Prince George Citizen June 8, 2019

Neighbours oppose proposed pot shop

Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff

mnielsen@pgcitizen.ca

A proposal to open a retail cannabis store in a strip mall near Carney and Fifth is being met with opposition.

A 25-name petition and a letter from two nearby homeowners have been submitted in time for Monday night’s city council meeting calling on council to reject an application to open a store at 484 Douglas St. Justin Mousseau and Ted Brown, who own and operate the nearby BX Pub and BX Cold Beer and Wine Store, are the applicants.

Concerns raised include the potential for an increase of unruly patrons and illegal activity.

Its proximity to a residential neighbourhood and an apartment building where families with young children live is also being raised.

“The proximity to nearby high school and elementary schools is a concern as students walk past this location on a daily basis to get to and from school by crossing at the lights at Fifth Avenue and Carney Street,” petitioners add.

The property is 422 metres from the Central Fort George Traditional School, 316 metres from the First Baptist Church, 453 metres from Watrous Park, 557 meters from Harper Park, 200 metres from the Moose Family Centre, and 204 metres from the Alano Society, according to a staff report.

In a letter to council, Mousseau and Brown emphasize their experience running the BX, saying it is a reason why council should support their proposal.

They describe the spot where they want to open the store as a secluded commercial strip mall with easy access and parking and where there are only two other businesses – both of which submitted letters of support as did two other nearby businesses.

Staff is recommending a three-year temporary use permit be granted to the applicants to give council time to determine the impacts before deciding whether to rezone the site.

That’s not good enough as far as two nearby homeowners are concerned.

“We don’t want to be part of an experiment to see whether there will be adverse impacts of a retail cannabis store on an adjoining residential community,” Ken Simonar and Saphida Migabo say in their letter to council.

We don’t want to be part of an experiment to see whether there will be adverse impacts of a retail cannabis store on an adjoining residential community.

— Ken Simonar and Saphida Migabo

Council will also consider an application from Zaga’s Hemp Shop owners Ginny and Fred Burnett to sell cannabis out of their store in Redwood Square at 1543 Victoria St.

One letter of opposition has been submitted on that application. Helen Sarrazin says it will only create more difficulties in an already troubled area of the city.

Staff is also recommending a temporary use permit for the Burnett’s application.

Also on the agenda:

• Council will consider two options for adding 4,000 hours to the city’s transit service.

Staff is recommending council accept an option to procure three buses and introduce frequent service along high-use routes to UNBC and CNC and additional off-peak service as needed at a cost of $265,881.

The other option is to procure one bus and focus equally on enhancing peak and off-peak service at a cost of $190,851.

Both options are projected to generate an additional $71,136 in revenue.

• A revamped sanitary sewer use bylaw will be presented to council.

It includes codes of practice for restaurants, vehicle repair shops and car washes and is aimed at reducing the cost of dealing with blockages in the system.

• Eleven bylaws adding up to $32.2 million worth of borrowing will be up for final reading after a campaign to force referendums on the items fell well short of the 5,546 responses needed during the alternative approval process.

• Council will be asked to authorize borrowing of slightly less than $1.6 million for the Killarney-Sussex-Wildwood sewer extension project. — see PROJECT, page 3

New trial ordered in P.G. murder after ‘confusing’ jury charge, court rules

Beth LEIGHTON The Canadian Press

VANCOUVER — British Columbia’s highest court has set aside murder convictions and ordered a new trial for three Prince George-area men after ruling the judge’s charge to the jury was disorganized and confusing.

In a unanimous decision released Thursday, a three-member panel of the B.C. Court of Appeal erased first-degree murder convictions for Lyle Baker and Dustin Lindgren, and a second-degree conviction for Kevin Zaporoski in the death of 22-year-old Jordan Reno in June 2012.

The decision says the victim’s bound body was found wrapped in plastic inside a box on Baker’s property north of Prince George.

The Crown alleged Reno was in conflict with several people involved in the Prince George drug scene.

The three men were arrested in 2015 and found guilty in June 2017.

In ordering the new trial, the Appeal Court says the trial judge’s final instructions to the jury were “defective” for failing to provide a “clear and logical” process for it to decide a verdict.

The Appeal Court decision also says the jury was incorrectly allowed to consider certain DNA and blood evidence when deciding the intent of the suspects.

Justice David Frankel says the jury had a “formidable task” as it considered multiple forms of mostly circumstantial evidence.

“There were eleven possible verdicts amongst the three accused,” he wrote on behalf of the panel.

“It was critical that the trial judge prop-

erly instruct the jury to enable them to discharge their task.” He says the organization of the charge failed to provide the jury with a proper framework to assess each of the accused’s alleged part in Reno’s murder. The ruling also examines the judge’s refusal to provide the jury with a written copy of the more than 100-page charge.

“Given the number of accused, the number of possible verdicts, the alternate routes to liability, and the fact that the instructions were provided only orally, it was of the utmost importance that the charge provide the jury with a clear and logical step-by-step process it could apply during its deliberations,” Frankel wrote.

“This it did not do.”

Evidence presented during the trial showed Reno had been severely beaten but forensic experts could not determine if he died of multiple blows to the head or suffocated due to the layers of plastic wrapped around his head.

The Crown presented blood and DNA evidence on clothing and on the walls of the trailer where Reno was attacked.

While Frankel agrees the spatter evidence could suggest multiple blows and an inference of intention to kill, he says DNA on clothing can’t offer the same consideration.

Several other grounds for appeal were also raised, including a concern about how quickly the oral charge was delivered. Frankel agreed with a Crown assessment that the pace was “fairly brisk,” but he ruled out further consideration because the appeal was allowed on other grounds.

A date for a new trial has not been set.

UNBC professors accept early-retirement offers

Citizen staff

University of Northern British Columbia’s bid to reduce senior faculty has produced results.

In all, 19 professors have accepted early retirement packages and a further five in UNBC’s School of Education have accepted voluntary exit packages, Barb Daigle, interim vice-president for finance, people and business operations, confirmed this week.

UNBC president Daniel Weeks has said the intent was to close the salary gap with comparator universities.

The overall number of faculty will remain the same, he stressed, with each who moves on replaced with a new professor. Faculty interested had to be at least 55 years old and have been at UNBC at least 15 years as of the end of this year. They will receive a month’s pay for each year of service to a maximum of 18 months. For the School of Education, there were no limits on age and years of service. Those who accepted will also get up to 18 months pay. Departures will be spread out over the next year, Daigle said.

Darren Neufeld with Blake

Showing appreciation

Janet Good loads the back of her car full of plants that she picked up for tenants in her six-plex during the Aboriginal Housing Society of Prince George’s tenant appreciation day. The society offers lunch and plants and planting supplies as a thank you to their tenants.

Local contestants ranked well in Maxim competition

Frank PEEBLES Citizen

fpeebles@pgcitizen.ca

staff

Two semi-finalists with Prince George connections are in the final stages of online voting for Maxim Canada’s Cover Girl Competiton.

Brandi Hansen now lives in Penticton and Terri Shields now lives in Burns Lake, but both have called P.G. home and both maintain communities of friends and family here. By strange coincidence the two actually know each other but were unaware that the other had entered the Maxim contest.

Both sailed through their respective groupings as the original cast of thousands was whittled down to these semi-finals.

Hansen and Shields are not in the same groupings now, and since online voting opened on Monday they have tended to be No. 1 in their sets, but some late-week surges by other contestants have jockeyed them in and out of the top spot.

In order to advance to the finals, they each must prevail versus the other competitors in these groupings.

Shields is in Group 6 while Hansen is in Group 9.

Voting goes on until Thursday. People are allowed to vote once per day or buy extra Life Votes, as many as you wish up to $1,000 at a rate of $1 per vote, with proceeds going to the Canadian Cancer Society.

For more information and photos on the two local competitors, visit their profiles at maximcovergirl.com and read more in depth about them in The Citizen’s feature stories on each one, available at the Prince George Citizen website.

NEWS IN BRIEF

City’s unemployment rate

4.7 per cent

The city’s unemployment rate stood at 4.7 per cent in May, according to Statistics Canada labour market survey numbers issued Friday.

In all 50,700 people were working while 2,500 were seeking work and 19,700 were not participating for an employment rate of 69.6 per cent and a participation rate of 73.1 per cent. The city’s working age population was 53,200. For the same month last year, the unemployment rate was 4.6 per cent with 51,600 working, 2,500 seeking work and 18,500 not participating for an employment rate of 71.1 per cent and a participation rate of 74.5 per cent. The workingage population was 54,100. In April, the unemployment rate was 5.7 per cent, with 49,300 working, 3,000 seeking work and 20,500 not participating for an employment rate of 67.7 per cent and a participation rate of 71.8 per cent. The working age population was 52,300.

The margin of error for the May unemployment rate was plus or minus 0.8 per cent, 68 per cent of the time while those for May 2018 and March 2019 were plus or minus 0.7 and 0.9 per cent respectively.

The numbers are based on a three-month rolling average and do not separate fulltime and part-time employment. See page 16 for more coverage.

— Citizen staff

Mackenzie Pulp Mill fined

Mackenzie Pulp Mill Corporation was slapped with $81,100 worth of fines for violating environmental regulations, Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy said. The fines were issued during the latter half of 2018 for failing to maintain a recovery boiler and failing to comply with permit limits for bivalent sulphur compounds and particulate matter.

— Citizen staff

Pop-up market starting up

The first of a series of pop-up markets will be held on Saturday in the Columbus parking lot next door to the Prince George Farmers’ Market at Third and Quebec. Hosted by Downtown Prince George, it will feature wares from home-based and part-time vendors and be on hand twice each month for the next four months: June 8 and 12, July 6 and 20, August 10 and 24 and September 7 and 21, 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.

— Citizen staff

HANSEN

SHIELDS

CITIZEN PHOTO BY BRENT BRAATEN

Mackey performs Jake’s Gift at Juno Beach

Frank PEEBLES Citizen staff fpeebles@pgcitizen.ca

There were soldiers from this area storming the Nazi machine guns and artillery at Juno Beach.

Now, 75 years later after they broke through the hard lines of tyranny, it is their stories that continue to fight for freedom. One of the most compelling stories of them all, a modern classic, and eternal ode to the Second World War is the play Jake’s Gift. During this period of mourning and gratitude marking 75 years since D-Day, the writer-actor behind Jake’s Gift is herself at Juno Beach to perform this treasured Canadian theatre on the precise spot where Canadian soldiers broke over the rise of French land on their way to liberate the world from the Nazi terror.

Julia Mackey and her husband Dirk Van Stralen, the play’s director, have performed there before, but this time there is an added sense of importance, with the world’s observance of the anniversary. Mackey will stage the play six times (four in French, two in English) in the Normandy region, and she will also be the intermediary between children in the Juno Beach area and children in the Cariboo. She is delivering 75 hand-decorated cards addressed to soldiers who are buried in the Bény-sur-Mer Canadian War Cemetery where so many Canadian soldiers are interred after making the ultimate sacrifice while storming the beach in the D-Day counterassault, and in the following push to victory in Europe. There are 2,048 graves there. All but four are Canadian.

This graveyard and others like it are cared for and deeply meaningful to the people of those French communities first liberated in that catastrophic invasion.

The mayor of one such community – Jean Luc Guillourad of Colomby-Anguerny – spotted a card of thanks written by a student from Ontario and placed on one of the grave markers.

It sparked an idea to have French and Canadian children do 75 cards of their own – one for each year since D-Day – and place them around the cemetery.

“It was such a beautiful idea, so moving of him to think of this. It’ll be wonderful to meet the students in advance and then we will be doing a performance in Anguerny,” said Mackey. “They have 75 students in their school, and we reached out to Red Bluff and Wells elementary schools to do the 75 from here.”

Each card had a message of thanks written personally from the student, and some artwork. The local teachers who facilitated were Danette Boucher, Linda Joyce and Teresa Beaven-McCart.

Guillourad sought out Mackey for this exchange because he had seen Jake’s Gift performed in Normandy on a previous occasion, and he knew the title character, Jake, had a brother named Chester buried in Bény-sur-Mer.

“We have had a very moving experience so far,” said Mackey, after attending the D-Day anniversary events and completing some of the performances on their Juno Beach sojourn.

“We had an evening French show and an English matinee in the exact locale of the play – right across the street from (the child character) Isabelle’s house in the play. It was so incredible to perform there. That house (now known as the Queens Own Rifles House) will be 100 feet from where I’ll be performing, and I’ll be able to see it from the stage.”

Mackey has experienced a wide range of emotions based on the response of audience members – in Prince George alone that has

City annual report out

Citizen staff

The City of Prince George’s annual report for 2018 is now available for public review.

The report includes audited financial statements, tax exemptions, services and operations for the previous year as well as city hall’s objectives and priorities, and measures of its activities and objectives.

The report is also full of data and statistics for residents and visitors. Did you know that the total length of city pipe infrastructure is nearly equal to the distance between Prince George and Winnipeg?

“This year, we are especially eager to support council’s priority regarding infrastructure renewal,” said city manager Kathleen Soltis.

“Compiling and providing comprehensive asset management information will help us to make infrastructure investment decisions that will contribute to

long-term sustainability.

“In fact, this annual report is an important part of quantifying our infrastructure assets for residents and showing how reinvestment is part of our workplan and council’s priorities.”

Copies can be downloaded through the city’s website at www. princegeorge.ca/annualreport while paper copies are available for review at the city hall service centre on the first floor.

The report will be taken to council members for their consideration at the June 24 council meeting.

And written submissions from the public regarding the report will be accepted until June 18, at 4 p.m.

Submissions may be sent by email to cityclerk@princegeorge.

ca. Members of the public are welcome to attend the regular meeting on June 24 to present submissions or ask questions.

Project to serve 80 homes

— from page 1

The 80 homes that will benefit from the work will pay back the loan over 20 years at a pace of $99,819 per year through an addition to their property tax bills under a local service area agreement.

The original budget had been set at $1.9 million but the final cost came in at $1.65 million and $61,715 had been received in commuted payments to reduce the total to be borrowed.

• Staff is recommending council deny a permit to vary the floor

area and height restrictions for a shop building at 2860 Gogolin Rd.

• Public hearings will be held for requests to rezone land at 7930 Bunce Rd. to allow for a two-lot subdivision and to close a road at 7919 Highway 97 South.

• Representatives from BC Hydro will give an update on the Peace to Kelly Lake capacitors project and representatives from Telus will give a presentation on its plan to extend its PureFibre fibre optic network to most of the households in the city.

of B.C. facing drought

been a Lieutenant Governor, many veterans, school kids, Theatre Northwest crowds, and more – and sometimes it seems the play has a streak of providence to it. Mackey was bowled over when she discovered that the people with whom she had to make arrangements for the Juno Beach Centre (the Canadian organization dedicated to the DDay memorial and museum in Normandy) were based in Burlington, Ontario. Burlington, by remarkable coincidence, plays a notable part in the play.

