The ongoing conflict over open-net fin-fish aquaculture in our coastal waters has not received much local press. After all, it's a coastal issue; we no  longer have salmon runs in our neighbourhood, thanks to a series of dams on the  Columbia River.  But I notice that we eat  salmon from the coast anyway, brought to us by the...

The BC government has announced a key step toward creating a new, more effective climate-change strategy.  The multi-sector Climate Solutions and Clean Growth Advisory Council is charged with advising the B.C. government and delivering its first public report in one year. Karen Tam Wu, acting BC Director of the Pembina...

To The Editor: Accountability. Local city councils in the Kootenays should follow the examples of  Victoria, Saanich and the District of the Highlands, who voted nearly unanimously to send a "Climate Accountability Letter" to 20 of the world's largest fossil fuel companies, asking the companies to pay their share of the...

West High Yield Resources Ltd. and the Record Ridge claims:  Rosslanders have been hearing from representatives of West High Yield  ("WHY") about mineral claims on and around Record Ridge that could be developed into a magnesium mine for some years now.  Some residents have been excited about the...

You have to hand it to the rich in dealing with the tax reforms proposed by the Liberals. They didn’t even have to put pen to paper or pick up the phone to protest the taxman messing with their ill-gotten wealth. They got the poor besotted small businessperson to fight on their behalf. In this newly fact-free world it didn’t...

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...

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...

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 ...

The fact that science is the foundation for civilization and democracy should be self-evident. Regrettably, that connection seems often to escape our collective consciousness. We tend to think of science narrowly as restricted to high-tech, laboratories, and the development of electric cars or travel to Mars. But everything...

The Selkirk College Students’ Union has launched a manual for students’ union organisers. The Fundamentals of Students’ Unionism provides student activists and organisers a framework to understand students’ unionism and the student movement. “Students are more in debt now than ever in the history of British Columbia and...