1 istative Library.
yarliasent Bldges, 308 Setter2tie St

Victoria, Be. Ceo

vev 14

Febi 28

Kootenay-West MP
isco announced
tax breaks for
Kootenay Tractor's im-
port duties on U.S.
equipment... A®

Polls

Minister

AS

Election
preferred, ~

indicate
Canadians want Prime

Mulroney to call an
election betore ftree-
trade takes effect...,

Brian

LOTTERY
NUMBERS

The winning numbers in Seturday's Lotto
@ 12, 14, 20, 33, 38 and 43. The

6/49 draw w
bonus number was 18.

. _ The winning numbers drawn Friday in The
Pick lottery were 2, 6, 12, 18, 24, 25, 28 and 36.

The $1,000,000 winning number in Friday's
Provincial lottery draw ‘is 18673606. There are

also subsidiary prizes.

ay
<
z
x.

¢OOTB, ke

Lions
stomp
Stamps
od the Calgary stom:

peders Friday at B.C,
Place... B2

WEATHERCAST

Sunny and clear for Sunday with highs of
38°, lows overnight of 13°. Same for
Monday with no precipitation forecasted

CASTLEGAR, BRITISH COLUMBIA,
SUNDAY, JULY 24, 1988

Vol. 41, No. 59

<>

2 Sections (A & B)
60 Cents

deal

Pulp

ratified

<a

OFFICIAL WELCOME . . . Thirty-four Japanese exchange students and later went to Zukerburg Island. The students will be in the
from Tokyo's Aoyama Technical Institute were ofticially welcomed
in Castlegar Thursday at City Hall. They received gifts from the city

area yntil next mont!

CosNewsPhoto by Bonne Morgan

Cape Horn Bluffs studied

By BONNE MORGAN
Staff Writer
The ministry of highways hopes to
begin work on the Cape Horn Bluffs
area by September

The treacherous section of road
along Highway 6, just north of the
Village of Slocan will receive $1
million worth of improvements this
year and might take as long as five
years to complete

The project which is currently
estimated to cost about $15 million
will establish a two-lane highway
with shoulders and a ditch along the
five kilometre stretch of road which
narrows to one lane, for one kilom

Highways will also build
walls to prevent rockslides
which have caused road closures in
the past

The large
quantity of rock (from cliffs above
the road) to be excavated and also
some retaining walls,” a

etre.
retaining

design calls for a

highways
official told a regional highways task
force assembled in Nelson yesterday

The design will push us into the
rock by about feet with a 75
degree slope,” Sutherland
regional director of highways, said at
the meeting

The task force is one of
lished to

Gordon

10 estab

in March identify issues

Zalm supported
in Nanaimo

NANAIMO (CP) The Social
Credit party executive in this Van
couver Island city has publicly en
dorsed the leadership of Premier Bil
Vander Zalm and the constituency's
president called on members in other
ridings to follow its lead

“We would like the other consti
tuencies that haven't been heard
from (to endorse the premier) and
get on with business,” Wes Sheard
said Saturday

We seem to be spending a lot of
time dealing with things that
history

Sheard said the 23-member board
of the Nanaimo Ladysmith constitu
unanimously back

are

ency association
Vander Zalm
Vander Zalm has been dogged re
cently by criticism of his leadership
Last week, constituency presi
dents from the Victoria are refused
to publicly endorse the premier
And a week earlier in Vancouver, a
group of local constituency
dents took the same position, upset
that a cabinet shuffle left
Vancouver ridings without any cab

presi
recent

inet representation

The leadership question heated up
earlier this month when veteran
cabinet minister Grace McCarthy re
signed her economic development

portfolio over what she described as
interference in her ministry from the
premier’s office and his principal sec
David Poole
A

That resignation came just a week
after Brian Smith stepped down as
attorney general,
about interference

On Wednesday
tructured his office, substantially re
ducing Poole's responsibilities.

The charges of interfere!
med from the sale of the
by the British Columbia Enterprise
Corp

retary,

also ‘complaining

Vander Zalm res

stem
po 86 site
formed to dispose of Crown
assets.

