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Castlégar News

PAGE A4, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17, 1991

MEMBER OF THE B.C. PRESS COUNCIL

ESTABLISHED AUGUST 7, 1947 TWICE WEEKLY MAY 4, 1980
THE MIO-WEEK 12, 1976-AUGUST 27, 1980

LV. CAMPBELL — PUBLISHER, AUGUST 7, 1947-FEBRUARY 15, 1973

PUBLISHER — Burt Campbell

EDITOR — Simon Birch
PLANT FOREMAN — Peter Harvey
ADVERTISING MANAGER — Wayne Stolz
OFFICE MANAGER — Warren Chernoft

EDITORIAL

Health should be
top priority

The Washington state Department of Health’s opinion that the
health hazard from dioxin is much less than previously estimated
should be treated as just that — an opinion.

The department’s new analysis, reported Sunday by the
Associated Press, calculates that people can be safely exposed to
13,000 times more of the chemical than the U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency says is safe.

Despite the Washington state Health Department’s assertion, it’s
obvious the jury is still out on the danger of dioxin and the EPA,
along with the Washington state Department of Ecology — which
regulates pulp mills in that state — said they will stick to stiff controls
they have proposed.

Erring on the side of caution is the sensible position to take when
there’s doubt, or difference of opinion, about potential dangers to
human health. .

There’s agreement dioxin is a toxic substance. What's debated is
the level at which it poses a risk to humans. That’s why former
premier Bill Vander Zalm’s decision not to impose tougher
regulations on the amount of organochlorines — which include dioxin
— pulp mills are allowed to discharge is so wrong.

He said — and it’s a familiar refrain — that tougher regulations
would cost the pulp industry millions of dollars, as if that’s a fair
tradeoff for gambling on people’s health.

Wait for the results of studies being conducted at B.C. univer-
sities, the former premier urged.

Indeed, the studies may back up the Washington Health Depar-
tment’s opinion that dioxin isn’t as dangerous as previously believed.
Then again, the studies may indicate the chemical is more dangerous
than thought.

The problem is, there’s likely to be debate about the dangers of
dioxin for many years.

Therefore, it makes sense from the point of view of protecting
people’s health to go with stricter controls right now, even if we have
to pay more for the products of our pulp industry to help it offset the
costs of meeting tougher regulations.

VIEWPOINT

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Choice questioned

Regarding the Selkirk College student housing
proposal and selection of a contractor, I have the
following questions and comments on the items I

am aware of.

William Berg Construction Ltd.'s price was
$303,000 less than Advanced Building Systems of
Kelowna and had four more resident rooms. Our

rooms were approximately 16 square feet

Our price per unit is $16,894 compared with

Advanced’s price of $20,600.

We carried $12,000 more for paving and
$10,000 more for landscaping. Our three-
design indicates more efficient heating and less

roof to maintain.

Our building is designed by an architectural
firm that is experienced in these types of structures
and has proviced a design similar to that of the

extended care wing at Castlegar Hospital

frame with stucco and a concrete overlay on wood
structure floors fully safe and sound resistant.

‘We had proposed a completion date

September 1991 versus Advanced’s date of

Update liked

I finished reading your March 30 issue a few
minutes ago and was, a3 always, very impressed
with the quality and appearance of your
newspaper.

But the West Kootenay Update 91 section of
the paper was above your normal standards of
excellence! I have visited your area many times
but now want to come back yet again.

Hats off to the Castlegar News for a job well

ne.

larger.

Timothy Hunt
Executive Director fi
The Festival at Sandpoint (Idaho)

Fair enjoyed

Pliny, an ancient Greek historian once said,
‘originality is simply a pair of fresh eyes.””

This particular definition of ‘‘originality’’ was
on display last Thursday afternoon in the Kinnaird
Junior secondary school gymnasium. And those
of people lucky enough to attend the Socials Fair
would be quick to add such expletives as

storey

— wood

January 1992. (More

Our proposal would provide more local people

with work.

