The lack of foresight our government has can be absolutely staggering sometimes. Our new currency and the application of it to our daily lives is a prime example of how we operate as a country. Force of habit led me to dumping two shiny 2012 toonies into an already overpriced parking meter the other day before realizing I may...

There is a discussion brewing in many of our communities right now about the opportunity to access broadband. If your community is in the Columbia Basin catchment area like my home town of Rossland the conversation is likely taking place for you as well. The Columbia Basin Trusts subsidiary Columbia Basin Broadband Corporation is offering […]

[In response to a letter by Henry Van Der Molen, published in the Rossland Telegraph on 11 June 2011] Dear editor, We note that Mr. Van Der Molen is a contract sprayer with Supergreen Lawn and Tree Care, hardly an impartial by-stander, which explains his support for B.C.'s status quo. I am retired middle-level public servant...

To the editor, I have to say, the article by Ms. Daghofer and Ms. Sears (PhD) (I could not find her name in the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario's researchers list) was an interesting read. Apparently the Special Committee on Cosmetic Pesticides is placing a blind faith in Health Canada's Pest management Regulatory...

It’s just under a year that Search and Rescue volunteer Sheilah Sweatman went out on a “recovery mission” near Nelson, B.C. only to have her life ripped away.This past weekend two more female search and rescue volunteers lost their lives in a “training mission” near Skookumchuck Rapids just outside of Halfmoon Bay, B.C. What...

Anyone who thought Dan Albas’ private member’s bill was going to open the floodgates to cheap cross-border shopping for wine should think again. When Albas’s Bill C-311 is finally passed, the provinces will experience an immediate shortfall in revenue. Indeed, John Skinner, the owner of Painted Rock Winery in Penticton is...

All of the celebrations surrounding SunFest recently have me thinking about small-town dynamics. I am definitely a small-town girl through and through. I love the community support, the sense of safety, and being able to walk down the main drag and wave at a dozen people I know as they drive by. Don’t get me […]

The words that title my piece are biblical and mean, roughly, “number, number, weight, division.” They are apt to this moment. I believe that numbers, judgment, and a state of feeling divided, are clues to our malaise as Canadians right now. To say that Stephen Harper divides Canadians like no other prime minister before him...

BC’s Special Committee on Cosmetic Pesticides reportrecommended against a ban on the sale and use of common pesticides for lawns and gardens. Prevent Cancer Nowhas reviewed the BC report. Its conclusions are based on blind faith in Health Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA). We believe that faith, and the...

Shouldn’t the economy be working for all of us by now? After all, we’ve been swallowing the prescription of the world’s financial leaders since the ‘80s, yet our quality of life is going down. We see the harsh results everywhere. People around the world, including the students in Quebec, are courageously defending their beliefs...