Before the site was purchased by
Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing
Vander Zalm and Poole took
cabinet and the corporation's board
an offer by the premier’s millionaire
friend, Peter Toigo, to buy all the
land from the corporation

The
corporation
McCarthy

because

disbanded the
Thursday, a move
described as vindictive
members had
spoken out against Vander Zalm
Vander Zalm said earlier in the
week, that the RCMP had _ inves.
tigated the financial relationship be
tween him and Toigo and had con
cluded there was no wrongdoing

governme!

on

some board

under the Regional Economic Diver.
sification Group

Findings of the task force on
major highways problems through
out the Kootenays will be presented
to the ministry of higwhays.

Sutherland said the $1-million
start which effects the worst section
of rock with the worst stability is
“not the ideal (solution) but it’s a
start anyway.”

The section of highway is the
shortest and most logical route for
residents of the Slocan Valley and
the upper Arrow Lakes who share
medical services, recreational facil
ities, and industrial resources.

Many of the community repre
sentatives making submissions at the
task force felt a tunnel through the
rock would be a safer solution. They
the
and

about
above

expressed reservations
stability of the rock
underneath the road
‘It looks impossible without ‘ex
nsive sealing and some astronom
stabilizing effort to hold the rock
above and below,” Nigel Waterfield
of Questar Marine Ltd., said in a
submission
Although admitting are
probably cracks throughout the
portion of rock which will remain
after excavation, Sutherland said a
widening of the road is more feasible.
“A tunnel was considered a
number of years ago, but the costs
are even higher,” said Sutherland,
adding a tunnel was estimated at $20
‘T think we'll be safe

there

million. fairly

once we stabilize everything,” he
said

Residents were not satisfied with
an estimated five years of construc.
tion with no guarantee given by
highways which approves budgets
annually.

“We should be demanding and
getting from the government officials
nothing less than a five-year plan for
this,” Bill Cuthill, Area K director for
the Regional District of Central
Kootenay said, calling the meeting “a
farce.”

A utility poles producer, B.J
Carney and Co. Ltd. said improve
ments to the highway are of “critical
importance to the comapny’s opera
tions in Nakusp.” James Comford,
president of the company stated that
CP Rail plans to close rail service to
Nakusp where the company is the
largest shipper of material by rail

“While we have historically been
able to truck short poles throughout
the Cape Horn Bluffs, with the loss of
rail service we will now have to truck
material up to 115’ in length.” said
Comford. “As you can well imagine
even on the best of days this is a very
tricky proposition.”

Most who gave submissions said
they have heard tourists say
will not come back to the area be
cause of having to travel the bluffs.

“For a Saskatchewan tourist to
inch around that narrow stretch of
road in his 40-foot motorhome
surely must be a nerve shattering
experience,” said Anne Barkley,
Slocan Ald.

Roaches discovered
inside hospital

VANCOUVER (CP) A pair of
cockroaches forced Vancouver Gen
eral Hospital to close part of its
intensive care unit for a week, @
hospital spokesman has confirmed

But the unit was back in operation
Thursday after fumigators and a
Vancouver health department in
spector gave the unit a ciean t
health

“It's not a big deal,” said hospital
spokesman Peter Walton

“We went overboard on the fumi
gation to make absolutely sure. After
all that, we only found two dead
cockroaches.”

The bugs apparently rode into the
unit in a tuberculosis patient's trans.
sistor radio.

Al Guthrie, a health department
inspector, said the cockroach prob
lem didn't originate in the hospital
and appeared to be taken care of by
the fumigation.

by unions

By CasNews Staff
and News Services

The contract tentatively agreed to
by the Pulp, Paper and Woodwork
ers of Canada last week received a
74-per-cent ratification vote from the
union's 280 Celgar members and was
also accepted by the Canadian
Paperworkers Union as well

Mike Espenhain, vice-president of
the Celgar PPWC local, said while
the members agreed with the deal
there are still some local issues that
concern them

ure, we didn't get everything we
wanted but the says we're
happy with it,” he said Friday. “We
hope the company shows good faith
and recognizes our concern for local
issues over the duration of the con
tract.”