» y effort
‘and learning, to describe the wide array of visual
and interactive display projects created by Grade 6

There was only one regret to this year’s
Socials Fair — such a tremendous display of
effort and creativity deserves to be seen by all of
Castlegar.

Barb Rainville
Castlegar

Something smells

I just don’t understand it. Former premier
Bill Vander Zalm jumps into the outhouse and
Iris Bakken still smells roses.
Skip Fraser
Robson

Please address ail letters to the editor
to: Letters to the Editor, Castlegar News,
P.O. Box 3007, Castlegar, B.C. VIN 3H4,
or deliver them to our office at 197
Columbia Ave. in Castlegar.

Letters should be typewritten, double-
spaced and not longer than 300 words.

Letters MUST be signed and include
the writer's first and last names, address
and a telephone number at which the
writer can be reached between 9 a.m. and

30 water
systems
fall below
standard

By CasNews Staff

Central Kootenay Health Unit's
medical health officer has advised
users of 30 community water systems
to boil their drinking water because
contamination exceeds. health stan-
dards.

Dr. Nelson Ames issued the ad-
visory after the health unit received
results of its.annual assessment of
water quality in 137 major com-
munity water systems.

The same advisory went out to 11
community water systems last year
following tests in 1989,

Receiving the warning in the
Castlegar area were users of water
systems in the Crescent Valley New
Settlement, Deer Park, Glade,
Krestova, Poupore, South Slocan
and the Village of Slocan.

People in those areas are advised
to boil water used for drinking for
three to five minutes because of total
coliform and fecal coliform bacteria.

Positive results of total coliform
tests indicate pollution from human,
animal, soil or vegetable sources.
The presence of fecal coliform bac-
teria indicate recent contamination
from the intestinal tract of humans
or animals. _

Water syStems in Robson-Rasp-
berry and Blueberry Creek did not
consistently meet health standards
but water users in those areas were
not advised to boil their drinking
water.

In a letter to the Robson-Rasp-
berry and Blueberry Creek irrigation
districts, Ames said distribution
systems should be flushed at least
twice a year or more to improve
water quality.

Water systems in Castlegar,
Brilliant, Slocan Park and
Ootischenia all got clean bills of
health from the Central Kootenay
Health Unit.

The health unit found water
quality at public beaches in the West
Kootenay to be clean with the excep-
tion of the picnic area at Syringa
Creek Park which had more than
double the acceptable level of fecal
coliform.

By the Recycle Advisory Group

Styrofoam. It's actually
Polystyrene foam. It's made from
benzene (a known carcinogen)
converted to styrene and then in-
jected with gases that make it a
“foam’’ product.

The gases often used are
chloroflourocarbons (CFCs)
which are known to-damage the
earth’s ozone layer, An alter-
native to CFCs is HCFCs, which
still cause damage to the ozone
layer, although at a lesser rate.
Others are pentane and butane,
which both contribute to urban
smog. Therefore non-CFC foam
merely trades one kind of en-
vironmental problem for another.

Polystyrene foam is totally
non-biodegradable — it just
won't go away. Even 500 years
from now, the foam cup you
used for your morning coffee
could still be buried in the
Ootischenia dump in virtually the
same condition as it is today.

Because of its very structure —
containing large amounts of air
+ all styrofoam, no matter how
it is made, takes up a lot of space
for its weight. This means. it

wastes a lot of valuable space at
our community landfill,

So what can we do? The best
option is to avoid using
styrofoam altogether. If you
don’t buy styrofoam products
there won’t be as much demand
to manufacture them. Rather
than buying eggs packaged in
styrofoam cartons, select the
Paper cartons.

If you eat at fast food
restaurants, ask for paper plates
and cups so they know you don’t
care for styrofoam. Avoid buying
coffee or other drinks which
come in styrofoam cups. Ask for
paper or other recyclable con-
tainers instead.

