Krawczyk believes that citizens are obliged to speak up when faced with injustice. The 78-year-old grandmother has scolded government, inudstry, and even fellow conservationists in defence of British Columbia's wilderness. Her outspoken manner inspires some, goads others - and has cost her almost two years in cumulative prison terms.
Krawczyk's remarkable journey has taken her from an impoverished childhood in southern Louisiana to the front lines of B.C.'s environmental movement. While raising her eight children, she found time to pen more than 200 fiction stories in the true-confessions genre ("I was his his love slave") for popular women's magazines - before taking up the cause of the Women's Movement in the late 1960s. During the Vietnam War, she emigrated to Canada after her first son joined the airforce and her second was about to be drafted.
Forty years, four marriages and divorces, eight grandchildren later, the Vanocuver resident is probably best known for her role in the Clayoquot Sound protests of 1993.
On a sunny afternoon, Krawczyk sat down beside an arbutus tree to reflect on her life in B.C.'s environmental movement. Her perch afforded a view of West Vancouver's Eagleridge Bluffs high above Horseshoe Bay, where she and other protesters spent six weeks on a blockade last summer to protest a highway expansion that has since proceeded through the area. ...
Q. What defines a successful campaign?
A. Clayoquot was successful in that is now a biosphere reserve. But it is still threatened, and I may have to go back there. For the moment, it seems all right. The Elaho was a success. It is now protected. The Walbran was not a success. The courts protected the logging companies. ...
Q. Were you ever frightened in your work as an activist?
A. That's a hard one. I guess I'm not frightened. I just take one day at a time.
My biggest worry is for the safety of the people out on isolated blockades. We were in the Walbran for over three weeks. It was very isolated and there had been some bad violence. Young protesters were attacked and it has not been brought to court. I keep in touch with the press and the RCMP; it's the press that keeps violence down. ...
Q. Why can't you work within the system?
A. Primarily, because there is too much money involved.
Corporations buy off the democratic process. They have influence and raw power. So it is very difficult, even in a system like ours, a system that is supposed to be democratic. It's not just our environment that's lost if we don't act decisively - democracy is lost.
So many people think that if they go vote every four years, their duty as a citizen is done. Your duty as a citizen is not done. Your duty as a citizen is to take part in the decisions being made, not to just pick someone else to do it for you...Only we as citizens can make changes. We mustn't depend on government to do it for us. Because they won't. (-- pgs. 52-56) |
Two kinds of justice - depending on the protester:
Ontario injunction barring native protesters:
| Quote: | Yahoo News
Yet another corporate medium but a no-cost one
Blockade of eastern Ont. rail line ends;
protesters warn of further actions
By Allison Jones
April 21/07
| Quote: | DESERONTO, Ont. (CP) - A key organizer of an aboriginal blockade, which paralyzed passenger and freight rail traffic on the busy Toronto-Montreal corridor, is warning that the protest that ended early Saturday is just the beginning in a series of "escalating" actions.
"We've identified targets as part of this campaign, one being the railway, one being provincial highways and one being the town (of Deseronto) itself," said Shawn Brant. "The disruption on the CN line was a first in a series of economic disruptions, the first in a campaign." he said. "The campaign calls for an ever escalating degree." The next target has already been chosen and plans to finalize the next action are in the works, said Brant, who commented Saturday morning at the site of contention in the dispute - a gravel quarry that the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte say is their land.
Though the protesters originally said they would stay at the railway blockade for 48 hours, it ended peacefully after about 30 hours at 6 a.m. Saturday, after a sleepless night of negotiations with provincial police and other officials. Protesters said they chose to end it early over fears of a violent conclusion. A court injunction ordered the protesters and the dilapidated school bus off the tracks with arrests warned as a consequence, but the order was never enforced by police. No arrests have been made at this point, said Ontario Provincial Police Sgt. Kristine Rae. "We're pleased that it was a peaceful resolution." ...
