COLUMN: From the Hill -- the new trade agreement
After months of negotiations and a seemingly endless series of false deadlines, negotiators have hammered out a new trade agreement between Canada, the USA and Mexico. The new agreement (called the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA for short) will create winners and losers, of course, and the general consensus...
COLUMN: Observations of Chaos from my Watchtower
“All along the watchtower…There's too much confusion, the hour is getting late... Bob Dylan “Here we are in the years… Children cry in fear, ‘let us out of here.’” Neil Young By Charles Jeanes So much food for thought, and limited space on the plate...
BC Court of Appeal grants injunction against drilling in Fish Lake area
The BC Court of Appeal has granted an interlocutory injunction against a drilling permit within the sacred sites of Teẑtan Biny (Fish Lake) and surrounding areas. On August 23, 2018, the B.C. Supreme Court upheld a permit authorizing Taseko Mines Limited (TML) to undertake an extensive drilling program at Teẑtan Biny and ...
Gold seekers are flooding into the Yukon and wreaking havoc on its rivers
By Jimmy Thompson; republished from The Narwhal Digging and scraping their way along river beds, a growing gold rush of placer miners is disturbing the territory of the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in First Nation — all under the rules of a bygone era that leave both Indigenous and colonial governments out of ...
Column: Disposable Culture
My parents married during the Great Depression. After the 1929 market collapse, people had to learn to make do, help each other out and live on meager incomes. Those times were seared into my parents’ attitudes and values. Although we were all born and raised in Canada, my family was seen as the enemy during the Second World...
Electric vehicles for the Kootenays
accelerateKootenays was in Rossland on for Golden City Days with their fully electric Chevrolet Bolt. They answered questions about electric vehicles at their booth at the Fall Fair and then allowed curious Rosslanders to take the Bolt for a test drive. accelerate Kootenays is Canada’s first community-driven, collaborative...
UPDATED report on local sulphuric acid spills
Teck Trail Operations sells sulphuric acid to International Raw Materials Ltd. (IRM), which contracts with a transportation provider to transport the acid. Sulphuric acid is used in numerous applications including pulp mills, mining, water treatment and for fertilizer production. Two incidents involving spills of sulphuric ...
Column: From the Hill -- Court Ruling on KM Pipeline; an Emergency Meeting
Last Tuesday I was in Ottawa for an emergency meeting of the Standing Committee on Natural Resources in the wake of the Federal Court of Appeal decision that quashed the federal government’s approval of the Trans Mountain Expansion project. The court quashed the approval based on two errors—the lack of consideration of marine...
Column: Constituents' concerns
On Sunday I completed my third annual “Ride the Riding” event, cycling 411 kilometres from Naramata to Nakusp. The ride provides an opportunity to meet and talk with constituents on the trail or at scheduled stops in cafes and restaurants in communities throughout the riding, celebrates the beautiful cycling trails we have ...
Op/Ed: BC's Timid Response to Climate Change -- and Twelve Solutions
I wish I didn’t have to write this. I count myself a friend of the NDP/Green Alliance, and I had high hopes for the government’s new climate action plans. [1] BC’s Ministry of Environment has published a series of Clean Growth Intentions Papers, with a deadline for public feedback of August 24th, in the heart of this fire and...
