Wednesday, March 4° THE FAR SIDE By GARY LARSON “Eat my apple, will you? LEAVE MY GARDEN! BEGONE! ... And take all the mole traps with you!” Castleview closing? Scott David Harrison EDITOR The Castleview Care Home is in critical condition. The private care facility says chronic under-funding may force it to close its doors. “If we don’t get operational funding, we will shut down,” Castleview administrator Di- anne Ramage said Tuesday. “We are in real jeopardy.” Ramage is lobbying to have more provincial funding thrown her and Castlegar’s way. As a community, Castlegar has 71 intermediate-care beds funded through the Ministry of Health — 36 of those at Castle- view. An additional 25 beds at Castleview are open, but not funded by the province. Ramage says the future of those beds depends entirely on the government. In her battle for greater funding, she enlist- ed the support of Castlegar city council, which has agreed to push for a meeting with Health Minister Elizabeth Cull to dis- cuss the intermediate-care bed problem. No date for the proposed meeting has been set. “Right now we have 96 peo- ple on the waiting list and after prioritizing those people be- tween (Castleview and the —Mountainview), 60 people are still not covered.” A telephone survey conduct- ed by Ramage Friday revealed that Castlegar has the least amount of intermediate-care beds available per capita in the West Kootenay. “I was shocked by that,” she said. “We are letting the pio- neers of our community sit on waiting lists because we can’t get funding.” Castlegar’s vision restored by society Jonathan Green NEWS REPORTER In a world where a lot of eyes are on the future, John Coyle has his on the past. The president of the Castlegar and District Heritage Soci- ety is interested in a B.C. Heritage Trust program called Com- munity Pride that helps communities remember yesterday. Tomorrow night, some 20 educational, service and business- oriented organizations will meet to discuss the program. Coyle said, if given the green light, Community Pride would eventually involve the public. “We want their input and what their vision is for Castlegar,” he said. Coyle said establishing a heritage would be beneficial to both the local merchant and historian. “If we have an attraction here, it will bring tourist dollars in and it will help preserve our heritage,” he said. Coyle said if both public and business reaction is favorable, a team from Heritage Trust would be out sometime in May. Top SIRLOIN STEAK Boneless © Family Pac 9.7 GREEN ONIONS 3 Bunches yew CHICKEN TONITE 650 mi. .99 GREAT PRICE Rogers GRAN. SUGAR Limit 1 With Coupon HOURS n.Thurs. & Sa 1.m.-6:00 p.r a.m.-8:00 fF 0:00 a.m.-5:C GROUND BEEF 5-8 Ib. Packages 3.70 kg. Californa Grown #1 HEAD LETTUCE 1.08 kg. APPLES | 3ib. Bag 14 SPAGHETTI SAUCE Big-1 Litre Size Asst. Varities 99 GREAT PRICE PRIMO PASTA Asst. Varieties e 900 g. William Tell APPLE JUICE 1 Litre OIL 100% Pure 1 Litre 99 GREAT PRICE i “COMMUNITY FUNDRAISER _ Buy a case of Minute Maid Juices 27-250mIl for $9.99 (reg. price $15.21) and $2.00 will go towards the purchase of a new scoreboard for the Sports Complex ‘ 635 Columbia Ave., Castlegar WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO LIMIT QUANTITIES. Prices Effective to Sat., Mar. 7 Open Sundays 10:00 a.m.-5:00: p.m. We've moved things around to make room for "Surplus Daves". < See us at the front of the store in} Castlegar Foods. Look for 1 Surplus Daves ad in todays paper » SecondFRONT | SUNFLOWER @ Wednesday, March 4, 1992 CALL THE NEWS @General Inquiries 365-7266 OUR HOURS _ The News is located at 197 Columbia Ave. Our statutory holidays. SUB RATES The News is published by Castle News Ltd. for Canwest Publishers Ltd. Mail subscription rate to The News is $40 per year ($44 in communities where School budget a tight one Women @ District No. 9 will have to learn to get by with less as government issues funds Glen Freeman NEWS REPORTER It’s going to be a tough year for Castlegar schools. Education Minister Anita Ha- gen announced budget totals for each B.C. school district last Wednesday. Castlegar’s School District No. 9 will receive a 2.34 per cent in- crease in funding, just short of the 2.4 per cent provincial average. “We certainly were expecting a few more per cent than that,” said School Board No. 9 Treasurer John Dascher. “Our enrollment is up and we felt we deserved more.” But the provincial-government insists the budget is fair. “It is a long, complex process to decide who gets what,” said Min- istry of Education spokesman Bill Stavdal. “Our process is fair, but it seems that there’s never enough money to go around.” The process may be fair, but it certainly isn’t comforting. “You bet I’m upset,” said Dasch- er. ! : “It won't be possible to maintain all the services and programs which we currently have in place. There will be cutbacks.” Dascher added that Castlegar’s school board must now decide what will happen