Vol. 41, No. 88 Bellevity, Feb, 29 60 Cents astleg AY - ~ CASTLEGAR, BRITISH ar News COLUMBIA, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1988 and precipitation is 70 per cent both days. Outlook for the weekend is for continued clouds and showers Mainly cloudy Thursday and Friday with @ few show: 8. Highs 10-12 C 46. Chence of 3 Sections (A, B&C) Six vie ay] DOREEN SMECHER enters race By RON NORMAN Editor There will be at least two new faces on Castlegar council following the Nov, 19 municipal election. For the first time in 12 years, Len Embree will not be on council. The veteran alderman has decided not to seek re-election. Embree, who is now living in Oasis, was unavailable for comment. . Ald. Bob MacBain had earlier announced that he will not defend his seat. That leaves Ald. Patti Richards as the only incumbent among the six candidates vying for the three vacant aldrmanic positions on council. However, at least two of the candidates competing for the council seats are not unknown to Castlegar voters. Marilyn Mathieson served on council several years ago and topped the polls in one election. However, she resigned her position when her husband was transferred to the Lower Mainland. The Mathiesons have since moved back to Castlegar. As well, longtime school trustee Doreen Smecher is making the jump into city politics. Smecher has served on the Castlegar school board for nine years. “I've been encouraged for a number of years to run,” Smecher told the Castlegar News. She said she has enjoyed her stint on the school board, and says she is running for council because “I have a number of questions I'd like some answers to.” Smecher says she isn't “unhappy” with council’s performance, but wonders why, for instance, the movie Roxanne was filmed in Nelson and not in Castlegar, and why small, clean manufacturers always “stop short of the Kootenays.” Smecher says she's “excited” about the municipal election, but adds that she feels it will be overshadowed by the Nov. 21 federal election. “It's going to be an awkward campaign to run.” Smecher has not resigned her position on the school board, and John Dascher, the school district secretary. treasurer, says there is no reason she can't hold both a council and school board position NT for council seat “She can hold two separate positions at the same time,” Dascher said, adding later: “It may be a first for Castlegar, that I can recall.” The other three candidates running for council are Dan Shields, a toolroom attendant; Robert Branning, a lockkeeper; and Joe Irving, a musician, The two city school trustee positions were filled by acclamation. Incumbents Gordon Turner, the present board chairman, and Mickey Kinakin were the only two who filed nomination papers. Kinakin is a maintenance worker who lives in Thrums, while Turner is a college instructor. The only race.in the school district will be in Area J where Bill Hadil is challenging incumbent Rick Pongracz. Hadikin, an engineering assistant and an Ootischenia resident, ran in the city several years ago, but was defeated. Pongracz, who recently moved into the city, is a plumber continued on page A2 LEN EMBREE not running Mulroney to visit riding By CasNews Staff Prime Minister Brian Mulroney will visit Castlegar and Trail tomor. row Kootenay West-Revelstoke Conservative incumbent Bob Brisco announced today Mulroney -will arrive at the €astlegar Airport at 1t-a.m. He will leave immediately for Trail where he will make a quick tour of Cominco's new lead smelter modernization. After a short speech in downtown Trail, Mulroney will meet supporters at the Fireside Motor Inn Banquet room shortly after 1 p.m Mila Mulroney will also be in town She will visit the Children's Development Centre in Tadanae and then join the prime minister at the Fireside. The Mulroneys leave for Edmonton that afternoon Meanwhile, the Liberal candidate in Kootenay West-Revelstoke has challenged Mulroney to debate the free-trade agreement “The voters of Kootenay West continued on page A2 INSIDE Rebels winners page BI Lottery numbers The following are winning numbers in Monday's lottery The Pick 6, 9, 17, 26, 41, 42, 48 and 51. Castlegar buzzing page A2 Hospital expansion page A4 Pulp mills can avoid dioxins By ALLAN SWIFT Canadian Press MONTREAL Scientists at the Pulp and Paper Research Institute of Canada say preliminary results in dicate that it’s possible to eliminate toxie dioxin and furan compounds that find their way into paper products in the milling process. “It's a triumph for the industry as a whole, “Institute president Peter Wrist told a news conference Tues day Laboratory conducted by chemical scientists Corrinne Luthe and Ron Voss have shown that by controlling the amount and type of chiorine used in bleaching pulp, “it is possible to avoid the formation of dioxins and furans.” The highly toxic chemical com pounds form in paper in trace quan tities when chlorine bleach is used by tests operations and succeeded in signi ficantly reducing their levels of dio xins and furans. In most cases, new equipment will be required to eliminate the dioxins, at a cost of up to $10 million per plant, and will take from 12 to 18 months. Environment Canada says labora tory animals exposed to dioxins suffer from birth defects, tumors and an impaired immune system but there is no conclusive link between human exposure to dioxins and long term effects such as cancer Trace amounts of dioxins became associated with the operations-ofthe pulp and paper industry following a study by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency The Canadian Pulp and Paper Association executive met a year ago other organochlorines into the rivers and sea Strachan said there was “no ques. tion we are dealing with very toxic substances. But he said the province will wait for more federal studies and noted the industry is already taking steps to reduce the use of chlorine, the bleaching chemical that creates or ganochlorines “Industry is taking the lead and knows this is a major problem,” the