Prince George Citizen June 25, 2020 by Prince George Citizen

Prince GeorGe

Thursday June 25, 2020

Your community newspaper since 1916

Self-imposed isolation part of pandemic reality

Leah Coghlan has no worries of a pending zombie apocalypse, but with the pandemic still raging in the world, she’s doing all she can to keep that evil C-virus from spreading.

coghlan works from home as a selfemployed virtual assistant, as she’s done for years. She gets her groceries delivered and rarely leaves her house. Since the outbreak hit in mid-March, she has avoided direct contact with people and her friends are equally vigilant maintaining their own self-isolation discipline.

“This is something my generation or my parents’ generation hasn’t lived through and it spreads and keeps mutating so i just kind of stick to myself,” said the 42-yearold coghlan. “in the beginning they told us to stay home, to stay away from people, and that’s what i’ve been doing. i’ve worked from home by myself since 2017 so it wasn’t much of a big change for me, it was only deciding not to go out.

“i really haven’t seen anybody, i’ve had one hug since this happened, because i live by myself. They’ve lifted the restrictions but i haven’t been out to restaurants. it’s the summer and it would be great to go out for a drink to patios, but it’s just not for me at this time. Being able to have people over or going to other people’s places, i just don’t feel comfortable doing that. People are still getting sick.”

The provincial curve has flattened with just 65 confirmed cases and no deaths in the northern Health region, which covers the entire northern half of the province. coghlan understands why many people don’t recognize the pandemic as much of a threat to their own lives and why they are more relaxed about close interactions with other people. But she says it’s too early to go back to pre-pandemic behavior, especially with another cold and flu season just four or five months away.

“Sure, we don’t have a ton of cases up here but it doesn’t mean that i’m not an asymptomatic carrier,” coghlan said. “A lot of people think i stay home because i’m scared, but i’m just doing my part. i’m not scared of getting it and i’ll deal with that if

it happens. But this is something that’s so different and it’s killed so many people, not necessarily in canada, but in the States. Florida had its worst day or record (Saturday) with 4,000 (new cases).”

She has friends with compromised immune systems and doesn’t want to jeopardize their health and that’s all the motivation she needs to remain cautious about keeping her distance. She’s had a couple friends visit her in her backyard but not in the house. if she does leave home for any reason, she wears a mask and encourages others to do the same, but says it is a personal choice and people should be kind and not give the “stink eye” to others who choose not to wear masks in public.

coghlan says she won’t feel comfortable going out in public places to socialize until there’s a proven readily-available vaccine. This time of year, she looks forward to going to the Show and Shine car show, taking a walk to Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park for canada Day festivities or showing support to her LBGTQ friends on Pride Day. But not this year, due to coViD-19.

“We all have to do our part or it’s going to be another summer when that’s not happening,” she said. “A lot of people say the second wave is coming, well we’re not even out of the first wave yet.”

Like many housebound city folks with more time on their hands in these coViD times, coghlan has taken up gardening and her potted vegetables and herb plants have never had so much love and atten-

Regional Chief Calls foR poliCing

Mike Howell

Glacier Media Anger. Frustration. Sadness.

These are some of the emotions Terry Teegee, the regional chief of the B.c. Assembly of First nations, has felt in recent weeks.

news reports present and past of indigenous people being badly hurt or killed in incidents involving police in canada have affected him deeply.

He lists off some of their names: chantal Moore, Athabasca chipewyan chief Allan Adam, Dale culver and his relative, everett riley Patrick, who died in hospital in April after being arrested by Prince George rcMP.

“Across this country we’re seeing it more and more with indigenous peoples being injured or killed while being arrested,” he told Glacier Media. “i’m so frustrated and dumbfounded. When you’re arrested, you shouldn’t end up being dead.”

tion. She hasn’t been to a hairstylist in months and points to her head and calls it “a science experiment.”

“i know that i can go get my haircut, but….” she said. “i’m not going to date for another year, why even try at this point? That’s a story you should do, people trying to date during a pandemic. i wouldn’t touch that with a 10-foot pole.

“i was hoping three months of isolation would change perceptions in people, because online dating is so disposable because it’s so readily available, with all these choices. People are always looking for the greener side of the grass. i was hoping if we were locked up long enough people would change that mentality and would really get to know each other before they date six people and lie about it. i’m totally happy not dealing with that right now and just being with myself and talking to my friends.”

Leah coghlan Graphic Design caters to entrepreneurs and her expertise is branding, web design and graphic arts raises their online presence to market their products. The pandemic brought a noticeable drop in her business the past three months.

“My clients are all entrepreneurs and some of them have physical locations and some of them are solely online and they’re either adapting or having to close their doors because of this,” she said. “We’re all in one way or another totally affected by what’s happening.”

Teegee spoke to Glacier Media in advance of national indigenous Peoples Day this past Sunday.

Teegee, a member of the Takla Lake First nation, joined Glacier Media via a Zoom call from the Lheidli T’enneh reserve near Prince George, where he lives with his family. The following interview was condensed and edited for length and clarity.

Does National Indigenous Peoples Day take on a different resonance with what’s going on in B.C. and across the world, with people taking to the streets to condemn racism and calling for change in institutions, including police departments?

it’s a significant day because of what we’re seeing with policing systems in the United States and in canada, and how the police have racist policies, are enforcing racist policies, and in many respects, are profiling. The vast majority are minorities. What we’re seeing today with the Black Lives Matter and the George Floyd ‘i can’t breathe’ movement…we totally sympathize because it’s cut from the same cloth.

The same thing is happening to indigenous people here in canada. The rcMP were here to enable law and order, which came from the colonial system. it wasn’t our law, our order. And in many respects, those laws were used to take us from our lands and put us on smaller reserves, and really enforce a colonial system.

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

Leah coghlan waters her beans in her backyard container. She’s been staying close to home throughout the entire coViD-19 pandemic.

‘The police were used to take our children away’

If you look at recent history, over the last 100 years, the police were used to take our children away. As a matter of fact where I’m from, Dakelh Territory, in our Carrier language we call the RCMP ‘nilhchuk-un,’ which means ‘those who take us away.’ The parents saw the RCMP as the ones who took our children away to residential school.

If you were in charge of a police department, what would be your first order of business?

We’re seeing examples out of the United States where police forces are being disbanded and being torn down and being built back up to reflect the current realities in society today.

Far too often right now we’re seeing that police forces and the way they’re trained is very heavy on force, it’s very heavy on penalties and not enough on understanding the situation, or the people they’re arresting — whether they have mental health issues, addictions issues, the domestic disputes. If it were up to me, there needs to be an overhaul, a systemic overhaul of the policing system, whether it’s the RCMP or municipal police. I think we’ve really got to understand what the job really means. If you’re a police officer, what training do you need more than just the ability to arrest somebody? There are situations out there where right now they’re ill-equipped.

Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart has called on Premier John Horgan to conduct a review of policing in B.C. The B.C. government says it will review the 45-year-old Police Act and look to modernize it. What do you say to that?

We’re seeing some progress in B.C. We have I believe six First Nations, Indigenous judicial courts, sentencing courts. They are more appropriate for some of the sentencing out there for Indigenous people that find themselves in a vicious cycle of getting arrested, going to jail. We do have a justice stategy — the B.C. First Nations justice strategy. They have adopted our suggested strategy. So I think there is significant movement and it’s a good case where we can see some significant change here in British Columbia. How would you describe the relationship between the B.C. Assembly of First Nations and Premier John Horgan’s government?

Right now, the situation here is far better than other provinces. We’ve seen the adoption of Bill 41, the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. That’s really a significant movement in terms of commitment from a level of government that sees it necessary to change their relationship with Indigenous peoples. So I think there is some positive movement which is great. We’ve seen other legislation that will live up to the Declaration. That’s what we’re working on in our action plan, and part of it too would probably be some of the judicial policies out there that really need to be changed provincially and federally.

I believe right now there is a commitment from the federal government to legislate the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It’s really important that they do this, and also live up to the fact that we have our own laws, we have our own sovereignty and those have to be recognized and lived up to as well. So provincially, I think we’re in a better situation than most regions. However, there is needed steps to carry on this momentum we have with the province of B.C.

As you know, Indigenous people are overrepresented in prisons, in homeless counts, in overdoses. Why do you think that is, and what are you doing as a provincial leader to reverse those trends?

We’re only five per cent of the population, and yet we’re overrepresented in incarceration rates. Women in jail — I believe in B.C. about 60 per cent of the population are Indigenous. For men and boys, we’re about 40 per cent. It’s really

important to understand and know those situations and how we need to change it. It’s systemic change we need within how we treat Indigenous peoples.

Our communities need the resources for all facets of life. It’s economic development, it’s mental health, it’s health, it’s infrastructure, having high speed internet in remote communities. We’re always lagging behind the norms of normal Canadian society. The situation we’re trying to create is for those First Nations to take over jurisdiction, take over their sovereignty, to implement their ways, really to assert their sovereignty and become self-sufficient.

All three levels of government have made commitments to reconciliation. How would you assess their commitments — are they genuine?

The definition of reconciliation, let’s look at that: Who’s reconciling here? In many respects, it’s government, it’s colonialism that’s reconciling with the Indigenous people. I think we’ve seen some positive

steps and progress. Many of our chiefs talk about implementing our own laws and we’re starting to see that with child welfare, here in this province and federally. We’re seeing it with environmental assessment law policies — the Environmental Assessment Act. I really saw ourselves cowriting that bill. So I think there has been some progress. Is it enough? I don’t think it is enough right now. This journey is long. It’s going to be along hard journey and we need to do this together, and there needs to be significant commitment to what reconciliation means.

You’ve been Regional Chief since 2017. What inspired you take on a leadership role? I saw an opportunity to speak up not only for the nations I represent, but all nations in B.C. My job is finding some semblance of justice. I wake up every day and I have to find some semblance of justice in speaking to and talking about the Forestry Act, or the judicial system, or child welfare. With all those conversations, the common denominator at any event that I’ve been asked to speak at — a week ago, I spoke to a rally here in Prince George about Black Lives Matter — all of those cases, the common denominator I’m speaking to and recognizing is that there is an injustice.

Are you optimistic about the future for Indigenous people in this province and country?

Yes. If I wasn’t’ optimistic, I wouldn’t be in this position. If I wasn’t optimistic, I wouldn’t be in these many meetings, I wouldn’t show up to the rallies. Because those things are needed. Things need to be said. Our situation is far better right now than I remember when I was four or five years old. We’ve gone through, in the last couple of years, a significant step with the adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act here in B.C. It’s been far better than I remember it in the last 40 years. Going forward, I would like to see a far different situation, not only for my children, but for my great grandchildren and generations ahead, and now is a good opportunity to do that.

Citizen file photo

British Columbia Assembly of First Nations Regional Chief Terry Teegee and Scott Fraser, Minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation, at a 2019 announcement on advancing First Nations’ economic development.

Submitted photoS

Randi George, right, is one of this year’s graduates from the Northern Medical Program. Above, Aunt Tina Morin, left, cousin Tammy Potskin, four-year-old Randi George in her favourite black and gold dress and her beloved mother Connie George are seen here in one of Randi’s most precious photos as it is the last one taken of her together with her cousin before Potskin’s suicide, the tragedy that was a catalyst to George’s career in medicine.

Cousin’s suicide prompts medical career

Christine hinzmann Citizen staff

Fuelled by her cousin’s suicide, Randi George, a recent graduate of the Northern Medical Program, will soon take her psychiatry residency in the Vancouver Fraser Medical Program so she can get the experience she needs to return to Prince George to help Indigenous people heal from their trauma.

George grew up in Hagwilget Village within the Hazeltons in the north and was just four years old when Tammy Potskin, her beloved cousin who felt more like a big sister, took her own life when she was just

18 years old.

That very personal loss affected not only George but her family and community as well.

It resonates so strongly with George to this day that she carries her cousin’s high school ID card with her as a reminder of why she needs to move forward on her educational journey so she can soon help heal others whose health has been impacted by painful history.

“Tammy spent summers with us and spent her last Christmas with us,” George said. “I have a picture of us - me at four years old and I’m looking up at her - it’s my last picture with her - she took her life just a few months before she graduated high school and that changed all of us.”

Because George was so young when her cousin committed suicide, she didn’t know exactly what she was going to do but she knew she had to do something.

