Editorial: Some news about cannabis, findings about dispensaries, and a surprise about psilocybin
First, the cannabis news: as readers of the "Council Matters" column already know, the provincial government is seeking input from municipal governments to help guide provincial policy on the decriminalization of cannabis. The federal government is preparing to pass Bill C-45 and Bill C-46. There are questions to be...
Energy Crawl -- October 21
The Sustainability Commission’s annual Energy Crawl takes place this Saturday October 21st between noon and 4:00 pm. Rosslanders are invited to visit Energy Crawl homes or drop by Energy Crawl Headquarters (Rossland Public Library) and take in the electric car show. Homeowners and vehicle owners will give you a brief tour,...
Column: time to talk about universal pharmacare
Universal pharmacare is a hot topic on Parliament Hill these days. The concept is simple—a single program that would ensure that all Canadians had free access to prescription drugs. Canada is the only country in the world with universal health care that doesn’t include the cost of drugs in its coverage. And that doesn’t...
COLUMN: Time to nix neonics.
The Canadian government is banning plastic microbeads in toiletries. Although designed to clean us, they’re polluting the environment, putting the health of fish, wildlife and people at risk. Manufacturers and consumers ushered plastic microbeads into the marketplace, but when we learned of their dangers, we moved to phase ...
Short term rental rules, knotweed bylaw, a paramedic for Rossland, National Championships here in March
Public Hearing: 6:00 pm, Tuesday, October 10, 2017 Present: Mayor Kathy Moore, and Councillors Lloyd McLellan, Marten Kruysse, John Greene, Aaron Cosbey, Andy Morel, and Andrew Zwicker. This Public Hearing was scheduled to receive public input on the following draft bylaws: a) Business Licence Bylaw No. 2326, 2017, and...
Can Southern Mountain Caribou Recover? See This Film.
BC's southern-most herd of mountain caribou is now so tiny that it can barely be called a "herd." What's been happening to them? Bryce Comer's avocation is film-making, and he has been working on a film documenting the southern herd of mountain caribou since 2008. Comer explained that while their...
Editorial: Bill C-365 is a time-wasting distraction
Conservative Member of Parliament Mel Arnold wants to make theft of firefighting equipment, which theft causes "actual danger to life," a specific Criminal Code offense with a maximum penalty of imprisonment for life. That's the same maximum penalty as mischief causing actual danger to life. Anyone who was evacuated from...
COLUMN: The other reasons for rising ICBC rates -- what we weren't told
The Insurance Corporation of British Columbia which was, only a decade ago, a financially sound crown corporation, is on the ropes today. What happened? The information ICBC offers on its “Rate Pressures” web page speaks of “significant external pressures on ICBC’s insurance rates”. From 2014 to 2016 the number of crashes...
Letters: Discarded bags of dog poop proliferating near trails
We have been increasingly distressed by the many, many bags of dog feces neatly bagged and thrown on the mining school road and on out the trails and presumably all over Rossland. The bears are hungry now and dog feces are rich in nutrients, and ugly as this photo is, people need to know that they are threatening the ...
COLUMN: Finance committee chair Wayne Easter defends the privileged, undermines modest tax reforms
What is it about progressive politicians going to Ottawa only to end up as arrogant and nasty conservatives? My old friend Pam Wallin was one of the kindest people I knew in Regina in the 1970s when she was a member of the Waffle group in the NDP. She turned into one of the nastiest Conservative senators. And the last encounter...