to the $13,890,220 budget. “We'll mull it over for the next two weeks or so, and figure out what we can do,” said Dascher. “The last thing we want to dois affect staff, but it remains to be seen which way the board wants to go. “We may have a surplus from the 1991-92 budget,” said Dascher, “so that may come in handy.” School Board Chairman Gor- don Turner agrees. “Every little bit will help,” he said, “because it looks like it is go- ing to be a very tight year.” Turner also suggested that the new budget did not reflect actual costs which School District No. 9. would face in the upcoming year. “We recently negotiated a con- tract with CUPE which gave sup- port.staff a healthy increase, but the government doesn’t take things like that into considera- tion,” said Turner. However, Turner is optimistic. “Qn the positive side, inflation is down, so the cost of paper and supplies will level out,” he said. “That might free up money for other areas.” The new school budget takes ef- fect July 1, and runs through to June 30 of next year. accused of arson Glen Freeman NEWS REPORTER Two nude females were taken into custody by Grand Forks RCMP Sunday. Mary Braun, 71, and TinaJma- eff, 67, allegedly removed their clothes, doused them in a flamma- ble material before tossing them at a Grand Forks home. The Grand Forks residents were allegedly found at the scene chanting religious phrases in Russian. Braun and Jmaeff have a previ- ous record of arson charges. The pair were transferred to a Vancou- ver corrections institution Mon- day. JELL-0-ING OUT If their mothers could see them now... A few Selkirk College students had the time of t' Tuesday, mixing it up during Jell-O wrestling competition at Robson's Lion’s Head Pub. News photo by Glen Freeman heir educational lives Home owner John J. Verigin was furious over the incident. “These two ladies have a long history of being firebugs,” Verigin said of the accused. “They are de- ranged and sick. Verigin, chairman of the Grand Forks Union of Spiritual Commu- nities of Christ and a devout Doukhobor, says that the attack may have been religiously moti- vated. “They belong to the Sons of Freedom, so I can’t think of any other reason they did it,” he said. “We forgive others,” said Veri- gin, “but this is a matter of law en- forcement. Somebody is going to get hurt one of these days.” Asenior member of Castlegar’s Doukhobor community agrees. “These ladies can’t call them- selves Doukhobors, or evens Sons of Freedom,” said the man who asked that his name not be men- tioned for fear of reprisals. “Doukhobors are against vio- lence and destruction, and I know that Sons of Freedom are good peo- ple. These ladies are just arsons.” Revitalization program re-examined li Committee meets to decide what lies ahead for Castlegar’s long-awaited downtown revitalization project Scott David Harrison EDITOR Transport Minister Art Charbonneau may have turned Castlegar’s revitalization dream into a nightmare. The lofty project, which would see Castlegar’s downtown core receive a facelift within three years, is being re-examined by the very people who are promoting it. Prompted by news that the Castlegar- Robson bridge won't be on line by 1993, the 10-person Castlegar Revitalization Committee met today at 8:30 a.m. to discuss-the fate of $4.95 million plan. “It’s a bit disappointing,” committee chairman Jack ' Parkin said of Charbonneau’s decision. “We expected (the bridge promise) to be carried through. I still hope it will.” Parkin said Charbonneau’s decision has left the committee wondering what steps to take. He said the minister’s words have thrown a wrench into project financing and the entire project itself. Castlegar’s revitalization plan got a much-needed boost on Jan. 21 when it received a $3.3 million loan from the province. That money, though, could be in question, depending on what the committee decides at its strategy session. According to the loan agreement, the $3.3 million would be spread over three phases, starting with $1.27 million for 1992-93. However, the first phase of the money must be used by July. “We’re in a real bind,” Parkin said Tuesday. “Either we use it or lose it.” Parkin said the committe will consider phasing in-the revitalization work, starting with some areas now and others when the $23.5 million bridge is up and operational. “The committee has been working on this project for two years and this is the furthest we have ever got on revitalization for Castlegar,” Parkin said. “We have to decide what we are going to do now that the build is on hold. Whether .we go ahead as planned or do it in parts.” The uncertainty of a bridge has left some merchants concerned about how to proceed, or whether to proceed. “We've been getting mixed reaction from downtown merchants,” Parkin said. “A lot of them are concerned because they don’t know if they can afford the extra taxation of revitalization without the bridge.” CAPSS ak aa ce A