“It changed my course in life - I always promised that I wouldn’t let her death be in vain,” George said. “I wouldn’t forget her life, I wouldn’t forget her love and somehow I would do something about it.”

To think she would ever go into medicine was beyond her comprehension.

“I was a little Indigenous girl from a reserve where a lot of people didn’t graduate high school let alone go to university or medical school,” George said. “I didn’t even see or hear about an Indigenous doctor, so it’s not something that was in my mind at the time - I just knew I didn’t want Tammy’s loss to be forgotten.”

George was at UNBC in her third year, working on her bachelor of science degree when she started to panic because she didn’t know where she was going with it.

“I realized I didn’t like lab work and I didn’t like field work,” George said.

She felt stuck and turned to career counselors, friends and then when she turned to family that’s when she got the revelation of her life.

“I was talking to my Auntie Tina (Morin), telling her I didn’t know what to do or what my next step would be - ‘what am I going to be? I want to help people but I don’t know what that looks like’ and that’s when she said ‘why don’t you be a doctor?’ I started laughing because I thought she

was kidding,” George said. “She just gave me a strange look and said ‘why are you laughing?’ and I said ‘you’re kidding, right? I can’t be a doctor,’ and she said ‘why can’t you be a doctor? You’re in university, you’re a straight A student - why couldn’t you be a doctor?’”

And that’s when George knew she found her path.

She did volunteer work at the hospital and she worked at the Central Interior Native Health Clinic in downtown Prince George as a medical office assistant just to make sure she wanted to work in the medical field.

“Working with the Indigenous and disadvantaged population downtown, working with an interdisciplinary team with culturally safe, trauma safe care I really got to see what type of medicine and what area I wanted to work in and I realized yes, I could be a doctor, yes, I could focus on medicine but I should also focus on education and advocacy when it comes to issues faced by my people,” George said.

That’s when she started her medical training in Prince George.

Working on the frontlines at the Central Interior Native Health Clinic changed her, George said. It shaped how she would approach medicine and the path she would take.

“My time working with the staff and patients at Central Interior Native Health is something I will carry with me forever,” George said.

The first time George knew her family was instrumental in starting the downtown clinic was when she received her welcome package after she was hired and read about the founders, Dan George and Harold Morin, who are her uncles, one from each side of her family. Founding board members were also in her family tree, including Lillian George and Teresa George.

“It was a really cool, full circle moment that I ended up working there and that ultimately sent me into medicine,” George said. “I’m hoping when I’m done I can end up working at the clinic again. It’s so close to my heart.”

George is one of 34 UBC Northern Medical Program graduates this year.

industrial park planned near summit lake

MArk nielsen

Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The Lheidli T’enneh First Nation and the McLeod Lake Indian Band have formed a partnership to develop an industrial park near Summit Lake.

It will be called Shas Ti-Dlezeh Industrial Park, be close to 400 hectares (1,000 acres) in size and be located on the east side of Highway 97 North and about two-and-a-half kilometres southwest of the lake north of Prince George.

“Our two communities have a history of being trading partners and it only makes sense that we work together with LTN and jointly pursue this new business opportunity,” McLeod Lake Indian Band Chief Harley Chingee said.

“Not only will development of Shas Ti-Dlezeh Industrial Park benefit our communities and other First Nations but it will also provide long term benefits to both the economies of Prince George and Mackenzie.”

Lheidli T’enneh Chief Dayi Clay Pountney said the venture “provides greater assurance that projects proposed for location in the Shas Ti-Dlezeh Industrial Park will meet our environmental standards, as well as maximize economic benefits to our communities and the region.”

A proposed $5.6 billion petrochemical complex could become its first tenant.

“It’s certainly one of the options we’re looking at,” West Coast Olefins president and CEO Ken James said. “A little early to comment.”

One other spot near Summit Lake and two spots near Bear Lake are also being considered, James has said.

The company had initially planned to

build the complex at a 300-acre site in the BCR Industrial Site, but after public concerns about air quality were raised the company announced earlier this month it will look locate north of the city instead.

The sites are close to the Enbridge West Coast natural gas pipeline that will provide the feedstock for the plants.

Management consultant Terry Kuzma, who has been working with the MLIB, said the next step will be a “government-togovernment” negotiation over jurisdiction,

land title and rights. He said the province’s environmental review processes would still apply to any heavy industrial proposal for the site.

Kuzma said the site’s northwest corner is about 2 1/2 kilometres south of Summit Lake’s southern tip, “so significant distance as the crow flies, so to speak.”

And thanks to the topography and area forest, “you won’t be able to see it from the community or the southern portion of the lake.”

He said the prevailing winds are from the west, and according to a preliminary review he’s conducted an discharges from the West Coast Olefins proposal would remain well within provincial standards.

“But what I would take comfort on if I had a residence in Summit is knowing the westerly winds are going to blow everything east towards the Rockies and there is no residence or community downwind from the proposed industrial park so I think that’s good news,” Kuzma said.

Pandemic-safe ways to celebrate Canada Day

Christine hinZMAnn Citizen staff

As the COVID-19 crisis has forced organizations to cancel events that see crowds gather in a public space, there are a few organizations and destinations that could still offer an alternative to the more traditional Canada Day celebrations.

Huble Homestead, while not officially hosting special events, is still open for its regular season as social distanc-

ing in the wide open spaces of the historic site is possible.

With a few adjustments, people can still have fun at the homestead with self-led activities, social distancing while exploring the handmade treasures in the general store and enjoying a burger or hot dog from the concession.

For more information visit www.hublehomestead.ca

The Central Interior Railway and Forestry Museum is open with hours of operation and days of the week limited. Access to more enclosed spaces, tours and special

events have been restricted but there is still plenty to see at the museum’s industrial park. Visitors are encouraged to bring a picnic lunch, stroll among the giants of industry, visit the gardens and urban orchard. For more information visit www.pgrfm.bc.ca

City parks are open to the public and a stroll in any park could be a suitable activity for Canada Day.

The Downtown Heritage Walking Tour can be done virtually or in person.

There are 22 historical locations in downtown Prince George and people can access the tour on their smartphones. Visit the city’s website to get started at www. princegeorge.ca and click on “Heritage” in the “Things To Do” category.

Hiking abounds in and around Prince George. For a vertical climb that offers a wonderful view for a hiker’s effort, head north to Teapot Mountain on Caine Creek Forest Road.

If a shorter version is what’s needed, a climb up the cutbanks with access from the Prince George Pulpmill Road could do the cardio trick.

The Ancient Forest/Chun T’oh Whudujut Park and Protected Area is British Columbia’s newest provincial park, located about 115 km east of Prince George on Highway 16. It offers an accessible 450 metre walkway that leads to a beautiful waterfall in amongst the only inland temperate rainforest in the world.

It’s an experience not to be missed. The boardwalk takes visitors past western red cedars that are more than 1,000 years old and offers a look at a unique variety of plants and mosses. Another 2.3 km of boardwalk provides access to more of the forest.

People drive by Mr. PG every day as he is located at the junction of Highways 97 and 16. He was first constructed in 1960 to recognize the importance of the forest industry in Prince George. He had a makeover a few years ago and now stands eight metres tall. He’s always ready for a selfie. For more things to do in Prince George www.tourismpg. com or visit the City of Prince George Facebook page.

RetiRed chef whips up wind tuRbine

Christine hinZMAnn Citizen staff

A local inventor wants to pay it forward for the wonderful life he’s had right here in Prince George.

“I don’t need to make money, I need to make a difference,” David Buchanan, 74, said while showcasing his five-panel vertical axis wind turbine in the Prince George Citizen parking lot Wednesday morning.

That means Buchanan’s idea is not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark, or patent laws.

“The whole world needs a vertical wind turbine, it’s as simple as that,” Buchanan said. “We’re all going to need more reliable electrical power. It makes no noise, has no vibration and will not kill birds, bats or bugs.”

His vertical turbine involves a lift and drag combination that makes it a powerful tool to convert the wind’s kinetic energy into electrical energy.

“It was my own personal frustration that prompted me to make it because vertical wind turbines have never been very popular,” Buchanan said.

The design Buchanan created to be most successful features a flat surface in front with a curved back for each panel.

“And the reason I added five panels is because wind sees the flat side as a wing so that creates lift and the curved side is the drag, so I get both lift and drag and that’s why I believe it to be more powerful than anything before and that’s what makes it unique,” Buchanan said.

He credits his time with the air force for his critical thinking when it came to having a solution to the problem of turbine reliability.

“After about four years of mistakes, trying to do what everybody else did, I discovered that wasn’t the way to go,”

Buchanan said. “Up until now everybody’s been trying to catch the wind - wrong. All wrong. You want the wind to see a flat surface and that’s why I made this. And that’s the reason I want this to be public domain.”

Buchanan made sure his creation could handle the extreme weather Canadians enjoy year round.

Buchanan successfully tested the durability of his turbine for strong winds while coasting down airport hill at about 65 miles per hour. He said that was a good start.

The turbine will soon find a home on a knoll near the airport for future stress testing and all past tests prove that so far it’s working great.

Buchanan’s current model puts out four to five kilowatts of power, which is enough to operate a small house or cottage. His next turbine will provide 12 kilowatts of power which will be suitable for most homes.

A retired chef who lives in an apartment while caring for his 96-year-old mother Connie, Buchanan is grateful for her help. Between the two of them they were able to finance the $11,000 project. Buchanan calls Connie his angel financier.

He also appreciates the help of his friends.

“I originally had a spot in Interior Warehousing, which was really nice because I had space and help when I needed it but since that’s been sold and I had to move out I’ve been building it at several people’s places.”

Citizen staff photo

David Buchanan has created a vertical axis wind turbine that uses lift and drag for more efficiency.

New fire hall $2 million over budget

Arthur WilliAms Citizen staffr

Construction of the new fire hall on Massey Drive is $2 million over budget, city council heard last week.

City director of infrastructure and public works Adam Homes gave city council an update on the status of 13 major capital projects currently in progress in the city. Homes said the fire hall, which will replace Fire Hall No. 1 downtown, is expected to cost the city $17 million by the time construction is completed this fall.

“This is the one project we’re expecting to be over budget,” Homes said. “The building itself did get bigger. Some of the program spaces were too small.”

The original design called for a 21,000 sq. foot building, but the final design will be 26,000 sq. feet, Homes said.

The additional space was needed for things ranging from the fire dispatch centre to additional space in the mechanical room.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused some supply-chain disruptions and some difficulties finding the needed tradespeople, Homes said. Those delays have added costs to the project.

When clearing the site, crews also found a layer of old construction debris –things like concrete and old tires – that had to be removed, adding further costs, Homes said.

Coun. Terri McConnachie said she understands the city couldn’t have planned for the COVID-19 pandemic disruptions, but questioned why the space issues and site clearing issues weren’t discovered earlier.

Construction crews work on the new fire hall on Massey Drive. The new hall, which will replace Fire Hall No. 1 downtown, is set to be complete this fall.

“It’s my job to press when we’re already $2 million over,” McConnachie said. “It seems that this has been risen before, with geotechnical testing not finding issues. What do we need to change with out geotech investigations? Are we expecting too little?”

Homes said the space needs for some of the programs have changed since the initial work was done in 2017, but there

was also a lack of consultation with some user groups early in the process. As for the geotechnical report, the report focused on soil conditions, he said, the layer of debris wasn’t the kind of thing a core sample will often detect.

Coun. Brian Skakun raised concerns about how the city will pay for the cost overrun.

In October 2017, Prince George voters

approved the city borrowing $15 million to construct the new fire hall in a referendum. Voters were 82.79 per cent in favour of borrowing the money.

“If the building is going to be a little bit bigger to accommodate more people, that’s fair,” Skakun said. “(But) it’s concerning we’re telling people it’s going to cost $15 million, and it’s not. To me, it’s not acceptable. I think council does have to have a firmer grip on some of these projects.”

City manager Kathleen Soltis said the referendum authorizes the city to borrow up to $15 million for the project, and that’s all the city will borrow for the project.

At the end of the year, some projects will have come in over budget and others under budget, she said, and those amounts will be balanced against each other. Two other capital projects Homes reported on, the replacement of culverts along Kelly Road North and Goose Country Road, were projected to come in approximately $400,000 and $500,000 under budget, respectively.