Condominiums are planned using gravel from the quarry for an area known as the Culbertson Land Tract, which is on a section of land given to the Six Nations in 1793. The Mohawks contend they never relinquished any part of it. (emphasis added) |
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B.C. injunction barring Eagleridge Bluffs protesters:
| Quote: | News 1130
Noisy Commercial Radio
Betty Krawczyk sentencing leads
to courthouse occupation
By Jim Goddard
March 5/07
Betty's lawyer, Cameron Ward told the CBC Early Edition in an interview early in March that the judiciary is wrong to enforce an injunction - a civil remedy intended to keep parties to a dispute in the same position until the dispute is tried - as if the case was in substance a criminal matter.
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| Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2008 1:26 pm Post subject: |
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From Protecting the environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
VLM
Magazine Subscription
The Downtown Eastside cleans up,
for the rest of us
By Carol Liu
April, 2008
| Quote: | ... Since it opened, United We Can has attracted 220 customers, businesses that leave bottles for (Ken) Lyotier and other binners to collect and take back to the depot. Selling the recyclables, the organization generates enough revenue to cover its costs.
A visit to the storefront near Hastings and Abbott in one of the Downtown Eastside's roughest strips forces you to rub shoulders with a horde of binners standing outside, keeping an eye on their run-down shopping carts. Once inside, you are hit by a smell like day-old booze. The screach of glass bottles scratching against each other as they are sorted is sufficiently painful that workers receiving and cashing out the items wear ear protection. Mountains of bagged plastic bottles line the east wall. The grimy glass front door is constantly opening and closing as people come in with bottles and leave with money in their pockets.
United We Can's main goal is to offer "employment opportunities," as Lyotier calls this brisk trade, to people dealing with mental health or addiction issues. ...
Binners such as Derek Holt claim to make $700 to $800 a month. And it's all tax-free. In the past he was able to make $400 to $550 from the Holiday Inn on West Broadway. Now he makes around $375 because "the maids caught onto what kind of money can be made and now keep half." (-- p. 29) |
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| Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:33 pm Post subject: |
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From An ancient spiritual practice - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
The New York Times Magazine
Magazine Subscription
The Green Issue
Ready-to-Wear
By Clay Risen
April 20/08
| Quote: | | ... not every claim to organic provenance is equal. "Greenwashing" is as prevalent in the clothing sector as it is in all sorts of other industries, like the oil business. Accordint to a survey of over 1,018 "green" consumer products by the environmental marketing firm TerraChoice, only 1 was completely free of inflated or unverifiable claims. Because apparel purchases are often made on the spur of the moment, buyers may be less likely than usual to research manufacturers' assertions. Last year, The New York Times exposed one trendy fashion label, Lululemon Athletica, which had claimed that one of its lines of yoga gear was made with seaweed. But lab tests showed that the clothing contained none of the minerals that indicaste its presence - findings that Lululemon disputed, although it withdrew the seaweed claim in Canada at the request of authorities there (emphasis added). Green fashion is a great way to connect with eco-conscious consumers, who then drive more conventional manufacturers to follow suit. But if consumers get the idea that green claims are inflated or unbelievable, the entire trend is threatened. That's why a number of eco-fashion marketers are pushing standardized labels for green clothing, the equivalent of existing imprimaturs like Energy Star and Green Seal. Still, let the buyer beware: TerraChoices's survey found that several products carried the labels even when they weren't up to standard. (-- p. 48) |
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| Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 2:16 pm Post subject: |
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From Gambling - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
cbc.ca
Once-proud News Leader Post-Cutbacks - ugh!
B.C. Lottery Corp. tackles money laundering at casinos
May 28/08
| Quote: | The B.C. Lottery Corp. is promising to beef up its procedures to help prevent money laundering in casinos, according to the province's solicitor general. Last week, a CBC News investigation demonstrated how easy it was to launder money at the two casinos. Reporters were able to pump thousands of dollars into slot machines, cash out after playing only briefly and then receive casino cheques with few questions asked.
The investigation also revealed the BCLC was reporting only a fraction of the suspicious transactions to the Financial Transactions Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, or FINTRAC, the federal agency that tracks money laundering. B.C. Solicitor General John van Dongen said Wednesday the BCLC has come up with a plan to address concerns raised by the CBC investigation. He said the board looked into what the CBC was able to do at casinos.
