COSTING TAXPAYERS

Heavy water obsolete

By DAN LEGER
OTTAWA (CP) — They sprawl over the Cape Breton

* landscape like sets from a futuristic movie, great masses of

expensive metal producing millions of dollars worth of a
product nobody wants.

The two heavy water plants owned by Atomic Energy
of Canada Ltd., one of Point Tupper and the other at Glace
Bay, continue to produce more of the unmarketable product.
even though they're costing taxpayers a lot of money and
producing jobs at the not-inconsiderable annual cost of
$110,000 each.

To a large extent, they exist because of the lingering
influence of Cape Breton's longtime political strongman,
Allan MacEachen.

MacEachen, for 31 years the MP for most of Cape
Breton, helped keep them going despite mounting pressure
from the Crown-owned AECL to close them.

Last September his seat, but not his influence, passed to
a rookie Tory MP who knows he has to accept the eventual
shutdown of one or both of the plants.

Lawrence O'Neil, MP for Cape Breton-Highlands-Canso,
has already started the manoeuvring to keep the plant in his
riding running in case the government decides to shut one or
the other. But he knows it can't go on indefinitely.

“People here are very realistic about the plant and its
future,” he said in an interview. “They know the present
situation can't go on forever, but they also know about the
devastating economic consequences of closing Point
Tupper.”

BOOSTS EMPLOYMENT

Each plant employs about 350 people and pays out
roughly $15 million a year in wages. They make a vital
contribution to the Cape Breton economy, where unemploy.
ment is officially 13.6 per cent. They cost AECL more than
$120 million a year for wages, maintenance and fuel.

And, there are hidden costs.

The Glace Bay plant burns 400,000 tonnes of Cape

Breton coal every year, p'

hased from the C: ed

Cape Brefon Development Corp.

Devco lost $49.6 million on its mining operations during

fiseal 1984.

The Point Tupper plant burns federally-subsidized
foreign oil. adding yet more costs to the taxpayers’ total bill.

And, aside from the cost of running the plants, there is
the galling reality that they are producing a product with no
market. When the plants were built in the 1960s and 1970s,
AECL figured it-would sell dozens of its reactors to
customers world-wide, and to Canadian utilities eager for

“the energy of the future.”
But only Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick bought

Candu technology, and Ontario Hydro produces all the

heavy water it needs. Overseas sales have not materialized
and there are other international suppliers of heavy water.

That leaves AECL with 800 tonnes of heavy water a
year being produced and no one to sell it to, and enough in its
stockpile to power a crowd of reactors well into the next
century.

Spokesmen for AECL, which in 1982 suggested moth-
balling the two plants, tread carefully when asked about the

Cape Breton situation. Calls about the subject are politely
referred to Energy Minister Pat Carney's office.

A spokesman for Carney, Pierre Alvarez, said a decision
is going to be made on the future of the Cape Breton plants,
but he did not speculate when that would happen.

When the time does come to bite the bullet, politics may
suddenly become important again for AECL’s Cape Breton
operations. O'Neil's riding contains one of the plants, Liberal
Dave Dingwall represents the other, Cape Breton-East
Richmond.

O'Neill, perhaps looking toward the April budget
planned by cost-conscious Finance Minister Michael Wilson,
says his first allegiance is to his own constituents.

“Keeping Point Tupper open is first on my list for the
new sitting,” O'Neill said.

Native women in business

WINNIPEG (CP) — Susan Tatoosh is as much at
home in the boardroom of her successful British Columbia
construction firm as she is in the sweat lodges of her
native Indian band.

But as a woman, a native, and someone who spent
years recovering from a tragic accident, it hasn't been
easy for her to feel one with business circles that are
often both male-dominated and not all that open to
Indians.

“The strength that I get from my spiritual beliefs
through fasting and cleansing helps me because it keeps
me from becoming that white-oriented person,” said
Tatoosh in an interview during a break in a native
women's business conference.

Dressed in a tailored jacket and skirt favored more
by stockbrokers than shamans, Tatoosh quietly told how
the rediscovery of native religion, following an accident
that killed her husband and nearly left her crippled,
helped her become a successful businesswoman.

Part-owner of Northern Native Development Corp.,
a Kamloops-based construction firm, Tatoosh is also a
founding member of Interior Forest Services Ltd., a
consulting firm that educates native workers in the
forestry industry.

SERVED ON COMMITTEE

A member of the Shushwap Indian Nation, Tatoosh
also served on a recent federal committee that held
country-wide hearings this year that sought ways of
boosting the number of native women in business and
finance.

