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Op-Ed
LYNN CHIPLEY, Broker/Owner Cell 306.421.0100
1339 Fourth St., Estevan, SK S4A 0X1 Office 306.634.1020 lynn.chipley@c21.ca www.century21.ca/lynn.chipley
Wednesday, May 13, 2020
A5
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Ana Bykhovskaia Twenty Lines About…
A lesson that might help Estevan’s future Since day one, the spread of a novel COVID-19 virus has become a learning edge for humanity that was caught by the throat. Not only wasn’t pandemic something new to humanity, but soon the arrival of a killer virus has actually been anticipated by many scientists and global leaders for a while. Nevertheless, most of these messages remained without attention until this spring when it already was too late to prepare, and just the time to react. Now we all are looking forward to the day when we can get back to normal. But when it’s over, the world and each country will have a lot to take home for correction work. And the one system that definitely will need to be reconsidered in the aftermath of the pandemic is our supply chain. Despite the many forecasts of a global pandemic, since the SARS outbreak in 2003, the world became much more dependent on China-manufactured goods. The current crisis made this dependency undeniably obvious and demonstrated its weakness. Supply chains have been shaking and shivering since the announcement of the pandemic (and I’m afraid we are not done yet). I feel that in the current situation only the time will show if they will make it through the pandemic or will collapse, leading to global starvation that I see being mentioned more and more in global COVID-19 related discourse. Even a minor failure may lead to a rise in death tolls due to a lack of medication. We may see the return of diseases that we’ve overcome in the past with the help of vaccination and who knows what else. Most of the vital items we are using (and almost all nonessential ones as well) are manufactured in China and India. Since the early 2000s, China outcompeted the world in manufacturing active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) from the financial standpoint, thus pretty much quietly taking control over the pharmaceutical market. Only 10 per cent of generic drugs used in the States is produced within the country, and it seems that the situation in Canada is no better. So if anything disrupts the manufacturing process, the West is left with no real means to affect it and no alternative. A huge percentage of the essential medical supplies used by the world is accounted for by the two giants as well. And they can be nationalized in case of emergency. Besides, even in case of emergency, the governments can only exert influence over the production within the country, not over the production offshored by local companies or contracts signed with foreign make. The current pandemic has demonstrated that the entire seemingly reliable supply chain may fail in the face of a deathly virus. And not that it was completely unexpected. The scientists were calling for it for a while, but nothing changed then and now we know how vulnerable we actually are. This means that the manufacturing, food production and trade might and should be reorganized when we come out of it. And that may open some long-searched for doors for stagnating or transitioning communities like Estevan. Dr. Michael T. Osterholm of the University of Minnesota, who is a Regents professor, holds an endowed chair, founded the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, has been cautious about the dependency of the global market on China and India long before the 2019-20 outbreak. Watching the situation now he believes that the critical changes are to happen in the supply chain: “I think that you're going to see a lot of the private sector taking a step back after this pandemic has run its course and asking ourselves, 'Do we want to be vulnerable to these very isolated location supply chain issues?' And what does redundancy mean? Are they cautious? But it may be a wise investment in the future ... The economic cost of this pandemic to the world is almost immeasurable. And now people have to understand what do we do.” Hopefully, when we are through this (which is probably still a long ways away), the industrialized west may reconsider its politics and direct its efforts towards the support of local manufacturing. And this is what not only Estevan, but Western Canada needs moving forward. Be it APIs or parts, clothes or medical equipment, throughout its history Estevan has been a reliable resource and energy supplier for many, many decades. The infrastructure is here, the workforce is here, the training capacities are set and people are eager to keep their hometown going. So if there is a demand for local production in after-COVID times, we definitely have the means to supply it.