In addition, the city has applied for grants that could reduce the $35 million price tag for the new pool downtown to replace the Four Seasons Leisure Pool, Soltis said.

Under the city’s sustainable finance guidelines, the city manager can authorize cumulative budget amendments up to five per cent of the city’s total operating budget for the year without needing city council’s approval. Any cost overruns would be funded from the city’s reserves.

“I expect most things will fall in my authority limit,” Soltis said.

residents warned after Bear attacks

MARK NIELSEN

Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Two women suffered scratches and bites when they found themselves in a confrontation with a startled black bear last week while out walking their dogs along a remote logging road northwest of the city.

B.C. Conservation Officer Service Sgt. Steve Ackles described the incident as a “chance encounter” that began when one of the dogs surprised the bear as it was foraging in a bushy area.

“The bear lunged at the dog and engaged the dog, The other dog engaged and the bear saw one of the other women standing there,” Ackles said. “She didn’t know if she fell or if she was knocked over by the bear and doesn’t know if she was scratched by the bear intentionally or the bear was trying to get at the dog. And the other woman, when the bear was standing on that person, tried to get in between them and was bit on the arm by the bear, so did sustain a bite mark to her lower arm.”

The two were taken to hospital by their companions, who were not there at the time of the attack, and released later the same day. The woman who suffered the bite still has full movement of her arm, Ackles said.

“The bear did not shake its head, it bit and released,” Ackles said. He said it was a small one, weighing about 150 pounds, and likely young.

By about 1:30 p.m. the incident had been reported to the BCCOS and within about two-and-a-half hours officers had

traveled out to the scene but were unable to find the animal despite a search that included deploying a drone.

Other than to say the site is within 50 kilometres of Prince George and was on a deactivated logging road, Ackles declined to provide any further details on where it is. He did say there are some large logging slashes in the area that would provide plenty of food for bears.

Ackles said the dogs were “great, well behaved Labs,” but were off leash at the time and while people like to let their dogs run while out in the woods, it can lead to negative encounters.

BEAR

KILLS dog

IN cIty pARK

A black bear killed a pet dog in Forests for the World on June 12. The attack occurred near the Cranbrook Hill lookout at about 10 a.m. and after the owner had let the dog off its leash in what Ackles described as an unfortunate incident.

“The poor individual with the dog. It was a little dog and I understand him letting the dog off for a little bit of a run, but it was wrong place, wrong time,” he said.

The owner deployed bear spray and the bear took off but by then it was too late.

“Dogs are dogs and they will get on the scent of a bear and go check it out and agitate the bear,” he said. “It was a smaller dog so it couldn’t run away from the bear. Larger dogs, they tend to agitate them, get scared and come back to their owner and a lot of times that’s where we get people run over by bears or contact is made with people, the dog being the instigator.”

Local doc takes prize

Citizen staff

Mr. Berry, a documentary about a retired local teacher who has kept on teaching into his 90s, has taken Best of Fest at the Yorkton Film Festival.

The announcement acknowledged writer/director Daniel Stark and producer Jason Hamborg of 6ix Sigma Productions, a Prince George company that was started in 2014.

The film was in the category of Documentary History & Biography in which it was also recognized with top honours.

Stark was getting ready for a basketball game Thursday when he tuned into the online Golden Sheaf Awards Gala. He never imagined the documentary about Mr. Berry would be named Best of Fest so he stopped watching the streamed event after he saw the announcement that Mr. Berry won in the Documentary History & Biography category.

“That win was my Yorkton dream come true,” Stark said. “As soon as that was announced I jumped on the phone and called Mr. Berry and left him a voicemail and I missed the last announcement.”

Stark was pretty pumped for his basketball game and didn’t find out about the Best of Fest win until Hamborg called to congratulate him after the game.

“I thought he was joking,” Stark said. “I thought he was just pulling my leg. Then I had my second little freak out in the car.”

Stark attended the festival last year and

he said he wasn’t surprised he didn’t win in 2019 because of the outstanding films that were up for the awards.

“I remember thinking if I could get a film as good as these winners’ films I would feel amazed,” Stark said. “I think the people that Yorkton highlights are very deep, thoughtful filmmakers and I think they do a really good job of trying to pick things that really impact their community, their province and Canada. They are always impactful films. It means a lot that they think Mr. Berry is as impactful as the films I saw last year. It really validates the fact that Mr. Berry’s story is important, especially in times like right now - that it’s a message that they think their community can learn from and they want the rest of Canada to learn from. That’s something I always thought. If everyone could just meet Mr. Berry and have tea with him they would leave a better person.”

The Yorkton Film Festival located in Saskatchewan began in 1947 as the Yorkton Film Council and began hosting international film festivals in 1950. The festival is open to Canadian productions or international productions directed by Canadians and focuses on films that are under 60 minutes in length.

“I would like to thank the whole team that made the film,” Stark said. “Thanks so much for getting on board with this. There was a lot of blood, sweat and tears that went into telling Mr. Berry’s story.”

Citizen staff photo

Local documentary filmmakers from 6ix Sigma Productions won Best of Fest in the Yorkton Film Festival for Mr. Berry, who is pictured here at his desk in his Prince George home.

What should you be appreciating?

Last week, I heard a wise man say “What makes life precious is that it ends.”

It got me thinking about some of the things in my life that have ended that I could have appreciated more. For 28 years, I ran my retail business and there were people and features about that business that, in hindsight, I should have appreciated more. We all have lost friends or family that we cherish even more since they are no longer with us. Perhaps we have had jobs, money, friendships, pets, or even spare time that we thought were burdensome yet now they have vanished, linger as treasured memories. However, in our busyness of the past moments we didn’t take the time to value them.

The last few months have changed our lives and as I was on the road working with my clients last week, I was made to realize that there were aspects of business that we are taking for granted. The simple handshake for one, or greetings such as a pat on the back or a hug whose value

BUSINESS

COACH

DAVE FULLER

has been underestimated in the business environment, take on new meaning when we can’t engage in them.

Virtual meetings have become a fabric of our society, and while I have been using them for years in my practice of working with clients across the country and around the world, they don’t truly substitute for the face-to-face meetings.

There is so much that can be gained by being physically present with people that we miss in our Skype or Zoomed out work spaces.

Yes, there are benefits to working from home, including enhanced efficiencies and reduced expenses but in many cases, there is also lost production and more stress.

More than ever, I see business owners and leaders with school-aged children popping into the background screen of our virtual meetings.

Women and men who are leaders seem to be trying to balance business and work, homeschooling, making lunch, and cleaning the house while continuing to get results, manage employees, and retain their sanity. I hear them say how much they appreciated going into the office or sending their kids off to school.

Employees too should be appreciating what they have right now. In 12-18 months, good paying jobs are going to be harder to come by. Once the full economic impact of the COVID-19 lockdowns filter through society and the government stimulus programs have run out, we will be left with businesses that are gasping for cashflow and governments that are cutting expenses and raising taxes to make ends meet.

Organizations are going to need to make tough decisions about where to make their cuts and as labour costs are typically the

City sees big recovery in building permits

Arthur WilliAms Citizen staff

The city saw a rebound in building permits issued in May, after a significant drop in permits issued in March and April. Last month, the city issued a total of 56 permits, worth an estimated $13.4 million. May’s numbers were better than the previous two years. In May 2019, the city issued 49 permits worth $9 million and in May 2018 it issued 39 permits worth $12.9 million. The COVID-19 pandemic took a bite out of the local construction sector in March and April. The city saw a roughly 20 per cent drop in the value of permits issued in March compared to 2018-19, and

an approximately 80 per cent drop in April compared to the past two years.

From Jan. 1 to May 31, the city issued a total of 175 building permits with an estimated value just shy of $35.6 million.

During the same period in 2019, the city had issued 209 permits worth $58.9 million.

largest expense for most establishments, those making decisions are going to be looking to the people that are delivering results to create the future of the organization. The current lack of accountability may benefit the lifestyle of some employees now but their job future may be in jeopardy if they are not creating value.

The current climate of change is requiring that we plan ahead to ensure our survival. Ninety-day plans should be common place in every work environment to engage employees, have clarity about what you need to do in this ever-changing situation, and keep everyone accountable to for achieving positive results.

Many of us didn’t appreciate normalcy while we had it and that normalcy is now precious because it has ended. What should you be appreciating right now that might be taken from you in the next months or years? Take some time today to cherish what you have and to be thankful for those opportunities you have been given.

Four commercial building alternations with a combined value of almost $6.5 million, 13 new single-family homes with a combined value of almost $5.5 million and a single new duplex worth approximately $582,700 comprised the lion’s share of permits. The remainder came from a number of smaller residential improvements.

Nachbaur lands job in top Swiss league

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

Monday was a travel day for hockey coach Don Nachbaur and it was going to be a long one.

His destination was Bern, Switzerland, where the 61-year-old has been hired as head coach of Schlittschuh Club (SC) Bern, considered the marquee franchise of the 12-team Swiss National League.

The pandemic has made flying difficult and Nachbaur wasn’t able to get a direct flight to Europe. He left his home in Richland, Wash., for a flight to Seattle, then was due to connect to New York before landing in Zurich.

SC Bern has a long line of success in the Swiss National League with 16 league championships, three of which came in the last four seasons. But the team finished ninth out of 12 teams last season, prompting the mid-season firing of coach Kari Jolonen. Nachbaur, a native of Kitimat who grew up in Prince George, signed a twoyear contract to replace him.

He takes over after coaching last season for HKM Zloven of the Slovakia Tipsort Liga. Prior to that, he spent a season and a half as an NHL assistant with the Los Angeles Kings. In 19 seasons as an WHL head coach with the Seattle Thunderbirds, Tri-City Americans and Spokane Chiefs, he was behind the bench for 1,333 games and won 692 of them, which puts him third on the WHL list of career wins.

As an NHL centre, Nachbaur played 223 NHL over eight seasons with Hartford, Edmonton and Philadelphia and wrapped up his pro career playing four seasons in Austria for Graz EC. Nachbaur has family ties in Austria also he coached Canada’s

under-18 national teams in European tournaments.

“I went over to Slovakia to reacquaint myself with the international game and it was a good experience,” he said. “My wife and I had both lived in Austria four years so she was comfortable with going back to Europe. I knew it was a good league and it was a good life experience living on the other side of the world.”

Nachbaur lost his job in L.A. in November 2018 when Kings head coach John Stevens was fired. He considers his Swiss opportunity one of the plum assignments in the hockey world.

“They’ve always been a really classy organization that produces winners, they probably have the most championships in the history of the Swiss league,” Nachbaur said. “So there’s a lot of nostalgia there and tradition and they might be looked at in Swiss hockey like the way we view the Toronto Maple Leafs of Montreal Canadiens.

“I viewed it when I was searching for jobs as one of the top leagues outside of the NHL. The Swiss league is right up there with the KHL and the Finnish League. It’s exciting. Just from a professional standpoint it’s a great league to coach in and as a head coach, it’s not being an assistant coach and I’m really looking forward to that.

“It’s a well-run league and everything about it is professional. The interview process I went through was as intense as maybe what I went through in the National Hockey League.”

SC Bern was the Swiss pro team Nico Hischier played for just before he was drafted first overall in the 2017 NHL draft

Don nachbaur hockey canaDa

Don Nachbaur is heading to Swizerland. The former Prince George resident is taking his hockey coaching talents to SC Bern of the Swiss National League.

by New Jersey and Nachbaur says NHLers like Hischier, Nino Niederreiter and Sven Bartschi are shining examples of the work Switzerland has put into developing its young players.

“Even when I did world juniors you knew it was going to be a tough game against the Swiss, simply because they don’t play just a traditional European game, they play a little bit like the Canadian game,” he said. “They work hard, they compete and they can be physical at times and they’re still skilled.”

The team perennially leads the Swiss

league in attendance and in 2006 set the European hockey record when it averaged 15,994 fans in 22 home games. Swiss health authorities announced last week a ban on crowd sizes over 1,000 people will likely be lifted by September.

“They’re the biggest drawing team in Europe. They probably outdraw some NHL teams,” Nachbaur said. “That’s still the uncertainty, whether the rinks will be open to full crowds or partial crowds.”

Preparation is key for any successful coach and he says his days around the rinks are often long, much longer than the time commitment needed for him to be a hockey player.

