GROWN-UP TALES
NARROW WIN Alouette’s mount comeback to down Stamps 33-32 B1
About not-quite-grown-ups D1
CENTRAL ALBERTA’S DAILY NEWSPAPER
BREAKING NEWS ONLINE AT WWW.REDDEERADVOCATE.COM
Visited by a monarch
FRIDAY, JULY 13, 2012
Call grows for review of pipeline safety BY SUSAN ZIELINSKI ADVOCATE STAFF
Photo by RANDY FIEDLER/Advocate staff
A monarch butterfly feeds on a cornflower in a Sylvan Lake garden Wednesday. The beautiful insects have migrated farther north this year from their Mexican wintering grounds than they ever have before. Typically, monarchs make it only as far as the Lethbridge area.
Butterfly migration makes a rare northern appearance BY LAURA TESTER ADVOCATE STAFF Red Deer is aflutter with sightings of monarch butterflies this summer. Residents are reporting to Kerry Wood Nature Centre staff about seeing the butterflies that are known for their orange and black markings. Jim Robertson, Waskasoo Park interpretive program executive director, said he’s aware of sightings as far north as Edmonton. A while ago, the city saw an influx of American painted ladies butterflies. That was a one-year eruption, Robertson said. “In the time since I’ve been in the city from the mid1980s, I don’t remember another outbreak of monarchs like this,” said Robertson. He anticipates the monarchs won’t return in wide numbers next year and that this year is unusual. These butterflies have little of their favourite food staple, the
milkweed. Robertson surmises the monarchs, which normally migrate as far north as Southern Alberta, ended up in Red Deer due to a blast of wind. “One butterfly doesn’t make that entire trip,” said Robertson. “It’s usually three or four generations where one goes part way and dies off.” There are two migratory routes. A large population migrates from Mexico and then finds its summer resting spot in southeastern Canada, northeastern U.S. Another smaller population from California travels north to the B.C. Rockies. “So the ones we have here might have blown in from the mountains or they might have come in from the great plains,” said Robertson. Robertson said the nature centre is also reporting more bird sightings of cedar waxwings and gold finches. “There might be more ravens around than usual,” he said. ltester@reddeeradvocate.com
More than 50 organizations are now calling for Premier Alison Redford to launch an independent, province-wide review of energy pipeline safety. The organizations represent a broad crosssection of Albertans including farmers, landowners, labour, health, First Nations and environmental groups. In May, 3.5 million litres of a mixture of oil and salt water leaked into muskeg near the northern community of Rainbow Lake from a Pace Oil & Gas Ltd. pipeline. In June, up to 450,000 litres of light sour crude leaked from a Plains Midstream Canada pipeline that ruptured beneath the Red Deer River sending oil into Gleniffer Lake. Also in June, 230,000 litres of heavy crude oil spilled from a pumping station on an Enbridge Inc. pipeline onto farmland near Elk Point. Don Bester, president of the Alberta Surface Rights Group, said these major spills have been a wake-up call for Albertans and they have a right to question the safety of pipelines. He said a review can’t wait until the Energy Resources Conservation Board concludes its review into recent spills. “We don’t want to see some major lines to go in under the same regulations. We want some proper regulations that fit the day, especially with the age of some of our pipeline system,” Bester said on Thursday. “We want a report that gives us some real teeth in regulations and real teeth in investigation.” He said oil spills impact the environment and a variety of organizations are concerned — from Nature Alberta to Public Interest Alberta to United Nurses of Alberta — and more are expected to join the call for a review.
Please see PIPELINE on Page A2
Gospel celebration has loyal following Teen found
bound with tape in wooded area
BY JESSICA JONES ADVOCATE STAFF It is an event that they’ve marked on their calendars for the 14 years it has been in Red Deer. Every year Shirley and Bob travel 12 hours from their Penticton, B.C., home to Canada’s Gospel Music Celebration — an annual show that is the second largest of its kind on the continent. Shirley, who declined to give her last name, says they rarely hear good gospel music anymore but do when they come to the three-day event. The Gospel Music Celebration started on Thursday and wraps up on Saturday at Westerner Park. “We have a lot of church friends who come here,” Shirley said, adding that the event acts much like a reunion. After hearing from the couple, Bea Hildebrandt and her husband Bill, from Abbotsford, B.C., decided to take in the show of 21 professional and semi-professional music groups who have come from across Canada and the United States. It is the couple’s second year at the
PLEASE RECYCLE
BY ADVOCATE STAFF
Photo by JESSICA JONES/Advocate staff
Front to back: Shirley and Bob and Bea and Bill Hildebrant. show. “Once you’ve been you’re hooked,” Bea said. She added that a church from Vancouver has also sent close to 40 people to the show, which draws close to 4,000 people per day. This is
WEATHER
INDEX
A few clouds toward evening
Five sections Alberta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A3,A5 Business. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C3,C4 Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A6,A7 Classified . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . E1-E6 Comics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . D4 Entertainment . . . . . . . . . . . D1-D3 Sports. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B1-B8
FORECAST ON A2
fantastic for Lima Taito who leads the group Keepers of the Faith Quartet with his three brothers and cousin.
Please see GOSPEL on Page A2
A 16-year-old boy was found bound and gagged with duct tape in a wooded area in Grandview on Wednesday night after an alleged attempted robbery. Red Deer City RCMP say two Good Samaritans found the teen at about 9:20 p.m. near 41st Avenue and 47th Street. The teen, who is not from Red Deer, said he was picked up near the downtown Mohawk gas station, bound and dropped off in what is believed to be an attempted robbery by three men driving a newer, jacked-up, dark-coloured pickup truck. The boy, with no apparent injuries, was taken to Red Deer Regional Hospital Centre by ambulance. Police are investigating the forcible confinement. Anyone with information about this or any other crime is asked to call Red Deer City RCMP at 403-343-5575, or leave information anonymously through Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS (8477) or online at www.tipsubmit.com.
LOCAL
ADVOCATE VIEW MAGAZINE
HOWSE PASS PROPOSAL ‘RIDICULOUS’
NEXT STAR JUDGES HAVE BEEN THERE
Punching a highway through the Howse Pass is a ridiculous notion that will never come to light, say people who have seen the issue rise and fizzle numerous times before. A3
When this year’s crop of Canadian contestants audition for The Next Star, they’ll have at least two sympathetic faces in front of them.