“I am so thrilled to be going back there, and this new relationship with the students just makes it so special,” said Mackey. She and Van Stralen attended a ceremony on Friday in the Juno Beach area at which an elementary school there was renamed Louis Valmount Roy after a fallen D-Day soldier. They also have been to Rue Bill Ross, named for a Canadian soldier who fought valiantly to liberate Anguerny, so the municipality named the road after him.

Mackey and Van Stralen were present to another impactful treat, the presence of so many surviving Canadian veterans of the DDay campaign who travelled to Normandy for these special ceremonies.

“People ask me when are you not going to do this play anymore, and yes, I will definitely move on to other things, but I’m 51 and this character and this play have been a part of one third of my life,” said Mackey.

“I hope it is always a part of my life as long as I’m physically able to do it. When you think about how you want experiences to come into your life, and how you want life to go – this is it.”

The events of war are over in a flash, and they are so epic in scope and context that they cannot be reproduced in a dimensional way. The closest representations come in the form of art. The plaques, statues, poems, songs and plays like Jake’s Gift are how the heroics of D-Day are passed on to future generations.

HANDOUT PHOTO BY DIRK VAN STRALEN

Julia Mackey, still in costume from performing Jake’s Gift, meets with audience member David Leon Teacher, a decorated D-Day veteran and author of the memoir Beyond My Wildest Dreams. They met at Juno Beach ceremonies this week in Normandy where Mackey performed her play a number of times in both French and English.

Canada’s oldest woman dead at 114

Adina BRESGE

The Canadian Press

TORONTO — As Canada’s oldest woman, Ellen “Dolly” Gibb’s zest for life won her national attention.

Once birthdays went into the triple digits, she would receive cards from the Queen and politicians at all levels of government. Reporters would come knocking to learn the secrets to her longevity.

After the 114-year-old’s death earlier this week, family members credited Gibb’s long life not only to good genetics and healthy habits, but her love for her sprawling brood of children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and greatgreat-grandchildren.

“She was pretty connected to all of us,” her grandson Dave Crozier said by phone Friday. “We feel so fortunate to have had her in our lives for so long.”

He said Gibb died peacefully Wednesday at a nursing home in North Bay, Ont., with her daughter, Sue Crozier, who is Dave’s mother, holding her hand.

“Whenever you think of her gone, you just think of how easy she went,” Sue Crozier said.

“We should all be so lucky to go that way.”

Dave Crozier jokes that Gibb was the world’s oldest “helicopter mom.”

Even as she approached 80 years old, Sue Crozier, who lived with her mother, said Gibb would worry every time she left the room.

“I think she really felt she was looking after me,” Sue Crozier said. “It could have been some part of what kept mom alive so long.”

This matriarchal tenacity extended to the rest of her kin, said Brittany Duggan, Gibb’s greatgranddaughter. She would spend hours studying photos of family

members, many of whom she rarely got to see.

“She was sharp, but she also worked at it. She just loved people. She loved everyone who came through her house,” Duggan said by phone from Squamish.

“Really her presence and visiting her brought the family together.”

Born in Winnipeg on April 25, 1905, Gibb was the daughter of a Metis woman and a Scottish-Canadian prospector who had sought his fortune in the Klondike gold

City seeks public input on priorities for climate action

Citizen staff

City hall is launching a public engagement campaign to determine a strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

It’s asking residents to assign priorities to 13 actions city staff has identified to carry out the work and will be used to update the city’s last energy and greenhouse gas management plan, produced in 2007, and pursue new targets aligned with provincial and federal commitments.

Public input is being sought via an online survey, to be available from June 12 to July 31 at www.princegeorge.ca/environment and a series of public events

starting on June 12 at the Bob Harkins branch of the Prince George Public Library, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Presentations will be given at 12:15 p.m., 4:30 p.m. and 7 p.m.

Staff will also be on hand at the Prince George Farmers’ Market on June 22, 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and at the Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park Pavilion on July 11, noon to 8 p.m.

After the last climate change plan was produced in 2007, Prince George became one of the first communities in Canada to establish a greenhouse gas inventory, set targets and establish action plans, and measure results. Greenhouse gas emissions

are reported in the city’s annual report.

Burning gasoline and diesel in vehicles currently accounts for half of Prince George’s greenhouse gas emissions, according to the city. Buildings account for another third through the burning of fossil fuel, such as natural gas, to produce heat and hot water.

Waste accounts for 13 per cent and are produced when biodegradable materials, such as yard and kitchen wastes, decompose without the presence of oxygen because they have been buried deep in a landfill, for example, and produce methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

rush, said Duggan.

When Gibb was five her mother died after giving birth to another daughter, and her father raised Gibb and her siblings on a small farm in what is now Winnipeg. Gibb developed an interest

in fashion in her teenage years, which earned her the nickname “Dolly.” As a young adult, Gibb put her passion to professional use by working at the Eaton’s department store, but was forced to quit when she got married to her husband, Dave.

“She always sounded disappointed when she talked about it,” said Duggan. “I think if she had lived at a different time, she would have kept working.”

Gibb became a homemaker, and the young couple had two daughters. In 1941, the family moved to Thunder Bay, Ont., where Dave took a job at an airplane manufacturer as part of the effort to fight the Second World War.

After 40 years of marriage, Gibb lost her husband in 1968, but in a show of independence, lived alone in their home until the age of 100, said Duggan.

Over the years, people have offered a wide array of explanations for Gibb’s longevity.

She never smoked, and only started drinking in her seventies, enjoying a daily beer in her later years. She walked almost everywhere, and ate in moderation, including indulgences such as cream and butter as well as Timbits.

But Duggan believes that the force that propelled Gibb for more than a century was her fiery spirit.

“She wasn’t trying to outlive anyone or set any records,” she said.

“I think if you asked her, she would have said (the secret is) to stand up for what you believe in.”

In addition to her husband, Gibb was also pre-deceased by a daughter and granddaughter.

She is survived by her daughter, nine grandchildren, 22 greatgrandchildren and 12 great-greatgrandchildren, along with a large extended family.

A celebration of her life will be held Saturday in North Bay.

Family sent wrong baby’s remains

The Canadian Press WINNIPEG — A Winnipeg hospital is apologizing for sending the wrong baby’s remains to a grieving family in Nunavut.

Martine Bouchard, president of St. Boniface Hospital, says a review is underway and the family will be told of its findings.

Tony Alagalak told the CBC this week he and his wife Alice Kinak went to the health centre in Arviat on April 19, where Kinak gave birth. Alagalak told the broadcaster the mother and baby were flown to Winnipeg, where the baby boy died in hospital.

Kinak returned to Arviat, the baby’s remains were sent, and a funeral was held.

Bouchard says shortly afterward, the hospital realized there had been a mix-up and sent two

people to Arviat to meet with the family and explain the mistake. Alagalak has declined an interview request by The Canadian Press, and Bouchard would not reveal the identity of the remains mistakenly sent to Arviat.

“No one should have to live through what this family has lived. We acknowledge that the wrong remains were released and on my personal behalf and on behalf of St. Boniface Hospital, I express my deepest regret for what has happened,” Bouchard wrote in a statement Friday.

“Our responsibility now is to ensure that this does not happen again to anyone else. We are proceeding with a thorough review of our processes so that we can fully understand the circumstances that led to this error and make the necessary changes.”

Ellen “Dolly” Gibb is shown in a 2014 handout photo. Canada’s oldest woman, whose longevity and zest for life won her national attention has died at 114.

NASA to allow private citizens to fly to the ISS

Christian DAVENPORT and Joel ACHENBACH

The Washington Post

It was a dizzying day for NASA. First, the agency announced a plan to allow private citizens to fly to the International Space Station and stay for the tidy sum of $35,000 per night. This news flash, representing a major change in policy for NASA, was soon overshadowed by a tweet from President Donald Trump that called into question his own administration’s much-publicized goal of returning astronauts to the moon by 2024.

“For all of the money we are spending, NASA should NOT be talking about going to the Moon –We did that 50 years ago,” Trump said on Twitter. “They should be focused on the much bigger things we are doing, including Mars (of which the Moon is a part), Defense and Science!”

It is unclear if Trump was unhappy with the current NASA plan or was expressing exasperation at the pace of human exploration of deep space. Trump’s confusing language about the moon being part of Mars plausibly referred to NASA’s framing of the moon plan as part of a longer-term goal of exploring Mars.

The administration’s decision to send astronauts back to the moon followed a unanimous recommendation to do so by the National Space Council, chaired by Vice President Mike Pence, in October 2017. This is a strategic pivot for NASA, which, under former president Barack Obama, developed plans to create a space station of sorts in lunar orbit but did not plan to repeat the Apollo-era achievement of landing astronauts. That had been the goal of NASA under U.S. President George W. Bush, but Obama killed the program.

Now, NASA has pivoted again to the moon – and Trump had hyped the plan on several occasions. NASA initially aimed for a landing in 2028, but earlier this year Pence, citing Trump’s wishes, ordered the agency to get there by 2024. That would potentially be before the end of a second Trump term. Trump’s confusing tweet came just hours after NASA’s administrator, Jim Bridenstine, warned that the biggest challenge to the moon plan was not technological but rather the “political risk.” Speaking at the International Space Development Conference

in Arlington, Bridenstine said, according to SpaceNews, “How do we retire the political risk? We go faster. We accelerate the program. The longer it drags out, the more risk there is we’re going to get diverted into something else.”

Bridenstine late Friday offered no pushback to his boss, instead echoing – and interpreting –Trump’s tweet.

“As @POTUS said, @NASA is using the Moon to send humans to Mars!” Bridenstine wrote on Twitter.

He added a shout-out to NASA’s robotic missions: “Right now, @ MarsCuriosity and @NASAInSight are on Mars and will soon be joined by the Mars 2020 rover and the Mars helicopter.”

A White House official said late Friday that the administration’s goal “has always been to get to Mars” and that the moon 2024 plan would enable the United States to reach Mars “roughly a decade after creating a sustainable presence on the lunar surface.”

The big news of the day was supposed to be the new commercial opportunities at NASA. The agency wants to open the International Space Station to more commercial interests, including filming advertisements. While NASA touted the plan as a way to help fund its ambitious plan to return astronauts to the moon by 2024 as it tries to build a sustainable economy in space, it’s unclear how much the agency stands to make under the new policy.

NASA’s announcement is a significant change for the agency, which has had a long-standing prohibition against allowing tourists on the station. Russia, however, has allowed several private astronauts on the station.

Under the NASA plan, as many as two private citizens per year could fly to the station and stay for up to 30 days, with the first mission coming as early as next year.

Jeff DeWit, NASA’s chief financial officer, estimated the cost per trip would be about $50 million a seat. But the cost and arrangements would be left to SpaceX and Boeing, the two companies NASA has hired to fly crews to the station. They would keep that money and also have to make sure that private astronauts “meet NASA’s medical standards and the training and certification procedures” for crew members.

While onboard the station, NASA would charge people for food, storage and communication,

a cost that would come to about $35,000 a night.

“But it won’t come with any Hilton or Marriott points,” DeWit said.

In addition, NASA would charge companies as much as $18,000 per kilogram for a round trip to and from the station. It also would charge for astronauts’ time: $17,500 an hour. Still, that is not likely to make a dent in the massive costs required to get people to the surface of the moon.

“This is smart policy move by NASA in that it engages a broader range of industry and increases visibility for space and the space station,” said Carissa Christensen, the CEO of Bryce Space and Technology, a consulting firm. “That said, the revenues generated from tourism and filming are likely to yield more good public relations than financial returns.”

Gwynne Shotwell, president and chief operating office of SpaceX, said in a statement that the company “was founded with the goal of helping humanity become a spacefaring civilization. We are looking forward to working with NASA and other commercial partners as we open up low Earth orbit to an exciting new chapter of human exploration.”

Space Adventures, a Virginiabased company that has helped several private citizens get to the station on Russian rockets, has a contract with Boeing to help sell seats aboard its spacecraft. A spokesman said the company has not yet determined a price.

Right now, commercial activity on the station is largely limited to science experiments.

“We have no idea what kinds of creativity and literally out-of-theworld ideas can come from private industry,” Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA’s head of human exploration, said during a news conference.

Gerstenmaier acknowledged that the policy changes were a risky bet that may not produce

results immediately.

“Economic market development takes a long time; transitions take a long time,” he said. “This is the very beginning.”

The announcement comes as the agency is trying to return humans to the moon by 2024, a mission that officials said would require significant additional funding.

NASA has already amended its budget request for next year to ask for an addition $1.6 billion, and has said that it would need significantly more money in the years to come to have any chance at pulling off such an ambitious plan.

There is a long history of businesses going to space to market their products. In 1999, Pizza Hut paid to paint its logo on a Russian rocket. In the mid-1990s, an Israeli milk company filmed a commercial on the space station Mir, and a pair of Russian cosmonauts even appeared on QVC to sell a pen able to write in a weightless environment.

Bridenstine has said he wanted to raise the profile of the agency’s astronauts by allowing them to appear in commercials and on cereal boxes. But that was met by pushback from critics who said it would violate government ethics regulations that prohibit government officials, even astronauts, from using public office for private gain.

In the proposal unveiled Friday, NASA astronauts’ participation in such activity would be limited to commercial activities “with ties to microgravity, NASA’s mission or sustaining a low-Earth-orbit economy.” They would be prohibited from appearing in advertisements, for example, and NASA said it would continue its policy of not endorsing any particular brand.

Traditionally, NASA has steadfastly stayed away from that – even going so far as to call the M&Ms astronauts eat “candycoated chocolates” out of fear of appearing to favour the brand.

Cougar euthanized near Esquimalt

VANCOUVER (CP) — A cougar has been euthanized after it killed a sheep near Esquimalt Lagoon west of Victoria.

B.C. conservation officer Scott Norris says the animal was killed at a hobby farm located in an area surrounded by subdivisions and walking trails. Norris says the cougar showed no signs of leaving the property after killing the sheep, despite the owner’s presence on the property. He says that type of behaviour from the predator is rare, as they are usually secretive animals.

Because of that behaviour, the attack on the sheep and the population of the area, Norris says conservation officers decided to euthanize the cougar. He says the cougar population on Vancouver Island is high but most don’t hunt in urban areas, adding there are many sightings each year that the B.C. Conservation Officer Services don’t need to respond to.

Court asked to move voting day off Jewish holiday

OTTAWA (CP) — A Conservative candidate for a seat in Toronto in this fall’s federal election is asking the Federal Court to shift voting day because it falls on a Jewish holiday. Election day can be no later than Oct. 21 under federal law, but Chani Aryeh-Bain is asking the court to force Elections Canada to move the day over the objections of the chief electoral officer.

Voting day is on the Jewish holiday known as Shemini Atzeret, when Orthodox Jews are not permitted to work, vote or campaign.