The pandemic has kept Nachbaur grounded close to home and in that time he’s been a weekly participant in five different chat rooms that allow him to exchange ideas with other coaches.

“I’ve been doing that five days a week since March, when the coronavirus started,” he said. “You go to lot of coaching seminars and it’s pretty guarded and it’s generic information at times. But these are personal conversations with 30 or 40 guys and we pick topics that range from bench management to a forecheck or to a breakout. There have been some terrific topics that never get covered in coaching seminars, so it’s been really good.”

Switzerland is known for its natural beauty with mountains and lakes, a snowy climate and an ancient culture, which adds to the lure of the job for Nachbaur.

“It’s one of those life experiences that don’t come around often. It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time and the timing has been right the last couple years.”

Kings shuffle lineup

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

The pieces of the puzzle of a new season continue to fall into place for the Prince George Spruce Kings.

The Spruce Kings team completed two trades last week to move a pair of 20-yearolds who did not figure in the B.C. Hockey League team’s plans for 2020-21.

The Kings picked up 2002-born forward Austin Spiridakis from the Alberni Valley Bulldogs in a deal that sent 2000-born forward Quintin Loon-Stewardson and future considerations to the Bulldogs.

Spiridakis, an 18-year-old native of St. Albert, Alta., is a five-foot-10, 180-pound veteran of two seasons with Alberni Valley and is committed to Quinnipiac University starting in 2021. In 42 games last season with the Bulldogs, he scored 12 goals and had seven assists. In 56 games in 2018-19, he put up six goals and five assists.

Loon-Stewardson was the player-to-benamed later in a deal the Kings made in December which sent forward Jaxon Steele to the Battlefords North Stars of the SJHL.

After the trade was made, forward Brett Gammer decided not to report to the Kings and instead went to Liberty University in Virginia, where his brother was playing.

The North Stars agreed to send Loon-Stewardson to Prince George after the season was completed.

“I knew when I got Quintin I was going to be moving him, just because I wasn’t going to have 20-year-old room on the roster) with what I had planned,” said Kings general manager Mike Hawes. “Austin is a really good player, he was highly soughtafter recruit when he came into the league as a 16-year-old. Any time you’re commit-

ted to a quality program like Quinnipiac it tells me you’re a pretty good player. He’s a very skilled player who’s young but has experience in the league.”

The previous day, the Kings announced they’d sent 2000-born forward Tom Richter to the Cowichan Valley Capitals in a trade for futures. The 20-year-old son of former NHL goalie Mike Richter scored two goals and had eight assists in 56 games with the Kings last season. He’s committed to Union College in 2021.

“Tom is a great person and teammate and just got caught up in a numbers game and being a 20-year-old player and an import player,” said Hawes. “He’s a great kid from a great family and they were great through the whole process. I worked closely with them as we tried to find him a place in our league to play. They wanted to stay in the BCHL and loved their time in P.G. and they were very appreciative.”

Coming off a disappointing 18-32-3-5 season, Hawes has been in the off-season making trades and acquiring new players. The 2018-19 league champions still have a few holes to fill before the already-confirmed roster players gather for training at Rolling Mix Concrete Arena on Sept. 1.

“I still need to add a couple d-men to the roster and move out some other 20-yearold guys we won’t have room for and we’re proceeding like we’re going to have a season,” said Hawes.

The BCHL has revised its target season start date due to the ongoing pandemic. The league originally planned for Sept. 18 for the first games of the 54-game schedule but that has since been pushed back to early October, pending approval from the provincial health officer.

Trying To keep lisTening hard

What I wouldn’t give to hear my two-yearold daughter chirp “shweet shwinging Shammy Shosa” again.

Watching the excellent sports documentary Long Gone Summer on TSN this week, chronicling the home run race in the summer of 1998 between Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa, brought me back to that cherished memory.

Something much hotter than baseball was top of mind for me that summer in Salmon Arm. I was busy covering the forest fire that would threaten much of the community and turn Mount Ida into a moonscape of ash.

When things finally settled down in September, I was just in time to follow the nightly home run derby, restoring my interest in Major League Baseball after the 1994 season-ending strike destroyed the best chance the Montreal Expos ever had of winning the World Series.

And for reasons I don’t remember, that included teaching Claire to say “shweet shwinging Shammy Shosa” whenever the Chicago Cubs star stepped to the plate.

Henry praise

B.C.’s Dr. Bonnie Henry was rightfully recognized by no less than the New York Times for her handling of the COVID-19 pandemic in our province.

The article pointed out her tireless, steadfast, low-key efforts to convince people to recognize what individuals can do to reduce the threat and then for the most part to do it.

They lauded her soft approach of wanting to convince people to do the right thing rather than a heavy- handed approach of forcing people to comply. Our low numbers and the steady reduction in those numbers shows her approach has worked.

One thing the article did not point out was the fact that our B.C. government has stood back and let her make what are some very difficult calls.

She has been the primary spokesperson for what should be done and her decision making has been based on solid numbers and science.

The NY Times article let us know she has the qualifications and experience to do just that.

Meanwhile Horgan and his government have not used her good efforts to their political benefit.

Our federal government meanwhile has done a pretty good job but I object to Trudeau’s almost daily waving of the Liberal flag while pointing out what their government has been doing.

Certainly we want to be informed

I’m so jealous of dads these days, with their ability to shoot quick videos of their adorable toddlers on their phones and immediately share them with family and friends on social media.

Dads with young ones, hear me.

Two decades from now, when they’re grown, you will embarrass your now-adult kids when you revisit these videos and fight back the tears of love and sentiment.

CBC Radio’s Andrew Kurjata asked on Twitter this week if there are any guides into not turning into an “Old White Guy.” He received some excellent advice, from Rob Budde’s “keep listening hard” to Rick Trow’s “I love being an old white guy!! I think the key is to NOT be an angry old white guy!!”

Not being an angry old white guy comes from the same playbook as being a decent dad.

“Keep listening hard” (my interpretation

of Budde’s response) means mouth closed, eyes and ears alert and, most importantly, mind and heart wide open to what’s being said.

That is no easy task because, as more candles have appeared on my birthday cake each year, the temptation to rely on my hard-fought wisdom has crept in.

Every day, it takes self-reflection and constant vigilance for me to choke down the bittersweet realization that my understanding will always be a work in progress and will always have blind spots.

Every day, it takes humility for me to recognize the worldviews I’ve held for years require constant revision to prevent the slide into irrelevance and anger.

Most difficult of all, I try to admit my views have caused others to suffer, regardless of my best intentions, and that I must be willing to recognize both my faults and my responsibility to make amends.

The best available blind spot alarm alert for me is to listen to my now adult kids. I raised them to be able to make up their own minds so I strive, not always successfully, to not dismiss them with a patronizing sneer when they have the gall to inform me I’ve got it all or partially wrong.

Their awareness of difficult issues around race and gender and identity, for example, is often insightful.

I’m blessed Claire is now 24 and enjoys her dad’s company and counsel but also has zero tolerance for her father’s biases, both conscious and unconscious. I’m blessed Drayden and Myah, her stepbrother and step-sister, both recent high school graduates, are similar to her in that regard.

All three kids still have much to learn about life and I can only hope my efforts have prepared them for the joys and the pains of that journey.

Through them, I can also continue to learn, to evolve, to accept.

Staying busy with those tasks doesn’t leave much room for anger, although crankiness too often sneaks its way in, brought on by increasingly present aches and pains, fatigue and the startling realization that even if I live to see my grandchildren and great-grandchildren, my life is already more than half over.

One of the antidotes to that realization will always be the memory of my beautiful little girl with her sweet voice calling out “shweet shwinging Shammy Shosa.”

but his morning press conference have become more an opportunity to convince folks he is doing a good job rather than keeping us informed.

Meanwhile south of our border the pandemic has become a political football highlighted by Trump’s finger pointing and spouting total untruths in his efforts to get reelected. No science or solid numbers there. Just blatant opportunism.

We are very fortunate to live where we live at this dangerous time.

Certainly there will be criticism. But all I know is I wouldn’t have wanted to have had to make the decisions that have been made attempting to find some kind of a balance between totally destroying our economy and having massive numbers of people die and our health care system collapse.

A big thank you to all those who have got us to where we are including Dr. Bonnie Henry, the government she works for and the many, many people who have been keeping our province going through all of this.

John Warner

Prince George

Ugly memory

I was raised and schooled in the Smithers area but I have not lived in the Bulkley Valley for decades. My ancestors were both Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en.

This region is also on the infamous “Highway of Tears.” I decided to speak

out in light of “Black Live Matter,” and the recent killings of Indigenous people in Canada.

We are not immune to racism in this country. I am aware of several incidents of police brutality against Indigenous people that involved emotional, physical and verbal abuse when growing up. In the Smithers region, I believe it is linked to Indigenous rights and the Delgamuukw case in the 1980s.

In more recent times, racism against Indigenous people has arisen regarding the anti-pipeline protests. This is despite the fact that some Indigenous people support the project. What is more troubling is that Indigenous women, children and elderly are often victims.

In my youth and as a young adult, I experienced a lot of racism when growing up in Smithers. One nasty incident happened at the ski hill. At the time, I was with a group of friends and we decided to split up for the afternoon and meet up in the lodge after the last run. I was on the chairlift run skiing by myself when I paused to take a break.

There were a group of white males on the lift watching me when they started to yell obscenities.

They swore and used words like “get off our mountain, Injun.” One of them mimicked a rifle with his ski pole and yelled, “If we had a gun, it would be open season on Indians.”

They all started to laugh as I ignored them and skied away. It was a very

disappointing event after a nice day on the hill. I never skied the chairlift run after that.

Yes, there are many “good people” in the Smithers region, but, sadly, ugly, events like this shaped my memories of growing up in Smithers.

In recent media reports, some deny that racism exists in Canada; which, seems like a form of privilege. I feel obligated to voice my experiences so that we can all become more aware of our downfalls and work together for the next generations of Canadians and a more prosperous future.

Gary George Burnaby

steel fire Hall?

As I drive by the Family Y, I see the new fire hall under construction. What really catches ones eye is the fact they’re building with steel studs rather than wood. A few years ago, with great fanfare, the Wood Innovation Centre was built on the site of the old PG hotel in downtown Prince George. Was it not the object of the Wood Innovation Centre to promote the use of wood in future buildings?

That mandate seems to have fallen on deaf years at city hall and the consultants who approved the new fire hall project.

A sad day for Prince George, a city that was built on the backs of forestry. Rod Angove Prince George

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PRINCE

House finally back in session

Ascreenshot came across the web. A conversation between two men, ending “should we march on Ottawa?” and the response, “oh yeah bud!”

It was shared by a few people as a joke, then many more as a curiosity, and finally, after the agitators got hold of it, proper imagery was added, turning it into a rallying cry. People began to print it on t-shirts and bumper stickers; some wrote songs in French and English. Eventually, people marshalled and began to move.

Reasons to march on the capital were legion. Some came from parts of the country that had been left to rot long ago, others because of recent misfortune; citizens who could trace their roots back to contact or before were joined by non-residents fresh off the boat; lastly, no political ideology dominated: the presence of pandemic and the absence of paycheques affected all, but their leaders’ complete abdication

Canada recently failed in a bid to become a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. It is something neither Stephen Harper nor Justin Trudeau were able to achieve as prime minister. The last time Canada was on the Security Council was when Jean Chretien was prime minister in 2000 and before that it was during the Brian Mulroney era in 1990.

The fact that Canada was not able to garner enough votes among member states in the UN is not surprising. Canada’s foreign policy is not what it used to be. In fact, an open letter to the UN signed by over 100 influencers, including Noam Chomsky and David Suzuki, stated, “Despite its peaceful reputation, Canada is not acting as a benevolent player on the international stage.”

In Latin America, Canada does little more than rubber stamp the United States and is developing a reputation similar to that of the Americans.

Despite overwhelming international pressure and even the advice of former Canadian diplomats, Trudeau will not

Reality says maintaining a healthy long-term relationship takes a lot of work. Contrary to the fairy tales we read as kids, it’s not all sunshine and roses.

Add brain injury into the equation and watch out! Be prepared for many roller coaster rides.

