Castlegar hosts pre-election workshop for region
Government! Government! Government! Despite your initial reaction, government is not a four letter word. Too often, we criticize it and complain about it as if it were the enemy. Federal and provincial partisan governments get lumped in with local government often leaving a sour taste in people’s mouth. But your local government is different. It […]
Column: From the Hill -- Columbia River Treaty issues
Last week I spent three days in Spokane at the Pacific Northwest Economic Region meetings. Over 600 legislators, business people, and other interested folks from BC, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Alaska, Alberta, Saskatchewan, the Yukon and Northwest Territories gathered to talk about issues important to this region....
Letter: PR levels playing field
To The Editor: One of the things that first attracted me to proportional representation, PR, apart from the fact that it just made sense, is that it is supported by people across the political spectrum. At my first PR meeting in 2004, I sat next to someone from the Canadian Rate Payer's Federation and Andrew Coyne was the...
City of Victoria wins lawsuit over plastic bag bylaw
More action on single-use plastic bags? Rossland City Council has stated that it was waiting for the outcome of the court challenge against the City of Victoria’s bylaw to ban plastic “check-out” bags. The Canadian Plastic Bag Association challenged the City of Victoria’s right to regulate plastic bags. Now the Supreme Court...
COLUMN: From the Hill -- G20 Energy
Last week I travelled with Jim Carr, Canada’s Minister of Natural Resources, to the G20 energy meetings in Argentina. The meetings are a mix of reports from the G20 countries and of presentations by world experts about the state of energy markets and future energy demand. The main theme of the talks was the “grand […]
LETTER: Canadian democracy not a matter of fairness
Canadian democracy is not a matter of fairness. Since European invasion, Canada has had 200 years of colonial autocracy, then 50 years of elections without votes for women, and an additional 50 years without votes for Indigenous people. In every form democracy has taken since Confederation, it has been used to defend the...
Guest Editorial: Wilderness, or heli-playground?
Editor’s Note: Many people are not yet aware of the proposal to turn about 700 square kilometres of the southern Purcell Range into a heli-playground, cutting new trails and building lodges, with helicopter flights carrying in skiers in the winter and hikers and mountain bikers in the summer. The...
Castlegar/Nelson to host Columbia Rivery Treaty public consultations
The Province will host a series of meetings this month to engage with and update communities about the recently launched negotiations on the future of the Columbia River Treaty. "As we begin negotiations around the future of the Columbia River Treaty, our government is committed to engaging in meaningful consultation," said...
OP/ED: Local advocacy group applauds Clear Referendum Question
The Castlegar and Area Fair Vote Chapter, a local citizens group for proportional representation, welcomed the announcement today of the referendum question by Attorney-General David Eby. “We're pleased to have a clear question for the citizens of BC. Now we can get to work on reaching as many voters as possible in our community...
COLUMN: Federal Bill C-76 addresses some electoral concerns
After the 2015 federal election, most Canadians were happy about the prospects for positive electoral reform. Both the Liberals and the NDP had campaigned on promises that first, there would be no more elections under the old first-past-the-post system, and second, that they would repeal the unfair aspects of the Conservative’s so-called “Fair Elections Act.” […]