The notice of application filed Thursday argues that Election Canada’s refusal to move voting day is unreasonable. Aryeh-Bain is hoping to win back the riding of EglintonLawrence, where the Liberals defeated finance minister Joe Oliver in 2015.

The International Space Station seen from the Space Shuttle Discovery during separation on March 25, 2009.

Liberals whistling past Canada’s infrastructure initiative graveyard

It has been evident in recent weeks and months that the federal government is in a weak position – even though it might proceed – to grant the go-ahead to widen the Trans Mountain pipeline.

The Justin Trudeau government has been talking of the imminent decision in the days ahead on whether to resume the twinning of its pipeline – yes, remember, it owns the pipeline – from Alberta across British Columbia and into tidewater to foreign markets.

This decision is acutely important politically as it moves toward an election, in ways symbolic and actual. While parts of British Columbia oppose the project, particularly in the Lower Mainland, the larger failings of deferred construction are not only losses of jobs and other benefits but also a larger doubt among international investors that Canada is an infrastructure initiative graveyard.

The pipeline is a litmus test across a range of frontiers for Trudeau and his government. Even if they can deflect the blame, an inability to resume construction as the nation heads to an election would at the very

least be an embarrassment.

There remains in B.C. an exceptionally strong list of impediments, and any move toward construction risks a very severe backlash.

Significant among the challenges is the Federal Court of Appeal ruling last year that noted the need for a much stronger duty to consult with First Nations. Work on this has, according to sources, gone much slower than is necessary to appropriately relaunch construction this summer.

One Indigenous lawyer told me that his client’s band is only at an early stage of deep consultation – and that this latest round rewound the clock and didn’t pick up where it left off, by the way. If there is any hope to surpass a court challenge, more time and talk seem necessary as part of the process.

Two sources indicate that the expanded nature of the project’s marine review has identified a new endangered species: steelhead, whose stock is in decline and whose once hereditary fishery would be threatened by a spill.

Another Indigenous representative noted that the federal government has not stepped

forward with substantial new economic options to bring wavering bands into the project economically, like Impact Benefits Agreements or equity positions – millions of dollars, instead of tens of millions of dollars, appear to be the gap. There are bands that will never support the pipeline, like Tsleil-Waututh Nation, but there has been precious little enrichment of the benefits for other bands to come aboard.

On the basis of last week, the Trudeau government’s decision on Trans Mountain will come at a watershed moment. The release of the disturbing Murdered and Missing Women and Girls final report concluded Canada had committed “genocide” through “state actions and inactions rooted in colonialism and colonial ideologies.”

In pledging measures to deal with an array of institutional issues identified in the long-awaited report, and in telling the world it can learn from what Canada has lately done and plans to do in its relationship with Indigenous peoples, Trudeau has increased the political ante in such a way as to have no margin of error in how his dealings can ensue.

YOUR LETTERS

Something’s got to give with city spending

While the total number of signed alternate approval forms opposing the city’s borrowing of $32 million over 20 years fell short of the legal required number to have the city reconsider this proposal or go to a referendum, the fact of the matter is some 3,000 citizens of Prince George did in fact sign the petition. They signed because most if not all of them are sick and tired of the constant increases in taxes, and the way in which the city spends our money.

Couching the spending in terms of necessary infrastructure below and above ground doesn’t cut it. We need to get the city to have a hard look at all their spending and the consequences of their decisions. When you reach the point where you are taxing people out of their homes or forcing them to make significant changes to their lifestyles because of the huge increases in taxes over the past many years, it is time to make some serious changes in how we do business in this city.

The fact that the AAP is nothing more than a sophisticated way to impair people’s ability to control the city’s borrowing also has to be looked into. There was (and is) no logical reason why this borrowing of $32 million could not have gone to a referendum. The city had no qualms about a referendum for the new swimming

pool and fire hall but chose the AAP for this borrowing. Why?

They will say that it was to save money, ie.; some $80,000 for a referendum, however this is just smoke and mirrors. This issue could have been put on a referendum along with the pool and fire hall or it could have had a stand-alone referendum. They chose the AAP because that was their best chance of getting the OK to borrow the money.

The city could have taken the $11 million from the provincial government and the $3.5 million from the additional gas tax money we received this year to do some of this infrastructure. They could also have held off on borrowing until they found out whether or not they will get the $6 million grant for the aquatic centre and also the grant for the swimming pool and thus reduce the amount of money that would need to be borrowed. Seems they have other plans for this money.

Municipal elections and referendums are required by law to be held on a Saturday. This allows most if not all of the citizens of a city the ability to vote. The same does not apply to the AAP. In fact, there was no attempt by the city to set up alternate places and times that citizens could fill out the forms. If you could not get to the city during regular office hours between 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday to Friday to get the forms, then you were for all intents and purposes out of luck.

Places that were set up to assist

citizens with this process, such as the farmers’ market, parking lot at CN Centre, behind city hall after 5 p.m. on the Tuesday and Wednesday prior to the Thursday, May 30 deadline, along with delivering forms to people’s houses were all done by volunteers on their own time and their own dime.

As was stated by others, the AAP is for all intents and purposes designed to fail. From 1968 to 2003, it was only necessary to get five per cent of eligible voters, however after 2003 it was returned to 10 per cent.

To give some perspective as to how successful this AAP was for those who were involved and who filled out forms, you need only to look at some other AAPs in the past.

Cameron Street Bridge, approximately 600 forms signed. New police station 1,100 forms signed. River Road Dyke, 9,271 forms signed. (Successful).

So 3,000 signed forms for borrowing $32 million is a solid message to the mayor and city council to reconsider this decision and find another way to fund these projects or go to a referendum. Contrary to what they may think, they do not have the support of the citizens of Prince George for this borrowing. What they have is the results of a convoluted process whose outcome was fairly predictable from the beginning.

Eric Allen

Prince George

LETTERS WELCOME: The Prince George Citizen welcomes letters to the editor from our readers. Submissions should be sent by email to: letters@pgcitizen.ca. No attachments, please. They can also be faxed to 250-960-2766, or mailed to 201-1777 Third Ave., Prince George, B.C. V2L 3G7. Maximum length is 750 words and writers are limited to one submission every week. We will edit letters only to ensure clarity, good taste, for legal reasons, and occasionally for length. Although we will not include your address and telephone number in the paper, we need both for verification purposes. Unsigned or handwritten letters will not be published. The Prince George Citizen is a member of the National Newsmedia Council, which is an independent organization established to deal with acceptable journalistic practices and ethical behaviour.

Thus, unless the next few days are remarkably efficient, any procession with construction of the pipeline without a more formidable support base of First Nations would create a clear problem for the prime minister.

As for the disposition of the $4.5 billion project, it has been widely reported that Indigenous groups are aiming to buy majority control of the pipeline.

But two banking sources indicate that conventional financing will be difficult to obtain in any uncertain environment. While financial institutions believe in the viability of the project, none will lend when there is any legal uncertainty.

Nor is there sufficient funds among the Indigenous groups that wish to own. That might require the federal government to somehow backstop any deal.

By the time this column appears in print, these issues might be addressed. But at the end of this week, sources were of the view there would be a deferral.

— Kirk LaPointe is editor-in-chief of Business in Vancouver and vice-president, editorial, at Glacier Media

Workplace safety trumps right to use medical cannabis, court rules

The Supreme Court of Newfoundland and Labrador has upheld a labour arbitration award that endorsed an employer’s refusal to employ a user of medical cannabis.

In International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Loc. 1620 vs. Lower Churchill Transmission Construction Employers’ Association Inc., 2019 NLSC 48, the court addressed the accommodation of employees who use medicinal cannabis in safety-sensitive workplaces. This case tips the balance in favour of workplace safety and is being closely watched by employers across the country.

The griever applied for labourer work on a large project involving the development of a hydroelectric generating facility in Labrador. He suffered from Crohn’s disease and osteoarthritis and used medical cannabis to help manage his pain. Under prescription, he was permitted to consume up to 1.5 grams of cannabis with THC levels of 22 per cent on a daily basis.

Conventional medicine was not an option to alleviate his pain.

The griever was offered employment on the condition that he successfully complete a pre-employment drug and alcohol test. This was like any other individual who was offered a job on the site, but he could not satisfy that condition.

The employer sought medical information from the griever and retained an independent medical expert. After thoroughly considering all of the information available to it and engaging in months of discussion with the griever’s union, the employer declined to employ him because of concerns about workplace safety.

The union grieved the employer’s refusal to employ the griever.

It argued that the employer was unlawfully discriminating against him and had failed to accommodate his disability.

In a well-reasoned arbitration award, arbitrator John Roil dismissed the grievance. He found the labourer work in question to be safety-sensitive. The work was inherently hazardous and there was no non-safety-sensitive position available at or around the job site.

Roil then turned to the question of whether the griever could safely perform the labourer work after consuming cannabis. The arbitrator relied exclusively on expert testimony and the medical literature before him to conclude that the use of cannabis can impair the ability of a worker to function safely in a safety-sensitive workplace; that the impairing effects of cannabis can last up to 24 hours after use and those impairing effects may not be known to the user; and that there was no resource readily available to the employer to allow it to adequately and accurately test on-the-job impairment from cannabis.

The arbitrator concluded that it would be inappropriate to require

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the employer to assume the safety risk of employing the griever. He highlighted the requirements under the applicable occupational health and safety law and the unknowns around cannabis impairment. The inability to measure the griever’s impairment posed an unmeasurable safety hazard and amounted to undue hardship for the employer. The arbitration award was upheld on judicial review. The Supreme Court rejected the union’s argument that the award was based on “stigma or stereotype attaching to cannabis users.”

The issue was whether the employer was legally obligated to accommodate medical cannabis use by a worker in a safetysensitive position. In the view of the court, the arbitrator had issued a “decision… within the range of reasonable outcomes” and had “based his findings on resolution of the evidence before him.”

The court summarized and upheld the key conclusions of the arbitrator, including:

• The duty to accommodate did not extend to a requirement that the employer accept a risk resulting from the possibility of impairment.

• The evidence of possible impairment put forward by the employer met its onus to demonstrate undue hardship, in part because the griever’s treating physician had conceded the possibility of residual impairment beyond the initial four hours after use.

As of the date this article was written, no appeal had been filed with the Court of Appeal of Newfoundland and Labrador and it is unclear whether such an appeal will be filed.

Take-aways for employers:

1. Evidence is key. The outcome of this case flowed from evidence of the safety-sensitive nature of the work and the impairing effects of cannabis.

2. The residual effects of cannabis use can last up to 24 hours after consumption and possibly longer.

3. Employee self-reporting on cannabis use and its effects – and any medical evidence based on such selfreporting – is of limited reliability. Indeed, as is evident from this case, the impairing effects of cannabis may be unknown to the user.

4. The inability to accurately test for cannabis impairment may amount to undue hardship for the employer.

James Kondopulos is a founding member and partner at Roper Greyell, where he practises all areas of employment and labour law. While every effort is made to ensure accuracy in the article, it is for general information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.

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B.C. kayakers follow the route of Spanish explorers

Dirk MEISSNER The Canadian Press

VICTORIA — Two British Columbia kayakers are set to depart from a remote Vancouver Island beach known as Rugged Point on Sunday for a month-long voyage retracing the passage Spanish explorers took in the late 1700s.

Jacqueline Windh, a fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, and her husband, Dave Gilbert, plan to hike and kayak the now virtually uninhabited outer coastal areas of Vancouver Island.

Most Canadians are aware of Canada’s British and French colonial history, but the Spanish connections aren’t as well-known despite many West Coast islands, communities and waterways bearing Spanish names, said Windh.

She pointed to Cortez, Galiano, Gabriola islands, the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and even Port Alberni, where she lives, as places on Vancouver Island named after Spanish explorers and dignitaries.

“I had no idea there was even a Spanish presence here,” said Windh, who arrived in B.C. from Ontario in the 1990s. “I thought it was weird, all the Spanish names here. But the Spanish were here before Capt. Cook. Spain and England almost came to war over this new territory.”

Spanish ships arrived on the outer coastal areas of Vancouver Island in the 1770s before the British, she said, adding they were searching for trade routes.

Windh said she’s calling her voyage “The Secret Coast” and it received support from the Spanish Embassy in Canada, which highlighted the expedition on its arts and culture website.

“The order we’re going, north to south, it’s kind of roughly chronological with the history of the early Spanish encounters,” said Windh, who estimates the entire trip will cover about 220 kilometres.

A float plane will take the couple to Rugged Point, where they will begin their journey hiking and kayaking along the Tatchu Peninsula, located on the northwest coast of Vancouver Island. The nearest community is Zeballos, almost 500 kilometres northwest of Victoria.

Windh said once the expedition reaches the southern end of the Tatchu Peninsula a boat will take them to Nootka Island and

the Hesquiat Peninsula, where they will make stops at Indigenous whaling communities and villages that are now almost completely uninhabited.

“We probably won’t see anyone who’s living there for the first two weeks we’re out,” she said.

Windh said she and her husband plan to stop at Homais Cove where the Spanish ship Santiago arrived in 1774 and first traded with Indigenous people.

They will also explore the Nootka Island whaling site British explorer Capt. James Cook called Friendly Cove in 1778 after

Carbon tax rebates below projections

Mia RABSON The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — The federal government has returned $1.75 billion in carbon-tax rebates to more than eight million Canadian families, the Canada Revenue Agency says.

As of June 3, 8,022,780 families had claimed the rebate, the federal tax agency said Friday. Families in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario and New Brunswick are eligible for the “climate action incentive,” which is claimed as a rebate on their personal income taxes.

The Canada Revenue Agency said in May about 97 per cent of eligible families had applied for the rebates, based on the personal tax returns it had processed to that point; as of Friday, it didn’t yet have an updated application rate to match the latest payout numbers.

A spokesman for the CRA said the agency will not be ready to release the final number of applicants and payments until mid-July. Self-employed people aren’t required to file their taxes until this month and some just file late, so the number of applicants will likely increase.

The federal government anticipated rebating $2.1 billion through the individual climate rebates this year.

Ottawa imposed a levy of $20 per tonne of carbon emissions in four provinces on

April 1 because none of them had provincial carbon-pricing systems of their own. Seven per cent of the revenues are being given to small and medium-sized businesses as rebates or assistance to make energy efficiency investments, while three per cent will go to municipalities, hospitals, universities, and schools, which can’t pass on their added carbon tax costs.

Legislation requires 90 per cent of the revenues to be returned to individuals with the rebates, through a tax credit that varies by province because the amount of carbon tax someone pays will be influenced by where he or she lives. Officials have previously said rebate levels will be adjusted each year to ensure that 90-percent target is always met.

This year’s rebates were paid up front, before the revenues were collected. It means the rebates were only based on estimates, not actual amounts of carbon tax collected.