It is extremely challenging to be in a relationship with a brain-injured survivor. The lives of survivors and their loved ones are completely turned upside down. As a survivor I see this in my own relationship and with others.

If us survivors appear to be acting in a selfish way, this is because we are in survival mode. Most of us lost our jobs, our careers, sense of purpose and selfconfidence.

In a previous article, I mentioned the “child brain” and the “adult brain” not working cooperatively after a brain injury. This is problematic because our inside voice comes spewing out before we have a chance to think about what we are going to

RIGHT OF CENTRE

NATHAN GIEDE

of responsibility was what ultimately overcame their inertia.

The ruled have a right to rulers. And free-born people have a right to responsible rulers. In the midst of the most tumultuous times in living memory, those in charge had abandoned the chamber where deliberations on global wars, the right to vote, and transcontinental infrastructure had taken place. Commoners and barons forced King John to Magna Carta; Charles I’s actions made dragging the Speaker necessary; now a throng would propel all MPs to the green carpet.

It was rather more The Napoleon of Notting Hill than Animal Farm - average

women and men moved towards the capital by planes, trains, automobiles, or foot. They gathered in the old streets our drunk founder walked and his friend was shot, looking for anyone wearing the mace lapel that marked them for Parliament. Then, with gentle words or firm hands, they nudged or dragged MPs to the chamber, from backbencher to speaker, setting guards to keep them there.

Members who were not close to the canal were found or dutifully returned from the far reaches of the second largest nation on earth. Finally, the last MP was accounted for. An elderly gentleman gave the mace to the Sergeant at Arms; the citizens left the chamber and sat in the hallways, on the lawn, in every pub, theatre, arena; on pews at church and foldable chairs at community halls; traffic stopped. It was dead silent, but the people continued to wait for their ancient right, the oldest form of representative govern-

Finding Canada’s ethical voice

LESSONS IN LEARNING

GERRY CHIDIAC

speak out against efforts of the NetanyahuGantz government in Israel to violate international law and annex Palestinian territories in the West Bank. Few Canadians are aware of how damaging this is to our international reputation.

Perhaps most egregiously, Canada continues to provide military machinery to Saudi Arabia while that country supports a civil war in Yemen. During a global pandemic, when Western powers are fully aware that starving, immune-compromised Yemini refugees pose a serious threat to global health, Canada continues to be a part of the problem.

Unfortunately, the list of ethical failures by the Trudeau government is very long. We have even seen how it impacts domestic policy, as our government fails to respect the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

How far we have fallen!

Despite our country’s actions in recent decades, Canada’s reputation on the international stage is well deserved. When we look at much of the good our country has done, however, one name comes up again and again: Joe Clark.

Though he was prime minister for less than a year, Clark established a precedent by allowing tens of thousands of refugees from Vietnam and Cambodia to take residence in Canada.

Despite the crimes against humanity being committed by the apartheid government, Pierre Trudeau never agreed to sanction South Africa. It was Brian Mulroney’s secretary of state for external affairs, the same Joe Clark, who went against the wishes of powerful leaders like Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and did so. He demonstrated the influence a middle power like Canada could have in promoting an ethical international agenda.

Clark and Mulroney also had the courage to cross political party lines by appointing Stephen Lewis as Canadian Ambassador to the UN. Lewis was, and continues to be, perhaps the most ethical, outspoken and

Brain injuries strain relationships

BOGGLED

DIANE NAKAMURA

say. On the opposite spectrum, there are survivors like me who emotionally flat line. It appears like we have no empathy, don’t care about anybody or anything. Feelings get squashed on both sides. Resentment builds, conversations are difficult to engage in and the cycle can repeats itself over and over.

In my case, my short-term memory was assessed in the 10th percentile. Imagine being with a spouse who can’t retain information. Communication can be an ongoing source of frustration when the injured partner can’t recall important conversations and decisions that were made. As the saying goes “the lights are on but no one’s home.” Couples can often feel they are

ment on earth, in a democracy (even as a subarctic backwater) which had survived and defeated several tyrannical empires, on that day commemorating the founding of the “True North, Strong and Free.” It was a pregnant pause.

The speaker began the session, somewhat timidly. Many honourable members were a bit red faced, not being used to coercion at their jobs. Questions were stilted at first, the responses equally unconvincing. Eventually, one of the MPs from Atlantic Canada made a joke, the whole chamber guffawing. That broke the tension, and the usual ruckus of a twosword length debate club got off to a roaring start. Traffic began to move again and the commoners returned home. No miraculous legislation materialized and the country hardly improved. But the House of Commons being operational again brought something back to this dominion: a sense of hope.

drifting further away from each other. So what can be done to tighten the gap?

At the Brain Injured Group (BIG), there is a group and manual for couples called Rebuilding Relationships After Brain Injury. Communication is the glue that prevents the fraying relationship strings snapping completely from the core. It is recommended that survivors and their partners communicate individual and relationship needs. This is called You, Me & Us. Of course these skills have to practised again and again because they don’t come naturally. It’s also important to write the details down when plans and solutions are agreed upon.

I’ve learned from BIG and my own experiences that listening to your spouse is key. Survivors think we are listening but we are often not because we’re thinking about our response.

I have found it helpful to stop in my tracks and take a time out. I will say “I need to gather my thoughts. Give me a minute.” I need to do this because if I don’t, my brain

well respected Canadian diplomat of all time.

Just as the list of Trudeau and Harper failures is long, so is that of Clark-Mulroney accomplishments. Clark took a leadership role in responding to the Ethiopian famine. In addition, he was able to challenge a very violent American policy in Central America and bring refugees from the region to Canada, all the while maintaining good relations with our neighbour to the south. Not all of Justin Trudeau’s foreign policies are bad and I certainly wrote my share of letters to my Progressive-Conservative Member of Parliament during the Clark and Mulroney years. It also needs to be pointed out that Clark’s Middle East policies had a lot in common with Trudeau’s. The point is, however, that Canadians are no longer seen as ethical players on the world stage. The truth is that we have done nothing significant to challenge powerful allies on a moral issue since Jean Chretien refused to send Canadian troops to invade Iraq in 2003.

We’d like to say that the world needs more Canada, but in reality, Canada needs more Joe Clark.

will shut down and I might say something I will regret. Even worse, I won’t remember what I said.

Prior to my injury, I was a firecracker who always had to be right. I’ve learned a lot about myself in the last year and a half. When conversations start to become difficult another strategy I used is to imagine myself being in my husband Bob’s shoes. I would be thinking “Who are you and what did you do with my wife?”

Bob has told me many times that he forgets I have a brain injury. I look the same and talk the same most of the time. It would be really hard to have a spouse who forgets important errands, conversations and decisions. It would be really hard to watch your spouse become exhausted after doing a couple of simple tasks and have to sleep for hours to recoup. It would be really hard to have a spouse who never goes out and socializes with other couples because of fatigue.

Both sides can say “Walk a mile in my shoes.”

A little ditty about Darrell and Diane

DSENIORS’ SCENE KATHY NADALIN

arrell Hubbell, the fourth of six children, was born in Invermere and grew up in the old asbestos mining town of Cassiar where his father worked as an oiler and heavy-duty mechanic in the mine.

His father discovered jade in the area and staked a claim on a rock slide with visions of getting rich cutting jade. This never came to pass; however, it was the start of Darrell’s passion of making jewelry.

Darrell graduated from high school in Ft. St John in 1974 just before the family moved to Woodpecker (near Hixon) and opened a very interesting rock shop of their own. He worked alongside his father and developed his craft over the next two years.

He first worked as a lumber piler, a labourer on highway construction and when he moved to Grande Prairie he logged and did sawmill work for the Proctor and Gamble sawmill, which is now part of Weyerhaeuser.

He got married in 1980 and had two children Edward and Andrew before separating in 1993.

In 1981, he moved to Prince Rupert and managed a jewelry store for three years; all the while maintaining his interest in making and repairing jewelry.

In 1984, he moved back to Prince George and opened his own jewelry store; 36 years later he is still owner and manager of his store Hubbell Designer Goldsmiths Inc. He is still successfully designing unique jewelry.

Darrell said, “In 1993, I was lucky and I met Diane. We went to see the movie Mrs. Doubtfire and we both laughed at the same time and at the same things. By the end of the movie I was totally in love so we got married in 1996.”

Diane Parent, one of the seven children of Romeo and Lillian Parent, was born in the old army hospital here in Prince George. She grew up at Fyfe Lake – near

West Lake – and went to school in Prince George. After high school, she got married and had three children - Michael, Nicole and Yvonne – before separating after 20 years.

Her first job as a teenager was part time at the Super Way Cleaners. She worked at the old McLeod’s store and then as shipper/receiver for Shoppers Drug Mart until she moved to Fort St. James. She moved back to Prince George 10 years later.

Diane worked as a substitute teacher for nine years.

She continued her education at CNC earning her honours certificate in developmental disability studies.

She worked at AiMHi for six years in the care giving department until Darrell persuaded her to partner with him in their jewelry store.

Diane is a prolific and masterful gardener, winning the coveted David Douglas Botanical Garden Society garden contest in 2007.

Darrell and Diane have a blended family

of five children and eight grandchildren. They have both been willing to give back to their community - Diane quietly and Darrell through his extensive community volunteerism.

Darrell’s volunteerism includes serving on the boards of the Two Rivers Gallery, the Prince George Symphony Orchestra, the Downtown Rotary Club, the Spirit of the North Healthcare Foundation, the Prince George Community Foundation and the Town Centre Business Association.

He is known for supporting local fundraising causes that include the Prince George Public Library, the Baldy Hughes Addiction Treatment Centre and Therapeutic Community, the Spirit of the North Healthcare Foundation, Rotary International, the Prince George Symphony Orchestra, Ducks Unlimited, United Way, Cystic Fibrosis Canada, the B.C. Cancer Foundation, RCMP Victim Services, the Hixon Community Association, the Mackenzie Chamber of Commerce, the Prince

George Chamber of Commerce and the Prince George Community Foundation. He was named the Prince George Citizen of the Year in 2011.

The Prince George Chamber of Commerce recognized Darrell as their Corporate Citizen of the Year in 2004, 2005 and 2009.

Darrell summed it all up by saying, “We are totally aware that everything we have comes from our community. We have long ago adopted the idea of giving back to our community. In Prince George, if you put in you get way more back out.

“Our business is now 36 years old and some of my clients are the children of people that I made wedding rings for back in my earlier years.

“We are entering into the stage where owning a store is not how we want to spend our semi-retirement. When we eventually close the brick and mortar store I will still work in my shop at home. I love my work and my clients. In fact, my clients are the best people on the planet.”

Improvement needed, assisted living study shows

Citizen staff

A recent report shows many residents in assisted living private-pay units don’t have all their needs met because they can’t afford to pay.

That was one of the key findings in the study called The Place of Assisted Living in BC’s Seniors Care System: Assessing the Promise, Reality and Challenges was conducted by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, the Hospital Employees Union and the BC Health Coalition. The study shows that after paying the basic fee, seniors and their families can’t afford services that come with an extra charge. The study was based on Interviews with care aides, licensed practical nurses, frontline managers, residents and family members and showed some residents were using towels as diapers or for wound care, had to skip meals not included in basic food packages and were wearing dirty clothes because laundry detergent was too expensive. The study shows concerns for an under-regulated, under-researched and

mostly privatized assisted living sector in the province. It seems a large number of seniors in assisted living residences don’t qualify for assisted living under provincial legislation which requires residents to be able to direct their own care and independently respond in case of an emergency.

Staff in the care homes reported they were not able to meet all the needs of residents with moderate to advanced dementia or those experiencing major mobility limitations while those residents were living on their own in publicly subsidized and private-pay assisted living.

“Working as an LPN in assisted living can be heartbreaking,” Anita Dickson, president of the Licensed Practical Nurses Association of BC., said. “We routinely encounter situations where residents are clearly suffering because they aren’t getting the level of care they need, but we are told not to interfere because they have the right to live at risk. This violates our code of ethics and standards of practice to provide safe and compassionate ethical care.”

The assisted living model allows residents to make the choice to ‘live at risk’ to remain independent but it can easily become a way for operators to cope with or justify low staffing numbers. But the situation can often leave residents open to neglect. In the study, frontline workers report being unable to do what they know they should but are not authorized to do because of low staffing levels, a lack of resources while following the directive of allowing residents to “live at risk.”