Bring a bunch of old ceramic
or glass mugs to your place of
work so nobody, not even
visitors, has to use styrofoam
cups. Tell your. butcher you'd
prefer not to buy meat that is
packaged in styrofoam trays and
ask for alternatives.

Every individual who refuses to
use styrofoam will help make the
situation a bit better. If you
refuse to use it and explain to
those around you why you refuse
to use it, then soon the situation
will become contagious, with all
of us benefitting from a better
environment. There is no such
thing as an environmentally safe
polystyrene foam.

CASTLEAIRD PLAZA

every $25.00 in groceries pu
get of these products at
get!
ot mck with

$25.00
THE MORE YOU BUY, THE MORE YOU SAVE!

Ven's

party
sticks

tmpertete ae. 4
= 199|=
& 8. pkg. el
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Writer combi

Canadian ‘writer Sid Marty is
coming to the Castlegar Library on
April 21 at 7:30 p.m.

He’s a poet, singer-songwriter and
environmentalist. His career as a
park warden in Banff National Park
inspired his acclaimed book Men for
the Mountains, a prose account of
his experience that won two national
book awards and has been widely
published internationally. His second
mountain book, A Grand and
Fabulous Notion, is a beautiful
docunientary of Canada’s National
Parks and a plea for their continued
survival,

Poems from his books Headwaters
and Nobody Danced with . Miss
Rodeo have been included~in many
textbooks and literary collections, in-
cluding the Oxford Book of
Canadian Verse.

Marty likes to present what he
calls a ‘‘Literary Cafe’’ show, com-
bining the performance of poetry,

Annual General Meeting

nes talents in show

Ce i
Costiogan Ubeoey. m

Stories and original songs. His en-
vironmental songs, brimful with sen-
sational imagery inspired by the
beauty of Southern Alberta, are
available on tape. He’s also heard
weekly on Alberta CBC’s Wild Rose
Country. His Castlegar visit is the

ALVA

Sid Marty

Sunday at the

first stop of his National Book
Festival tour of the West Kootenay.

His performances are co-
sponsored by the Canada Council
and the libraries involved. The events
are free and should have wide ap-
peal.

TUPRE..

Johnston running
out of time

By GERARD YOUNG

VICTORIA — British Columbia
voters have little time to decide
whether Premier Rita Johnston is
giving them a new look Social Credit
government or just recycling the one
they’ve had for 41% years.

Johnston, who took over after
conflict of interest forced
predecessor Bill Vander Zalm from
office in disgrace, has just months to
get her shell-shocked government
back on track and: erase memories of
scandal from voters’ minds.

An election, aborted by scandal
several times in the last year, must be
called by fall.

Johnston, once among Vander
Zalm’s staunchest supporters, took
one step toward distancing herself
from the former premier when she
apologized to British Columbians for
his abuse of the office.

On Monday, Canada’s first female
premier took another step —
bringing in her own, leaner cabinet
and new policy that clearly is a
change of direction from the Vander
Zalm days.

**I do not believe that the people
of B.C. are expecting, as a result of
recent changes, their government
structure to be turned inside out and
frankly there is no need to do so,”
Johnston sai

“*However, in
changes and
required.’”

Among other things, Johnston an-
nounced several policy reviews, in-
cluding one on recommendations of
the recently completed and con-
troversial royal commission on
education.

She has also frozen most provin-
cial loans, grants and subsidies pen-
ding a review and put greater em-
phasis on family and women’s
Programs. .

“*She’s putting out new priorities

my view, some
fine tuning are

University of Victoria political scien-
tist.
There appears to be less emphasis

on Vander Zalm economic polity~

and more on social issues, he said.
She'll get voters’ attention, Ruff
said, but whether she can deliver in a
short time is another question.
Johnston also is banking on her
fresh-look cabinet and promising «

RITA JOHNSTON
+++ ‘fine tuning required’

strict code of ethics to govern their
behavior.

Under Vander Zalm, seven cabinet
ministers resigned amid scandal and
several returned after a period of
Penance. With Johnston’s changes,
only one remains.