When announcing the carbon-tax rebate program, the federal government estimated the average payment would be $248 in New Brunswick, $300 in Ontario, $336 in Manitoba and $598 in Saskatchewan.

As of June 3, CRA says, the average payment was less than those amounts: $174 in New Brunswick, $203 in Ontario, $231 in Manitoba and $422 in Saskatchewan.

arriving there and interacting with the local Nuu-chah-nulth people, she said.

The Spanish built a fort on Nootka Island and after more than 15 years of tensions and negotiations between Britain and Spain over who would control the territory, the two countries reached the Nootka Accord in 1794, which turned the area over to the British and averted war, said Windh.

The final leg of the expedition involves paddling southward along the outer coast towards Tofino, she said. The expedition will stop at Flores Island, named after a Spanish viceroy, and home of the Nuu-

chah-nulth Indigenous villages of Ahousaht and Opitsaht.

Windh said she and her husband plan to arrive at Chesterman Beach in Tofino on July 8. She noted Tofino, now a popular tourist town on the west side of Vancouver Island, is also a Spanish name. She said the legacy of the 18th century Spanish expeditions to Canada’s Pacific West Coast is one of the shared history of both countries.

The expedition aims to raise awareness of a nearly forgotten period of history between Canada and Spain, she said.

Victoria council debates asking feds to help fund Remembrance Day

Dirk MEISSNER The Canadian Press VICTORIA — A move to seek federal funding for Victoria’s annual Remembrance Day events may have backfired, the city’s mayor said Friday.

Lisa Helps said she expected council members would rethink their positions following widespread public backlash over a committee motion that moved Thursday, the 75th anniversary of the D-Day Invasion.

Reaction to the committee’s plan to approach the Defence Department and Veteran’s Affairs to help with policing costs for Remembrance Day events has been intense.

Helps said she sensed councillors would reject the proposal when it comes up for a vote next week.

“My colleagues on council are thoughtful, considerate people and if they hear some of the feedback that’s come from around the region and across the country, I think there’s a chance that they will change their minds and just leave Remembrance Day funding as it is,” said Helps at a news conference.

Helps said the timing of the debate was inappropriate and caused an uproar that spread far beyond city hall.

At least one member of Victoria council has already indicated she has changed her mind and will vote against the motion.

“I understand it was wrong to hold this vote on D-Day, and I take full responsibility for that,” said Coun. Laurel Collins in a statement. “I’m truly sorry for the impact.

It pains me to think about veterans being disrespected in any way. I will be voting against this motion when it comes to council next week.”

“I will never stand by and allow Remembrance Day to be defunded,” added Collins, who is the New Democrat candidate for Victoria in the upcoming federal election. But Coun. Ben Isitt said he will continue to support the committee’s proposal. Isitt initiated the request at the meeting, saying the Canadian Forces budget is in the billions of dollars and should help the city defray some costs associated with the event.

The debate about funding Remembrance Day emerged as councillors considered a request by the Victoria Police Department for $135,300 to patrol Canada Day celebrations.

“I can’t speak for my colleagues, but I think it’s a good policy to try to apportion the costs of these big regional events more equitably,” he said in an interview.

“I think the timing of yesterday’s decision was unfortunate in terms of coinciding with the 75th anniversary of D-Day, but I do believe it’s appropriate for the taxpayers of Victoria and Esquimalt to have some help in hosting these very large regional events.”

Isitt said he stands by earlier comments he posted on Twitter, lashing out at the media and “alt-right” groups for criticizing his position on funding Remembrance Day events.

“Those comments extend beyond this issue,” he said.

JACQUELINE WINDH HANDOUT PHOTO

Jacqueline Windh and her husband Dave Gilbert are shown in a handout photo supplied by Windh. A remote Vancouver Island beach known as Rugged Point will be the start Sunday of a month-long voyage for two British Columbia kayakers who will retrace the passage Spanish explorers took in the late 1700s.

He promised his son Rome – would it deliver?

Will HAWKES

Special To The Washington Post

The passenger in the seat next to me on the 12 p.m. flight to Rome keeps laughing, loudly. I’d be annoyed, but it’s my sevenyear-old son, Fraser, and it’s my fault. I’ve given him Asterix the Gladiator, a comic book I loved when I was his age, to read during the flight. After the umpteenth guffaw, I ask what’s so funny: “The gladiators are refusing to fight!” Fraser has autism spectrum disorder. His condition once would have been described as Asperger’s syndrome, and he is “highfunctioning,” but Fraser is happy with plain “autistic.” He has huge, all-encompassing passions: tigers, the prehistoric era, writing comics and ancient Rome, which he fell in love with after watching an episode of his favorite program, Horrible Histories. I’d often said I’d take him to Rome, and now I’m delivering. It should be great fun, and our schedule is carefully planned to avoid overconsumption – we’re visiting one or two highlights a day – but I’m fretting. Rome is noisy and unpredictable, which could be stressful for an autistic child (and, of course, his father).

I’m also concerned that the city won’t live up to his expectations: Ancient structures can be beautiful, magical even, but they’re not as immediately engaging as TV shows and full-colour comic books. And then there’s the food: Was it sensible of me to agree in advance that he can have salami pizza for every meal because he finds unfamiliar food very difficult?

Fraser, on the other hand, is pretty calm. I’m surprised by how unapprehensive he seems, although he’s used to travelling and doesn’t always let on that’s he worried. In fact, our first challenge doesn’t arrive until after we check into our small and friendly hotel, the Relais Forus Inn in the city center.

We set off to experience our first taste of Ancient Rome: the Pantheon. It’s a 20-minute trek featuring growling, hooting traffic and huge, unruly crosswalks. Fraser grips my hand and concentrates hard as a scooter threatens to collide with us.

He keeps his hood up, but when I ask him if he needs his noise-canceling headphones, he says no.

As we walk, we enjoy a distant glimpse of the Colosseum – Fraser visibly shivers with excitement – and the Vittorio Emanuele II Monument, the overbearing, flamboyantly white 19th-century monstrosity on Capitoline Hill built to honour that first king of a united Italy. I’m not a fan, and I tell Fraser it’s sometimes derisively called the Typewriter.

He disagrees: “I like it.”

I’ve seen the Pantheon before, but I’d forgotten how big it is. Opened as a Roman temple around A.D. 126, it has the largest reinforced concrete dome in the world, with

a circular hole in the center. Fraser spends a minute staring up at it, spinning around, before I stop him for fear he will fall over.

We leave the Pantheon in search of pizza.

When we find it at Baffetto 2, an offshoot of its well-known parent, we’re the second people in (at just after 6:30 p.m., too early for most Romans) and Fraser is impatient.

“How long will it be?”

“Just a few seconds.”

“1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ...” he counts.

“Is he cooking our pizza right now?”

“Yes, Fraser, right now.”

When it arrives – perhaps five minutes later – we fall on it like wolves.

That first night, it takes Fraser a while to fall sleep, but his weighted blanket – which we’ve brought from home – and a pile of familiar books help. We get up at 8 a.m., and while I’m eating the breakfast supplied by the hotel, he has the same thing he has every day at home in London: two wholegrain cereal bars with a mug of weak Earl Grey tea. It’s a crucial bit of normality on a very unusual and exciting day. This morning, Wednesday, is the big one: the Colosseum. Fraser is a bundle of energy as we wait, running in circles and flapping. (This is how he expresses excitement or anxiety.) He stops now and then to offer an observation.

“Did you know that the Romans invented the whoopee cushion?”

I did not. (That fact came from Horrible Histories.) When we get inside, Fraser just wants to see the auditorium, which he savors in near silence.

“What do you think, Fraser?”

“I love it.”

We spend two blissful hours inspecting every nook and cranny. The fact that the

Colosseum features so heavily in books and films about Rome is what makes it so important to Fraser – plus, as he tells me, animals were once kept here. It’s two passions in one place. He normally dislikes crowds but, an occasional grimace aside, he seems OK. He points down to the cellar-level chambers and passageways that would have been covered by the stadium floor.

“That’s where the gladiators and big cats were kept,” he tells me.

“Were there many tigers?” I ask.

“No, most of the fights were with lions. Tigers are very well camouflaged, and lions live in groups, so it would have been easier to find them.”

In the permanent exhibition about the Colosseum on the building’s second floor, Fraser wanders up to a large chunk of engraved marble, created (a sign says) to commemorate the restoration of the arena floor after an earthquake in A.D. 443.

“Can we touch it?” Fraser asks.

“It doesn’t say you can’t,” I reply. Fraser, who revels in touch, is delighted.

Another pizza, at a place nearby called Alle Carrette, follows.

“I don’t think they had pizza back in Roman times,” Fraser says between mouthfuls. No, I agree.

“Why would you eat mice if you had pizza?” (Romans ate dormice dipped in honey, a fact that amuses both of us).

“Yes,” he says, nodding.

We go to the Roman Forum afterward. It’s my favourite afternoon of the trip: The Forum is perfection in the warm sunshine, and it’s relatively empty, except for dozens and dozens of seagulls. “Do you think gulls are descended from Romans, Fraser? They seem terribly confident.”

A frown.

“No, gulls are descended from dinosaurs.” I leave it there.

We take a seat on a prone chunk of marble. It’s almost tranquil: I can hear a busker 200 yards away in the Via dei Fori Imperiali, playing That’s Alright, Mama. Afterward, we spend the afternoon wandering this way and that, finishing up overlooking the Circus Maximus from the back of Palatine Hill. By 8:30 p.m. – after, you guessed it, another pizza – we’re both dog tired. Sleep comes easily.

On Thursday, we start with the Baths of Caracalla, an immense, brick-built ruin perhaps 10 minutes’ walk from the Colosseum but with far fewer visitors – which is why we scheduled it to follow Wednesday’s excitement. It’s thrillingly atmospheric. We pause in a room that once contained a natatio, or swimming pool.

“Would you like to have a bath here?” I ask Fraser.

“Oh no,” he says.

“I like to have my bath at home.”

When pizza time approaches, I make a last-minute alteration to my plan to visit Casa Manco, a much talked-about pizza stand in the Testaccio market. Although the pizza looks delicious, it’s not what Fraser is expecting: too thick, not enough salami. We go to a nearby restaurant, Mattarello, which has the right kind of pizza. As Fraser devours it, the young waiter approaches.

“Which is better, Italian or English pizza?” he asks Fraser.

“Italian!” is the answer, to my relief. It’s the sort of amiable, straightforward treatment we get everywhere; I’m not sure how aware of Fraser’s autism people here are, but more often than not, Italians are kind to children.

A walk northward along the Tiber follows. We have a look at the remnants of Teatro Marcello, a theater begun by Julius Caesar, and eat ice cream at Giolitti, one of the city’s most famous gelatarias (chocolate for Fraser, black cherry and raspberry for me). We wander over to the Trevi Fountain, where I tell Fraser that if he drops a coin in, he’ll come back to Rome.

“I don’t believe that, but I’m going to do it anyway,” he tells me.

Back at the hotel, it’s time for more Asterix.

“Every book ends with them eating wild boar,” Fraser says, approvingly, as he leans back on his bed. Our trip, inevitably, ends with us eating pizza. It has been a great three days: My fears were largely unfounded. Planning where we’d go and what we’d eat before we arrived was vital – Fraser likes to know what’s coming next – but the key thing has been his attitude. He doesn’t like to moan and he’s pretty much always positive. He’s the perfect travelling partner.

“What was the highlight?’ I ask him as we wait for our flight home.

“The Colosseum,” he says, “and the infinite pizza!”

THE WASHINGTON POST PHOTO BY WILL HAWKES

Fraser at Pizzeria Galilei with one of the many salami pizzas he consumed on the trip.

THE WASHINGTON POST

A view of the Colosseum in Rome.

Sports

Assault takes aim at high-flying Devils

Ted CLARKE Citizen staff tclarke@pgcitizen.ca

This Sunday at 1 p.m. the Northland Nissan Assault will get another crack at the Westwood Pub Devils.

The Devils have lived up to their nickname this season and every other team in the Prince George Senior Lacrosse Association would like to take a pitchfork to their perfect 10-0 record.

For that to happen the Assault (6-4, second place) will need to be at full strength. One of those missing pieces, right-handed forward Clarke Anderson, is expected to be back in the lineup after missing seven games with a leg injury.

“It’s sure nice having him back,” said Dave Jenkins, who also came out of retirement to rejoin his former team.

“He understands the pick-androll game better than most guys I’ve played with and that’s what good lacrosse is. He hasn’t played in seven years but he’s getting it back pretty quick.”

Assault coach Don Wittmeier convinced Anderson and Jenkins to return to the Assault and they’ve helped revive a combined Assault/Co-op Petroleum Stylers team that appeared to be in danger of folding.

Jenkins knows his team will have to be at its best to knock off the Devils. Northland Nissan lost 15-3 to the Devils at the start of the season and dropped a 16-10 decision in their second meeting with Westwood in May.

“There hasn’t been a lot of parity at their level and in the league in the last few years and we’re making an effort, but that only happens when we have our full team show up,” said Jenkins.

“Often with guys working shift work it’s a question whether we’re going to give them a game on any night.

“They’re certainly the class of the league. Andrew Schwab is scoring at will and they have five or six more guys who put the ball in the net every time they’re in position to do so. They’re good at camaraderie and keeping their guys close-knit, the organizational

aspect is there with that team. Everybody shows up.”

Jenkins was out of lacrosse for two seasons after developing a knee injury. At 34, he says it takes longer to shake off the body aches that come with playing one of the most physical contact sports invented.

“I’m a little more sore after every game than the last time I played, I look like I’m walking with a limp the day after every game,” said Jenkins.

The Assault will also be in action tonight at 7 p.m. at Kin 1 when the face the Mackenzie Conifex Power Lumberjacks (5-5, third place).

The Devils, who also play the RPR Mechanical/JR Construction Bandits tonight at 9 p.m., are coming off a 10-3 win over the Mackenzie Thursday night.

Devils goalie/manager Jamie Bellamy said his team decided at the end of last season they’d get serious about winning a provincial championship in 2019 with Prince George playing host to the B.C. senior C tournament, July 26-28.

“We’ve built a pretty good team this year,” said Bellamy.

“I think it’s just our consistency, we’ve had a lot of players out (playing) pretty much every game. In this league it seems like the more players you have out the better your chances of winning every game. We have a pretty dedicated group this year.

“We really want to push for provincials. We’ve done it once

before (they won the senior C title in 2017) but we didn’t get to play a lot of the Vancouver teams that year, there wasn’t that many that came up that year. The guys have booked the time off work this year and they’re ready for it.”

Schwab leads the PGSLA scoring race and he’s had ample support up front from Colton Poulin, Danton Nicholson, Pierce Watson, Cam Braun, Lewis Ennis and Dylan Long. Moleski solidifies the defence with Long, Kyle Adams, Scott Anderson, and Vancouver import Nolan Bayliss.