"They had reviewed six transactions done by the CBC. Four of them failed in terms of the policy. They acknowledge that was a failure of the policy," van Dongen said. The BCLC also plans to review current policies and procedures around reporting suspicious financial transactions and the issuing of cheques at casinos.
Casino staff will receive better training so they can detect money laundering, van Dongen said. The failure of the BCLC to report suspicious transactions will also be addressed. He said the corporation will now pass on all reports collected in the last six years. ... |
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| Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 2:53 pm Post subject: |
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From Government corruption just business as usual in 'BILLYville:
| Quote: | cbc.ca
Land deal with former solicitor general tore B.C. family apart: son
April 2/08
| Quote: | A Chilliwack, B.C., man says his family was torn apart by a land deal that's now part of the RCMP investigation that prompted former solicitor general John Les to resign.
Willy Rasmussen told CBC News Wednesday that he and his sister have not talked for 10 years because of the way their parents' 11 acres of farmland in Chilliwack ended up being owned and developed by Les. Wilmer and Karen Rasmussen, who owned the property just off Camp River Road, wanted to keep two acres of it for a home where they could retire and sell the rest, the son said. The municipality and the Agricultural Land Commission repeatedly denied their applications so the couple sold the land in 1997 to their daughter and son-in-law, Henny and John Watt. The Watts in turn sold the land to Les, then mayor of Chilliwack. The city subsequently approved a subdivision that parcelled the property into two-acre development lots that Les sold, in what is now known as the Rosebank development. (emphasis added)
"If it was 'No' for my father, it should have been 'No' for John Les," said Willy Rasmussen, who grew up in Chilliwack and now sells car parts for a living in Surrey and Coquitlam.
The attorney general's criminal justice branch says the RCMP investigation has to do with whether Les improperly benefited from commercial transactions involving land developers. ... |
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| Quote: | cbc.ca
Embattled Port Coquitlam mayor refuses council demands to resign
May 27/08
| Quote: | Port Coquitlam's embattled mayor has once again refused to resign following his conviction on two counts of assault last week. Mayor Scott Young was asked by council to hand in a letter of resignation at his first council meeting on Monday night following his guilty plea last week on two charges of assaulting his former girlfriend and her boyfriend at her home last year.
It was the third time his fellow councillors had demanded his resignation since the mayor was arrested last year and spent Easter weekend in jail.
The latest motion, brought forth by all six of Port Coquitlam's councillors, read: "Now that Scott Young has admitted guilt, the city councillors are once again requesting that the mayor resign immediately."
All of the city council, except Young, voted for the motion. Coun. Michael Wright said he was not surprised at Young's refusal and said working with the mayor had become very awkward for the councillors. "Most people are absolutely incredulous that he is still the mayor of the city of Port Coquitlam and has not resigned," said Wright.
Apart from asking Young to resign voluntarily, the council has no legal options to force the mayor out. But he will have to answer to the public if he decides to run again in the November civic election. (emphasis added)
Young did not speak to the media following the meeting. He has been involved in municipal politics in Port Coquitlam since 1990, when he was elected as a school trustee. He was elected as a city councillor in 1996 and became the city's 14th mayor in 2001. Young pleaded guilty to two charges of assault and one charge of breaching the conditions of an undertaking, all stemming from an incident at the home of his former girlfriend last year. The B.C. mayor had faced a total of seven charges, including assault, criminal harassment and breaking and entering, following his arrest on April 4, 2007.
The Crown stayed the proceedings on the remaining four charges last week when Young appeared in Port Coquitlam provincial court. He will be sentenced at a later date. |
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Here's why the bar against criminals holding public office in 'BILLYville won't change anytime soon:
| Quote: | cbc.ca
B.C. premier says he won't contest drunk driving charge
Jan. 11/03
| Quote: | British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell has apologized after being charged with impaired driving in Hawaii. Maui police Sgt. Ken Prather says Campbell was arrested just after 1 a.m. Friday morning.
"At 1:23 in the morning, a Gordon M. Campbell, a 54-year-old male was arrested for drunk driving on the island of Maui. He has since bailed out. He bailed out sometime this morning." Prather says Campbell did spend some time in jail before bail of $257 was posted and a tentative court date of March 25 was set.
