February 4, 2021 Vol. 20, No. 05
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Community Foundation Grant Helps North Frontenac Little Theatre Adapt by Jeff Green ometimes the worst timing can be the best timing. North Frontenac Little Theatre (NFLT) has been going through a very public split with its long-standing partner, the Limestone District School Board. The Little Theatre was founded by teachers from local schools. Most of the names on playbills from NFLT productions in the 1980's and 1990's, and into the new millennium, are filled with names of teachers and administrators with the Limestone Board and its predecessor, the Frontenac Board of Education. Actors, directors, and executive members alike, worked at the school board. The home of the NFLT was Sharbot Lake High School, and when it came time to build a new school, the relationship between the new school and the NFLT was front and centre when Board officials came to public meetings with parents and Central Frontenac Township. That relationship has soured since Granite Ridge Education Centre opened its doors in 2014, mainly because of board policy towards community use and user fees that were charged to NFLT. The split became final when NFLT removed its lights from Granite Ridge just under a year ago. NFLT made a deal with Central Frontenac to use the OSO Hall in Sharbot Lake for its future productions. They were hoping to start putting up plays in 2020. Of course, a few weeks after the lights were removed, on February 19, 2020, plans for live productions went on hold when COVID-19 restrictions were imposed. The hall has remained closed ever since. But the closure has given the township of Central Frontenac and the Little Theatre a chance to work improving the hall, for the theatre productions and other uses. The ceiling has been removed, and insulation and a new, higher ceiling are being installed. At the same time, the NFLT lights are going in. But putting in the lights is not cheap, because it requires a new electrical panel, and dozens of outlets
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North Frontenac Litttle Theatre's Jeff Simon presents a cheque to Central Frontenac Mayor Frances Smith.
and a lot of wiring need to be put in as well. “This caused a problem for us because we have no productions running, and therefore no revenue, and we do not have the reserves to cover those costs,” said NFLT President Jeff Siamon. So the NFLT applied for funding from a source they have gone to in the past, the Community Foundation for Kingston and Area. With Central Frontenac Township providing support, as a partner in the application, a $14,500 grant was awarded to help NFLT settle into the OSO Hall. Last Thursday (January 28), a cheque was presented to Central Frontenac Mayor Frances Smith, to cover electrical and other costs associated with the NFLT use of the Hall. “Of course, we don't know when productions will start up, likely not in 2021, but we are working with the town-
ship to make sure we have a good, intimate space for 50-100 spectators,” said Siamon. The hall has a very small stage, so the possibility of purchasing risers to extend the stage, a sound system, and perhaps even small, fold up bleachers, are all being considered for the future. “For now, we are happy to get the lights in, and the fact that the township was already working on the ceiling made it an ideal time for that. I don't know how we would have done with the Community Foundation funding, however,” said Siamon. “We are looking forward to a long, steady relationship with NFLT,” said Mayor Frances Smith, “and for them to bring the lights and the funding to install them, with them, for the use of the township and everyone who uses the hall, is a benefit for Central Frontenac.”■
'The Past Matters', & There Is Such A Thing As 'Too Late' – Dr. John Smol On Climate Change by Jeff Green he 350 Kingston, ‘Turning the Tide on Climate’ Speaker Series, presented a Zoom talk by Queen's Professor, Dr. John Smol, on Monday Night (February 1). Dr. Smol is a paleo-limnologist. He studies the sediment at the bottom of lakes, to learn about the past. He is the Canada Research Chair in Environmental Change at Queen’s University. He founded and co-directs the Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Lab (PEARL), where students and other scientists study long-term global impacts of climatic change, acidification, eutrophication, contaminant transport, and other environmental stressors. “As for climate, no one can deny something strange is happening, but some people say it always changes. And we don't have very much direct evidence of the past to settle that question,” he said. The best direct record we have is of temperature, because of Dr.'s Farenheit and Celsius, but that record only goes back to 1700,” he told those who were gathered virtually in front of their devices, across the region. He said that while radiocarbon dating can provide information going back thousands of years, it does not work
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for the last 100 or 150 years. He briefly explained how the sediment record provides information about the more recent past. “The overall idea is very straightforward. Lakes simply fill with mud. All day long, from outside the lake, and from within the lake. It is like a history book, slowly layered down at the bottom of the lake. Most lakes have 4 metres of sediment, collecting their history going back 12,000 years to when they were created by the last Ice Age. The Last few hundred years is collected in the top 50 centimetres. We section the sediment, removing a 1/4 centimetre at a time, and analyze the contents. In that mud, is a library of information, contaminants like mercury, lead, and cadmium; insecticides, and pollen grains. Everything living in a lake is leaving some sort of fossil, and we can reconstruct what was there. We do that all the time.” The information that has been gathered from the sediment record in lakes in the Far North, on the Canadian Shield and elsewhere, demonstrates that climate change is an issue that overwhelms all other environmental problems”. Dr. Smol has been conducting studies in the Far North
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