The committee's report Was released Friday at the
start of the three-day conference that attracted about 130
native businesswomen from across the country.

Tatoosh said there are probably more native women
in business than people suspect but they tend to keep a
low. profile.

“It's the nature of native women that they are quiet,”
she said. “You don't brag. You just do your thing.”

But Tatoosh found that staying in the background
was a drawback when she helped launch the construction
firm several years ago at the invitation of an all-male
group of natives who wanted to draw on the managerial
experience she obtained working for B.C. Telephone for
seven years.

“I think they were looking for someone who had
some business experience, some capital, and I suspect,
someone who could make coffee as well,” Tatoosh said.

TOOK CHARGE

Tatoosh eventually learned to stop performing the
menial duties that were expected of her and started
taking charge.

“When they (fellow board members) saw me on the
job sites talking to the men and the crews as one of the
bosses, their whole attitude changed,” said Tatoosh.

But Tatoosh's entry into the business world was
preceeded by years of ups and downs. Born a non-status
Indian in the B.C. interior city of Kamloops, she entered
the Canadian Forces and worked as a radar control
operator for five years after growing tired of nursing.

She wed a non-native also in the air force and spent
much of their 15-year marriage in Germany and Scotland
as a housewife and mother.

The accident that killed her husband left Tatoosh in
hospital for eight months with a warning from doctors
that she might never walk again.

“After the accident I lost my self-confidence. I was
toally physically depleted. The only strength I had was
spiritual . . . I found more comfort from my beliefs as a
native person than I did from the (Roman Catholic)
church I belonged to at the time.”

Tatoosh did recover and with her new-found
strength — plus the fact she had to feed three children —
attended business administration classes.

She is remarried toa native, gaining Indian status at
the same time, and regularily attends clan ceremonies
and confers with band elders.

Game questions scruples

WINNIPEG (CP) — Henry
Makow has invented a card
game in which the players
are confronted by moral dil
emmas.

“This game wasn't intend.
ed to reform anyone, but the
idea did start asn an article. I
was going to write about the
baby boomer morality,”

“There is a constant kind of
dialogue going on in our
heads between our cons-
cience and ourselves in a
number of situations,” said

them in place.
NO EXPERTS

he had a hand in everything
from printing the cards to
designing the mould holding

Some examples:

— After looking for work
for six months, you get a
good offer from a large de
fence contractor. Do you ac.
cept it?

— Despite all your words
of caution, your unmarried
17-year-old daughter be.
comes pregnant. Do you en
courage her to have an abor.
tion?

The game is called A
Question of Scruples and the
discovery on which it is based
“is that people like to talk
about their everyday moral
dilemmas,” says Makow, a
35-year-old former university
lecturer.

Although the market has
been flooded with new games
recently, Makow says his is
different. “The game tends to
be real.”

It's ideal for after-dinner
parties for from four to 15
players, he says, and it's de
signed to keep the atmos.
phere playful

Possible answers to the
questions posed by the game
are yes, no, or depends — an
option that requires a brief
explanation.

Ip addition to morally
heavy questions, there are
some that aré just plain silly
— to keep the game light
hearted and non-threatening
to participants.

Makow said in an interview.
DO MORE GOOD

He said he realized that the
game could do a lot more
good than any one article
about the generation of
people who were in their late
teens or early 20s in the
1960s, and who now range in
age from about 30 to 45.

“Part of the idealism of the
‘60s involved rebelling
against the system, and rip-
ping off the bank or de.
partment store, as an act of
revolution.”

Makow's game, which re
tails for $18 to $20, gives
people a chance to re-exam
ine some of those beliefs and
to compare their principles
with the way they act now in
everyday life

In Seruples, winning does
not depend on professing the
highest moral standards but
on making the shrewdest as.
sessment of other people's
moral character.

If a player's reply is chal
lenged as untrue, a minute is
set aside for discussion. Then
all the players use special
cards to vote: they hold up a
halo card for sincerity or a
devil's pitchfork card for in
sincerity.

GET LAUGH

Moral dilemmas put in a
game context often get a
laugh, said Makow.

Makow, who drew many of
the game's 240 moral dil
emmas from his own life and
from friends.

“What should we do, for
example, if a bum asks us for
a quarter and we're sure he's
just going to buy some al
cohol?

“That happens to us all the
time and we all go through
that little dialogue in our
heads: should we give him
the money or should we not?

“And so it’s great to re
lieve that pressure by finding
out what someone else would
say they'd do, and then
finding out whether that's
really what they'd do, and
then comparing notes.”