In goal, Patrick Bayliss and Steven Brizan have played most of the games but Bellamy will get more involved in crease action as the season draws to a close. After this weekend, most teams will have just six games left before the playoffs.

The Devils have improved considerably with the addition of Jeff Moleski, who played 194 games of pro lacrosse over 12 seasons with Calgary and Vancouver, and he’s now back playing with his twin

brother Adam. They were also part of Prince George junior B Posse clan in the early 2000s.

“Jeff has helped us out a lot,” said Bellamy.

“He’s a leader for sure coming out the back gate for us and kind of helps with our younger D guys and kind of tells them where to go. When you have a guy with his level of experience you listen to him and soak in what he learned.”

The Assault have Steven Moleski, a younger cousin of Jeff and Adam, playing for them.

“We tell Steve he’s the only Moleski that matters,” laughed Jenkins.

“Defensively, that’s the strongest lineup any team is going to go up against in the league and with a guy like Jeff, he can transition the ball twice as fast as any guy in the league. It’s nice to play against people of that level and it brings the quality of lacrosse way up.”

Jeff and Adam Moleski, Anderson and Jenkins were teammates as teenagers with the Prince George Posse junior B team in 2003. Coached by Dave Jenkins Sr. and Tony Ciolfitto, the Posse won the provincial title and finished third in the Founders Cup national championship. Two other holdovers from that team also play in the PGSLA. Assault goalie Russill Mills returned to the game this year and Jesse Huffman has had a longstanding role with the Bandits.

“In those years with the junior Posse we were playing in two leagues at the same time (the PGSLA and Alberta-based Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League) and we getting lacrosse five nights a week,” said Jenkins.

“I think that’s why we developed so many players who went on to play junior A and even higher levels. We had Jeff and Adam (Moleski), Chad Tinney, myself, the Cable brothers (Shawn and Scott), the Westwood brothers (George and Bubba), Adam Labarbera, Brandon Atherton, Rusty Mills, Clarke Anderson, Justin Norbraten. It was a long time ago but it was the highlight of my lacrosse career, with all those guys playing for Prince George.”

Series champion Pettis back on home turf

Ted CLARKE Citizen staff

tclarke@pgcitizen.ca

Number 1 is the most coveted plate in motocross.

It means you’re the defending series champion from the year before.

Jesse Pettis of Prince George earned that fair and square as top dog in the Rockstar Energy Triple Crown MX Tour championship 250cc pro class and the novelty of seeing that plate on his bike hasn’t worn off.

“It blows me away every time I put my gear into my gear bag or look at my bike to go ride every day – to see that Number 1 on there is cool for sure and I definitely don’t take that for granted,” said Pettis, 22, a KTM-sponsored rider who gets to race his home course at Blackwater Motocross Park today when the Triple Crown series makes its return to Prince George.

“I feel like I work well under pressure and I have a good team behind me with all the KTM guys and a whole new team and mechanic. KTM is the biggest factory team in all of Canada and they have a great team, great bike, kind of a dream team to be on and I’m happy to be with those guys to try to defend my Number 1 plate.”

Riding with an arm injury he sustained in practice a month ago, Pettis lined up in the gate for the season-opening race in the Triple Crown series last Saturday in Calgary and finished fifth in the first race and seventh in the second.

“Calgary didn’t exactly go the way it went last year (when he won both motos) but I was superhappy with how it went, I got off to a great start and got a hole shot in both races and kept it on two wheels and got some good points for the championship,” said Pettis.

“Considering my circumstance I was happy with how the whole day went. Calgary was pretty much my first day on my bike in about a month and there was about a 90 per cent chance I wasn’t going to race, but I toughed it out and it was a good decision.”

Pettis now ranks seventh in the points race, 14 behind series leader Josh Osby of Valparaiso, Ind.

Last year at Blackwater, Pettis was leading the first moto when his bike stalled on the final corner of the last lap. He ended up second in the second moto.

“Last year I had a couple DNFs and I was still able to get the championship, hopefully we can

have a good day,” said Pettis. “I don’t spend much time at home now, travelling all over the map and I don’t take it for granted having a hometown race and sleeping in my own bed 20 minutes from the track. It would be nice if it was like that every

weekend. It’s definitely a cool atmosphere and and it will be fun to have friends and family out there. The whole sport up here is growing bigger and better every year and having it on live television with all the riders and all the teams is pretty cool to see.”

Prince George Motocross Association director Kourtney Lloyd has known Pettis since he was starting out in the mini class and she knows how hard it’s been for him to get to where he is now, making a living as a sponsored pro rider.

“He and his family have put their heart and soul into it I think the people who are rooting for him, we really do respect him so much,” said Lloyd.

“He’s such a nice person, he’s not just a talented rider, so it’s really important for this town to back him and come up and cheer him on.

“Their family is so much closer because of this sport. You don’t see many 18-, 19- or 20-year-old who want to be camping with their families every weekend like in motocross.

“They’re not on their iPads for six hours a day, they’re out weedwhacking, they’re out testing or washing their bikes. It really builds a person and Jesse is such a prime example of that, he can speak to

people, he’s good with little kids and good with grown-ups, he’s such a well-rounded kid.”

Fresh from winning his first national series title, Pettis went south of the border and made an immediate impact on the Monster Energy AMA Supercross West series.

He posted five top-12 finishes racing the NHL of motocross and likely would have continued on that path if not for a crash in practice Feb. 19, that sidelined him for the rest of the series.

“What Jess did in the States this year was incredible, he was in the top 10 in points, battling with the top guys in the world,” said Troy Wilson, PGMA vice-president.

“They all haul out of semis, they have the best equipment and Jess was doing it out of a sprinter van. It was really awesome to see.”

Qualifying starts at 9 a.m. and racing begins at noon with the first 250cc pro moto, with the 450cc pros, women and pro-mix classes to follow. Colton Facciotti of Aldergrove is the 450 cc series leader. The 250s will be back in the gate at 2 p.m.

Showers are expected today with a high of 16 C under mainly cloudy skies.

Racing resumes Sunday morning with the Future West BC amateur races.

JENKINS

CITIZEN FILE PHOTO

Jeff Moleski (3), captain of the Prince George junior B Posse, considers his options during a May 2003 Rocky Mountain Lacrosse League game at the old Kin 1 against the Edmonton Outlaws senior B team. Moleski, a 12-year NLL veteran, is back playing in his hometown for the Westwood Pub Devils of the PGSLA, who have two games this weekend at Kin 1.

PETTIS

North Stars clinch Wilson Memorial Cup

Ted CLARKE Citizen staff tclarke@pgcitizen.ca

After an uneventful first half with only a couple threatening incursions from Notre Dame shooters looking for paydirt around Northside Christian North Stars net, 10-year-old Austen Vanden Bos took over the North Stars’ netminding duties from Marlyn Lampert. Locked in a scoreless draw with their opponents from Dawson

Creek in a game to decide the Terry Wilson Memorial Cup soccer championship, Vanden Bos breathed a sigh of relief when the North Stars of Vanderhoof scored two quick ones early in the second half for a 2-0 lead.

First Dietrich Pelzer took a lead pass from his younger brother Luther and chipped a shot high into the net behind Notre Dame goalie Owen Wilkinson.

Then, less than a minute later, Nick Wall got free behind the defence and booted in another from just outside the crease. That’s when the fun began for Vanden Bos. With seven minutes still to play, the field started to tilt the other way as Notre Dame’s offence came to life and they starting playing like they did in a 5-0 undefeated run to the final.

They needed goals to have a chance at taking home the trophy to Dawson Creek for the first time in the tournament’s nineyear history and came close when they missed a slow roller that trickled wide of the net.

Not long after that, Ellyos Alix, who banged one off the goalpost early in the game, put a shot on goal that forced a quick reaction from the Grade 5 goalie, who went down on his knees to smother the ball. But the best save for Vanden Bos was one he didn’t have to make.

With about three minutes left, North Stars defender Sion-ed Peters put her hand out to deflect a loose ball away from a pack of Notre Dame forwards converging on the crease and the penalty shot was awarded to a Zaedmon Delacruz. From 10 feet away, Delacruz’s point-blank blast hooked wide of the net and that pretty much sealed Notre Dame’s fate.

“We had some good plays and our team was just really good in this last one and we had a whole bunch of fun here,” said Vanden Bos.

“We got the two goals back-to-back. We wanted to win this so we just kicked and kicked to get it in and we’re happy we won.

“That penalty shot was pretty scary.”

Luther Pelzer, 10, who scored the winner for the North Stars in a 3-2 semifinal victory over St. Ann’s of Quesnel, said Vanden Bos’ netminding heroics were the deciding factor that gave the North Stars their first title win in three years of playing in the Wilson tournament.

“He might have been our best player on the pitch,” said Pelzer.

“When we did score two goals it kind of put the pressure on to defend well and not let any goals in.” Wilkinson played in last year’s Wilson tournament and said his team played well enough to win Friday’s final but just couldn’t score.

“It was fun, we did a lot better than last year,” said Wilkinson.

“We played pretty good. We had pretty good chances.” Alix was still thinking about his missed opportunity as the players gathered for the awards ceremony.

“That was pretty sad,” he said.

“It was pretty sad that we lost. We were close to getting it back in the second half.” Northside fielded two teams for the tournament and the other North Stars team lost 5-1 to Notre Dame in the A semifinal.

“It’s an honour to be part of this tournament” said North Stars coach Adrian Pelzer.

“It’s a Catholic tournament and we’re not a Catholic school and they’ve graciously allowed us to participate in three of the last four years.

“We’ve got a really athletic group of kids who love soccer and we had a number of Grade 5s that joined us as well. There’s only had three girls in our class and they played a lot. They want girls on the field and we tried our best to get the girls in there. We had two teams here and some of the girls played on more than one team.”

In other final results, the St. Anthony’s Sabres of Kitimat defeated St. Mary’s Huskies of Prince George 1-0 on penalty kicks in the B final, while Veritas Knights of Terrace topped the Sacred Heart Panthers of Prince George 4-1 in the C final.

Action from a game between Sacred Heart 2 and Veritas (Terrace) during the ninth annual Terry Wilson Memorial Cup. Teams from 10 different schools participated in the Catholic Schools’ Invitational Soccer Tournament.

Raptors just one win away from title

Lori EWING The Canadian Press OAKLAND, Calif — The Toronto Raptors are one win away from their first NBA championship in the team’s 24-year history.

Kawhi Leonard scored 17 of his 36 points in the third quarter to lead to Raptors to a gritty 105-92 come-from-behind victory over the Golden State Warriors on Friday.

The Raptors, who lead the bestof-seven series 3-1, can capture the Larry O’Brien Trophy on home court at Scotiabank Arena on Monday.

Leonard also hauled down a team-high 12 rebounds for the Raptors, who are making their Finals debut. Serge Ibaka added 20 points for the Raptors, who took control with a massive third quarter. Pascal Siakam chipped in with 19 points, while Kyle Lowry had 10 points and seven assists.

Klay Thompson, who sat out Game 3 with a hamstring injury, had 28 points to top the twotime defending champion Warriors, who are making their fifth consecutive Finals appearance. Stephen Curry, who had a playoff career-high 47 points on Wednesday, scored 27.

Kevon Looney also returned for Golden State after it was previously announced he was out for the remainder of the series with a rib injury.

Trailing by as many as 11 points in the first half, the Raptors roared back with 37 points in the third, outscoring the Warriors by 16 points in the frame. Leonard had two straight threes to kick-start the quarter, then Marc Gasol’s jumper 1:29 into the quarter gave Toronto its first lead since early in the first quarter. The Raptors led 79-67 to start the fourth.

Leonard drilled a three with 8:44 to play to stretch Toronto’s advantage to 16 points. A Curry three-pointer capped a 13-6 War-

riors run that sliced the Raptors’ lead to just eight with 2:56 to play.

But Siakam made two free throws and then drilled a two before Lowry drove for a layup and the Raptors went back up by 14, sending hundreds of Warriors fans to the exits.

Siakam scored on a mid-range jumper with 52 seconds left, prompting a roaring “Let’s go Raptors!” chant from the Toronto fans in attendance.

Fred VanVleet, who had eight points on the night, took a massive elbow to the face from Shaun Livingston – and lost a tooth in the process – a couple of minutes into the fourth, and was bleeding

profusely before he was helped off the court and to the locker-room. VanVleet received seven stitches but passed concussion protocol and returned to the bench.

The Raptors are 8-0 in playoff games in which Ibaka scores 10 or more points.

The Raptors acquired Leonard, Gasol and Danny Green in their quest for their first NBA championship. If there’s been one common character trait throughout the team in their historic postseason ability, it’s their ability to keep level-headed through both the highs and lows.

Asked in his pre-game availability whether the Game 4 pressure

was on Toronto or Golden State, Raptors coach Nick Nurse told the media: “That’s probably up for you guys to decide.

“Again, whether we’re up 2-1 or down 2-1, or down 2-0 or blah, blah, blah, we haven’t really talked about the score of the series at all the entire playoffs,” Nurse said.

“We have tried to just isolate every game.

“We know they’re all critical, right? I guess all I know is you need to win four, and you can’t win four until you win three, I think, if my math is good there... Take them one at a time.”

The teams split the two games in Toronto, then the Raptors

captured Wednesday’s game in Oakland 123-109, a contest that saw all five starters score at least 17 points for just the second time in NBA history (Houston did the same in 1995).

Pockets of Raptors fans dotted Oracle Arena, at times breaking into chants of “Let’s go Raptors!” and “M-V-P!” when Leonard went to the line.

The Raptors rewarded the travelling fans with a win.

The star-studded Oracle Arena crowd included rappers Common, Snoop Dogg and E-40, comedian Dave Chappelle, actors Julia LouisDreyfus, Lilly Singh and Jesse Williams, and filmmaker George Lucas.

Burlington, Ont., Indie band Walk off the Earth performed O Canada, drawing mixed reviews on social media, while Ne-Yo performed the U.S. anthem. Hip-hop dance group Jabbawockeez provided the halftime entertainment. Leonard had 14 points in the first quarter, but Raptors baskets were otherwise in short supply. The Raptors missed their first four shots before Leonard ended the drought three-and-a-half minutes into the game. Looney tipped in a shot to give the Warriors an 11-point lead with 53 seconds left in the first. The Raptors closed the quarter with a mini 5-0 run and Golden State took a 23-17 lead into the second. Toronto held the Warriors’ offence down in the second quarter, pulling to within three points on a pair of free throws by Lowry. The Warriors went into the halftime break up 46-42.

The two teams were a combined 4-for-30 from three-point range through the first half. Leonard had Toronto’s two threes, while Thompson scored twice for the Warriors.

A Game 6, if necessary, would be back in Oakland. Game 7, if needed, would be in Toronto.

Special team: Blues penalty kill has them on verge of Cup

Stephen WHYNO

The Associated Press

Something is missing from the Boston power play.

