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Red Deer Advocate WEDNESDAY, DEC. 23, 2015
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All they want for Christmas is a home
Owner shaken, defiant after break-in BY LANA MICHELIN ADVOCATE STAFF
Photo by ASHLI BARRETT/Advocate staff
Miss Daisy, front, and Kena are two of four dogs rescued from Milk River still up for adoption at the Red Deer and District SPCA. As of Christmas Eve, the dogs — two bonded pairs — will have been up for adoption for a full year. BY CRYSTAL RHYNO ADVOCATE STAFF Only five remain. It will be exactly one year on Dec. 24 when the Red Deer and District SPCA took in 40 dogs of the 76 dogs cared for in Central Alberta as part of the efforts to bring back-to-health the 201 dogs rescued from a Milk River-area property. The shocking case was one of the worse cases of animal neglect in the province. Seventy-one of the dogs cared for at the Red Deer and District SPCA, Klassic Kennels and Alberta Animal
Services have found permanent places to call home. Two large bonded pairs are still seeking homes – Kena and Miss Daizy, two Huskies, and Burke and Britz, two Wolfhound crosses. Amy Corpe, SPCA Animal Care manager, is hoping for a Christmas miracle. “All month we have been trying to get them a home for Christmas,” said Corpe. “I have received a tremendous amount of emails but no one concrete has followed through or come down to meet them.” Part of the adoption criteria includes no small children and the dogs must be adopted in pairs. Corpe said
the pairs will be a handful of work and the two dogs may not necessarily work with a family with small children. Both sets of the dogs have had the most behaviour and medical challenges. Copre said they are great dogs who are a little timid because they never had a normal puppyhood. She said both pairs have shown a lot of progress in the year that they have been at the SPCA. “We would consider separating them but they are so bonded,” said Corpe. “For their own sanity and mental health it is in their best interest to keep them together.”
Please see DOGS on Page A2
Jill Mitchell defiantly reopened her Parkland Beach general store after a weekend break-in left her front door smashed and her emotions shattered. “When I’d calmed down, I thought, they can’t do this to me. They can’t do this to my community,” said Mitchell. “They are not going to make me so fearful that I’m not going to open my doors.” The merchant in the summer village on the north side of Gull Lake, was rudely awakened at 4 a.m. Sunday by the shrill sound of the security alarm. At first Mitchell, who lives with her husband, Robert, in a residence attached to the store, thought it was set off by accident. “I thought maybe a Christmas decoration had fallen …” But in the few minutes it took the couple to enter the retail establishment, a thief — or thieves — had already made off with alcohol and cigarettes after smashing though one of the glass front doors. Another door had what looked like a bullet hole in it — although police did not find a bullet. “To say we’re shaken to the core is an understatement,” said Mitchell, who’s operated the general store in the quiet community for eight years without a previous break-in. To have it happen a week before Christmas was particularly unsettling, said Mitchell.
Please see BREAK-IN on Page A2
2015 Christmas Light Tour spans city A second 2015 Christmas Light Tour has been designed for Red Deer. Last week, the Kinette and Kinsmen clubs’ Christmas Light Tour was offered to seniors. It drew some of its route from one previously designed by a former city bus driver Jim Elliott. Elliott had been designing a Christmas light tour in the city for many years and in the past has hired city buses to take special needs children on the route.
WEATHER 60% flurries. High -13. Low -18.
FORECAST ON A2
Jim, who has worked for the City of Red Deer for 38 years, drove a Red Deer Transit bus for 25 years until a few years ago. His son, A.J. Elliott, 14, was the main course designer this year. A.J. knows the city inside out, said Jim. A lot more has been added to the 2015 tour, which now takes light travellers downtown, to both north and south sides of the city, and also out to the Parkland Nurseries and Garden Centre just east of Red Deer.
Please see LIGHT TOUR on Page A2
INDEX Four sections Alberta . . . . . . . . . . . . A3 Business . . . . . . . B1-B3 Canada . . . . . . . . A5, C2 Classified . . . . . . D1-D2 Comics . . . . . . . . . . . . D4 Entertainment . . .C7-C8 Sports . . . . . . . . . B4-B6
Photo by ASHLI BARRETT/Advocate staff
Cartoon characters and a Christmas-themed ferris wheel adorn the front of a house on Farrell Ave. Displays like the one pictured above are part of the 2015 Christmas Lights Tour.
White Christmas for Red Deer What’s Red Deer got that Calgary, Edmonton, Victoria, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal and Halifax don’t? Snow!
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Story on PAGE C1
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