Frontline staff interviewed for the study said there was a high rate of emergency room visits and admission into hospital largely due to falls.

“We know seniors want to live in the more home-like environment that assisted living can provide,” Dr. Karen-Marie Elah Perry, author of the report, said. “But I am concerned many seniors and frontline workers are instead dealing with a poorly coordinated sector that increasingly resembles under-resourced and more lightly regulated long-term care.”

Assisted living is considered a housing model, as opposed to long-term care where operators are responsible for overall care of residents and provide 24-hour nursing care and personal supports. In assisted living, the unit in which the resident lives is considered their own home, with operators providing non-medical services like assistance with dressing, bathing and administration of medicines, but not responsible for providing traditional medical care like nursing, physician or rehabilitation service or mobility aides as is found in long-term care.

“The recommendations in this report provide a road map to the Seniors Advocate and the provincial government for a more comprehensive assessment of assisted living, driven by the experiences and voices of seniors, their families and the front-line workers who provide care amid frequently impossible circumstances,” Marcy Cohen, CCPA-BC research associate and member of the advisory group for the research project, said.

Citizen staff photo

Darrell and Diane Hubbell in November 2019.

Cruisin’ ClassiCs draws thousands

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

On Father’s Day, nobody had to remind eight-year-old Victoria Lawrence who was the Best Dad Ever.

It was the guy sitting ahead of her in the passenger seat of the 1965 Ford Mustang wearing a black shirt that read exactly that.

Nobody lets Victoria beat them up a play fight the way her dad Mark does and that’s why he’s the best dad ever, she explained, while waiting with her parents in the CN Centre parking lot Sunday for the start of the Cruisin’ Classics COVID Cruise for a Cause.

The Mustang was being driven by Victoria’s mom Elizabeth, a California girl who got the car as her first vehicle as a present from her father, who brought it back to showroom quality in their garage in Mill Valley, Calif.

“We bought it for $650 and it barely made it back to the house and he spent about 10 years restoring it,” said Elizabeth. “He’s a backyard mechanic and he’s restored many vehicles. He has a ’63 Ranchero, my sister had a 50th anniversary Mustang, my brother has a Mustang and my other sister has a Mustang – we’re a Ford family for sure.”

Her ‘65 now has 747,000 miles on it, about the same distance as three trips to the moon. Elizabeth always looks forward to displaying in at the Cruisin’ Classics Show and Shine and loves the camaraderie of meeting up with other car owners. But this year, the pandemic forced organizers to scrap the usual gathering at Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park and instead they brought some of the city’s finest rides to the people.

“I love driving it,” said Elizabeth, just before the tour took off. “We kept it straight to (original specifications). It has a 200 cubic-inch straight-six (cylinder motor).

“We’ll miss the one-on-one conversations with everybody but I’m hopeful we’ll reach more people who might not have been able to make it down to the park.”

Mark is quite talented with a wrench in his hand and he’s already started fixing up a ’57 Olds Fiesta station wagon he inherited from his grandfather and the pressure is on to get it done. Victoria wants that to be her wedding car.

“I’ve got a few more years to go,” he said. The Lawrence family joined a long line of vehicles in the Father’s Day cruise and they toured a good chunk of the city in a parade from Exhibition Park to the Hart to College Heights. It drew about 325 vehicles and thousands of spectators who waited

along the route to watch the slow-moving procession go by.

Lori Tataryn, a former Prince George resident who now lives in Penticton, showed up with her son Michael in a stunning orange 1936 Nash three-window coupe, a car her husband Mike began to restore shortly before he died of a heart attack five years. He never got to finish the car, one of six of its type left in the world, and Lori paid to get the job done.

“He had it running the day before he died,” said Michael.

Mike left a legacy of a Chevy pickup truck and three other restored cars, including the 1970 Pontiac GTO Michael drives. He found the Nash coupe in a farm north-

east of Edmonton and brought it back to Prince George.

“He died five years ago at the end of March and I had some guys finish it for me and it was at the Father’s Day Show and Shine that year,” said Lori. “It was a tribute to my husband.

“I came to see my son and daughter-inlaw and grandkids and do the Father’s Day car show. I’m here every year for Father’s Day.”

Michael normally would have brought the GTO his dad used to have as his daily driver, but it’s up on blocks right now with a transmission problem so he took his seat behind the wheel of the Nash.

Marilyn Monroe showed up Sunday for

a ride in the back of Bill Empey’s red 1956 Cadillac convertible. Monroe, also known as Kat Fullerton, said she thought it would be fun to bring a little Vegas to the cruise and she connected with the Cruisin’ Classics on their Facebook page to find just the right vehicle.

“I had to be in a convertible and I’m glad it’s not raining today,” she said.

The event was a fundraiser for the Salvation Army Food Bank.

“We had a lot of fun,” said Cruisin’ Classics president Chris Knight. “There were a lot of people on the roadside and a lot of people out everywhere. They were lined all the way up Foothills and on all the side streets we were on. It was a beautiful day.”

Citizen staff photos

Above, Marilyn Monroe, otherwise known as Kat Fullerton, rode in Sunday’s Cruisin’ Classics COVID Cruise for a Cause in the back of Bill Empey’s 1956 Cadillac convertible. Below right, Mark and Elizabeth Lawrence with their daughter Victoria showed off their 1965 Ford Mustang. Below left, Lori Tataryn, a former Prince George resident who now lives in Penticton, showed up with her son Michael in a stunning orange 1936 Nash three-window coupe.

Classic car fan turns page after wreck

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

Sitting in the restaurant eating breakfast last summer, Bob LeDuke didn’t hear the sickening grind of metal on metal as a semi-trailer truck made mincemeat of his pristine 1955 Chevy Bel Air.

But something in the reflection of the window caught LeDuke’s eye as that truck backed into his car for the second time. Pushed into the curb by such an irrestistible force, the cashmire blue car with the white hardtop flipped up on two wheels sideways and that was enough to get LeDuke’s attention.

When he came out and saw the damage, his heart dropped.

“You’re literally in shock,” he said. “You just can’t believe it.”

He’d given that car 22 years of love and attention. His $68,000 investment was left with a bent axle, damaged rocker panel and a driver’s side dent the size of the red spot on Jupiter.

“He was backing out of Grama’s Inn delivering groceries, his first day on the job, it almost rolled it over against the curb, he hit it twice,” said LeDuke. “There were skidmarks from where he hit it sideways.

“Lots of trucks make me nervous but I took Rick Fewster with me and he said this will be a safe place to park, because they usually back out the other way. I had a hunch to park by another guy and hunches you should follow.

“I didn’t sleep for a couple of nights.”

That beautifully-restored chrome-decorated two-door sedan and its luxurious cloth and leather upholstery, and painstakingly-detailed paint job, was near and

dear to everybody in the LeDuke family and news that it was in suddenly in grave condition, in need of intensive care, sent out ripples, almost as if there had been a death in the family.

“It’s gone through all the highlights of our family life – grads and proms and weddings,” said LeDuke’s wife Tammy. “You just can’t replace it.”

Or can you?

This past January, George Windsor, LeDuke’s Cruisin’ Classics car club buddy, found a car for sale in Port Coquitlam nearly identical to the accident victim. It was the two-door-hardtop sport coupe painted in the same tone of blue as LeDuke’s car and the only noticeable differ-

Special vintage car show offered to local seniors

Ted Clarke Citizen staff

Old cars lovingly restored to their showroom finishes are made to be seen.

For 45 years, the Prince George Cruisin’ Classics car club has made the Father’s Day Show and Shine one of the city’s most popular outdoor events - a chance for hundreds of vehicle owners to show off their pride-and-joy rides and provide the public a mechanical feast for the eyes.

But this year, with COVID-19 public health restrictions still in place, crowd gatherings of more than 50 people are not allowed and the Show and Shine had to be canceled. Rather than let all that Turtle wax got to waste, the city’s vintage and antique car clubs came up with an alternate plan to stage a couple of parades.

The first of those processions was Friday’s seniors tour, a spectacular line of shiny classic cars and trucks that made drive-by visits to seven local long-term care homes. That was followed by a 51-kilometre parade Sunday, starting at Exhibition Park and visiting each neighbourhood in the city to help raise funds for the Salvation Army Food Bank.

Bill and Kurt Vanderlans started the seniors tour about a decade ago and normally, if there was no pandemic, car owners would have stopped and parked in the lots at each senior home, allowing residents enough time to give those classic vehicles a close inspection. COVID protocols prevented that from happening this year and residents could only watch from windows or outdoor verandas as the

parade of cars passed by.

“The seniors tour was designed to bring the show to the seniors who couldn’t get to Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park too see our Show and Shine,” said Cruisin’ Classics president Christopher Knight. “The seniors in the past have come out and observed the cars up close and this year, unfortunately, they can’t do that and we can’t do that so we decided to run a slow-speed parade through as many seniors homes parking lots as we could.”

About 60 vehicles (double the number in previous years), representing three clubs – Prince George Cruisin’ Class, Vintage Car Club of Prince George and Overdrives –took part in Friday’s parade. The threehour tour out of downtown started at Parkside Lodge at 12:30 p.m., then went to Rainbow Lodge, UHNBC and Simon Fraser Lodge, followed by visits to Laurier Manor, Gateway Lodge and Riverbend Manor.

It’s a blast down memory lane for some of the residents, who perhaps owned vehicles similar to the ones being driven in the city this weekend.

“They’ve always appreciated the quality of the automobile we bring them and there’s a lot of automobile knowledge in the seniors that are here and the conversations that have been had in the past have been extremely informative to us and to them,” said Knight, who brought his charcoal-over-red ’33 Ford five-window coupe.

“There are a lot of smart automobile people in town, regardless of age. We love to show them off and this is a great way to do that.”

ence is there’s no post between the side windows. After a bit of wrangling back and forth with ICBC, the insurance payout came through and LeDuke bought the car and brought it home on a trailer.

“This is a hardtop and looks better but the other one was a solider car because of the post,” said the 68-year-old LeDuke, who was just four when his Chevy left the assembly line in Oshawa, Ont. “The other one had no rust but this has had a lot of work done to it (to repair rust).

“This one will have to do the trick.”

The hardtop is powered by a 350 cubic-inch Chevy engine and three-speed transmission, same as his wrecked car had. It has a similar suspension, with

power steering and power disc brakes to make it safer and nicer to drive. Fitted with 18-inch low-profile wheels in the back and 17-inch in the front, the car sits a bit lower than his original did. The trunk comes with a surprise: a hidden storage drawer that slides in under the back seat.

There is a bit of a happy ending to the story. Dwayne Harvey, another car club friend and neighbor of LeDuke’s, bought what was left of the old car and has entrusted Scott Russelo at Your Way Autobody to start fixing the damage. That’s possible because of the thickness of the metal frame and body parts, which still maintain their integrity under the hammering needed to straighten all those creases. Still, the repairs will likely end up costing $35,000.

“It’ll be back on the road, and I’ll get first dibs to buy it if I want,” said Bob.

Citizen staff photo

Bob and Tammy LeDuke, left, with their replacement 1955 Chevy Bel Air after the original, above, was hit by a delivery truck last summer.

CL ASSIF IEDS

Sep 24, 1961Jun 20, 1999

“Smoke ‘em till the wheels come off!”

We miss you lots and love you very much.

From Mom and family & friends.

With strong hands, a gentle heart and a loving spirit You lived your life ... A life remembered a life

Maxine,

Dec 28, 1942Jun 13, 2020

With heavy hearts we announce the passing of Marlene Irma Loring. Marlene was predeceased by her husband Cliff Loring, father and mother Adam and Irma Klein and grandson Clifford Haviland. She is survived by 3 sons, Greg, Alan (Jana) and Marty (Crystal) and only daughter Kelly (Jim). Grandchildren Cody, Ricki, Sydney, Hayden, Liam, Lindsay, Cole and Noah. great grandchildren Jasmine, Phoenix, Cohen and Bria. Social distancing celebration of life was held on June 20th.

