Observer SALMON ARM
Wednesday July 11, 2012 www.saobserver.net $1.25 HST INCLUDED
Federated selling to Gorman By Martha Wickett OBSERVER STAFF
By those involved, it’s being described as a win-win-win situation. Federated Co-operatives Limited gets to divest itself of its forest products company, Gorman Bros. Lumber Ltd. can enhance its wood supply, and the more than 300 people employed by Federated’s Canoe operation get to keep their jobs and their wages. Although it will likely be another two months at least before the transaction is finalized, Federated Co-operatives Limited has officially announced it has entered into an agreement to sell its Forest Products Division assets and operations at Canoe to Gorman Bros. Lumber Ltd. of Westbank. “It’s an excellent opportunity for both Gorman and FederDarrell ated Cooperatives,” Embley said Darrell Embley, FEDERATED Federated’s vicepresident of forest products, noting that Federated has wanted a buyer who would keep the operation running. “They (Gorman) are great for the community, they’re not in the business of shutting operations down. We’re very, very pleased...” Embley said Federated has been a good employer over time, but the federation doesn’t need to own a forest products company in order to supply forest products to its membership. “It’s probably time to have this operation in the hands of a forest company who understands the business moving forward.” Rick Scott, chief financial officer with Gorman Bros. Lumber, said Federated’s “fibre basket” or selection of timber, as well as its location, matches well with Gorman’s operations in the Okanagan and Revelstoke. See No job changes on page A2
Care concerns: Dina and Bruce Loeb look at a picture of Dina’s late father, who she says was over-medicated to help keep him compliant while he was living at Bastion Place.
By Barb Brouwer OBSERVER STAFF
I
t may be July, but snow is the word that reverberates through Dina Loeb’s head. Her father, Jack Johnson, died in Bastion Place Jan. 12 and Dina and her husband, Bruce, believe his death was, at least in part, a result of “snowing” with the prescription medication Seroquel, or Quetiapine, as it is also known. Snowing is a colloquial term for sedating an individual so they are no longer intrusive or distracting in their behaviour
This week New funding sets Mary Thomas Sanctuary on faster track. See page A8. Enduro-cross racer climbs to the podium at X Games. See page A20.
or the sounds they make. Seroquel is an anti-psychotic drug, whose use has been banned in the U.S. and for which Health Canada issued a risk communication in 2005, advising health care professionals of the risk of giving the drug to elderly patients with dementia and has since required that all manufacturers of anti-psychotic drugs include warnings in their product monographs. Yet Johnson, who was diagnosed with dementia in 2003, was prescribed Seroquel in April 2011. The Loebs maintain Bastion
Place and Interior Health officials have failed to respond adequately to their concerns and believe Johnson was inappropriately and over-medicated. Dissatisfied by answers they have so far received from Bastion Place and Interior Health, the Loebs wrote a letter to the Ministry of Health on April 12 but were referred back to Interior Health. Deborah Smith, residential health services administrator for Interior Health West, says the health authority takes the issue of medication very seriously. “All medications are pre-
scribed by a physician and we have a least-restraint policy,” she says, noting she understood the Loebs were satisfied with what they heard at a family meeting last fall. “We use methods that are the least intrusive and that maintain the dignity of the residents.” Dina describes her father as “the most joyful man you could ever meet,” and says he and her mom Florence moved in with the Loebs in 2010. He had never showed any signs of violence until last spring. See Relatives on page A10
Index Opinion ....................... A6 View Point .................. A7 Life & Times ............... A8 Sports............... A20-A23 Arts & Events ... A24-A27 Time Out................... A28 Vol. 105, No. 28, 52 pages