CAN BLUFF

While the game can reveal
a lot about the players, the
questions are not put in a
menacing way and there are
provisions for bluffing out of
a situation

“People are allowed to
bluff because I wanted to
raise these issues without
people really feeling like they
were on the spot,” he said
“people will naturally direct a
question to the person to
whom it's most delicate.”

Makow said Scruples has
also enabled him to break out
of an academic life.

In addition to thinking up
and marketing the product,

Unlike Tri Pursuit or
other games that focus on
ood seraps of factual know.
ledge, Makow said his game
is non-competitive and there
is no way to master it.

“There's no given answer
to any of these questions,”
said Makow, a former re
porter who holds a PhD in
English literature from the
University of Toronto.

“This game tends to make
people talk about things that
aren't trivial, because these
issues aren't trivial, and at
the same time they have a
good time.”

Makow, who has been
handling sales and distribu
tion himself, said the game
was placed on the market at
the end of September and
sold 7,000 copies in the first
two months. It is marketed
across Canada.

DUSINESS GIREC

Telephone 365-5210 — saincscbireciory wil te'secopted op ts Spm, Sou: so for he month

News
of February.

Brian L.
Brown

Certified General
Accountant
270 Columbia Ave.

Castlegar
Ph. 365-2151

MOROSO,
MARKIN &
BLAIN

Certified General
Accountants

241 Columbia Ave.
Castlegar

Ph. 365-7287

Soligo, Koide
& John
Chartered Accountants

615 Columbia Ave.

(Upstairs)

BS
SHORTWAVE RECEIVER
*20

Quartz - Digital Tuning

Medala Shortwave

365-5687

—_—_————————-
Peppercorn
Dining Under the Palms
ars © 1905 Universal Press Synaicate ot A
anne : Affordable Prices
I'll explain later. He had sana NOVA moron win

to go to the hospital.’’

ASK CHES OR JOHN FOR _
@ BEAUMARK the

APPLIANCES ay
WITH B.E.W.C. TO PROVIDE ALL PARTS

AND ALL SERVICE FOR THE LIFE
‘OF THE MACHINE TRAN, B.C. Dy,

stiegar
Phone 365-7745
Henry John, B.Sc., C.A.
Resident Partner

KOOTENAY'S
BEST

Appliance Parts
Service Dept.
* All Brand Nomes Serviced
© All Parts Stock:
* Rebuilt Timers
* Used Applionces &
‘Consignments
* Coin-operated Machines
© Industrial Laundry
WE ALSO SERVICE: + KENMORE
Teicha: wotowmne tC
CASTLEGAR PLUMBING
& HEATING LTD.

1008 Cotumbie Ave. 345-3988

Russell Auctions
399-4793

Thrums
Buy or Sell by Auction

eo
JB Super Sweep
Chimney Services Ltd.

* Complete Masonry Work

* Chimney Lining

© Certified Fire Sotety
Inspections

735 Columbia Ave.
365-6141

See us for:
* Complete

nursery

WILLIAMS MOVING

stod
© House.
none & STORAGE
* Florist
: Serdae 2237-6th Ave., Castlega
@ FULL LANDSCAPING Invite you to call them for a free
SERVICE ate. Let our
COMMERC! RESIDENTIAL tell you ebout
‘FREE ESTUAATES es which hove
¥ he most respec
the moving
Nursery & Florist Ltd. business
2601 - 9th Ave.,
Castloger Ph. 365-3328 Collect
365-7312

ML LeRoy

1001 Rossland Ave., Trail
Reservations 364-2222

THE COLANDER
SPAGHETTI HOUSE

Specializing in Italian cuisine

For Reservations
Phone 364-1816
1475 Cedar Avenue

Trail, B.C.

A,B,C, D...
orX, Y,Z

Yes, whether your
nome starts with A or with Z
Business Directory advertising is
for you!

RATES ARE ATTRACTIVE TOO!

Phone 365-5210

FOR FULL DETAILS.

|

COLEMAN COUNTRY
BOY SERVICE

Sump & Septic Tank
Pumping
Phone 365-5013

3400 - 4th Avenue
Castlegar

CLOTHING, DRAPERIES, 8.S. 0.0.
BEDSPREADS
Sroryeenn o8 eeannett. 1012-4th St.,
NEARLY NEW SHOP Castlegar
776 Rossland ye Phone 3361

Tues.-Fri. 9a.m.-5 p.m.

