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APRIL 17, 2012 Vol. 117, Issue 74
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Smokie scores scholarship Page 10
INCLUDING H.S.T.
PROUDLY SERVING THE COMMUNITIES OF
ROSSLAND, WARFIELD, TRAIL, MONTROSE, FRUITVALE & SALM SALMO
A BELLY GOOD TIME
Teachers to vote on plan of action in face of Bill 22 BY TIMOTHY SCHAFER Times Staff
TIMOTHY SCHAFER PHOTO
Isis, left, and Nebula belly danced for a good cause on Monday inside the Ferraro Foods foyer to raise awareness of the Flash Mob they have planned for May 12 (International Belly Dance Day) in Trail. The two, along with the rest of the Soul Fire Dance troupe, will be in the city that day to fundraise for the women’s shelter. People can donate ahead of time by emailing bstang7@hotmail.com.
AKBLG CONVENTION
Bright idea produces green benefits BY TIMOTHY SCHAFER Times Staff
There aren’t many people who would argue with saving 93 per cent on their electricity bill. A proposed plan to cut power usage to city street lights down to seven per cent will be unveiled this week as a summit of another sort sits when the top political minds of the Kootenay-Boundary region convene in Trail. Under the umbrella of the Association of KootenayBoundary Local Governments convention that begins
Thursday, the West Kootenay Climate Leadership Summit (WKCLS) will gather and mull over their latest green idea: LED street lighting. Although the City of Castlegar came up with the LED lighting idea, and they have implemented it in one of their subdivisions, Trail councilor Gord DeRosa said the Silver City is still toying with the idea — and considering the payoff. He said light emitting diodes are 13 times cheaper than fluorescent lighting. A lighting experiment this sum-
mer with the mural on the Cominco Arena wall could drop a $1,200 power bill in 2011 to around $84 this year. “That’s the sort of savings you have with LED,” he said. “But it’s a matter of estimating how far technology is going to take you and where is your best bang for your buck.” The nature of LED street lightning is still very new technology, said DeRosa. Although Trail has a green first philosophy — one that saved 45 per cent of the heating and cooling costs at the Aquatic Centre — he felt the
city would wait and see what results Castlegar uncovered. The summit this week will go a long way towards building a case for instituting wide spread LED street lighting, and will build on what has been an ongoing roundtable discussion of what communities should do to reduce carbon emissions. The WKCLS is group of 13 mayors, councilors and regional district directors from across the West Kootenay that have been bandying about ideas on a number of green topics.
This week will be the testing ground for whether the province’s back-to-work legislation has sufficiently cowed teachers across the province. Members of the B.C. Teachers’ Federation — including over 250 Kootenay Columbia Teachers Union (KCTU) members — will be voting today and Wednesday on their action plan in response to the province passing Bill 22, legislating them back to work late last month. Although the tenets of the teacher’s action plan are confidential and remain in committee, they will be made public on the day the voting results are tabulated, said KCTU representative Andy Davidoff. “I really don’t know which way it is going to go,” he said about the vote. “I guess we’ll see what the membership will decide to do and then it will get interesting after that.” Some information is available online on what possible strategy the teachers are considering, including stopping all voluntary activities, holding a vote on a province wide strike and working to defeat the Liberals in the May 2013 provincial election. The strategy includes continuing to teach, but not participate in any BC Ministry of Education
See UNION, Page 3
Report cards due BY TIMES STAFF The Labour Relations Board ruled Monday that teachers must produce report cards from the beginning of the school year when they staged a limited strike. The B.C. Public School Employers Association had applied to the Labour Relations Board for a decision on report cards, arguing teachers should write two missed report cards so parents know about their children’s progress. Teachers were legislated to resume full duties last month. “We are not doing retroactive reporting because that is struck work in our opinion,” said Davidoff prior to the Monday ruling.
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