Earl Hugh Fisher

Oct 1953 - May 2020

It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of Earl, as he will be dearly missed. Born on October 31, 1953 in Dauphin Manitoba and passed away on May 21, 2020 in Prince George. Earl was predeceased by his father Norman and his mother Ruth. Earl was a long term mill worker, produce worker and spent many years at the Nechako Bottle Depot. His friendly nature and his love of people meant that he made many friends throughout Prince George, he was a good friend and a good man who had a positive influence on many people, he will be greatly missed and fondly remembered. A memorial service was held on Friday, June 19, 2020 at the Prince George Funeral Home at 1014 Douglas St.

Paul Oesch

September 14, 1937June 9, 2020

On June 9th our beloved Dad, Grandpa Paul Oesch passed away peacefully surrounded by his loved ones. He is survived by his children, Cindy (Rob), Mike (Naiomi). grandchildren Fallyn, Shy, Jace, Shelby, Sidney, nine great grandchildren and numerous friends and extended family.

Paul was born and raised in Hunikon, Switzerland and in his twenties came to Canada where he met his wife and raised his children. He worked in forestry and had a great love for the outdoors. He enjoyed hiking, walks and visiting with his friends at the legion and Nancy 0’s. Age is just a number he always told us, and he proved it up until the very end. We will miss you but we will live by example and enjoy life. A celebration of life will be announced at a later date, And if you feel inclined a donation to the Hospice House in honour of Paul, would be greatly appreciated.

Bis wir dich wiedersehen, wir lieben dich

In loving memory of Eddie Barber

Marlene Irma Loring

2020

It is with great sadness that the family of Jeffrey James Hacock announce that Jeff left us on June 12, 2020 with grace and dignity at the age of 59. He left as he had lived; on his own terms.

He is pre-deceased by his two brothers, Ken and Gary and his father, John.

He is mourned by his life partner of 20 + years, Gerald Harnden, his mother, Sylvia Morehouse (Harry) sisters, Karen Mordus (Don) and Sharon Conway (Bill), stepchildren Eric Harnden( Danielle) and Brian Harnden, grandchildren Fred and Eva and a large extended family of adoring nieces, nephews, great nieces and nephews, and dear friends old and new, far and wide.

Jeff left his mark on the hearts and memories of anyone who ever met him. Those who had the good fortune to know him, loved him with a passion that was infectious. Everyone loved Jeff!

As a husband, son and brother he was a best friend. To friends, he was family. To strangers, he was kind, welcoming and charming. He was the centre of social life for so many in Prince George as a young man, in Vancouver as an adult and in Courtenay, where he called home for the last 2 decades.

In life he faced many heart-breaking trials, the last of which was a decade long struggle with increasingly debilitating MS. He faced each challenge with determination and humour. He remained generous and caring throughout his life to the very end.

Words do not express the loss we all feel or the gratitude to the MAID team of medical professionals who helped him leave peacefully and painlessly, in his own home surrounded by the love of his partner, mother and family.

By Jeff’s request, those who wish to remember him and his generosity with a donation could do so to the Multiple Sclerosis Society of BC.

Pamella Marie Doris Sims

April 25, 1958May 27, 2020

It is with great sadness that we announce the death of our mother, partner, & friend Pamella Marie Doris Sims ( Hurtubise ) on May 27, 2020. Pamella was pre-deceased by her mother & father, her mother & father in-laws, her sister Jeannine, her 2 brothers Victor and Paul, sisterin-law Patty and her brother in-law Marty. She is survived by her loving husband Will, of 44 years, daughter Janet, sons Jaime ( Rochelle ), Nick ( Jade ) and grand children Alyssa, Sammy, Noah, Shaylee, Alicja, Isaiah, & Malcolm. Pamella also leaves, too numerous to name, siblings, nieces and nephews that she loved very much. Pamella was a truly inspirational woman whose positive attitude during adverse times was a testimony to her Christian Faith. She loved her pastor and brothers & sisters in Christ at Prince George City Church. In lieu of flowers please make donations to Prince George City Church. A Celebration of Life will be arranged at a future date.

Jill Peniuk (Postlethwaite)

1952 - 2020

It is with a broken heart that I share with you the passing of my loving wife of 39 years. Jill was born November 15, 1952 in Great Urswick, England. At the age of 18, Jill immigrated to Canada to pursue a new life experience. It was in Vancouver we met and we married in England. We moved to Prince George in 1985 and a few years later opened and operated a print shop until our retirement in 2012.

Jill loved her tennis and also participated in squash, racquetball and curling until rheumatoid arthritis prevented her from playing. Jill spent many hours in her garden overlooking the Nechako River.

Jill was predeceased by her parents and is survived by her husband, Ron; two brothers Andrew and Thomas (Kath); many nieces and nephews; two stepsons Terry and Trevor, and their families.

Many thanks to Dr. Raymond and Dr. Grose for their kindness and guidance.

A private celebration for Jill will be held at later date.

Jill’s final resting place will be at home in England.

Loring Dressel

With profound sadness we announce the passing of our mother, grandmother and friend, Pamela Susan Loring Dressel on June 5th, 2020. She left us peacefully at her place of residence in Simon Fraser Lodge in Prince George, British Columbia. She was in her 76th year.

Born on Vancouver Island in British Columbia in 1943, and then moved to Vancouver as a child, she grew up in a happy and loving home.

In 1968, she married the love of her life, Heinz and in 1974 followed him to Prince George where they have resided since.

She was the beloved mother of Timothy (Simone) and Louise (Joe), and very proud grandmother of Jordan, Christine and Lorelei.

Predeceased by her parents Tim and Kathleen Ely.

Pam lived a full life as a wonderful mother, volunteer, and then manager in the retail store that she absolutely loved and she met many cherished friends while working.

She loved to garden and had beautiful flowers every summer, kept an immaculate house, and had a love for travel which was passed on to her kids and grandkids. Pam loved to chat and could have conversations and make friends instantly with perfect strangers! Most of all she loved her family and instilled in her children strong values that have served them well. She will be dearly missed and forever in our hearts.

As per Pam’s wishes, she would like to have her memorial and ashes in different locations across Germany.

Donations in Pam’s memory can be made to the Alzheimers Society of BC.

The family would like to sincerely thank the Staff in the Elm wing at Simon Fraser Lodge for the amazing care shown to Pam while residing there, but especially in her final days of life.

ANDREW “ANDY”

JOSEPH GAAL

March 9, 1940June 16, 2020

The Gaal family is sad to announce the passing of our dear Andy. He was born in Prince George to Hungarian immigrants Rose and Andy Gaal. He spent his early years in Aleeza Lake. Life was hard, but he learned many skills and became a very good handyman. For many years, Andy worked as an electrician by trade for Lakewood Electric. In 1962, he married Marie Bartlett, and their union resulted in 3 fine sons. Andy was a great provider for the family. He and Marie bought property on Norman Lake and the building and maintenance of the cabin was a lifelong project. It became a summertime haven for the family with many wonderful memories. Andy was a quiet man with a dry sense of humour. He liked watching sports, nature shows and “Highway Thru Hell” on tv and listened regularly to Cougars hockey games on the radio. He was also a fan of the old “Lone Ranger” tv series and Johnny Cash. Word searches and playing solitaire on his phone were daily pasttimes and he looked forward to his weekly shop at Costco. Andy enjoyed picking berries and making haluska, head cheese, and fried oysters. He especially demonstrated great devotion to and care of his mother in her elderly years. Andy was predeceased by sister Roseanne (David) and son Joey. He is survived by his wife Marie, sons Wayne (Gail), Jason (Tanya), brothers Louis (Katie), Michael (Marlene), 7 grandchildren, and 3 great-grandchildren. No funeral service by request. A memorial tree will be planted at the cabin this summer during a private family celebration of life. Special thanks to Dr. Raymond and the caring hospice staff. Donations may be made in Andy’s name to the Hospice House or Kidney Foundation of Canada.

Celebrate the lives of loved ones with your stories, photographs and tributes

Pamela Susan

Jeffrey James Hacock 1961 ~

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Kay (Kathleen) DeClercq

May 4, 1926 - Jun 15, 2020

It is with great sadness that we say goodbye to our mom, Kay (Kathleen) DeClercq, age 94, at Evergreen House, North Vancouver, BC.

She leaves behind her 5 sons and their families, Lee & BetsyAnne (Anna/ Brian and their 2 children Myles and Madison and, Sarah/Josh); Wayne & Jude (Carmen/Josh and their son Nathan, and, Graham/Alexis and their son, Sammy); Dale & Carol (Christa/Rider and their 3 children, Wilder, Vienna, Indiana; Laura /Adam and their 2 children Iyla and Owen; Lisa/ Adrian and their 2 sons, Ashton and Liam); Lyle & Jessica (Albert/Alana, and Nicole); Hal & Lorea.

One of the most important memories of our mom is how strong she was at the time of our father’s passing, Albert Gerald DeClercq (1925-1977). She went on to continue raising her sons at an incredibly difficult time. Her boys and family meant everything to her.

Kay was a very successful businesswoman with various ventures in Prince George, BC. She also went into real estate in Prince George and West Vancouver, BC. She resided in West Vancouver from 1987.

After she retired as a realtor in the Lower Mainland, she volunteered at the W. Vancouver Seniors Centre for many years. She made many new friends there and enjoyed the camaraderie of the staff and members.

She was well-travelled and well-read. She enjoyed large family gatherings and social-functions alike.

Kay also had one sibling, Mike Beliak (1924-2008) aka “Uncle Mike”. He was a kind soul and always had a joke to share.

Mom (Nana) you are forever loved.

The DeClercq family would like to graciously thank the nurses, doctors and careaid workers for their tireless efforts caring for our mom since Sept 2019. Memorial donations in lieu of flowers may be made to the Lions Gate Hospital Foundation for Evergreen House. A celebration of Life will be held post-Covid-19 pandemic.

ST. AMAND, Gabrielle

ST. AMAND; Gabrielle, born in St. Denis, Sask., July 30, 1925, died very peacefully in her own home, the early morning hours of June 7,2020. Survived by her children, Isabelle (John) Moses, Lionel (Lynn) St. Amand, Valerie Haas and Carmen (Terry) Coltman, her grandchildren; Monique Hargreaves, Francine (Daniel) Turner, Mark (Aryanne) Moses, Kyle and Greg St. Amand, Cory and Andrea Coltman, her great grandchildren; Alexis and Dyson Hargreaves, Isabelle Moses, Preston, Reese, Malakai and Avia Turner.

Our precious little mom was the 2nd youngest of 21 siblings, predeceased by her beloved husband, Roland, and every one of her siblings. She would have celebrated her 95th birthday, July 30, 2020.

A memorial mass and celebration of her life will take place August 9, 2020 at 1:00 p.m. at the Church of the Immaculate Conception (Cathedral Ave.), which mom loved and attended mass faithfully since 1965, when the church was then called the Domano Chapel. Mass will be concelebrated by Fr. Chris Lynch and Fr. Pier Pandolfo.

Mom was a resident of the Simon Fraser Lodge from Aug. 2, 2019 to June 2, 2020. She always wanted to end her days at home and when it became clear that her time had come, we removed her from the Lodge and brought her home to be with family.

Her life was all about her faith, her family, food and music. In honouring mom, we have considered the multitude of relatives and friends. We are acutely aware of the implications of COVID and in keeping with COVID restrictions, we will utilize the entire property that Immaculate Conception Church sits on. Immediate family and the eldest relatives and those needing assistance will be welcomed in the church(50 people) and hall (50 people). Tents will be set up in the school grounds where social distancing can be maintained and where, as many people who would like to attend can do so safely. By Aug. 9, 2020 we are hopeful that many restrictions will be lifted. Either way, social distancing etc., can be accommodated. Mom’s favourite day of the week was Sunday and every day while at the Simon she would ask, “Is it Sunday today?”. Thus, we have chosen a Sunday to honour her. We ask only that you bring a lawn chair, your mask, your appetite and your voices.

Again, mom loved her church. The St. Amand family, along with other parishioners, were instrumental in building ICC and in mom’s memory, rather than send flowers, she would have wanted donations to her church, so we will pass the collection at her mass.

Another notice will be placed in the Citizen and on facebook closer to the date of her celebration. Thank you to every single staff member at the Simon Fraser who cared for and loved our beloved little mom, Gabrielle. Most of all, thank you to Dr. Steven Chang, mom’s favourite doctor of all time.

