GAZETTE Baby Contest entries, pages 10-13
NORTH ISLAND
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47th Year No. 20 THURS., MAY 16, 2013
www.northislandgazette.com
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Region to go dark for night
Gazette staff All areas of the North Island, from Woss north, will be without power overnight June 15-16 as BC Hydro adds equipment needed to connect
the Cape Scott Wind Farm Independent Power Project. The outage is scheduled to begin at 11 p.m. Saturday, June 15, and last approximately eight hours
until 7 a.m. Sunday, June 16. The electrical interruption is necessary, says BC Hydro, for the safety of its work crews. While the power is down,
additional crews will be put on duty to take advantage of the break to perform system upgrades and repairs at various locations. The public can prepare for outages and stay
informed by visiting bchydro.com/outages or bchydro.com/mobile from your handheld device. Additional information is available by calling 1-888-POWERON.
• CANOE RENEW
School district hosts rededication ceremony, rides in craft. Page 14
• NISS STRIKES
Port McNeill girls turn home advantage into provincial berth. Page 15
Above, a ballot is placed into a box at Port Hardy Civic Centre during Tuesday’s provincial election. At right, a voter enters the Civic Centre to cast a ballot. J.R. Rardon
Trevena poised to retain office • SIGNING OFF
Hyde Creek station makes change from Esso to Petro Canada. Midweek, inside LETTERS Page 7 NORTH ISLAND LIFE Page 14 SPORTS Page 15 CLASSIFIEDS Page 20-22
Gazette staff B.C.’s New Democratic Party asked citizens of the province to vote for change. But in the first hour after polls closed Tuesday night in the provincial general election, the electoral map was looking much the same as it had before the 2013 election writ dropped. Final preliminary vote counts were not complete when the Gazette went to press Tuesday night. But with more than a third of the North Island’s ballots reported, MLA Claire Trevena was leading Liberal challenger Nick Facey comfortably in her bid for a third straight term.
At the same time, she seemed destined for a continued role in opposition as the Liberal party grabbed the early lead in legislative seats province-wide. For final preliminary vote totals and election updates, visit www. northislandgazette.com. With 52 of 153 ballot boxes counted, Trevena held a commanding lead over Facey, 2,6721,975 (53.2-39.3 per cent). At that time, news outlets were projecting the Liberals for 29 seats to 23 for the NDP, with the rest undecided. As the first of the North Island’s ballot boxes were counted, Facey jumped to the early
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lead, 49 per cent to Treven’s 42, with Conservative candidate Bob Bray collecting the remainder of the votes. As ballots continued to trickle in the gap closed, until the two were running neck-and-neck, at one point separated by just seven votes with more than 1,500 counted. That matched the party race between the Liberals and the NDP, with 12 members of each party confirmed as elected within an hour of the polls closing. The North Island District, made up of much of the Comox Valley and communities to the north, has 40,514 registered voters. Of those, more than 10 per
cent (4,652) took advantage of advance polling in their local communities. Final voting results will not be available until conclusion of the final count, which commences May 27. Prior to Tuesday’s general election, Student Vote B.C. polled elementary and secondary school students throughout the province. In the entire North Island district, Trevena claimed a fourpoint win over Liberal challenger Nick Facey. But the lone school on the far North Island to take part, Eagle View Elementary in Port Hardy, chose Facey by a 51-46 margin.
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