Opinion Value chair of Anything Land Reserve. p6
Powering way to national science fair. p12
THE NEWS
Homes Harden home with new technology. p31
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Overseas arrest linked to Amanda Todd case Defence lawyer confirms charges are related by M on i sh a M ar ti n s staff reporter
Colleen Flanagan/THE NEWS
Easter celebration Mary Fulton (left) and Patricia Langton of the Royal Sweethearts don colourful Easter bonnets as they look at pictures during an Easter gathering of the group at ABC Restaurant on Wednesday. Each month the group hosts a different outing. It has been together since 2005.
Dutch police have arrested a 35-year-old man believed to be behind to the extortion of Amanda Todd, a 15-year-old girl who took her own life after being blackmailed online and bullied at school. A spokesman for the National Public Prosecutor’s Office in the Netherlands confirmed a man was arrested in January on a series of charges stemming from a “illegal webcam sex investigation.” Spokesman Paul van der Zanden would not confirm that any of the charges relate to Todd’s case, although the man’s lawyer verified the links to Todd via Twitter. See Arrest, p5
‘School cuts going too deep’ Unionized employees ask board to defy Victoria by Ne i l Co r b e t t staff reporter
Education: Wheelhouse program charts different course. See story, p10
School district employees told trustees that the latest round of budget cuts go too deep, urging them to defy the provincial government and resist solutions to erase a funding shortfall. Angry teachers, school secretaries and other CUPE members
spent about two and a half hours detailing the ways that budget cuts are going to hurt the school system Wednesday at Maple Ridge secondary. The district offered the opportunity for public input on the $129 million proposed budget for 2014-2015, before it is considered for final adoption at the end of the month. The board faces a shortfall of $5 million, and its cuts include 23 full-time equivalent CUPE positions, and about 20 FTE positions in the B.C. teachers’ union.
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Many of the 28 presenters spoke about how cuts to school secretary positions will compromise school safety. Heather Upton-Brown said secretaries deal with children whose parents fail to pick them up after school, guardians who show up at school intoxicated, and other “shocking stories.” She noted that in the proposed budget, “not one excluded management position was cut.” “Those are very important jobs, but not more important than the person who receives the call from
the RCMP, to put a school into lockdown. “Cuts should be across the board, not to just one employee group,” she added. Wendy Hyslop, the administrative coordinator at Garibaldi secondary, said receptionists are key to a school’s safety. They monitor strangers who would otherwise be “free to wander the school.” They are aware of child custody issues and non-contact orders. “They are the very eyes and ears of the school,” she said. See Cuts, p14
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