CATHY MURPHY

2x90.0

PGC002015

Wood,Joyce June23,1937-June6,2020

OurbelovedMother,JoyceWood,passedaway peacefullywithherfamilybyhersideinPrinceGeorge, BConJune6th,2020.JoycedatedJohnMurphyforsix years,thenmarriedin1958.Theyhadtwochildren,Cathy andGeorge.Theirmarriageendedafter29yearsof marriage.JoycemetAllanin1987andtheymarriedin 2000.Theyweretogetherfor31yearsbeforeAllan passedawayin2017.Theylovedtotravelwiththeir friendsintheRVandenjoyedsittingbythelake.Joyce andAllanwerebothactivemembersintheSeniorgames wheretheycompetedincarpetbowlingandwontwogold andsilvermedals.

Joycewasdedicatedthroughoutherlifetodifferent organizations,suchastheRoyalPurple,Momwas honoredlastyearwithher50-yearpin.Shehadserved twiceasaPresidentoftheRoyalPurple,andPresident fortheL.A.oftheLegion,shewasalsoamemberof EasternStar.MombelongedtotheRedHattersand sharedmanyfuntimeswiththegirls.

Joycewasaveryelegant,classy,well-respectedladywho wasupbeat,funtobewith,andwasveryoutgoingand lovedlifetothefullest.Whereevershewentexcitement followed.Mom’spassionwasmusic,whetheritwouldbe singingindifferentchoirsovertheyears,orplayingthe piano,accordion,orguitar.Joycelovedgettinguponthe danceflooranddancingthenightawaywithAl.There wasnothingshelovedmorethantobeplayingmusicfor peopletodancetoandspendingtimewithherfamily. Shewillforeverbemissed.Joyceleavesbehindher daughter,Cathy;son,George(Laura);twinbrother,Bob (Vera);halfbrother,Cliff;manyniecesandnephews; grandchildren,Jodi(Mike),Blaine(Amber),Michael,and David;andgreat-grandchildren,Ethan,McKayla,Teagan, Kaylie,andBrinley.Joycewaspredeceasedbyher husband,Allan;sister,Helen;andbrothers,Dennis,Bud, andJim. TherewillbeaCelebrationofLifeatalaterdate.

Elizabeth Mary Wojciechowski (nee Olts) of Kamloops BC, passed away on June 12, 2020 at 81 years.

Beth is survived by her loving children Dean (Jocelyne) Steliga, Deanna Steliga, and Lyle (Chrystal) Steliga, stepchildren Jacquie (Lloyd) Schachtel, Tamara (Dean) Facchini, Michelle (Andrew) Watson and Donna Wojciechowski, grandchildren Kristopher, Elizabeth, Devin, Haylee, Kevin and Kira Steliga, Avery (Simon) Hoffmeister, Delaney Schachtel, Megan and Callie Watson, and Jonas Facchini, great grandchildren Daphne, Konnor, and Freija, also survived by her sister Trudene (Ken) McMillan, step-brother Ken (Alannah) Royston, niece Alana, nephews Alan, Michael, and Jason.

Predeceased by husband Adam Wojciechowski and son Peter Robert Steliga.

Beth was born in Vernon, BC and spent her childhood in Redpath, Kelowna and Prince George, BC. She lived in Montreal, QC from 1967 until 1983 when she returned to Prince George, Lillooet and settled in Kamloops in 2002. She loved to golf, to curl, travel, and the Kamloops Blazers. She was an active member of Eastern Star, Job’s Daughters and Rainbow of the Masonic family. Beth was a calm loving spirit to everyone she met. She was a firm believer that a child did not have to be of her blood to be loved.

Memorial donations to Juvenile Diabetes Research would be appreciated.

A private family Celebration of life will take place on Saturday, June 20, 2020

Arrangements entrusted to Alternatives Funeral & Cremation Services 250-554-2324

Condolences may be expressed to the family from www.myalternatives.ca

BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY

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Duplexes for Sale

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Houses for Sale

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Recreational Property

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Tips for styling your shelves

In many homes, shelves are essential for making sure your items are organized and easy to find. Here are a few tips for styling them.

CONSIDER LOCATION

The way you style the shelves in your bedroom will differ from the way you display items in your bathroom. You should match what you’re storing to the location. For example, a collection of porcelain dishes is perfect for the kitchen, while books may better suit the living room.

CREATE INTEREST

If you display only one type of item, your shelves will look dull and uninspired. Instead, choose a variety of things

in an array of different shapes and sizes to create visual interest.

WORK WITH COLOUR Group items on your shelves by colour. This will ensure that what you display looks cohesive and well-organized.

CORRAL THINGS IN BINS

Often, people use their shelves to store things they need but that aren’t very attractive. Baskets, bowls and bins are great for holding these items, and using them will make your shelves look prettier and more put together.

If you follow these tips, you’ll avoid having shelves that look cluttered and unappealing.

3

great reasons to finish your basement

Are you wondering whether to invest time and money into finishing your basement? Here are three good reasons to go for it.

1. TO LOWER YOUR HEATING AND COOLING BILLS

An unfinished basement is often uninsulated, making the rest of your house more difficult to heat and cool. Since a key step to finishing a basement involves insulating the walls and floor, a positive side effect of undertaking this project is having a comfortable temperature throughout your home.

2. TO EXPAND YOUR LIVING SPACE

Whether you want to make a playroom for the kids, an office for you or

a home theatre for the whole family, the basement is the perfect location. If the space allows for it, you can also convert it into a small apartment, which might be ideal for your adult children or elderly family members.

3. TO ADD VALUE TO YOUR PROPERTY

If you decide to sell your home, a finished basement typically provides a 50 to 75 per cent return on investment. In addition to the increase in value, your property will likely be more attractive to potential buyers.

Keep in mind that renovating a basement may not be as expensive as you think. This is because you can choose different materials than those used in the rest of your home. In fact, the same hardwood flooring that’s ideal for a living room is a terrible option for a basement due to the higher risk of moisture problems.

7 signs your home’s insulation needs to be replaced

Insulation is essential for keeping your home warm in the winter, cool in the summer and dry all year long. Here are seven signs it’s time to replace yours.

1. SOUNDS TRAVEL

The insulation in your walls, floors and ceilings should muffle all but the loudest noises in your home. If you can hear ambient sounds like the clicking of a keyboard or the dripping of a tap from another room, the insulation isn’t doing its job.

2. HIGH ENERGY BILLS

Inadequate insulation forces you to turn up the heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer. A higherthan-usual energy bill is often the first sign that you need to replace your insulation.

3. UNEVEN TEMPERATURES

The temperature in your home should be consistent from room to room. If you have areas that are cooler or warmer than others, it’s an indication that there’s a problem with the insulation.

4. COLD SURFACES

Walls, floors and ceilings shouldn’t be

cold to the touch. If yours are, it’s a sign that there isn’t enough insulation.

5. CONDENSATION AND MOULD

If you have mould on your ceiling, condensation on your windows or damp walls and floors, it’s a sign that there’s too much humidity in your home. This may be due to poor insulation.

6. PEST INFESTATIONS

Animals and insects can get into your home through gaps in your insulation. Additionally, they’re often attracted by mould and damage caused by water infiltration.

7. FREEZING AND ICE

It isn’t normal for pipes to freeze or for icicles to hang from the edge of your roof. Both are signs that your insulation isn’t doing its job.

While it may seem like a big undertaking, replacing your insulation is a surefire way to make your home more comfortable and lower your energy bills.

Add flowers to your plate

Edible flowers are a feast for the eyes as well as the taste buds. So why not reserve a part of your backyard for growing edible flowers this summer? Just bear in mind that you’ll have to take a few precautions.

Borage, nasturtiums, violets, bee balm, phlox, gladioli and even tulips are just some of the flowers that you can eat. There are many others, but be careful: not all flowers are edible. In fact, some are even toxic. So, before you taste a flower, make sure you know exactly what you’re about to eat.

The flowers you use to embellish your recipes should not have been treated with pesticides. Pick fresh flowers early in the morning when the dew has evaporated or after sunset. Shake them to remove any insects; remove the stamens and rinse with cool water. Place the flowers on a paper towel, and when they’re dry, put them in a plastic container in the fridge. Most flowers will keep for several days.

As well as being a beautiful addition to salads and pastries, edible flowers can be used to make an herbal tea, lemonade, butter, sauce, syrup or jelly. You’ll really impress your guests if you sauté a couple

of fresh flowers quickly and serve them with a main dish or starter. You could even cool your drinks with flowers embedded in ice cubes. This summer, there are plenty of new ways to appreciate flowers — you can start by putting some on your plate. Enjoy!

Turn heads with an upside-down

Growing plants upside-down in hanging containers is nothing new, but the idea gains in popularity every summer thanks to its many benefits, both for the gardener and the plants themselves. Many enthusiasts swear by this technique, which produces a hearty harvest with minimal effort and space required.

The two most common species grown upside-down are tomatoes and cucumbers,

garden

but other vegetables like eggplants, beans and peppers are also suited to this type of gardening. A variety of herbs and flowers also produce great results in a hanging garden.

THE UPSIDE OF UPSIDE-DOWN GARDENING Hanging gardens are much easier to maintain than traditional ones. Since the plants are at eye level, there’s no need to bend over for watering or picking fruit. And you can say “goodbye” to tilling and weeding, as neither are required. Plus, plants grown using this space-saving technique tend to be more vigorous and have better, stronger roots. Furthermore, their fruits don’t touch the soil, which reduces the risk of rotting and pest attacks.

TRY IT FOR YOURSELF

Are you ready to grow your own upside-down veggies, flowers or herbs? All you need is a large container, a mix of soil and fertilizer and something to hang it all up with. Drill a hole around five cm in diameter in the bottom of the container. Stick the plant’s stem through the hole, from the inside of the pot, and cover the roots with soil. Hang it up somewhere that receives enough sunlight, and voila! You’re all set for gardening success.

Edible flowers are a feast for the eyes as well as the taste buds.

Beautify your BALCONY

If you’d like to give your balcony a makeover, here are some simple upgrades that will spruce up even the smallest of spaces.

FURNITURE

Purchase outdoor furniture with clean lines, neutral tones and natural fabrics. Add visual interest with brightcoloured cushions and blankets. If you have the space, hanging chairs, hammocks and swings are great options.

LIGHTING

Use electric candles, paper lanterns or string lights to help set the right mood. Opt for multicoloured ones to create a

festive vibe or white ones if you want something a little more romantic. Alternatively, install solar LED lights that will brighten up your whole balcony.

ACCESSORIES

If you have the space, install shelves to display your choice of outdoor decorations. You can also add a touch of colour with an outdoor rug. An umbrella or curtains can be included to provide you with shelter from the sun.

PLANTS

If your balcony has a roof or overhang, use it to display hanging plants. If not, let vines twist around the railings. For a rustic look, consider growing herbs and flowers in wooden crates.

It won’t take much to transform your balcony into an outdoor haven. With a little effort, you can create a beautiful space to enjoy all summer.

If your backyard is in need of an upgrade, here are some ways to give it a makeover.

INSTALL OUTDOOR LIGHTING

Enjoy your backyard both day and night by installing smart outdoor lighting that turns itself on when the sun goes down. You can even choose a system that allows you to match the intensity and colour of the lights to the situation. This way, you can create the perfect atmosphere for every evening, from quiet nights at home to festive barbecues with friends.

INCORPORATE

NATURAL MATERIALS

Natural materials like wood and stone are ideal for most landscaping projects and complement design esthetics ranging from traditional to modern. For a more contemporary look, pair wood and stone with corten steel, which can be used for fireplaces, garden edging and flowerpots. Additionally, plants like vines, grasses and succulents enhance wood and stone features.

CREATE A NATURAL POOL

In a natural swimming pool, water is filtered using oxygenating and purifying plants rather than chlorine and other chemicals. Besides being kinder to the environment, these pools are often designed to imitate natural bodies of water and therefore blend into your yard more than traditional pools. If you don’t have room for a swimming pool, consider enhancing your outdoor space with a water feature like a fountain or small pond.

RETHINK

OUTDOOR COOKING

Outdoor kitchens are increasingly popular. Consider upgrading from your basic barbecue to an integrated grill with a counter and sink. Other features you may want to include are a bar, a smoker and a woodburning pizza oven.

To get started on your backyard makeover project, be sure to get hold of a reputable landscaping company or general contractor.