Late Friday afternoon Campbell's office issued a statement in which Campbell said he "made a serious mistake," and offered an apology to his family, colleagues and the people of British Columbia. "I do not intend to contest the charge," he said. ... Campbell is in Hawaii on vacation. He said he will speak with the media when he returns to Vancouver on Sunday. |
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editor
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| Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 3:21 pm Post subject: |
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From Protecting the Environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
| Quote: | cbc.ca
Janitor speaks out about rat problem at B.C. hospital
Vermin attracted by 'green' composting practices
June 3/08
| Quote: | Janitor Brian Britten believes the rat problem at Delta Hospital was caused by composting practices introduced about a year ago. A B.C. janitor is speaking out about an infestation of rats at the Delta Hospital, which he believes was caused by a new "green" program to compost kitchen waste. Brian Britten said he first tried to report his concerns to hospital administrators before and after rats appeared last year, but said he was told by his employer, a private contractor, to keep quiet.
"They didn't appreciate anybody telling them about the potential of rats, and then finally when rats did show up, it was like well, there they are," said Britten. "They are disease carriers … and they bring … the kinds of public health issues that we don't want in our public health system."
Britten has worked in B.C. health-care facilities for 30 years and is now a weekend janitor at Delta Hospital. His employer is the multinational company Sodexho, which has the contracts for cleaning and pest control at the hospital, among other things. In the spring of 2007, Britten said Sodexho housekeeping staff at Delta Hospital were told to start dumping leftover food into bins in the bay area at the back of the facility. Kitchen scraps were being dumped in unsealed bins and left outside the hospital, before being picked up and taken away for composting. He said the waste was left for days before being picked up periodically by a waste management company, which took it to a nearby composting plant.
"(The housekeepers) complained to me. 'Oh Brian,' they said, 'We're gagging. This is like terrible slop. We open the containers and there are flies buzzing in our face,' and I said 'Yeah, I've already told people all I can,'" said Britten.
The composting plan was part of Fraser Health Authority's region-wide initiative to "go green." But Britten said he warned hospital administrators early on that they were asking for trouble.
"It was done quickly without preparation — poorly planned," said Britten, "It doesn't take a genius to figure out that if you are going to go about this procedure of recycling food waste, that you are going to end up with (pest) problems."... (emphasis added) |
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Much better:
| Quote: | The New York Times Magazine
Magazine Subscription
The Green Issue
Biotech
By Robert Andrew Powell
April 20/08
| Quote: | Boulder Community Hospital in Colorado became the first LEED-certified green hospital in America in 2003. But it took a waste audit financed by the Environmental Protection Agency to uncover a problem no one at the hospital had really thought about. Twenty percent of all the waste in the hospital Dumpsters, the auditors determined, consisted of just one item: blue wrap, which was used to sterilize surgical equipment - and then thrown away after just one use.
Boulder Community's sterile-processing director requested $120,000 in hard containers for sterilization. used tools are tossed into the hard containers, the containers and the tools are sterilized together and then reused again and again. By eliminating blue wrap, and by keeping it out of the trash, the outlay for the hard containers was recouped in just a year and a half, and there's a fifth less trash in the waste stream ... Recycling confidential documents instead of shredding them has cut costs by $90,000 ... Switching to energy-efficient light bulbs has saved another $40,000. ... (-- p. 72) |
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But if we're really stuck on composting - and we should be -
| Quote: | The New York Times Magazine
Magazine Subscription
The Green Issue
Compost Feast
By Tess Taylor
April 20/08
| Quote: | | ... In San Francisco's "Fantastic 3" system, residents sort their refuse into three bins: recyclables, food scraps (including meat) and trash. Food scraps and recyclable material are picked up free, but residents have to pay to have trash hauled away. These incentives have enabled San Francisco to divert 70 percent of the city's trash from landfills. The composting program - the largest in the U.S. - also curbs a lot of the city's emissions. When San Francisco researched its carbon footprint, it found that 20 percent of its emissions came from rot, specifically the methane produced by decomposing food waste. While it's possible to run a methane-recapture program at a landfill, up to two-thirds of the gas may still be lost. Composting is much more efficient: the methane is reabsorbed, and the city ends up with a viable product to sell to farms, golf courses and vineyards. Ten years later, 2,000 restaurants and most residents separate their garbage, and the sanitation workers of San Francisco get an additional reward of well-made foods. (-- p. 48) |
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| Posted: Thu Jun 26, 2008 5:18 pm Post subject: |
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From Protecting the Environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
Canadian Geographic
Magazine Subscription
A River to Ruin
Why are Americans fighting so hard to protect
British Columbia's Flathead River
from a strip mine?
