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Coal proposal fires up teen activists BY JENNIFER THUNCHER REPORTER editorial@royalcityrecord.com
New Westminster Secondary’s Fiana Liu and Grace Ji are only 17 years old, but they are already seasoned activists. The Grade 11 students are on a mission to stop the proposed $15-million Fraser Surrey Docks coal transfer facility because of concerns that coal dust will impact New Westminster. The girls worked with the Dogwood Initiative last year and gathered approximately 400 signatures for the environmental group’s Beyond Coal campaign. Now they have paired with Kids for Climate Action and are planning a Ride for Our Future in August. They will rally support from youth in New Westminster and surrounding communities over the summer and then ride their bicycles to Victoria to meet with MLAs and present them with a petition opposing the Fraser Surrey Docks expansion. The girls were previously involved in a No Tankers campaign, opposing Enbridge’s proposed increase in tankers carrying oil off the B.C. coast, but when they learned about the Fraser Surrey Docks proposal, which would mean one more train and two more cargo ships travelling through New Westminster each day, they switched gears. For both girls, the dock proposal hits very close to home. Liu can see the Fraser ◗Coal Page 8
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Coal opposition: New Westminster Secondary School students and activists Grace Ji, left, and Fiana Liu oppose the $15-million Fraser Surrey Docks coal transfer facility for health, environmental and economic reasons.
Dropping picket line causes rift between leaders CUPE president upset NWTU allowed picket line to come down BY NIKI HOPE REPORTER
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While relations are fractured between the teachers and the provincial government, two labour allies are having a dispute of their own. The president of the local Canadian
Union of Public Employees is “disappointed” the New Westminster Teachers’ Union allowed picket lines to come down Thursday at the New Westminster school district’s Columbia Square headquarters to allow two CUPE members to enter the building to help with staffing and payroll for next year. “I’m very unhappy and very disappointed in the NWTU and the fact that they would allow that to happen after we’ve been out here for the last two weeks supporting them 100 per cent, after our union is paying $2 million in strike pay
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since last Monday. … I have a real hard time with that happening,” CUPE Local 409 president Marcel Marsolais told The Record. CUPE members received $15 a day for the first 10 days of the strike, then the amount rose to $75 a day. Marsolais estimated CUPE members have lost about two weeks’ pay as a result of the teachers’ strike. New Westminster Teachers’ Union president Grant Osborne said the union OK’d closing down the picket line at Columbia Square because they want to get the staff-
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ing dealt with for the fall. “We have the CUPE people who are working on some staffing, so that building is not locked out today,” he said. “It’s something that we’ve been working on in terms of making sure staffing can happen, and that has been the development. … We’ve been wanting staffing to happen, so yes, we’ve obviously OK’d that.” But Marsolais said exempt staff should be looking after the staffing during the strike. “I don’t know why it couldn’t wait ◗Rift Page 8
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