Elected officials need our help The editor: It is time to give our elected officials, whether they be urban, rural or provincial, some much-needed help and advice to avoid having their ratepayers going bankrupt or becoming insolvent. We are guilty of not having done something sooner, perhaps when those massive assessment increases came through from the Saskatchewan Assessment Management Agency three years ago, and mill rates were not adjusted to help small businesses and oil companies. Some of the things we should point out to assist in the decision-making are as
follows: 1) Large groups of ratepayers get more attention than one ratepayer in front of a group of councillors. 2) Empty buildings do not create revenue. 3) Businesses that have been shut down or compromised by government policy have little or no income coming in. 4) Vacant oilfield shops and offices in RMs do not require any roads to be graded, and as such are no burden to the RM they are located in. 5) If ratepayers are forced to bulldoze buildings and leave behind empty lots, it is not good for councils wanting
to collect tax revenue. 6) A fair amount of tax is better than no tax. 7) It takes a lot of room rentals for a motel to pay taxes in excess of $100,000. 8) Small business creates employment for us and our children. 9) Council has the ability to abate taxes on an individual basis. 10) Crown Corporations and city councils might better serve citizens by perhaps leasing vacant properties from ratepayers rather than spending millions on new facilities, or creating small museums for fire departments or flagship police stations.
11) Perhaps the tax burden could be more evenly distributed between business, agriculture and domestic property. 12) In order for ratepayers to better understand and be able to help our officials, perhaps when tax enforcement lists are printed in local papers, it could include a report from councils showing all expenses, revenues and bank balances of the respective municipalities involved. 13) COVID did not cause this problem; it just made it more noticeable. George Foord Macoun
Family centre holding important fundraiser The Estevan Family Resource Centre has come up with a new fundraiser for this year in order to continue its valuable services for the community. The organization is holding a Growing Smiles fundraiser, in which the centre is selling beautiful, locally grown plants to help raise money for its programs. The family centre believes plants are a great way to encourage friends to get out into the garden while choosing to support a healthy fundraiser. “It’s a good fit for us,” said family centre executive director Colleen Macmillan. “So you can go online and order plants. These are plants for outside, so hanging baskets and patio planters, herbs, succulents, individual plants, that sort of stuff.” The fundraiser started May 1 and will continue until May 16. The order will go in
on May 17, and flowers are scheduled to arrive May 27. The fundraiser has been going very well thus far. There is no limit on the amount of products they can sell or order. “We’re very happy with how much we’ve sold thus far,” she said. Proceeds from the sale will go towards the centre’s operating costs, staffing and programming. Traditionally the family centre has held a golf tournament as its biggest fundraiser of the year. But that has been called off due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the current challenges facing the energy sector, so Growing Smiles will be their biggest fundraiser of 2020. “You have to figure out new ways of doing things that don’t bring a bunch of people together, so this was a great fit,” said Macmillan.
using our Instagram and our Facebook and our Twitter and ever ything else, and we’ve done a lot of stuff on Zoom as well. Some of the stuff on Zoom is open to everyone. Other things are password protected, so you have to register for it,” she said. The family centre is confident they will emerge from it, but this is tough, because they aren’t government-funded, and they aren’t sure what will be available from the Community Initiatives Fund, since the fund is supported by casinos, which are closed. So it means their fundraisers will be more important than ever. “We’ve been here for 18 years, so I would hate to see that this is what would close the doors,” said Macmillan. Visit https://estevanfamilycentre.growingsmilesfundraising.com for more details on the fundraiser.
Love from Midale
The province is gradually reopening, but many residents still find ways to keep sending positive messages out to support those who’ve been working really hard throughout this entire time. Scott Kienlen submitted this picture of their farmyard near Midale, adding that this is the heart for healthcare workers. Photo submitted
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Sacred Heart School in Estevan has held this fundraiser before, and anyone who purchased through the school said the flowers they received were high quality, Macmillan said. The family centre reached out to the school to ensure they weren’t doing it this year before proceeding. The pandemic has forced the family centre to put its popular Drop in and Play program on hold, and the centre’s counsellor has been working from home, although people can still call her for assistance. Macmillan is still in the office every day. Everything they do is happening virtually, and people can still get emergency supplies of diapers, wipes, baby formula and more, although the family centre asks them to call ahead. “Our kids programs are online, and we have a YouTube channel now. We’re
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