“TT. (TIM) ALLAN

B.Sc.0.D.
OPTOMETRIST

366 Baker St.
Nelson, B.C. Ph. 352-5152

Saturday 9 a.m.-12 noon
——_$__—___|

DRAFTING

PUBLISHER

The Castlegar News is
published by Castle News Ltd
Mail subscriptions rote to the
CASTLEGAR NEWS is $30 per
yeor ($34 in communities
where the post office has let
ter carrier 5

vice). The price
‘on newsstands is 50¢ for each

editions is only 66¢ 0 week
(collected monthly). Second.
class mail registrati-n number

ERRORS
The Casflegar News will not
be responsible for any errors
in advertisements after one

er to
s od when it is first
published

It is agreed by the odver
tiser

* Residential ‘ odve:
f Renavenens Castlegar Plumbing the cor

Office interiors
* Construction
Supervisions

365-2546

& Heating Ltd.
Quality Wholesale

CASTLEGAR

Plumbing & tion of the adv
: Fy ied by th ror
Heating Supplies |] Seypie? by she erroneous
ps | ‘

tion, of in the event that
errors occur in the publishing
of an advertisement, that por:

ising space

and professional advice
. re 4

for
signature, will not be charged
for but the balance of the ad.

1008 Columbie Avenue.

FUNERAL CHAPEL

Dedicated to kindly,
thoughtful service.

Granite, Marble and
Bronze

Phone 365-3222

BA
& GIBSON
The Plumbing &
Heating Centre
American Stondord

Valley Fibrebath
Jocuzzi* Crane

F. PIRSH
CONTRACTING

2045 Columbie Ave., Trail
* Renovations
© Custom-built kitchen cabinets
. a

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eeeeee

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You' Il find
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PHONE
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ALL TYPES OF

peeved pes COMMERCIAL PRINTING

Weddian Ringe ot a ntewey yt od

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te., Ete

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(* Bulowe * Seo * ‘WES PRESS FACHITIES
+ Doutton* Wadgewend=teysiawer | CASTLEGAR NEWS:
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will be poid for ot
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event of an error, advertising

Is oF services at o wrong
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is merely an offer to sell. The
offer may be withdrawn at

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Lid. is vested in and belongs
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THAT PART AND THAT PART

‘end belong to the advertiser

CASTLEGAR NEWS
Established Aug. 7, 1947
Twice Weekly May 4. 1980

to Aug. 27. 1980

L.V. (Les) CAMPBELL

Publisher Aug. 7, 1947
to Feb. 15, 1973

BURT CAMPBELL
Publisher
Ron . Editor: PETER
HARVEY, Plont Foreman
MICKEY Composing

Room Foreman: LINDA KOSIT.

SIM, Office
MAGAW, Advertising
—— y

islative Library,

riiasent Bldgs., 501 Belleville 3t
Victoria, B. C. =
VSBV_ 1x4 Fehs 228

Dr. Hall,
| presume

Columnist Jack Charters
talks with Dr. John Hall
about his two-year stint
in Papua New Guinea.

That's
spirit

Pat Metge takes a look
at the history of the Old
Arena and the com-
munity spirit that built

it,

The six winning numbers in Saturday's Lotto 6/49 drow were
seven, 24, 35, 37, 45 and 47, The bonus number wos 23. There
was no winner of the jackpot of $2,043,941.50. The
second-prize pool, awarded to ing five regular

the bonus number, had 12 winners of
$64,503.70. The $500,000 winning number in Friday's Provin-
cial lottery drow is 561323.

Helping
to cope

Cancer Society volun-
teer Rita Ross talks to
CasNews - repor
Chery! Calderban
about dealing with
breast cancer.

WEATHERCAST

Mainly cloudy today with highs
@round 3. Clouds will continue in-
to Monday with chance of
Precipitation both days around 20
per cent

50 Cents

—_

VOL. 38, No. 6

CASTLEGAR, BRITISH COLUMBIA, SUNDAY, JANUARY 20, 1985

2 Sections (A & B)

City, CUPE
discuss new

contract

By CasNews Staff
The City of Castlegar and the
Canadian Union of Public Employees
began bargaining this week on a new
contract for city workers.

Ed Hagen, national yepresentative
for CUPE, which represents about 50
inside and outside Castlegar municipal
workers, said he met with city rep-
resentatives on Monday, Tuesday and
Wednesday.

Hagen said discussions centred on
contract wording and language.

“We Haven't talked about money
yet,” he said. He said the two sides will
return to the bargaining table thi
Tuesday and Wednesday. .