By Jeff Hull
June, 2008
| Quote: | The ecological value of the valley - its unparalleled carnivore populations and pristine water - "is too important to jeopardize with irresponsible energy development," says Max Baucus, Montana's senior senator. As chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, he wields a great deal of influence on Capitol Hill. He says he's 100 per cent committed to stopping" industrial development in the Flathead. ...
"I don't know if we're going to seek tenure further down the road. Right now the referral process does not include the Flathead. Therefore our plans are to not include the Flathead," says BP (multinational energy producer, formerly British Petroleum) spokesperson Anita Perry. "It's up to the British Columbia government, not BP, to decide if the Flathead will every be developed, and today it's just not available."
BP's caginess points out why Baucus and others on both sides of the border feel that eventually, without comprehensive protection for the Flathead, an energy project will become the first in a series of destructive dominoes that would ravage the most ecologically rich, unprotected valley remaining along the Canada-U.S. border. Despite BP's withdrawal, other companies, including one eyeing a mine site within the Flathead River flood plain, appear poised to take advantage of the improved infrastructure that would accompany development of Cline's Lodgpole Mine project.
"We are hell-bent to get it done and are pushing the government to get it done," Cline's chief executive officer Ken Bates said recently in the online magazine Kootenaybiz.com. "I'm sorry they are taking so long."
Accordingly, Cline's proposal has ignited a cross-border shouting match and triggered a Canadian Environmental Assessment . Senator Baucus has implored Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to ratchet the dispute to a higher level, and U.S. State Department officials confirm that they are, on some unspecified level, planning to engage their Canadian counterparts.
... Premier Gordon Campbell ... would like to recast the argument as one about global warming, piously claiming that climate change, not industrial development, is the biggest threat to the Flathead. But the premier's concern about climate change seems a bit obtuse given that open-pit mining of low-grade coal, which Cline plans to ship overseas to feed the largely unregulated industrial economies of China, India and Brazil, would ultimately generate even more greenhouse-gas emissions.
... faced with the B.C. government's two-zone mining policy - under which provincial lands either are already protected as parks or reserves or are open to mining - (Montana Governor Brian) Schweitzer, Baucus, ... American scientists and a dedicated cadre of Canadian conservationists believe that minding their own business would be tantamount to watching the ineluctible degradation of a unique ecological treasure. ...
... another mining proposal, on Sage Creek, threatened the valley in the 1970s. Canadian and American officials demanded - and won - a referral to the International Joint Commission (IJC), which adjudicates disputes about waters that cross the Canada-U.S. border. In 1988, the IJC Study Board, a collection of more than 50 scientists from both countries, unanimously concluded that no mines should be allowed in the Flathead until baseline scientific data were collected and both countries could agree on a "mutually acceptable use of resources." (View the results). The Sage Creek mine was never developed. (emphasis added)
... As far back as 1911, John George "Kootenai" Brown, the first superintendent of Waterton Lakes National Park, argued it "seems advisable to greatly expand this park" to protect adjacent "breeding grounds" in the Flathead. In the 1950s and 1960s, various government officials lobbied for park expansion into British Columbia. In 1995, when UNESCO awarded World Heritage Site status to Waterton -Glacier, the missing piece of pie - British Columbia's Flathead valley - was noted as problematic, too much core area was left unprotected, and expansion was recommended.
In 2002, Prime Minister Jean Chretien tried but could not overcome the B.C. government's resistance to park expansion. ...