environment minister said continued on page A2 GIANT HELICOPTER . . . Can Arc, a company based out of Langley has been contracted to lift 450 cubic metres of bug infested white pine out of the Blueberry Creek Watershed area. Local pilot Bob Wiebe is flying the helicopter which is the size of a greyhound bus and lifts the logs on 50-metre cables Brisco releases spending figures By BONNE MORGAN Staff Writer Bob Brisco, the Conservative in cumbent for Kootenay West Revel stoke out claims about federal spending in this riding are accurate. Brisco takes credit for an influx of more than $120 million in federal funds into Kootenay West over the last four years. He handed reporters an itemized 11 page document to back his claims at a press conference today Brisco also claims former New Democrat MP Lyle Kristiansen gen: erated only $9.8 million during his set to prove today his term in Ottawa from 1980-84. Brisco said he got that figure from one of Kristiansen's 1984 campaign brochur Brisco was responding to chall enges from Kristiansen and Liberal candidate Garry Jenkins that his figures may be misleading “I want to just the figures straight,” said Brisco. “It's not as though we fabricated the figures at all,” added, pointing to the brochure and spending list Brisco refuted Kristiansen’s claims that he has taken credit for projects continued on poge A2 set manufacturers to turn pulp and paper white. The toxins have been found in milk absorbed from cardboard cartons, and in products such as disposable diapers, tissue paper, towels and coffee filters. Non-white papers such as news print are not affected Wrist said some of the 47 pulp mills in Canada that use the chlorine bleaching process have changed their Wrist said only one to dioxins released cinerators. Meanwhile. and decided to act Wrist said his industry contributes two into ment from all sources automobile exhausts or municipal in BC Minister Bruce Strachan has rejected a plea for regulations to stop B.C pulp mills from dumping dioxins and immediately, By CasNews Staff Charges against a forme’ Castlegar teacher were stayed i Nelson provincial court Friday. James Gordon Hemmons, 57, was charged with sexual assa’ and indecent assault. The charges against the reti Kinnaird elementary school teach- er stemmed from alleged incident in 1980 and 1986. of the environ less than per cent the Environment ELECTION HERE WILL BE CLOSE By BRENDAN NAGLE Staff Writer There is only one sure thing about the Nov. 21 federal election in the Kootenay West-Revelstoke riding — it will be extremely difficult to predict a winner. According to an Elections Canada riding profile, Kootenay West Progressive Conservative incum bent Bob Brisco would have won the 1984 election by a narrow 95-vote margin if the electoral boundaries were the same as today's. Brisco captured the 1984 election by 744 votes in the old Kootenay West riding 1986. He beat then NDP MP Lyle Kristiansen in one of the closest decisions in the country But the decision could be even closer this time, since Revelstoke voters cast 392 more votes — 2,022 to 1,630 — for the NDP in the last election, That block of votes from Revelstoke will now affect the outcome of the battle between Brisco, Kristiansen, Liberal candidate Garry Jenkins and Green party candidate Michael Brown. The addition of Revelstoke makes the riding one of the largest in the province at 29,942 square kilometres and gives the riding one more urban centre for a total of five with more than 2,000 residents — Revelstoke, Trail, Rossland,. Castlegar and Nelson. But the addition does not change the economic face of the riding which relies mainly on a resource. based economy. The forests, mines and supplemen tary processing facilities that go with those resources are the mainstay of the riding’s economy before it was redistributed to include Revelstoke in, Sawmills, pulp mills, a smelter and mines dot the constituency which has suffered unemployment rates as high as 22 per cent in the last four years. last four years. Of the estimated 65,000 people in the Kootenay West Revelstoke riding, approximately 42,300 will be eligible to vote in this election. The voters represent a broad range of economic and social backgrounds. Mill workers, small business owners, miners, loggers and big business executives will all be scrutinizing the political parties and candidates to find one who will best represent their interests What are those interests? What key issue will decide the winner? “The main issue overall which will cause the voters to switch (from Conservative to NDP) is the free-trade issue,” said NDP candidate Kristiansen. He said voters in this constituency are concerned with the Canada-U.S. trade agreement and its effect on the economy in the riding. He believes his party's vehement opposition to the deal will win votes from electors who voted for the Mulroney government in 1984 “I'm sure that’s going to be the major consideration of the Conservative voters who will vote NDP this time,” he said. “There appears to be a significant number But Bob Brisco scoffs ai the suggestion people will vote against the Conservative party in this riding because of the free-trade issue. Instead he says his track record in the last four years will win him votes. ‘I think I've established a good track record,” he said. “I don't try and kid the troops at all.” He said he has followed through on his “shopping list” of priorities in the riding over the iast four years — including the Castlegar Airport expansion and the $500,000-marine survey of the Arrow Lakes — and has prepared another list for the next four years. “L have a shopping list,” he said. “As far as I'm concerned it's my duty to fill it.” Liberal candidate Garry Jenkins Jean Turnbull was the Liberal candidate in 1984 when the Liberal party was more than 9,000 votes behind both Brisco and Kristiansen makes it clear as to what the central issue in the riding is. “I think the key issue is the Mulroney trade deal,” he said. “There are people who voted continued on poge A2