FRIDAY DEC 20 2013 VOL. 40, NO. 29
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Teddies for Christmas
The performance test
The Cube
The Museum and Archives’ most huggable exhibit to date
Taekwondo students demonstrate skill and courage
The story behind the biggest sculpture in the Cove
Communty initiatives can improve air quality
Bowen needs status as a “rural” community
MERIBETH DEEN
We may have a population of well under 4 thousand people, and we may not have any stoplights, but because Bowen Island is technically a part of Metro Vancouver, it is not defined as a rural community. According to Gordon Ganong, chair of the Economic Development Advisory Committee (EDAC), we’ve missed out on many opportunities because of that. “There’s an organization called Community Futures, which exists to promote economic development in rural areas,” says Ganong, “And when we met with people from this organization back in June, they told us we weren’t even on their radar.” Fortunately, Damien Bryan, a Bowen resident who is taking a regional economic development course at SFU helped to forge a relationship between Bowen and Community Futures, inviting his classmate Sharon Anderchuk to give a talk to local businesses here. “Sharon works with Community Futures in Sechelt,” says Bryan, “And from the perspective of the Sunshine Coast, we are definitely rural, and we qualify to work with Community Futures. If you spoke with someone from the organization in downtown Vancouver you would likely get an entirely different response. Following Anderchuk’s talk, she met with four local business owners who may be eligible for assistance through the program. Ganong points to the Gas Tax as another instance where Bowen suffers because it is a part of Metro Vancouver. In September, the Municipality’s manager of finance, Kirsten Watson, wrote a report showing that funds collected through the Gas Tax on Bowen go straight to Metro Vancouver, whereas other similarly-sized communities get to access the money collected through the tax.
MERIBETH DEEN EDITOR
EDITOR
Here on Bowen, we have less traffic and more trees than in the city, so breathing clean air is one of the straightforward benefits to island-living that we can count on. However Peter Frinton, Bowen’s representative to the Sea to Sky Clean Air Society, says there’s much more we can do locally to ensure the air we breath is free of pollutants. Many Bowen Islanders heat their homes with wood stoves. While this is a relatively cost-effective method of heating, it is also a source of fine-particulate air pollution. “This is the stuff that gets deep into your lungs,” says Frinton, “and it is a straightforward health issue.” According to the Lung Association of Quebec, in nine hours an uncertified wood stove can emit as the same amount of pollutants as a car driving 18 thousand kilometers. The city of Montreal is contemplating a move to ban wood burning outright by 2020. Frinton says that on Bowen, pollution from wood stoves is often visible in certain neighborhoods on days when the air is cold and stagnate. To do his part, Frinton says he’s invested $4 thousand in the past year to bring his stove and chimney up to the highest standards possible, installing new dampers, a new chimney and working to make his home’s boiler more efficient. The BC Woodstove exchange program offers a $250 rebate for the replacement of a non-certified wood stove with a certified one. This rebate is offered through the Bowen IRLY Building Center, but they have only filled out two rebate packages in the past five years. continued, PAGE 8
Lenya Dowler and her horse, Mars, head up to Artisan Square to get a photo with Santa. Meribeth Deen photo
continued, PAGE 6
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