Paul Martin's Liberal government made a park feasibility study a condition for the transfer to provincial jurisdiction of other federally owned coal blocks underlying the Flathead. But in 2006, the (Conservative) government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper quietly dropped the feasibility study from the deal. Without it, park expansion proposals are dead in the water. (-- pgs. 42-52) |
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editor
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| Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 11:52 am Post subject: |
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From Definitely not the choirboys:
cbc.ca
Severely Stressed Public News Source
RCMP nab escaped prisoner near Hope
Aug. 8/08
| Quote: | A fugitive who escaped from a pre-trial centre in Port Coquitlam, B.C., by posing as another inmate bought a newspaper to read about his exploits on Friday. But he'll have to finish reading the story behind bars. Dean Sykes, 39, offered no resistance when a car he was driving was pulled over by RCMP officers on Highway 1 near Hope early Friday morning, Const. Tara Harrington of the Fraser Valley RCMP said.
Harrington said Sykes stopped at a market in Bridal Falls early Friday morning to pick up a paper, and joked to the clerk that he looked like the man pictured on the front page. The clerk agreed — and then phoned police after Sykes left the store.
Sykes was mistakenly released from custody when he attended the Port Coquitlam provincial court on Aug. 5, posing as another inmate, Timothy Broadbent, 42. Sykes, still pretending he was Broadbent, was returned to the North Fraser Pretrial Centre, where he was subsequently released from custody.
Sykes attempted to use Broadbent's ID when he was arrested by Hope RCMP, Harrington said. He was arrested on a charge of escaping lawful custody and is being held at the Hope RCMP detachment.
Broadbent was in court again today on a new charge: assisting in Sykes's escape. The original charges that had him in court on Aug. 5 and Aug. 7 were mischief and possession of a break-in tool. He was represented on those days by duty counsel, who would never have seen him before, which could explain why court staff didn't realize Sykes had taken his place.
Sykes's escape was the second from the facility in less than a year. Dressed as a janitor, kidnapper Omid Tahvili walked away from the centre on Nov. 15 with the help of prison guard Edwin Ticne, who later pleaded guilty to his role in that escape. (emphasis added) |
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editor
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| Posted: Fri Aug 15, 2008 12:00 pm Post subject: |
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From Definitely not the choirboys:
Public accountability for police malfeasance - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
cbc.ca
Severely Stressed Public News Source
Former Victoria police chief could face public hearing
Details of RCMP probe kept from public
Aug. 15/08
| Quote: | A decision on whether to hold a public hearing into the conduct of Victoria's former police chief will be made next week, B.C.'s police complaint commissioner says.
Dirk Ryneveld had ordered an RCMP investigation into allegations made about the behaviour of Paul Battershill last fall. The investigation found no criminal wrongdoing, but a disciplinary hearing that had been scheduled was cancelled when Battershill resigned on Wednesday. Ryneveld said Thursday the fact that Battershill is no longer a police officer might prevent him from holding a public hearing into the matter. At issue, the commissioner said, is whether the public interest would be served by pursuing the matter.
"Quite clearly, the public is very interested but would a public hearing, with all the attendant costs and legal arguments as to jurisdiction … be in the public interest? [That] is something I have to wrestle with," Ryneveld said. Ryneveld said the case underlines the flaws in the B.C. Police Act, which the provincial government has promised to fix. Victoria Mayor Alan Lowe, chair of the city's police board, said Thursday details about the allegations against the former chief — and the RCMP investigation into those allegations — cannot be released under the act.
In an interview with the editorial board of the Victoria Times Colonist on Thursday, Lowe said even police board members were not given full access to the report. Lowe told the newspaper that, after reading the report, he gave board members only the information he felt was necessary for them to reach a decision on whether to approve Batterhill's resignation. The nine-member police board decided that it had suffered a "loss of confidence" in Battershill's leadership. On Wednesday Lowe said that the board had accepted Battershill's resignation effective immediately.
