DUAL DONATIONS
OLALLA CITIZEN’S GROUP
MEXICAN HOLIDAY
Meeting gives rise to Friends of Olalla See page 8
Local farm help has their own celebration See page 3
Food bank receives much needed support See page 13
E H T www.keremeosreview.com PM Agreement #40012521
Vol.15 Number 38
Thursday, September 20, 2012
Serving the communities of Keremeos, Cawston, Okanagan Falls and Kaleden
$1.15 including HST
Ducks Unlimited partner to restore valley habitat Contributed
Photo by Steve Arstad
The Blackbirds had patrons dancing on the tables on September 15 at the 11th annual Sizzlefest in Memorial Park. This year’s version took place under ideal late summer conditions, with hundreds turning out to witness or participate in the hot stuff going on.
British Columbia communities bid to host the BC Winter and BC Summer Games Penticton asks for RDOS endorsement By Steve Arstad news@keremeosreview. com Bids to host the BC Winter or BC Summer Games in 2016 or 2018 have been received from seven communities including Abbotsford, Coquitlam, Cowichan
Valley, Kamloops, Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows, North Vancouver, and Penticton. The communities of Abbotsford, Kamloops, and Penticton bid for the 2016 and 2018 BC Winter Games. Bids for the 2016 BC Summer Games came from Abbotsford, Cowichan Valley, Coquitlam, and Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows. The same communities also bid for the 2018 BC Summer Games along with North
Vancouver. Communities provided detailed facility information, resolutions of support from school boards and municipalities, and event hosting plans. The BC Games Society will review and score the bids with a recommendation to be presented to the Minister of Community, Sport and Cultural Development, Bill Bennett. Only one of the four BC Games will be awarded to
a particular community for this bid process. At the September 8 regular meeting of the Regional District Okanagan Similkameen Board of Directors, a motion endorsing Penticton’s bid for the Winter Games was passed. Penticton held the winter games last in 1994. A legacy for the city from those games was a new track for athletic activities at Penticton High School.
Ducks Unlimited Canada (DUC) and the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) are proud to announce the start of an extensive restoration project on 162 acres of critical wetland habitat in the Okanagan Valley. The initiative will restore historical natural oxbows and streamside habitat throughout the Osoyoos Oxbows floodplain located at the north end of Osoyoos Lake. The conservation property, which includes Bobolink Meadows, was purchased by DUC and NCC in 2002 with the intention to eventually restore its natural wetland and floodplain areas. Past land uses have changed the biological functioning of this property, a phenomenon familiar across much of the South Okanagan Valley. Floodplains and bottomlands, riparian areas and adjacent uplands continue to be compromised by urban expansion and
agriculture. ”Restoring the oxbows was always a key objective of conserving this property,” says Barb Pryce, NCC’s southern interior program manager. “Reclaiming its natural systems, while also supporting those native species that have found a niche in the fields, will greatly enhance the conservation value of this internationally significant land.” The lands comprise a mosaic of habitat types that supports a diversity of species, such as mallard, wood duck, hooded merganser, yellow-breasted chat, long-billed curlew, great basin spadefoot toad, tiger salamander and the bobolink. This restoration project was made possible by the generous support of the Habitat Stewardship Program, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the BC Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, and Gord Lindsay of Barefoot Beach Resort in Penticton.