The uninterrupted puck movement and cross-ice passes to a wide open David Pastrnak aren’t there anymore. Torey Krug isn’t getting the chance to fire away from the top. Patrice Bergeron isn’t dominating between the faceoff circles like before.

Boston rode its lethal power play to a 2-1 lead in the Stanley Cup Final. Since then, the St. Louis Blues have shut out the most effective power play unit in more than 30 years and shut down the Bruins’ best players, too. The Blues power play has been nothing special, but their penalty kill is a major reason why St. Louis has won two straight to take a 3-2 lead with a chance to claim the first NHL championship in franchise history at home Sunday night.

St. Louis has gone from being the playoffs’ least-penalized team through three rounds to some-

thing else entirely. The Blues are borderline undisciplined, relying on targeted toughness to beat up and disrupt the Bruins. It’s working. Since allowing six power-play goals early in the final and letting the Bruins go 4-for-4 on four shots in Game 3, the Blues have made five successful penalty kills. Suddenly Boston’s most valuable weapon is quiet.

“We’re staying tight to each other,” Blues penalty killer Oskar Sundqvist said.

“We’re not letting them pass through the seams and shoot from the top and things like that. We’re making it harder on them and keeping them on the outside. We just need to keep doing the same thing and we’re probably going to be fine if we do that.”

Not just fine. If this keeps up, they could be Stanley Cup champions.

Game 3 was such an eye-opener of how good Boston’s power play is that many wondered if the Bruins were just going to steamroll the Blues and win the series in five games. But Sundqvist was suspended that game and goal-

tender Jordan Binnington has shown serious resolve since then. Blues coach Craig Berube has also made adjustments to Boston coach Bruce Cassidy’s special teams.

“They really like using seam passes and things like that, and I thought we were tight and doing a good job with our sticks and doing a real good job on our stand at the blue line on their breakouts and breaking plays up,” Berube said.

The Bruins power play had been converting over 30 per cent – a clip that could’ve been the secondhighest all-time for a Cup champion – and was drawing comparisons to the New York Islanders’ 1980s dynasty that featured Mike Bossy, Denis Potvin, Clark Gillies and Bryan Trottier.

“Back then it was more drop-off, backdoor, overload... a lot more point shots,” Cassidy said.

“Little more low-to-high driven net-on-net, whereas now I think you see a lot more power plays, certainly always the half wall is a big thing. But I would guess more net-front tips, rebounds back then. Now it’s more one-timer, seam passes.”

Krug considers Cassidy a powerplay mastermind, and that will be tested in preparations for Game 6 in St. Louis with the Bruins facing elimination for the first time since Game 7 of the first round against Toronto.

“I think in zone, they’ve been tight,” Cassidy said of the Blues.

“Either got to stretch them out to get some seams or we got to be less stubborn, then get a net presence and take the shot that’s available with that net presence. Maybe stretch them out off of puck recovery. A little bit is on us to make sure – ‘us’ the staff – and it’s on the players to make the right decision at the right moment in time.”

Getting the power play righted is key to staving off elimination. And it’s not just about scoring because the power play fuels the Bruins’ 5-on-5 offence, and even that’s not happening right now.

“Any time you don’t get chances on the power play, you’re going to get frustrated,” Blues captain Alex Pietrangelo said. “So we’re just doing our job.”

St. Louis has done a much better job at maintaining defensive assign-

ments on the penalty kill after inexplicably leaving skill players wide open in Game 3. Seemingly dumbfounded by Boston’s power play that night, the Blues have begun to turn the tide on faceoffs on special teams and figured out how create their own penalty-killing momentum.

“Just staying aggressive,” Pietrangelo said.

“That’s all. Staying aggressive and we’re getting the puck down when we have a chance to clear.” Closing down the Bruins power play has compensated for a serieslong parade to the penalty box by the Blues. If it continues, St. Louis could soon be hosting its first professional sports championship parade since baseball’s Cardinals won the World Series in 2011.

“We’ve got a big job ahead of us,” Berube said.

“I try to keep everything in perspective and calm and cool as much as I can. It’s hard. And it’s hard for the players, too, but it’s important that we keep our heads and keep level headed knowing we’ve got a big job ahead of us for Game 6.”

WOMEN’S DOUBLES Semifinal Saisai Zheng, China and Ying-Ying Duan, China, def. Kirsten Flipkens, Belgium and Johanna Larsson (15), Sweden, 6-4, 6-4. Kristina Mladenovic, France and Timea Babos (2), Hungary, def. Elise Mertens, Belgium and Aryna Sabalenka (6), Belarus, 6-2, 6-1. MIXED DOUBLES Final Ivan Dodig, Croatia and Latisha Chan, Taiwan, def. Gabriela Dabrowski, Canada and Mate Pavic (2), Croatia, 6-1, 7-6 (5). Juniors Men’s Singles Semifinal Holger Vitus Nodskov Rune (7), Denmark, def. Martin Damm Jr (10), United States, 6-4, 6-2. Toby Alex Kodat, United States, def. Shintaro Mochizuki, Japan, 6-3, 6-4. Juniors Women’s Singles Semifinal Leylah Annie Fernandez (1), Canada, def. Maria Camila Osorio Serrano (3), Colombia, 6-2, 6-4. Emma Navarro (8), United States, def. Qinwen Zheng (5), China, 2-6, 6-1, 6-4. JUNIORS MEN’S DOUBLES Quarterfinal Andrew Paulson, Czech Republic and Eric Vanshelboim, Ukraine, def. Harold Mayot, France and Arthur Cazaux, France, 6-7, 6-4, 10-5. Thiago Agustin Tirante, Argentina and Matheus Pucinelli de Almeida (5), Brazil, def. Bu Yunchaokete, China and Zane Khan (4), United States, 6-3, 6-2. Flavio Cobolli, Italy and Dominic Stephan Stricker, Switzerland, def. Toby Alex Kodat, United States and Martin Damm Jr, United States, 6-4, 6-4. Sergey Fomin, Uzbekistan and Gauthier Onclin (8), Belgium, def. Pablo Llamas Ruiz, Spain and Juan Bautista Torres, Argentina, 7-6,

7-5, 7-6 (2).

CP PHOTO BY FRANK GUNN

Toronto Raptors centre Serge Ibaka (9) fouls Golden State Warriors centre Kevon Looney (5) during Game 4 of the NBA Finals in Oakland, California on Friday.

Julia Roberts, Spike Lee toast Denzel Washington at event

Lindsey BAHR

The Associated Press

LOS ANGELES — Denzel Washington was the man of the hour Thursday night with everyone from Julia Roberts to Spike Lee turning out to celebrate him as this year’s recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award. But when he finally took the stage to accept the honour he did something unexpected: at his own award ceremony, Washington turned the spotlight away from himself and gave his wife of 40 years, Pauletta Washington, her own standing ovation.

The crowd of multigenerational Hollywood A-listers, from Michael B. Jordan and Mahershala Ali to Cicely Tyson and Morgan Freeman, readily obliged.

“I would not be alive without Pauletta Washington,” Washington said. “I wouldn’t survive.”

It’s a difficult task to have a moment stand out in an evening that included a surprise Beyonce appearance (there briefly to present an honour to director Melina Matsoukas) and an earth shattering rendition of Sam Cooke’s A Change is Gonna Come by Jennifer Hudson that brought Washington to his feet, but he managed to do it.

As Roberts, Tyson and others attested throughout the evening,

two-time Academy award-winner Denzel Washington is a family man first. Seated alongside Pauletta Washington, his son Malcolm Washington, Lee, Tyson

and directors Carl Franklin and Ed Zwick, the 64-year-old was for two hours taken on an emotional tour through his storied career in Hollywood – from eager newcomer to movie star to acclaimed director –by those who were by his side.

“We’re all here because we love Denzel,” said Lee, who has directed Washington in four movies (Mo’ Better Blues, He Got Game, Malcolm X and Inside Man).

“Denzel represents our black manhood.”

Lee, the final speaker of the evening, likened Washington to other G.O.A.Ts (greatest of all time) like Michael Jordan, Ella Fitzgerald and Miles Davis.

“That’s the rarefied air that Denzel Washington lives and breathes in,” Lee said.

Lee also said that, although he might be biased, “Malcolm X is the greatest performance ever committed to celluloid.”

And others were just as effusive. Roberts recalled that working with him on The Pelican Brief was like

“working with the Beatles.”

He is, as Jamie Foxx put it, “someone who is just better than everybody else... when it comes to acting!”

“Even Leonardo DiCaprio is like, ‘I am really frightened of Denzel,”’ Foxx added.

The American Film Institute brought out a host of the next generation’s brightest talents to talk about Washington’s impact on them, too.

“Mr. Washington’s arrival was a seismic moment for my generation. You paved the way,” Ali said.

“Your influence, your reach transcends race without ever denying it.”

Michael B. Jordan said he was inspired by the story that while filming Glory, Washington kept wearing his fake scars in a scene where he had his shirt on. Jordan employed the same technique for his Black Panther character.

Chadwick Boseman even went so far as to say, “There is no Black Pan-

ther without Denzel Washington.”

Issa Rae brought Washington to tears of laughter as she recounted the very adult noises she remembers her mom and aunt making while watching his movies when she was a little girl. She came to understand it, she said, when she watched Devil in A Blue Dress when she was a little older.

Washington stayed alert and amused throughout the evening, laughing heartily when Jodie Foster said that they were all there to, “kiss your black a--,” and yelling “Let it out, Morgan!” when Freeman took a long pause after announcing with an expletive how jealous he was.

He and Lee were as playful as schoolboys during the “hoodwinked and bamboozled” speech from Malcolm X, reciting the lines along with the reel, and he accepted a long line of well-wishers during the dinner break.

And when it finally came time for him to speak, in addition to thanking his wife for “40 years of sacrifice and 40 years of forgiveness,” Washington used his moment on stage to talk about God and those who have helped him along the way.

“If nothing else I’m living proof of the power of God,” Washington said.

“I like acting. I like making movies... But my love for God is stronger than anything else.”

The 47th AFI Life Achievement Award Gala, put on with the support of Audi, also recognized Matsoukas with the Franklin J. Schaffner Alumni Medal, providing everyone with an early thrill when Beyonce came out to speak about her friend and collaborator, who directed her Formation video among others.

“She is holding up a mirror for people who look like you and me to see ourselves, saying, ‘You are beautiful and your stories matter,”’ Beyonce said.

“She stays authentic to her roots and femininity in an industry dominated by men.”

Matsoukas said that without her, “I’m not the same voice and I’m not the same creator.”

The ceremony will be broadcast on TNT at 10 p.m. on June 20.

Judge: Spacey accuser’s phone must be turned over to defence

The Associated Press

NANTUCKET, Mass. — A Massachusetts judge says a phone used by a young man who says Kevin Spacey groped him at a bar must be turned over to the defence.

The actor’s lawyer told the judge at a hearing Monday that they need the accuser’s phone so an expert can try to recover text messages his lawyer says support Spacey’s claims of innocence.

Nantucket District Judge Thomas Barrett said Friday that the phone must be turned over by June 21.

Spacey is accused of groping the then-18-year-old man in a crowded bar on the resort island in 2016.

Spacey’s lawyers say the man deleted text messages that could help the actor’s defence.

Spacey attended Monday’s hearing but didn’t speak or respond to questions from reporters.

The accuser’s attorney declined to comment Friday.

AP PHOTO BY CHRIS PIZZELLO

Actress Julia Roberts addresses the audience during the 47th AFI Life Achievement award ceremony honouring actor Denzel Washington at the Dolby Theatre on Thursday in Los Angeles.

Randy Travis gets candid in first memoir post-stroke

NASHVILLE — More than a month after Randy Travis suffered a near fatal stroke in 2013, doctors were not hopeful about his recovery. Complications were piling up, including a collapsed lung and infections, and the country star was in a near comatose state. His doctors told his then-girlfriend that it would be a matter of time before his heart stopped.

Mary Travis, who would later marry Travis in 2015, described in his new memoir that she sat at his bedside and asked him if they should keep fighting. She said she saw a tear fall from his cheek.

“And the warrior that he is, he mustered up the strength to squeeze my hand,” Travis said in an interview with The Associated Press.

“I was like, ‘We’re fighting this. He’s not ready to give up and we’re not giving up. The only person that’s going to take him out of this world is God.”’ Travis, who has aphasia, a condition that limits his ability to speak and give interviews, reveals his painful, months-long recovery from the stroke in the new memoir chronicling his rise to fame in candid detail.

Called Forever and Ever, Amen: A Memoir of Music, Faith and Braving the Storms of Life, the book reveals his highs and lows, from platinum albums and Grammy awards, to his arrest for driving under the influence and his divorce from his previous wife and manager.

The Country Music Hall of Famer, who turned 60 in May when the book came out, ushered in a new wave of neo-traditionalism in the 1990s with hits like Forever and Ever, Amen, On the Other Hand, and Three Wooden Crosses.

“We’re fighting this.

He’s not ready to give up and we’re not giving up.”

— Mary Travis

Mary Travis said they wanted to be honest with fans about his life.

“He felt like, cause he’s the one that ultimately made the decision after the survival of the stroke, it’s time to share these ups and downs,” she said.

Co-writer Ken Abraham explained that he studied Travis’ speaking style over years of interviews and tried to mimic the way Travis would write.

“I listened to everything I possibly could where Randy was speaking, on a TV interview, in a radio interview,” Abraham said.

“Then I’d bring that back to Randy and Mary. ‘Does that sound like Randy? What I put into words, does that sound like Randy?”’

The North Carolina native hit it big with his multiplatinum 1986 album Storms of Life, and went on to win seven Grammy Awards, in both country and gospel categories. He acted in movies and toured, but behind the scenes, the book said he was largely unaware of his financial situation because he left those decisions up to his wife and manager Elizabeth Hatcher-Travis.

They filed for divorce in 2010 after 19 years together, but it turned contentious, with lawsuits filed over his management contract. In the book, he compared her to Colonel Parker, Elvis Presley’s controversial manager.

For the first time publicly, the book addresses his 2012 arrest for driving under the influence, in which Travis, who was nude and intoxicated on sleeping pills and alcohol, crashed his car and was videotaped on police dash cam.

“It was moving forward and it was time for his story to be told his way, not through a tabloid,” Mary Travis said.

“Because sometimes in your silence you’re misunderstood. So if you’re quiet then they just make up the story.

In 2013, Travis was hospitalized due to viral cardiomyopathy, a virus that attacks the heart, and then suffered a stroke. Travis had to relearn how to walk, spell and read in the years since his stroke and he still struggles with aphasia. But in 2016 he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and surprised the crowd by singing Amazing Grace.

“What Randy wants most is for that book to inspire people that maybe feel rejected or lonely, people are battling with things they don’t know how to understand,” Mary Travis said.