In its decision, the board cancelled the disciplinary hearing, promised never to discuss the accusations against Battershill, and agreed to pay $15,000 toward his legal costs. The board also issued a statement saying the probe had found no evidence of any criminal or financial wrongdoing. Lowe said the board signed a deal with the former chief to not disclose the contents of the investigation. Lowe was asked by reporters why he would agree to the conditions after having promised taxpayers several months ago to disclose as much as he legally could. The board agreed to the settlement because "we felt it was in the best interest of all involved," Lowe told CBC News on Thursday.
Lowe said it's up to Ryneveld to either release the details or call a public hearing. But Ryneveld said the Police Act does not prevent Lowe from disclosing the details in the case. |
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editor
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| Posted: Thu Sep 04, 2008 3:06 pm Post subject: |
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From Protecting the Environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
Canadian Geographic
Magazine Subscription
The lost Eden of Okanagan
Vineyards are replacing orchards, recreation is replacing ranching and retirees are replacing rattlesnakes in the arid ponderosa hills of the Okanagan Valley
July/August, 2008
| Quote: | ... The houses and condos will be bought up eagerly by a wealthy generation of human migrants from Alberta or Australia. They come to play in Canada's most perfect valley, towing wakboard boats, snowmobiles, quads. "Man must recreate," says Sarell resignedly.
Their televisions and air conditioners will require a bigger power line through this piece of snake habitat. Their blossoming yards, ensuite bathrooms and golf courses will demand more water from this semi-arid country. More fine restaurants, more landfille, more marina slips and muffler shops. (Biologist Mike) Sarell returns his catch to its rocky lair. He does not think the night snake's presence here is a 'showstopper,' consultancy parlance for a particular flora or fauna that can halt development. If an exceedingly rare desert night snake cannot do it, I ask Sarell, what would? He thinks about it for a moment before responding.
"Recession," he says. (emphasis added)...
"Water is going to be a problem," says (historical geographer Wayne) Wilson, as does anyone you meet in the valley. Nestled in a rain shadow of the Coast Mountains, the Okanagan dodges British Columbia's famous onslaught of maritime precipitation. The valley is replenished by rain or snow from higher in the watershed, the Okanagan Highlands of the Interior Plateau. However, much of the runoff is lost to evaporation in Canada's driest locale, where the Great Basin Desert biome extends it warm reach. What little surface water does arrive is 100 per cent managed. About 70 per cent is used for agriculture, which contributes almost one-quarter of the province's total agricultural output. Homeowners compete with wild plants and animals for the rest.
Newcomers mostly fail to understand how a valley blessed with so many lakes - including Okanagan Lake, more than 100 kilometres long and deep enough, at 230 metres, to hide a mythical monster called Ogopogo - could ever be short of water. However, the lake has an extremely low flushing rate of more than 52 years; only the top one metre or so is replenished annually. The whole valley is dry - much of it is semi-arid, and significant portions are true desert - which is not obvious in what seems like a watery place. Virtually all its smaller upland waters are dammed or diverted, which has contributed ot the decimation of Okanagan Lake's once plentiful Kokanee salmon. A 1994 study suggested that existing water in the valley could support a maximum population of 425,000 people, provided agriculture was scaled back significantly. (emphasis added)
... Once the section linking 'the Coke' to Kelowna was completed in 1991, the $1 billion toll highway across the Cascades effectively brought the Okanagan into Vancouver's backyard, reducing the trip to less than four hours. Transport upgrades continute today. The low-volume floating bridge across Okanagan Lake has been replaced with a soaring new one named for the Kelowna-born Bennett. Meanwhile, a runway upgrade at Kelowna's airport will soon accommodate the largest Airbus jumbos direct from Europe and Asia. (-- pgs. 44, 52-53) |
Yee-haw. ...
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Last edited by editor on Tue Nov 25, 2008 11:51 am; edited 1 time in total |
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editor
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Posts: 878
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| Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 12:15 pm Post subject: |
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From Definitely Not the Choirboys:
| Quote: | canada.com
Corporate Smelt With Occasional Forays into Journalism
Another officer faces drunk-driving charge
By Graeme Wood, with files from Jessica Kerr, Vancouver Sun; with files from Delta Optimist
October 31/08
| Quote: | METRO VANCOUVER - An officer in the New Westminster police department (GlobalBC identified her as Tomi Hamner) faces charges of impaired driving after allegedly crashing an unmarked police vehicle into a highway sign. RCMP said in a news release Thursday the officer was arrested Oct. 16 following a single-vehicle collision on the Trans-Canada Highway in North Vancouver. She was released on a promise to appear in North Vancouver Provincial Court on Dec. 17. She was the only occupant of the vehicle and there were no injuries.