Espenhain said the shifts for relief
pool workers is still a concern for the
Celgar local but added will take time
to resolve the issue

vote

The new agreement which covers
about 13,000 workers across B.C. will
cost ‘the industry an additional $200
million over its three-year lifespan,
said Eric Mitterndorfer, president of
the Pulp and Paper Industrial Re.
lations Bureau, which negotiated the
deal

‘That will have to come from the
customers,” he sai

Forest industry analyst Ross Hay
Roe warned that the contract could
cut into industry profits if an expec
ted downturn hits in 1991

“The companies are not going to be
enjoying such fat margins,” he said

Members of the Pulp, Paper and
Woodworkers of Canada and the
Canadian Paperworkers Union voted
71 per cent in favor of the agreement
which increases the base wage rate
to $15.35 an hour from $14.48 in the
first year — a six-per-cent hike — and
5.5 per cent in each of the final two
years

By the end of the the
companies’ pension contributions will
$35 a month per
member for each year of service from
the current $25.

“We also have early retirement at
age 60 with no penalty,” said Stan
Sewaga, president of the Pulp. Paper
and Woodworkers.

The last contract expired at the
end of June.

contract,

rise to union

Before negotiations, Mitterndorfer
promised he wouldn't agree to any-
thing that would lock the industry
into high labor costs, in case of
another downturn. But he admitted
the new agreement gives the prov-
ince's pulp and paper sector the
highest labor cost in North America.

COST GAMBLE

You've got a bit of a gamble,” he
said Friday. “You've got a lot of
things that could work against you.

“We have to work that much
harder to be a low-cost producer.”

Support for the deal was broad
among union locals, although work
‘ers at the Skeena pulp mill near
Prince Rupert rejected the agree-
ment

“A lot of criticism or feedback I
have been getting was that there
wasn't enough negotiated in the
first said She.
waga was that the
industry has been releasing wonder.
ful profit pictures and expectations of
the membership was higher than the
negotiating team

“I think it was the kind of contract
where the companies feel they paid
too much and the workers feel they
didn't pay enough,” echoed John
Sketchley, president of the Canadian
Paperworkers local at Canadian For.
test Products’ Prince George pulp
mill, whose members approved the
agreement.

In 1986, with the industry crawling
out of a three-year slump, the unions
settled for no wage increase that
year and 40 cents an hour in 1987.
Since then the industry has posted
almost three years of record profits.

With markets still strong, Hay-Roe
said the new contract won't cut into
the industry's competitiveness im
mediately

It's influential
atically he said.

What's more important right now,
said Hay-Roe, is the strength of the
Canadian dollar against its American
industry which
currency

but not dram.

counterpart in an
buys and sells in U.S

They can absorb it (higher labor
costs) if the Canadian dollar stops
going north,” he said. “It's eating up
our competitive position very rapid
ly

CP Rail to spray
Spike next month

By CasNews Staff

CP Rail has been given the green
light to spray the herbicide Spike
along the rail lines leading from
Castlegar to Trail and Nelson

Stuart Craig, regional manager of
the provincial pesticide control pro
gram for the Ministry of Environ
ment and Parks in the southern
Interior and Kootenay region, said
the permits for the local spraying
were issued last year. The permits
were appealed but the rail
earned the right to spray the areas
after the ministry turned down the
appeals and issued additional condi
tions for spraying

“Three permits were issued in the
area,” Craig told the Castlegar News
“They were appealed last year and
the appeals were denied but further
controls were added to the permits.”
The other permit is for track in the
East Kootenay

The rail company also applied to
spray the line between South Slocan
and Slocan City but Craig turned the
request down

lines

‘I did an on-site inspection and of
the 26 miles of track, about 20 miles
were within 10 metres of water
bodies including creeks, rivers and
drainage ditches,” he said. “It's our
general policy not to allow the use of
any pesticide or herbicide within 10
metres of any water body.”

Following Craig's inspection, CP
rail cancelled their permit to spray
Spike up the Slocan subdivision at his
request

Despite the ministry's policy of not
allowing the use of Spike near
waterways, Craig said the herbicide
poses no real threat to marine life

“Like any herbicide it's designed to
kill vegetation,” Craig said. “It's not
overly toxie to animal life.”

Six other permits have been issued
for Interior rail lines in Kamloops,
Kelowna, Vernon, Enderby,
Invermere and Radium

The spraying permits for the
Castlegar area are for the days from
Aug. 9 to Aug. 22 and Craig said
Midland Vegetation Control Inc. of
Regina will do the spraying.