Hagen said the union is looking for
a one-year pact, but that is negotiable.
The city workers’ contract expires at
the end of February. Their last

contract was a two-year deal with a
three per cent increase in the first year
and zero per cent in the second.
Hagen noted that contract talks are
“actually early” this year. He said more

this week's round of talks.

KBVA
BANKRUPT

By CasNews Staff

Faced with a debt of more than
$70,000, the Kootenay Boundary Visi-
tors’ Association declared bankruptcy
this week

The move followed a two-hour meet-
ing Wednesday in Castlegar. Most of
the 40 members who attended the
meeting supported the motion to dis-
solve the KBVA.

The group has been losing money for
two or three years.

The declaration of bankruptcy will
protect the KBVA directors from being
sued by creditors.

The KBVA owes $70,836, including a
loan of more than $18,000 from the
Ministry of Tourism and a $16,000 loan
from the Canadian Imperial Bank of
Commerce

The tourist organization also owes
$18,000 to Agency Press for printing
brochures.

Twin Rivers Elementary students

learned the health benefits of

rope Fe ly this week during
jor

Jump Rope for Heart Program
sponsored by the B.C. Heart
Foundation. Rope jumpers were
from a Burnaby elementary
school

CostewsPhoto by Chery! Colderbonk

$30,000 MISTAKE

More money for
school district

A Ministry of Education miscalcula-
tion means the school district
will get an extra $30,000 for their
January to June short school term.

Education Minister Jack Heinrich
announced Thursday that as a result of
reviewing budgets submitted by the 75
B.C. school districts, a total of $3.7
million will be handed out.

Heinrich estimated the budget in-
creases ranged from about $25,000 for
small districts to $75,000 for medium-
sized districts, while large districts got
“a little bit more.”

Ci district
says the money comes from a province-
wide ministry error which failed to in-
clude administrative allowances when
figuring out average teachers’ wages,
as part of the six-month budget period.

Schools superintendent Terry Way-
ling said the Ministry of Education in
November calculated Castlegar tea-
chers’ wages as being an average of
$35,705, but didn’t include provisions
for administrative allowances tradi-
tionally given to principals, vice-
principals, and head teachers.

Last month the school board dis-
closed that the distriet faced a $182,000
shortfall for the January to June period
— $100,000 of which was to be made up
from a projected operating surplus
from 1984.

The rest of the deficit was to be
made up as follows:

days;
plies;
backs;

the ministry.

SKILLED TRADESMEN

B.C. may face s

By CHERYL CALDERBANK
Staff Writer report.
British Columbia could face a shor-
tage of skilled tradesmen by the latter
part of this decade unless steps are
taken to increase apprenticeship en-
rolment, according to a report by the
Provincial Apprenticeship Board.

The college also said it agrees with
the Board's report that the present
apprenticeship tri
“fully satisfactory

The board says there is enough
evidence in the short term that without
deliberate steps now to increase enrol-
ment in apprenticeship programs, the
system may not meet the trade skills
required for the B.C. economy in the
late 1980s.

Selkirk College is concerned enough
about the report to write to the
minister of labor asking that his min
istry give top priority to increased
training.

journeymen.

“Unless some alternatives are estab-
lished, the province may face skill
shortages in the future and many
young people will be denied the oppor.
tunity to become journeymen,” the
college says.

The college made the comment in

TERRY WAYLING
jomething has to give

$7,300 from a reduction in testing
services and teachers’ p i

© $18,080 from a reduction in sup-
@ $6,041 from miscellaneous cut-
¢ $11,773 from a deficit approved by

However, while the $30,000 “mis.
take” will ease the effect of the cut

response to the Apprenticeship Board

The 20-page report was prepared
following a series of meetings held
around the province. The meetings
looked at apprenticeship training and
how it can be improved.

However, the college says the report
does not deal adequately with the

process of maintaining apprenticeship ,
training during periods of economic re-
cession — such as at present

Due to the economic recession, ap.
prenticeship programs have all but
been eliminated at Selkirk College and
at many other institutions in the prov
ince, college principal Leo Perra told a
recent college board meeting.

The college also adds in its letter to
Labor Minister Bob McClelland that
the Apprenticeship Board report fails
to sufficiently recognize the anticipated

$126,500 which must be paid

awarded by an arbitration panel.

backs, the district faces an extra
teachers
for the 2.3 salary increase recently

Wayling pointed out that the in-
crease still has to be agreed upon by

to accomplish this.

and non-teaching employees.”

we simply do not have the ability

crash diet.

new government estimate for

nearly $8.2 million. This is approx-
imately $300,000 less than what the

district received in 1964.

changed by the government.