New Westminster police spokesman Sgt. Ivan Chu ... confirmed she was a secondary school liaison officer. ...
Word of the incident follows the news of an RCMP officer facing charges of impaired driving causing death after a collision in Tsawwassen on Saturday. Orion Hutchinson, 21, was killed while riding westbound on his motorcycle on Sixth Avenue when he collided with a Jeep. ... Delta police have so far recommended two charges -- impaired driving causing death and exceeding .08 blood-alcohol content. The officer facing charges, who has not been named by police but has been identified as Cpl. Benjamin Monty Robinson, is to appear in Surrey Provincial Court on Jan. 15. |
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editor
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Posts: 878
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| Posted: Sat Nov 08, 2008 12:46 pm Post subject: |
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From Government accountability/public trust - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
| Quote: | cbc.ca
Publicly-funded News Source ... so far
Embattled Port Coquitlam mayor won't quit politics
Oct. 10/08
| Quote: | The mayor of Port Coquitlam will seek a councillor's seat in the upcoming municipal election despite being found guilty of assault.
Scott Young put his name in the race Thursday afternoon before the deadline for the Nov. 15 election.
Young pleaded guilty in May to two charges of assault and one charge of breaching the conditions of an undertaking. He was later given a 12-month conditional sentence to be served at home, with a curfew from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. except to attend council meetings. (emphasis added)
Young was also placed on 18 months of probation, ordered to perform 60 hours of community service, abstain from alcohol and drugs, and stay away from former girlfriend Colleen Preston and her partner, Glen Shaw.
Many Port Coquitlam residents have called for Young to step down since his plea, and council has asked him to leave three times. (emphasis added)
He temporarily stepped aside but returned to the mayor's chair a month and a half after the April 2007 incident.
Initially, he faced seven criminal charges, including assault, criminal harassment and breaking and entering, but the Crown stayed several charges. |
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Here's why the absent rule against criminals holding public office in 'BILLYville probably won't change anytime soon:
| Quote: | cbc.ca
B.C. premier says he won't contest drunk driving charge
Jan. 11/03
| Quote: | British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell has apologized after being charged with impaired driving in Hawaii. Maui police Sgt. Ken Prather says Campbell was arrested just after 1 a.m. Friday morning.
"At 1:23 in the morning, a Gordon M. Campbell, a 54-year-old male was arrested for drunk driving on the island of Maui. He has since bailed out. He bailed out sometime this morning." Prather says Campbell did spend some time in jail before bail of $257 was posted and a tentative court date of March 25 was set.
Late Friday afternoon Campbell's office issued a statement in which Campbell said he "made a serious mistake," and offered an apology to his family, colleagues and the people of British Columbia. "I do not intend to contest the charge," he said. ... Campbell is in Hawaii on vacation. He said he will speak with the media when he returns to Vancouver on Sunday. |
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editor
Site Admin
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Posts: 878
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| Posted: Tue Nov 25, 2008 11:34 am Post subject: |
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From Protecting the Environment - B.C. 'BILLY-style:
The New Yorker
Magazine Subscription
The Mail
How to Save the Forest
Nov. 17/08
| Quote: | In 1992, I entered Vladivostok, one of the first foreigners to do so legally in many decades, eager to explore what may be the most diverse temperate forest on earth. I left profoundly depressed by the prospect of its rapid destruction. However, there is an important distinction to be made, which Khatchadourian mentions: while forests in the developing world are rapidly disappearing, forests in the industrial world (with the exception of Canada) are expanding. (emphasis added) In much of Europe and North America, there is more forest today than at any time in the last half a millennium, although it is often less biodiverse than virgin forest. An essential part of the strategy to save the world’s forests must include encouraging forestry in affluent countries where guidelines are well established.
Lars Norgren
Manning, Ore. |
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