Saturday, May 30, 1992 @

Cougar visits
neighborhood

i Unwanted guest seen
roaming 9th Avenue

Jonathan Green
NEWS REPORTER

For the second time in four
months, Castlegar was paid a
visit by an unwanted guest.

Local conservation officer
Barry Farynuk said a cougar
was spotted in the 3200 block
of 9th Avenue Wednesday
night.

Farynuk said the sighting
was reported by a Columbia
Avenue resident Ken
Poznikoff, who spotted the
cougar chasing his dog. °

Stephanie Poznikoff said
the cougar was scared off by
her father.

“I guess it stopped when it
saw my dad,” she said, adding
that the family dog was un-
harmed.

Farynuk said he, fellow
conservation officer Michael
Krause and a cougar hunter,
went out with search dogs ear-

ly Thursday, but came up
empty.

“We weren't able to find it,”
he said, adding that the
weather didn’t lend any help.

“The scent doesn’t stick
around very long at this time
of year.”

Farynuk asked that area
residents keep their eyes open
for the unwanted vistor.

“We told everybody to
watch their pets and watch
their children and to give us a
call immediately if they any
problems with the cougar,” he
said.

A cougar was spotted in
south Castlegar in February,
where it killed a dog on:the
back deck of a house in the
2500 block of 10th Avenue.

Farynuk said that, for now,
he and Krause would play it
by ear.

“It might stick around, it
might move on,” he said.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it
was the same one.”

SCHOOL’S OUT

About 60 Castlegar members of the British Columbia Teachers’ Union hit the streets
Wednesday to protest the provincial government's poor educational funding formula.

News photo by Jonathan Green

Pope and Talbot talks break oft

_@l Reduced benefit package holds up
new agreement at Castlegar sawmill

Wi Three sperate spills
hampers weekend work

Jonathan Green
NEWS REPORTER

Cominco employees were
on their toes last weekend as
three separate spills kept the
Trail operations’ workers
busy.

tion flowed into the Colum-
bia River after making its
way into.an access line lead-
ing to a sewer.

The third spill occurred at
Cominco’s Warfield fertilizer
operations Monday when an-
other switch gear overheat-
ed, resulting in a series of
pump shutdowns.

“Every time there is a

Scott David Harrison
EDITOR

Talks between Pope and Talbot and its
Castlegar sawmill workers have broken off.
The move comes after two days of negotia-

tions as IWA-Cana-

According to Ferreira, the contract Local 1-
405 is being asked to accept is similar to those
already in place at Pope and Talbot’s Midway

and Grand Forks operations.
Ferreira wouldn’t elaborate on the benefit

package being proposed or the concessions the
union is being asked to accept, though. Instead,
he said it has nothing to do with pension plans

as wrongly reported

da Local 1-405 and
Pope and Talbot try
to reach a new
three-year agree-
ment.

“We will be meeting again
somewhere down the road’

in Wednesday’s edi-

tion of The News.
Ferreira couldn’t

say when the two

— IWA-Canada’s Tony Ferreira sides would return to

“We've just sepa-
rated,” IWA-Canada

spokesperson Tony Ferreira said Thursday.
“We've just broken off talks and we'll try to

meet again.”

Ferreira said the problem lies with the ben-
efit package his members are being offered.

He said his local is being asked to accept a
contract which has been okayed by Southern

the bargaining table
again, though he sus-

pects it will happen this week.
“Things are up in the air right now,” he said.

“We will be meeting again somewhere down

that.”

the road. I can’t really. say anything beyond

On Tuesday, Ferreira said that wages were
not an issue in negotiations. He said the 300

@ Saturday, May 30,1992

PhotoF ILE

CITY
PRIDE ON

PARADE

Miss Castlegar
Kirstin Mason
(top) delights 19-
month-old
Rhiann
Maddocks at the
Community
Complex
Thursday night
as Castlegar
celebrated
Community Pride
Day with block
parties at 16
locations: across
the city.

BIG ONA -
BALLOON

With cake, juice
and balloons for
all, Community
Pride Day was a
big hit with the
kids in
attendance.
Seven-year-old
David Ferreira
(bottom left)
pushed his
balloon to the
limit, knowing
that if it broke
there were plenty
more where it
came from.

KICKING
UP THEIR

HEELS

The Highland
Dancers (bottom
right) fascinated
and thrilled the
crowd with their
special skills.
The dancers,
Jolene Littlejohn,
Tiana Nedjelski,
Heather Cook
and Heather

CommunityPRIDE DAY

Interior sawmill and sawmill office workers: workers that fall under the Local 1-405 con-

He said that agreement could mean giving up tract have already approved nominal increas-

items which the local workers already have. es, which include no increases in the first two
“The benefits are different and ifthe sawmill years, followed by an 85 cents per hour hike in

workers were to accept them, it would mean __ the third year of the agreement.

concessions,” Ferreira said. “The same would Pope and Talbot president Abe Friesen could

be the case for the office workers.” not be reached for comment.

‘Somehow or other, that story developed into
some sort of enviromental spill.’
—Cominco’s Graham Kenyan

Sheppard, were
on the receiving
end of.a rousing
round of
applause at the ©
conclusion of
their show.

when a power surge shorted
out a switch gear in a ma-
chine room, causing machine
oil believed to contain PCBs
to leak over the area. Comin-
co environment manager
Graham Kenyan claimed the
incident was overplayed, say-
ing the ordinary machine oil
was contained.

“Somehow or other, that
story developed into some
sort of environmental spill,”
he said. “It didn’t go any-
where. All it did was splash
around the walls and floors of
the closure.”

Less than 12 hours later,

The spills s d Friday shutdown, there’s a small

spill that ends up in the sew-
er,” he said.

The shutdown sent phos-
phoric acid into the sewer. An
investigation revealed that
63 milligrams per litre of ef-
fluent were discharged. The
government standard is 115

“Every day we average the
total effluent discharged over
a 24-hour period,” he said.
“The amount of phosphate in
the effluent sample was no
different than any other day.”

Kenyan said of the three
incidents, only the one in-
volving zinc electrolyte is un-
der ministerial investigation.

. Ministry investigating of-
ficer Ed Stockril was un-
sIahl, for at.

Francophones ask for help

Wi Telephone survey helps
Francophones stay in touch

Glen Freeman
NEWS REPORTER

Don’t be worried if you re-
ceive a phone call from a per-
son with an accent.

It’s probably the West
Kootenay Francophone Asso-
ciation running their regional
survey.

“We will soon be phoning
people in Castlegar asking for
their help,” said the associa-

ion’s secretary Eliane Taburi-
aux.

Their goal is to obtain up-
dated statistics on the number
of French speakers in the
area.

‘There were 15 families
in Castlegar alone...’
— Eliane Taburiaux

“It’s amazing how many
people speak French in the
Kootenays,” she said. “There
were 15 families in Castlegar
alone, and that has probably
gone up.”

Taburiaux said that the
survey, which has already
been taken in Trail, Nelson
and Rossland, has been well
received.

“If someone in the house-
hold speaks French we will
ask them a few questions,”
Taburiaux said. “The ques-
tions only take a few minutes,
and people have been very co-
operative.”

The survey takes place the
first two weeks of June in
Castlegar, after which the as-
sociation will focus on the Slo-
can Valley and New Denver.

ED MILLS