Kristin M. HALL The Associated Press

AP PHOTO BY THOMAS NELSON

This cover image shows Forever and Ever, Amen: A Memoir of Music, Faith and Braving the Storms of Life by Randy Travis with Ken Abraham.

In Patsy a woman goes in search of freedom

Ilana MASAD Special To The Washington Post Patsy By Nicole Dennis-Benn Liveright. 432 pp. $26.95

In recent weeks, as more and more states have been restricting abortions in blatant attempts to challenge the federal precedent set by Roe v. Wade, the question of worth has once again come up. Who is worth more: The person who is pregnant, the life they’ve lived thus far and the future they envision? Or the person who doesn’t exist yet, the idea of a person, its potential? It’s a question that doesn’t end at birth, really – most societies expect mothers to act a certain way, to love a certain way, and women who don’t conform risk harsh judgment. Nicole DennisBenn’s sophomore novel, Patsy, methodically and unapologetically engages with choices women do and should be allowed to make, and as with her last novel, Here Comes the Sun, does so with nuance and grace.

The titular Patsy is 28 when we meet her in 1998, living in Jamaica with her mother, Mama G, and her daughter, Tru. Patsy, who yearns for a life that encompasses more than motherhood and dull work, believes she knows exactly how to get it. As the book opens, she approaches the American embassy, which could grant Patsy what she wants most of all: to join her best friend and erstwhile lover Cicely in New York City.

With her newly minted tourist visa, Patsy must wrench herself away not only from Tru but from everything a child’s life symbolizes and demands of a parent, while knowing that judgment will surely follow. In her final moments with Tru, Patsy is achingly aware of her own inability to love her daughter as well as she believes she should.

“A good mother would have snapped a photograph of a baby girl not quite six with a mouth fixed like her father’s and eyes that seem to contain many moons that threaten to eclipse the sun,” Patsy thinks.

“A good mother would have taken the time to use the very last second to inhale her daughter’s scent of Blue Magic hair oil mixed with baby powder. But she’s late to catch her flight.”

Of course, this very set of thoughts is evidence of Patsy’s deep love for Tru. But it takes more than love to be a good caretaker, and there are desires stronger than love anyway, one of which is the ache for freedom – specifically the freedom to love and be with Cicely in a relationship neither woman would have been able to pursue openly in Jamaica without losing their families, friends, communities and more. While Patsy believes that the United States will give her freedoms she doesn’t have at home, readers may recognize that her plan to overstay her visa and remain undocumented foreshadows a different yet still caged life.

Over the course of the novel, this becomes a recurring theme: a disconnect between Patsy’s desires, ambitions and abilities and what she is allowed and expected to do. Having always loved math and been good at it, Patsy wants to go to college – but she can’t, because she can’t get a scholarship or aid without documentation. She wants an interesting and challenging job, but companies won’t hire an undocumented woman without a degree for anything but janitorial work. She wants to be with Cicely, but discovers that Marcus, the man Cicely called her “play-husband,” is nothing of the sort: They aren’t only married for Cicely’s green card but have built a life together and are raising a child. And while Marcus is controlling and violent, he is also wealthy and provides a kind of security that Cicely has always craved.

While Patsy’s life in the United States racks up one disappointment after another, her child grows up in Jamaica, raised by her previously absent father and his wife. Tru, whose given name is Trudy-Ann, has always been more drawn to those things categorized as boyish, and her shortened name suits her as well as the first impromptu soccer ball she learns to kick. While her sections can be as painful as Patsy’s, Tru’s trajectory also demonstrates the ways in which it is possible to deviate from gender and sexual norms even within a country with few protections for LGBTQ people.

Dennis-Benn explores themes of gender, sexuality, motherhood and freedom, as well as colourism and classism and the ways the two intertwine both in Jamaica and here in the United States. But none of this feels didactic or moralistic so much as integral to the characters’ lived experiences and seamlessly woven through their emotional arcs. Ultimately, Patsy is a deeply queer, sensitive and vividly written novel about a woman’s right to want and a child’s right to carve her own path; it is also, as Patsy expresses late in the book, about this hard-won nugget of truth: “Never let anyone define you. Always know that you matter. Your thoughts, feelings, and your desires matter. Your happiness matters.”

Masad is a queer, Israeli American book critic and writer and a doctoral student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

HANDOUT PHOTO BY LIVERIGHT

Patsy, a novel by Nicole Dennis-Benn.

China ‘inventing excuses’ to block canola shipments, Trudeau says

The Canadian Press

PARIS

— Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says China is “inventing excuses” to block imports of Canadian canola.

Speaking at a press conference Friday with French President Emmanuel Macron, Trudeau used his toughest language yet over the Chinese government’s decision to reject Canadian canola on the grounds that inspectors have found pests in it.

Trudeau calls the decision to block canola imports “unjustified” and part of a wider diplomatic row between the two countries. He suggests the Chinese might do something similar to block other Canadian exports.

Canada-China relations have deteriorated since December, when the RCMP arrested Huawei senior executive Meng Wanzhou in Vancouver at the behest of the United States.

China was outraged by Meng’s arrest and has since detained two Canadians on allegations of espionage and sentenced two other Canadians to death on

drug-related convictions.

“We know that China has been engaging in ways that aren’t necessarily aligned with our values around the world through various corporations and through various entities,” Trudeau said.

“We are having significant political difficulties right now with China because of the two Canadians who have been arbitrarily detained and their unjustified decisions on canola, which is the best in the world and the cleanest in the world, and they’re inventing excuses around that to block canola and perhaps next steps as well.”

Trudeau says the government continues to “engage in diplomatic measures” with China, but has yet to decide whether to seek a face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at a G20 leaders’ meeting at the end of the month in Japan.

Huawei is also at the centre of a decision the Liberals have yet to make about which companies will be allowed to supply technology for Canada’s next generation of wireless networks.

Unemployment hits record low

Craig WONG The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — The Canadian economy showed signs of strength in May as it added 27,700 jobs and the unemployment rate fell to its lowest level since comparable data become available in 1976.

Statistics Canada said Friday the unemployment rate fell to 5.4 per cent, compared with 5.7 per cent in April as the number of people looking for work fell sharply.

Economists on average had expected the addition of 8,000 jobs for the month and an unemployment rate of 5.7 per cent, according to Thomson Reuters Eikon.

The better-than-expected increase in the number of jobs –made up entirely of full-time employment as there was no change in the number of part-time jobs – followed a record 106,500 jobs that were added in April.

However CIBC senior economist Royce Mendes noted that when you drill down into the details of the jobs report some of the details weren’t as good as the headline suggested.

“The details though weren’t immaculate, if you look at where the job creation was focused,” he said.

“Yes, it was focused in full-time which is solid for the Canadian economy, but it was also attributed to self-employment, which tends to be more precarious than paid employment at companies.”

The number of self-employed workers rose 61,500, while the number of employees fell by 33,800 including a drop of 13,100

public sector employees and 20,700 private sector employees.

Mendes also noted that hours worked were down for the month.

“So despite having a healthy increase in headline employment, hours worked, which actually translates more directly to GDP, were actually down,” he said.

The jobs report was the latest data point to suggest the economic weakness seen over the winter is on the mend.

On Thursday, Statistics Canada reported the smallest merchandise trade deficit since last October, helped by a rise in exports.

The Canadian economy posted its weakest back-to-back quarters of growth since 2015 in the fourth quarter of 2018 and the first quarter of this year.

However, the Bank of Canada has said that it expected the weakness to be temporary and that the economy would pick up pace throughout the rest of this year.

TD Bank senior economist Brian DePratto said the jobs report will serve to reinforce the Bank of Canada’s cautious approach.

“Recent communication attributed weakness in hours worked to caution among employers. That caution clearly remains, and with trade uncertainty elevated, expect the Bank of Canada to stay on the sidelines for some time,” DePratto wrote in a note to clients.

Mendes noted that he’ll be looking to upcoming data on wholesale and retail sales as well as the next read on manufacturing in Canada for signs of how the

economy is faring.

“Those will provide a clearer indication whether the strong hand off from the first quarter – where we saw monthly GDP in March really post a strong reading – continued into the second quarter in April,” he said.

“That will be the next hurdle for the Canadian economy to really show that some of the weakness that we’ve seen recently is in the past now.”

The jobs report Friday found the goods-producing sector of the economy added 4,900 jobs, while the services sector added 22,800.

The health care and social assistance industry added 20,400 jobs in the month, while professional, scientific and technical services increased by 17,200.

Business, building and support services lost 19,400 jobs and employment in accommodation and food services fell 12,000.

Regionally, Ontario added 20,900 jobs in May, while B.C. saw the number of jobs rise by 16,800 during the month. Newfoundland and Labrador lost 2,700 jobs for the month.

Year-over-year average hourly wage growth for all employees, a key indicator monitored by the Bank of Canada ahead of its interest-rate decisions, was 2.8 per cent in May, up from 2.5 per cent in April.

Compared with May 2018, the Canadian economy added 453,100 jobs including 299,000 full-time positions and 154,100 part-time jobs.

U.S. hiring slows amid trade disputes

Christopher RUGABER The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — U.S. hiring stumbled in May as employers added just 75,000 jobs, a sign that businesses have become more cautious in the face of weaker global growth, widening trade conflicts and perhaps some difficulty finding enough workers.

Last month’s modest job gain followed a much healthier increase of 224,000 in April. The U.S. Labor Department said Friday that the unemployment rate remained at a nearly 50-year low of 3.6 per cent.

The tepid job growth, along with rising pressures on the economy, makes it more likely that the Federal Reserve will cut rates in the coming months. Bond yields fell after the jobs data was released, signalling expectations for lower Fed rates. Stock investors, too, signalled their approval, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average up about 250 points by midday.

On Friday, the government also revised down the economy’s hiring gains for March and April by a combined 75,000. In the first five months of the year, job growth has averaged 164,000 a month, a solid pace that is enough to lower the unemployment rate over time. Still, it’s below last year’s pace of 225,000.

The economy is showing signs of sluggishness just as the expansion has reached its 10th anniversary.

Next month, it will become the longest period of uninterrupted growth on records dating to 1854. Yet

consumers have turned cautious about spending, and companies are scaling back their investment in highcost machinery and equipment.

Economists cautioned that May’s job figures cover just one month and that broader trends indicate that hiring remains steady. They also noted, though, that May’s weaker hiring data preceded U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat last week to impose five per cent tariffs on Mexico. So the full impact of the trade fights will likely show up in coming months.

“This looks like an economy that is slowing down, which does not mean that we’re necessarily entering a recession,” said Martha Gimbel, director of economic research at the job listings site Indeed.

“Coming in the context of tariffs and other economic headwinds makes this number more worrisome.”

The economy expanded at a healthy 3.1 per cent annual rate in the January-March quarter. The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta estimates that annual growth will slump to 1.5 per cent in the April-June quarter.

The deceleration in hiring could mean that some employers are just having trouble finding the workers they need, given that the pool of unemployed is comparatively small. Yet wages should be rising faster than they are as employers compete for workers.

Average hourly pay rose just 3.1 per cent in May from a year earlier, down slightly from last month’s year-over-year gain of 3.2 per cent. That was the smallest such annual increase since September.

Smaller raises, combined with slower hiring, could diminish consumers’ willingness to spend in the coming months.

Hiring was weak across a broad range of industries in May. Manufacturers added only 3,000 jobs, a fourth straight month of anemic gains.

Construction companies hired just 4,000, financial services only 2,000.

Employers in several industries cut payrolls. Retailers shed workers for a fifth straight month as stores struggle with online competition. A category that includes telecom, publishing, and media shed 5,000 jobs. Federal, state and local governments cut a combined 15,000.

Software and technology firms remain a bright spot. Paul McDonald, a senior executive at the staffing firm Robert Half International, said that mobile app developers, data analysts, coders, and senior financial analysts are still typically receiving multiple offers and strong pay gains.

“It’s still a job seeker’s market,” he said.

The tariffs have affected manufacturing and retail firms more than they have software companies and have become a growing threat to the economy. Last month, Trump increased tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese imports from 10 per cent to 25 per cent.

CP PHOTO

A worker washes windows on the new garages and paddocks at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal on Thursday. The Canadian economy added 27,700 jobs in May.

At Home

How to create a welcoming garden for all creatures

Adrian HIGGINS The Washington Post

Before gardening for pollinators and wildlife habitats became fashionable, the National Wildlife Federation presciently encouraged homeowners to create gardens that provided sustenance and shelter to all manner of creatures.

These gardens would stick out on a block as much for the paucity of the yards around them as for their own richness. In the animal-friendly landscapes, lawns were diminished and gardens were full of longflowering plants such as lavender, asters and coneflowers.

The federation would certify qualifying gardens – you can get a sign to announce your habitat to the world – marking the recipient as a person who cared about our world and the creatures in it.

Flowers are joyful to us, but for a moth or a bee or a hummingbird, they are essential. A hedge may give us a green screen, but for a songbird, it’s a place to escape the hawk or your neighbour’s free-range cat.

What struck me about these examples was that, although they were made for animals, they were great gardens because they were planted for continuous flowering from March to November. Or to flip that, if you made for yourself a wonderful garden, it would inherently become a great place for birds, small mammals, insects, reptiles and amphibians. It would provide shelter, bloom and fruit virtually every month, have a constant source of water, and grant all the home-building material any life form could want. (The complete garden zoo includes caring for all the beneficial microbes in the soil, too.)

As my understanding of the needs of our fellow creatures has grown, I have come to do a little more for the animals than I used to. For example, in choosing a shady vine for my arbor, I put in a Dutchman’s pipe (Aristolochia macrophylla) instead of a clematis, knowing it would draw the beautiful pipevine swallowtail butterfly, which is large and black with iridescent blue lower wings. Its caterpillars feed on the leaves, raising another key point: All kinds of flowers feed the adult, but the larvae need specific host plants.

If you are setting out to create a welcoming garden, there are a few basic measures. It’s all right to douse aphids with soapy water, but don’t use insecticides, especially systemic ones. Not only will you harm bees and other beneficials, you will destroy the larvae that birds need to raise their young. Another key strategy is to convert some (or all) of the lawn into plant beds and start

planting ground covers in place of mulch. Also high on my list would be to add – and maintain – a water feature, if only a bird bath, and keep the cat indoors. You also have to be more relaxed. It was a revelation to discover that large autumn stands of Swiss chard were not being devoured by slugs but by goldfinches.

In Washington, the Smithsonian’s horticultural division, Smithsonian Gardens, has organized an exhibition named Habitat, which explores how gardens can nurture nature. Linked to landscapes at 14 sites across the National Mall, the exhibit seeks to convey three key messages, said Barbara Faust, director of Smithsonian Gardens: “Habitats are homes, they are fragile and

interconnected, and they need to be protected.”

