Red Deer 1913 — 2013 Create Celebrate Commemorate
SPRING IN FULL SWING
BATTLE OF ALBERTA Edmonton wins 4-1 B4
Local greenhouses making preparations B1
CENTRAL ALBERTA’S DAILY NEWSPAPER
BREAKING NEWS ONLINE AT WWW.REDDEERADVOCATE.COM
WHAT THE HECK IS THAT?
TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 2013
PDD cuts a disgraceful ‘shell game’: Swann BY SUSAN ZIELINSKI ADVOCATE STAFF The province has cut roughly $45 million in funding for Persons with Developmental Disabilities living in the community just weeks after announcing plans to close Michener Centre. “I just can’t believe they’d come out and do that cut right now. It’s like you’re already bleeding and they now they want you to hemorrhage,” said Bill Lough, president of Society of Parents and Friends of Michener Services, on Monday. The society is fighting the plan to move 75 of Michener Centre’s 125 residents to community group homes, and 50 medically fragile residents to seniors care facilities by next January. Opponents argue Michener is the only home residents know and the high level of care can’t be equalled outside the centre. Up until now, families believed remaining residents, whose average age is 60, would be allowed to stay at Michener until they died based on a 2008 report that recommended consolidating all operations at Michener’s south site. David Swann, Alberta Liberal human services critic, said in a press release that he was appalled by the cut to funding that is distributed to care agencies for Persons with Developmental Disabilities (PDD). Liberals say it means possible staff shortages and a reduction in services. “The government has hidden these cuts in the budget by promising increased wages for those who work with PDD, but Community Access Support programs in Calgary alone are left with a $16 million hole to fill. Because of the complex nature of this year’s budget, a lot of the agencies couldn’t tell how severe the cuts were until they crunched the numbers themselves,” Swann said.
Please see CUTS on Page A2
Lacombe resident feeling ‘defeated’ in fight against huge water bill BY MYLES FISH ADVOCATE STAFF
Photo by RANDY FIEDLER/Advocate staff
A motorist stopped at the Ross Street and 41st Avenue lights watches a costume-clad Johannes Vandenakker Monday. Calling the elaborate rig his Spirit of My Inner Self, Vandenakker spent nearly two hours at the intersection delighting and confounding passersby. “I felt like doing it for a week now,” he said. “Let’s call it spring fever.”
RECYCLE
INDEX
Sun and cloud. High 9. Low -3.
Four sections Alberta . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A3 Business. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C3,C4 Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A5,A6 Classified . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . D1-D3 Comics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . D5 Entertainment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . C5 Sports. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . B4-B6
FORECAST ON A2
Please see BILL on Page A2
CANADA
LOCAL
OTTAWA RECONSIDERS SMOG STILL TOXIC SITE PRIORITIES CHOKING CITY Cleanup costs at a single northern mine next to Great Slave Lake are ballooning so high they are forcing Ottawa to rethink plans for thousands of contaminated sites across the country. A5
Smog continues to diminish air quality in Red Deer. The smog is due to inversion layers, which develop overnight when a layer of cold air becomes trapped under a layer of warm air. C1
45391D3
PLEASE
WEATHER
Brookes Wallace did not get the mid-winter blues and install and fill a swimming pool at the halfduplex she owns — but she is facing a water bill suggesting she did something of the sort. The Lacombe resident could not believe her eyes a few weeks ago when her monthly water bill showed her owing $1,028, a 12-fold increase on the average charge of the residence where her two tenants live. The bill corresponded with the 364 cubic metres of water that apparently passed through the residence’s water meter in February. At first incredulous, Wallace is now exasperated that she cannot find a sympathetic ear.