However, B.C. teachers are now
gearing up to negotiate another

continued on page A2

ortage

ticeship program.

should be continued and expanded
provide alternatives for tr
prentices.

number of recommendations in
report, among them:

er Ed Peck — who's under no deadline

Wayling says neither Heinrich or the
government is “prepared to acknow-
ledge increased salaries for teaching

This presents a Catch-22 situation,
since the arbitration process is con- t
trolled by the provincial government.

“The school board's position is that

pay these increases,” Wayling added.

And the economic situation Wayling
describes for the 1985-86 school term
which begins July 1 resembles that of a
starving man requested to undergo a

The district is currently waiting for a
it's

Wayling pointed out that the esti-
mate is only preliminary, and might be

length of the current recession and the
“long term impact” that the lack of new
apprentices may have on the appren

The college also said that the “posi.

tive results” achieved through inno-
vative simulated on-the-job training

ing ap-

The Apprenticeship Board made a
its

@ that the Ministry of Labor take the

in ping a

to

to

to

groups of smaller employers.

munications programs designed

and the publie at large

continued trai
apprentices through a program
simulated on-the-job training.

P appr
training programs among compatible

@ that the Ministry of Labor give
priority to expanded continuing com

create wider understanding of the ap
prenticeship system among employers

© that governments facilitate the
g of laid-off final-year

to

of

By ADRIAN CHAMBERLAIN
Staff Writer

At 6:30 p.m. on Nov. 25, Corrine Postnikoff
experienced what every parent dreads — a medical
emergency with one of her children.

Postnikoff prefers that specific details of the incident
remain private. But she remembers well the anxiety and
sense of urgency felt by her husband and herself that
Sunday evening when they phoned the emergency
ambulance number in Castlegar, and had an unpleasant
surprise.

“It was a real shock to me,” remembered Postnikoff.
“I phoned and contacted — not the ambulance centre —
but an answering service in Trail.”

After giving a few details of the emergency,
including her telephone number and address, Postnikoff
hung up, and then phoned back seconds later to cancel the
request for an ambulance. She'd decided it would be
quicker to drive her child to the hospital herself.

Luckily, the incident had a happy ending — the child
survived with no ill effects.

Lawrence Chernoff, acting unit officer for the
Castlegar ambulance unit at 2233-6th Ave., verified the
incident.

He said although the unit is manned by at least one
full-time attendant 365 days a year (with another
part-time attendant either on the premises or on call),
from 6 p.m. until 7 a.m. emergency calls are directed to an
answering service in Trail.

But Chernoff also says this is no cause for alarm
During these hours, the two full-time and 10 active
part-time attendants are on call, and can be reached
either at home or on pagers. He said all attendants live
within five minutes of the station, so the extra time
required to answer calls after hours is negligible.

And he pointed out that, since an extra attendant
may have to be called in during regular day-time hours,
as a crew of two is required to man an ambulance, there is

no real difference in response time between having calls
go through the answering service, or a manned office.

“Basically, we do provide a high level of eare to the
patients in the community,” said Chernoff. He said the
area covered by the ambulance service includes Castlegar
and surrounding like Thrums, Sh .
Pass Creek and Glade.

The estimated response time to get to Glade — which
is furthest away — is 17 minutes, which compares well
with provincial statistics, he said

Chernoff says although the response time of the
ambulance unit is quick, 10 minutes of waiting for an
ambulance can seem like hours for someone in desperate
need of medical attention.

“It's the general feeling of the public that it does take
a long time. It seems a lot longer than the real time.” he
explained. “You talk to anyone in the province — it's
generally the same thing. You get that response.”

Postnikoff said when she called the answering

Ambulance service: how it works

service to cancel her ambulance, she asked that the
Castlegar and District Hospital be notified that she and
her husband were en route

This request was denied, she says. The reason
given, according to Postnikoff, was that only ambulance
attendants make such calls.

Chernoff agrees the answering service should have
notified the hospital. “It's good practice to notify them —
to get the dispatcher to do it,” he said

But when Chernoff contacted the answering service,
they informed him they'd received no such request

At any rate, he says this “mixup” has been “cor.
rected” — the answering service will now notify the
hospital at the request of an emergency caller.

Postnikoff also says she's concerned about the
ambulance unit's occasional practice of having an
attendant arrive at the scene of an emergency in his own

continued on page A2