A report released recently by Evidence for Democracy shows that resource capacity and scientific independence are the most pressing scientific integrity issues within the BC government. "Evidence-based decision-making" has become the mantra of governments, but without good evidence, it's a difficult promise to deliver. Without...

The federal government recently created two marine protected areas in the Pacific region and has committed to increase ocean protection from one per cent to 10 by 2020. But will this be enough? Canada has the longest coastline of any nation, but our country doesn’t end at its ocean shores. With a 200-nautical-mile economic ...

What poses the greatest hazard to BC's endangered Southern Mountain Caribou -- habitat loss, wolves, or corporate donors?  Or are all three of those factors linked, and if so, how? This opinion piece is from DeSmog Canada.  Read and contemplate. The B.C. government is granting logging permits in critical caribou...

Over the past month I have visited most of the RCMP detachments in South Okanagan-West Kootenay.  While the conversations covered some of the obvious law and order issues such as marijuana legalization, rising levels of property crime and staffing levels for highway patrol, I was surprised that one issue dominated most of my...

Chocoholics:  Is it possible to know enough about chocolate? What do we need to know, except that it tastes wonderful?  Worldwatch Institute writer Gaelle Gourmelon discusses chocolate's history and the social and ecological impacts of the way it is grown, and how all of us chocoholics can help to improve matters...

If you own a smartphone, you have more computing power at your fingertips than NASA scientists had when they put people on the moon in 1969! And it’s in a small device, unlike the massive hardware the space agency used. Technology moves in leaps and bounds. As someone who grew up before home computers, transoceanic phone...

Rossland's City Council held its regularly scheduled meeting at 6:00 pm on Monday, March 27, with Mayor Kathy Moore and Councillors Lloyd McLellan, John  Greene, Andy Morel, Marten Kruysse, and Andrew Zwicker present.  Only Aaron  Cosbey was unable to attend. The gallery produced no opinions for the Public Input Period, so ...

Senator Lynn Beyak's complaint that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) "didn't focus on the good" done by Canada's residential schools has provoked calls for her resignation, and some people wonder how she is qualified to sit on the Senate's Aboriginal Peoples Committee. For any who have not yet read the letter of...

We recently highlighted the faulty logic of a pseudoscientific argument against addressing climate change: the proposition that because CO2 is necessary for plants, increasing emissions is good for the planet and the life it supports. Those who read, write or talk regularly about climate change and ecology are familiar with...

Rejoice, Rosslanders! Rossland will receive a sprinkling of money from the federal and provincial governments to help with the Spokane Street infrastructure replacement project.  This will help keep our taxes from rising faster and further, and it will make our water supply more secure, and keep us from spending a lot of money...