News Editorial Letters Healthwise Drive Time Sports Classified
3 8 10 17 19 34 36
Life imitating art?
Young at art
As Colin Firth, star of The King’s Speech, polishes his Oscar-winning speech, a UBC graduate relives a life laced with a fear of stuttering.
The Children’s Festival of Arts at the Richmond Cultural Centre is a colourful affair, with puppet-making, balloon shaping, clowns and jugglers.
F
YOUR
SOURCE
FOR
LOCAL
R
I
D
A
SPORTS
,
3 Y
02082955
Index
26
,
NEWS
F
,
E
B
R
U
W E AT H E R
A
R
Y
AND
2 5
,
CALL NOW!
23
FREE HOME EVALUATION • Free list of Available & Sold homes • Full details w/photos
604-649-0108
23
www.tonyling.com
2 0 1 1
E N T E RTA I N M E N T
!
WWW
.RICHMOND-NEWS.COM
EDUCATION
Skint district finds $4 million School board surprised by massive budget surplus BY E VE EDMONDS
eedmonds@richmond-news.com
They didn’t win the lottery, but $4 million suddenly appeared in the kitty, anyway. “We were shocked,” said Trustee Donna Sargent, chair of the Board of Education, referring to the school district’s surprise surplus. Mark De Mello, district secretary treasurer presented a report at Monday’s school board meeting outlining where the windfall came from and what can be done with it. Tuition from international students
accounts for half of the total. Because of the recession and concerns about the global economy, district staff had made a conservative forecast for this year’s profits. The total came in $2 million more than predicted. Another $1.5 million came from the provincial government. The report describes that grant as a “one-time operating grant hold-back release from the Ministry of Education.” The final $500,000 came from frugal administrators and district employees who found ways to stretch their dollars. see Sargent page 4
CITY
Warning: Don’t sign that document Councillors nervous about endorsing ‘illegal’ growth strategy
CHUNG CHOW/RICHMOND NEWS
Where’s spring? ... A piece of driftwood has been morphed by a beachcomber into a kind of staff, wedged into the rocks on a frigid Garry Point coastline. Temperatures are set to plummet even further this weekend, threatening record lows for late February, with a few centimetres of snow forecast for Saturday.
$
$ $
$
$
$
Beer, Wine, Pop, Juice, Water
It's worth
RICHMOND BOTTLE DEPOT
it.
=$
The City of Richmond could risk being buried under an avalanche of litigation if it endorses what’s being branded an “illegal” Metro Vancouver plan, according to Coun. Harold Steves. City council was asked this week by city staff to accept and sign off on the proposed Metro Vancouver Regional Growth Strategy — a guide for development across the area until 2040. But some councillors, residents and environmental groups are voicing serious concerns over Metro Vancouver’s urban designation of the Garden City lands, DND lands and Terra Nova Rural Park.). It’s feared that such a designation — which contradicts the provincial Agricultural Land Commission (ALC) — is a prelude to future development of the three parcels of land. And the same groups are also worried that the acceptance of the strategy
may lend weight to the Musqueam Indian Band’s legal action over the city’s $60 million purchase of the Garden City lands. “The document that we’re being asked to sign is an illegal document,” Steves stated at Monday’s meeting. “It clearly contemplates altering the use of the land. We’re opening ourselves up to legal action from environmental groups as we’re clearly being asked to make an illegal decision tonight.” Mayor Malcolm Brodie, who is on the Metro Vancouver board of directors along with Steves, suggested that any legal action sparked by the document would swing in Metro Vancouver’s direction, as opposed to being directed at the city. That view was supported by staff. Terry Crowe, the city’s manager of policy and planning, said that Monday was the “seventh time that council has looked at the strategy” that has already been accepted twice before. see Lawyer page 4
8171 Westminster Hwy. (at Buswell, one block east of No. 3 Rd.) Walkway access also from Save-On Foods parking lot
Mon-Sat 8:45-6:30 Sun 10-5 (604) 780-4959
07283111
BY A LAN CAMPBELL
acampbell@richmond-news.com