PM grocery list: milk, butter, eggs, bread... and art. See story, page 5
THE WEDNESDAY
CANADIAN COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER AWARD 2012
TRI-CITY NEWS The power of Riverview
Poetry in photography
SEE PAGE 3
SEE ARTS, PAGE 27
SEPT. 5, 2012 www.tricitynews.com
INSIDE Tom Fletcher/10 Sign Me Up/20 A Good Read/24 Sports/31
30,000+ students head back to school in the Tri-Cities
JANIS WARREN/THE TRI-CITY NEWS
Principal Derek Passaglia (centre) welcomes students and parents back to school at Coquitlam’s Glen elementary Tuesday morning with the help of Grade 5 student Alexander (right). The first day of school is a brief affair as heads are counted in the first hour before staff spend the rest of the day assembling classes. The first full day of classes is today. The first School District 43-wide pro D day is Friday, Sept. 21.
Escalating fines for transit cheats By Jeff Nagel BLACK PRESS
Transit fare evaders will face higher fines down the road if they refuse to pay their tickets for being caught without proof of payment in a fare-paid zone. Last Friday, TransLink unveiled escalating fines that start at the same initial level of $173 but will now climb to $213 after six months and $273 if unpaid after a year. The changes took effect yesterday (Tuesday). see NEW FARE FINES FINES,, page 8
Food bank needs a fill-up Back-to-school means increase in food demand By Sarah Payne THE TRI-CITY NEWS
The Share food bank is down to less than a few weeks’ worth of food, with supplies expected to drop even
lower with the start of school this week. PriceSmar t Foods in Coquitlam is hoping the community will come out to re-stock the shelves through to December with a Food Bank Fill Up on Friday. Donations of cash and/ or food can be dropped of f at the Pinetree Village store (formerly Save-On Foods). Pre-
p a ck a g e d h a m p e r s, priced at $10 and $15, can also be purchased. “It’s a really important event for us,” said Martin Wyant, Share’s CEO. “Like all of the other food banks in the Lower Mainland this year, we’ve all been struggling and we’ve seen our numbers continue to grow.” Share provides relief for at least 900 Tri-
City families every two weeks; of the recipients, 43% are children. Those numbers are nearly 60% higher than they were just four to five years ago, when the economic crash hit, Wyant said. “It’s never levelled off,” he added. “We had a significant bump in that recession and every year since then, it’s just continued to grow, so we
need to lean on the community even more than we have. Every year we’re just trying to keep pace with the demand we’re seeing.” Share is aiming to repeat last year’s successful filling of a semitrailer, which would require about 40,000 pounds of food. see ‘CRUCIAL CRUCIAL TIME’, TIME , page 6