Her new cabinet features two
backbenchers who walked out of
caucus for several months over Van-
der Zalm’s leadership.

Social Credit governments have
run the province for all but three
years since 1952.

The NDP, which was poised to
form the next government with Van-
der Zalm at the helm, shrugs off
Johnston’s changes as cosmetic.

Opposition Leader Mike Harcourt
said the cabinet isn’t so fresh because
she had very little to choose from
with almost everyone in caucus
having gone through cabinet.

Ruff, however, thinks there are
some mixed messages in the cabinet
shuffle and policy redirection that
may be difficult for voters to sort
out particularly in the short time
available.

*s a mixed report card,” he

Gerard Young writes for The
‘Canadian Press.

I question why the college chose Advanced’s
proposal. I feel that the college should review its
selection of a proposal and offer sound reasoning
to justify the extra $300,000 being spent for a
smaller and apparently less-feasible package than

we have presented.

William J. Berg“

President

William Berg Construction Ltd.
Castlegar

and 7 students.

5 p.m. The writer's name and city or town

offer explanations.

by the social studi iti of

department at KJSS, the fair is an annual event
involving cooperation among various school
departments, educators, parents and students.

Perhaps the most enjoyable feature of each
Project was the interactive aspect, which meant
that the student-creator-of each project attended
his or her particular work to answer questions and

in exceptional
published without the writer's name.
Nevertheless,
telephone number of the writer MUST be
disclosed to the editor.

The Castlegar News reserves the right
to edit letters for brevity, clarity, legality,
grammar and taste.

only will be published. Only
cases will letters be

the name, address and

Illegal logging hard to track

By ANDY TOMEC
Vernon News

VERNON (CP) — The culprits
had already. abandoned the area
more than a month before a local
rancher happened on the scene.

What he found was a virtual
moonscape of barren and churned-
up ground, littered with hastily
hacked brushwood dnd stumps.

In the spring of 1990, nearly five
hectares of fir trees — an area
equivalent to 10 football fields —
was stripped clear from the site on
the northwest side of Okanagan
Lake.

Forests Ministry officials in Ver-
non say it was the largest illegal
logging operation in the area in
memory.

Operating in broad daylight with
heavy equipment that included
bulldozers and logging trucks, three
or four log poachers took away a
forest of almost 1,000 trees.

The incident is one in a growing
number of illegal logging cases, says
Ken Belik, Vernon district forest

manager.

He estimates an average of 12
similar illegal logging incidents —
most smaller in scale — occur each
year within the 830,000-hectare Ver-
non forest district.

Even more common are cases,
equally illegal, in which legitimate
logging companies stray beyond theit
appointed cutting boundaries, he
said.

Trespass logging of one kind or
another in his district last year ac-
counted for about 5,000 metres of
timber, or 150 truckloads, Belik said.

It’s difficult to keep track of
illegal logging, said Cpl. Mac Mcln-
tosh, who heads the RCMP’s four-
member log theft squad based in
Vancouver.

“But my estimate would be that
about $20 million is bilked from tax-
Payers in one way or another every
year by illegal logging,” he said.

“Not too long ago I told that
number to somebody in the industry,
and he said, ‘No, that figure’s low —
try $50 million.’ ”*

Last month, a stand of 15 cedar
trees more than 500 years old was
removed by poachers from an area
south of Monashee Provincial Park.

The estimated take for the cedar,
turned into roofing shakes, was a
mere $5,000. But the ancient forest
— slated to become an old-growth
reserve — may take until the 25th
century to regenerate to its former
state.

Culprits are difficult to find,
McIntosh said, because the majority
of incidents are discovered weeks or
months after the initial cut.

Cases are also difficult to prove,
because evidence is very quickly
disposed of by processing the trees
into lumber or cedar shakes, he said.

Provincewide, a half-dozen cases
might make it to court in a given
year, usually on charges of theft,
mischief, or fraud.

Not everyone in the forest industry
is dishonest, McIntosh said.

