11 Under fire
midweek edition WEDNESDAY, JUNE 16, 2010 Vol. 101 No. 48 • Established 1908 • East
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Beyond Bollywood
Ode to chickens
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GM Place general manager wants another shot at UFC Fight night crowd relatively well behaved Mike Howell Staff writer
UFC promoters hope to bring fighters such as heavyweight Pat Barry back to Vancouver.
photo Dan Toulgoet
The promoter of the soldout mixed martial arts event at GM Place Saturday night wants to return for another show, according to the general manager of arena operations for Canucks Sports and Entertainment. Harvey Jones said he is working with the Las Vegas-based Ultimate Fighting Championship to schedule another night of fights before city council’s two-year trial of the sport expires at the end of 2011. “We need to sit down with them now and talk about some dates and when they might want to do that,” said Jones, noting he initially had reservations about hosting Saturday’s bouts. But after meeting with UFC organizers and talk-
ing to operations managers of arenas where the popular sport was held, Jones said he felt more confident about hosting what was dubbed UFC 115. “I was a little skeptical but [the UFC and operations managers] said that generally people are fairly well behaved. They come to watch the event and they don’t cause a lot of trouble. And that was pretty much what we experienced.” Jones said the number of incidents with fans Saturday night was consistent with security staff’s dealings with spectators from recent Nickelback and Tom Petty concerts. Most of the incidents involved people attempting to smuggle booze into GM Place. Many people were smoking in the bathrooms, too, Jones added. See ATHLETIC on page 4
School board, province differ over budget shortfall number Board chair wonders if ‘we’ve been set up’ by province Naoibh O’Connor Staff writer
A dispute about the school district’s actual funding shortfall could spark trouble for trustees when they submit a draft balanced budget to the minister of education this week. The school board insists it faces a $17.23 million shortfall for its 2010/11 budget despite a sugges-
tion in the special adviser’s report that its actual shortfall is $11.79 million. Last Friday, Education Minister Margaret MacDiarmid issued a ministerial order directive requiring the board to submit a draft budget by June 18, which takes “full consideration” of the adviser’s recommendations. But the difference between the two shortfall figures puts the board in an untenable position, according
to trustees. If they adopt a budget based on the $17.23 figure—the district’s most recent revised shortfall—the minister could accuse them of not following the directive and potentially fire the board. But if trustees pass a budget based on the adviser’s $11.79 million figure, they put the district in financial peril next year. “There is some question whether we’ve been set up a little bit
with this—we’re damned if we do, we’re damned if we don’t,” board chair Patti Bacchus told the Courier Tuesday morning. “If we go with the conservative number, will the minister come back and say our budget is unnecessarily provocatively cutting things? But if we do it with their numbers, we’re ignoring staff advice and we think we’ll get ourselves into trouble.” Senior VSB finance staff ex-
plained at a committee meeting Monday night that the main financial conflict revolves around what’s called the “restricted surplus.” Comptroller general Cheryl Wenezenki-Yolland, the special adviser, suggests the board apply its estimated “restricted surplus” for the 2009/2010 school year to help offset the 2010/11 projected budget shortfall. See ADVISER on page 4
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