“But scamming a little here and
there is part of a status quo that’s

‘ “~<
David Peerla, coordinator of
Greenpeace’s National Forests Cam-
paign, says what's needed is better
monitoring and enforcement.

been a tradition in B.C. since loggi
began.

Vernon’s huge forest area is
policed by only six forest officers,
whose duties include site inspection
and issuing permits, he said.

Staff levels in the Forests Ministry
have dropped in the last decade to
3,400 employees from a high of
6,400, Peerla said.

“*At a time when the level of cut-
ting in the province is increasing,
there are less and less people direc-
ting the cutting.””

But Belik said no amount of ad-
ditional monitoring will stop the
problem.

“It’s a law of diminishing returns
— like catching speeders,’’ he said.

“The police know it’s occurring,
but to stop it completely you're
going to have to put a police car on
every corner.””

Ottawa angry at trade challenge

WASHINGTON (CP) — Panels
set up under the Canada-U.S. free-
trade agreement were absolutely,
positively to have the final word on a
variety of trade disputes. Most of the
time.

They were to be unquestionably
the court of last resort. Unless you
wanted to make a big deal out of it.

The United States has decided to
make a big deal out of it.

With Monday’s appointment of
three retired judges to review a pork

ruling, an y

tee — two Canadians and one
American — is expected to rule
within 30 days on whether a panel
went way off base in a decision that
led to the cancellation of a counter-
vailing duty on U.S. imports of
Canadian pork.

In studies, speeches and glossy
brochures produced since the
agreement went into effect in
January 1989, the emphasis has
always been on the binding powers
of the U.S.-Canadian panels.

But appeals

challenge’ has begun that Ottawa
says could undermine the agreement,
not to-mention one of the key selling
points to a Canadian public not
taken with free trade so far.

The binational challenge commit-

despite
to President .George Bush from
Prime Minister Brian Mulroney,
went ahead with the challenge under
congressional pressure from pork-

‘states.
The consequences to Canadian

jobs and industry of opening the
border to more U.S. goods and in-
vestment remain a subject of heated
debate. But the pact’s dispute-
settlement mechanism has been more
widely recognized as an immediate

gain.
What so galls Ottawa is that

recently.

All the squawking from Ottawa
sounds a bit much to Peter Morici,
director of Canadian studies at the
University of Maine who's writing
his second book on Canada-U.S.
free-trade.

“If the United States is clearly

linkage — the that
sees the administration give
something to Congress to get support
for something else — could come
back to haunt trade regulation.

on this... then
the panel of retired judges will just
throw it out," he said.

The challenge provision was even
narrower than a World Bank
on which it was based.

Using the chal to sway
congressional votes for the
of « trade deal with

Mexico or something entirely

The bank's procedure for settling
international investment disputes
allows challenges when the ruling
body fundamentally departs from
Procedure or manifestly exceeds its
authority.

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1:00 p.m., Ootischenia Hall

April 27, 1991

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TRAIL, FRUITVALE, ROSSLAND
CUSTOMERS CALL 364-0213

.. cut from Canede grade A beet

— PRODUCE —

imported * no. 1 limit | per customer

" np plan drake Ibs
fresh vest 5 oy a
strawberries *

kg. 1.747%. 7 e)
granny smith 0 GQ
apples we 22/0,

— BAKERY —

fresh

cantaloupes

unsliced 2 49

bread st *
99

— MEAT —

3.89

Inspected pork * Gainers

government
smoked * shankless 9 g
= kg. 2.10/10.

pork picnic
= cae

shoulder
1009. a: o
100 ». a 6 ky

GROCERY

1.29
2.29

4.99
2.98

Advertised prices in effect
Thursday, April 18-Saturday, April 20/91

“WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO LIMIT SALES TO RETAN QUANTITIES.”

french

standing rib
roast

Kellogg's * limit 1, over limit 2.49

corn flakes
cereal

Robin Hood * whole
© Henit 1, over limit 5.69

all purpose
flour

all Hevors * limit 1, over limit 3.98