Her staff worked with exhibition specialists and craftspeople at the Smithsonian, and turned to wood sculptor Foon Sham for some of the large outdoor sculptures linked to the show. This includes Mushroom, made from thousands of slabs of timber and positioned in a shady grove on the west side of the National Museum of American History. It represents the microbial life in healthy garden soil that not only nourishes and protects plants but also allows trees to signal to one another chemically when they are threatened by pests or disease. Nature is connected in ways we are only beginning to comprehend.

The sculptures and other pieces work with interpretive panels to heighten the show’s theme. They also lighten it with their whimsy. If you want a laugh with your education, the display named Nests, on the Constitution Avenue side of the Natural History Museum, offers vastly upscaled re-creations of nests, conveying the immense design variety between species. Slung from one limb like a hammock is the pendant nest of a Baltimore oriole. Nearby is a bottlelike nest made from dried mud reinforced with feathers – the nursery of the barn swallow.

In the Middle Ages, cottages were constructed from mud and horsehair, and thatched with reeds. It’s as if the birds were showing us the way.

The replicated nest forms are drawn from the Smithsonian’s collection of 5,000 nests, Faust said. Each species brings its own marvelous architecture to the world.

The pollinator garden is a series of linear borders on the east side of the Natural History Museum. It has always been a place full of large summer perennials and annuals that are easy to grow, long-flowering and happy in this town’s heat and humidity. They include various asclepias, tithonia, giant coneflower and the Maryland wild senna, the last a native plant deserving much more garden use.

As part of the exhibition, natural materials have been assembled within the framework of playful insect sculptures to provide habitat for various species of bees and other insects.

By July, the garden has a lush quality that persists into the fall. It is in not cleaning up all the fading material in autumn that allows creatures such as bumblebees, fireflies and various butterflies to maintain their life cycles and flourish.

“It’s okay to be a little bit messy,” said Marisa Scalera, the project manager for Habitat, which runs until the end of next year.

“Messy can be beautiful.”

Habitat is the first coordinated exhibition by Smithsonian Gardens. Others are planned.

“We have 25 million visitors annually,” Faust said.

“We hope to bring this into their consciousness, what they can do.”

Gardening tip: Many late-season perennials benefit from cutting back now to keep them inbounds and prevent flopping. Candidates include asters, Russian sage, caryopteris, lespedeza, buddleia and chrysanthemums. Cut back spring growth by about a half.

Hedging shears are an ideal tool.

THE WASHINGTON POST PHOTO BY SMITHSONIAN GARDENS

A collection of apartments for bees and other insects is found in the Homes exhibit in the Mary Livingston Ripley Garden next to the Arts & Industries Building.

THE WASHINGTON POST PHOTO BY SMITHSONIAN GARDENS

The Nests exhibit outside the National Museum of Natural History includes a giant version of the oriole’s pendant nest.

Bernadette, Southridge, St Anne Ave, Bernard, St Clare St, St Gerald Pl, Creekside, Stillwater.

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MONEY IN BRIEF

Currencies

OTTAWA (CP) —

Tariff deal with Mexico expected, Trump says

Jill COLVIN, Matthew LEE and Luis ALONSO LUGO

The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — After a week of threats, U.S. President Donald Trump declared Friday that “there is a good chance” the U.S. will strike a deal with Mexico to avert the tariffs he’s scheduled to take effect Monday to force the U.S. ally to stem the flow of Central American migrants into the United States.

Trump tweeted his more optimistic view from Air Force One as he flew home from Europe, but added: “If we are unable to make the deal, Mexico will begin paying Tariffs at the 5% level on Monday!”

The tweet marked a change in tone from earlier Friday, when his spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters in Ireland before Trump took off: “Our position has not changed. The tariffs are going forward as of Monday.” Trump has often said unpredictability helps him negotiate.

A tax on all Mexican goods , which would increase every month up to 25 per cent under Trump’s plan, would have enormous economic implications for both countries. Americans bought $378 billion worth of Mexican imports last year, led by cars and auto parts.

Many members of Trump’s Republican Party and business allies have urged him to reconsider – or at least postpone actually implementing the tariffs as talks continue – citing the potential harm to American consumers and manufactures.

change but appeared open to considering a potential compromise that could include exceptions or waivers for different types of cases.

The markets today

TORONTO (CP) — A weak U.S. jobs report further stoked hopes of interest rate cuts, while strong numbers in Canada helped to lift the loonie to a three-month high.

“The market is really firmly pricing in probably weaker growth prospects and the significant likelihood that you’re going to get more central bank easing globally and particularly in the U.S.,” says Mike Archibald, Associate Portfolio Manager with AGF Investments Inc.

The futures market is pricing in two rate cuts by the Federal Reserve by September and three by the end of the year. While no move is expected in July, cuts should be announced at the July meeting, he said.

And so there is a rotation in the market back to sectors that do well in a weaker growth market, such as technology. Investors also have concerns about U.S. trade tariffs against China, Mexico and potentially Europe and Japan but Archibald said Fed chairman Jerome Powell cemented this week’s stock market rally during a Wednesday speech in which he vowed to respond to data weakness by potentially cutting interest rates.

“That really set the market on fire again in the middle of the week and that’s continuing to follow through here.”

U.S. markets rebounded from a poor performance to post the best week of the year. The Dow Jones industrial average was up 263.28 points at 25,983.94 to end the week 4.7 per cent higher. The S&P 500 index was up 29.85 points at 2,873.34 for a 4.4 per cent gain on the week, while the Nasdaq composite was up 126.55 at 7,742.10 for a 3.9 per cent weekly increase.

The S&P/TSX composite index rose 1.2 per cent on the week after closing up 3.16 points at 16,230.96 on Friday. The market is now up 13.3 per cent for the year. Canada’s main stock index didn’t respond much to strong Canadian employment data but the Canadian dollar rose to its highest level since March 1 on the Canadian economy adding 27,700 jobs in May and the unemployment rate falling to 5.4 per cent, its lowest level since comparable data become available in 1976. In addition, the Bank of Canada is expected to maintain interest rates at the current level. The Canadian dollar traded at an average of 75.28 cents US, up from an average of 74.75 cents US on Thursday.

U.S. and Mexican officials held a third day of talks at the U.S. State Department trying to hash out a deal that would satisfy Trump’s demand that Mexico dramatically increase its efforts to crack down on migrants. Sanders said the two sides had “made a lot of progress” but not enough.

The talks were said to be focused, in part, on attempting to reach a compromise on changes that would make it harder for migrants who pass through Mexico from other countries to claim asylum in the U.S., those monitoring the situation said. Mexico has opposed such a

Trump has nonetheless embraced tariffs as a political tool he can use to force countries to comply with his demands – in this case on his signature issue of immigration. And he appeared poised to invoke an emergency declaration that would allow him to put the tariffs into effect if that is his final decision, according to people monitoring the talks.

“If negotiations continue to go well,” Trump “can turn that off at some point over the weekend,” Marc Short, Vice-President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, told reporters.

Talks had gotten off to a shaky start Wednesday, as the U.S. once again pressed Mexico to step up enforcement on its southern border with Guatemala and to enter into a “safe third

country agreement” overhauling its asylum system. But as talks progressed Thursday, U.S. officials began to grow more optimistic, with Short reporting Mexican “receptivity” to potential asylum changes.

Still, he said there was “a long way to go in that particular piece.”

In Mexico, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador would not say whether he would accept his country agreeing to be a “safe third country.”

“That is being looked at,” he said Friday during a news conference, where he held out hope a deal could be reached before Monday.

In addition, Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said Thursday his country had agreed to deploy 6,000 National Guard troops to its border with Guatemala to help control the flow of migrants as part of its concessions.

Senate changes to environmental assessment bill put industry ahead of environment, Liberals say

Mia RABSON The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — The federal Liberals say they are reviewing the changes the Senate has made to their environmental-assessment legislation but accuse the Conservatives of bowing to pressure from the oil and gas sector.

Bill C-69, a major overhaul to how major national resource and transportation projects are assessed, passed the Senate Thursday evening with more than 180 amendments.

Environment Minister Catherine McKenna said in a statement she is “carefully considering” what to do with the amendments and is open to some of them but won’t say which ones.

The changes, made mainly by Conservative and Independent senators, reduce the authority of the minister of the environment to intervene in the assessment process, increase the role economic considerations play in deciding on a project’s merits, and tighten the time constraints for a the assessment process to be completed.

They also make it harder to challenge a project’s approval in court, put some restrictions on who can participate in a review hearing and water down the consideration that must be given to a project’s impact on climate change.

Nova Scotia MP Sean Fraser, McKenna’s parliamentary secretary, said Friday that the cabinet will discuss the changes made by the Senate and then make a recommendation to the House of Commons on which ones to accept and which to defeat.

The Senate would have to then approve the bill again. He wouldn’t say when it would all get done but believes it can happen before Parliament rises for the summer.

That’s scheduled to happen in two weeks, though the House of Commons could choose to sit longer.

Otherwise, the bill would die when the election is called.

Fraser said no decision has been made about the amendments but signalled the government isn’t likely to sign off on all of them.

“It seems as though, when you see what happened, particularly with the amendments that came from the Conservative caucus members who still sit in the Senate, it appears as though they’ve taken their speaking points and amendments directly from the oil and gas lobby and haven’t considered the potential social, economic or environmental impact that some of those amendments would have,” Fraser said.

Many of the Conservative amendments were word-for-word copies of requests from the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.

However many similar amendments were proposed by independent senators appointed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney and Conservatives in the Senate, as well as the oil industry, have said the bill is only workable if all the amendments are accepted as a suite.

“Surprise, surprise – I disagree with Jason Kenney,” Fraser said.

Conservative natural-resources critic Shannon Stubbs said Friday the amendments “re-

duce the catastrophic damage” the bill would have on the energy industry but a Conservative government would repeal the legislation no matter what the Liberals do with it.

She said every major industry affected by the bill “demanded” changes to it.

“Conservatives opposed this legislation for the last year and a half because Bill C-69 imposes open-ended timelines for approval, increases political interference in the review process, and introduces vague project criteria that will allow anti-resource activists to significantly delay approved projects in the courts,” Stubbs said.

McKenna said killing Bill C-69 is “a recipe for economic problems, social tensions and environmental damage.”

Environment groups are urging the government to reject most of the changes.

In a letter to McKenna last week, 26 Canadian environment groups said Bill C-69 was already “a significant compromise” for the environment as the government presented it.

“There is no justification for its further weakening in favour of oil-and-gas-industry interests,” the letter reads.

The legislation fulfills a Liberal election promise to repeal Conservative changes made to the assessment process in 2012, which they argue was leading to courtroom challenges rather than construction.

The original legislation, introduced in February 2018 following a long consultation process, was already heavily amended in the House of Commons a year ago.

SNC-Lavalin delays jury decision in corruption trial

Christopher REYNOLDS The Canadian Press

MONTREAL — SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. is pushing back its decision on whether to opt for a trial by jury or by judge alone in a corruption case that has tripped up the engineering giant and ensnared it in a political controversy for months.

“I need more time to make the choice. It has to be decided by several people in the company,” defence lawyer Francois Fontaine told the Court of Quebec on Friday.

“Because it’s an important decision,” he told reporters after the morning hearing.

“It’s a big company.

“It’s necessary to take the time to analyze it carefully.”

Last week a Quebec judge ruled there is enough evidence to send SNC-Lavalin to trial over charges of fraud and corruption, prompting a further tumble in the beleaguered firm’s share price.

The company has previously pleaded not

guilty to the criminal charges.

SNC-Lavalin is due back in court June 28.

The Montreal-based firm is accused of paying $47.7 million in bribes to public officials in Libya between 2001 and 2011.

SNC-Lavalin, its construction division and a subsidiary also face one charge each of fraud and corruption for allegedly defrauding various Libyan organizations of $129.8 million.

The court hearing in Montreal on Friday was the latest step in criminal proceedings that be-

gan last fall after SNC-Lavalin failed to secure a deferred prosecution agreement, a kind of plea deal that would have seen the firm agree to pay a fine rather than face prosecution.

Since early February, SNC-Lavalin has been at the centre of a political controversy following accusations from former attorney general Jody Wilson-Raybould that top government officials pressured her to overrule federal prosecutors and negotiate a deferred prosecution agreement with the company.

AP PHOTO

U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump wave at supporters as they walk across the South Lawn on their return to the White House on Friday in Washington.

Catholics in Kenya rebel against celibacy vow for priests

Max BEARAK The Washington Post

NYERI COUNTY, Kenya — He was a priest just out of seminary. She was a nurse. They were both from the slopes of Mount Kenya, but their paths improbably crossed in Rome. He became unshakable in his desire to marry her, even though he had taken the Catholic Church’s mandatory vow of celibacy for priests.

When he returned to preach in Kenya, Peter Njogu was shocked when fellow priests told him that many of them had broken that vow, marrying and having children. In hushed tones, they spoke of their “secret families,” kept hidden in distant homes. The thought of doing so pained him.

As the Catholic Church goes through a global crisis brought on in part by the revelation of widespread sexual misconduct by its clergy, self-proclaimed Bishop Njogu believes he has figured out how to save Christianity’s largest church from its own sins: Let priests marry and raise families. Njogu’s breakaway faction, the Renewed Universal Catholic Church, is Catholic in every way except in having optional celibacy for its priests. Its growth in Kenya is rooted in opposition to the practice of keeping secret families but reflects a growing worry among some Catholics that the celibacy requirement – to many an nonnegotiable tenet of the priesthood – creates a harmful culture of sexual secrecy.

The Vatican has shown no interest in reexamining the issue for all priests, and Pope Francis has called celibacy a “gift to the church.” But the pontiff has also signaled that he is open to ordaining married men in remote parts of the world with a severe shortage of priests. More radical voices in the church have called for the church to rescind the requirement altogether.

“Most of our members are ex-Catholics,” said Njogu.

“They are tired of the hypocrisy. Some of our people call us the ‘Church of the Future’.”

Nearly 20 priests and more than 2,000 parishioners have joined Njogu since 2011, he claims, mostly in the towns and villages that dot the fertile slopes of Mount Kenya, the 17,000-foot-high extinct volcano right in the center of this country.

“Now that I’ve come out, these other priests tell me, ‘The problem with you is you went public,’” he said on a recent Sunday after celebrating Mass.

“And I say, ‘I am not the problem; I am the solution. Join me.’ “ To his flock, he said: “This is where you find your freedom from all that hypocrisy.”

The church in the hilltop village of Gachatha where Njogu preaches his reformation is a far cry from a cathedral. The pews, pulpit and church itself are all made of wooden planks nailed together. The floor is sawdust atop dirt. On a clear day, the ice-capped peak of Mount Kenya glimmers through a glassless window.

While Catholicism has declined in numbers in some former bastions in the West, such as Ireland, it is growing more rapidly in Africa than anywhere else. Africans make up nearly a fifth of the world’s Catholics.

Njogu’s sermons hark back to Catholicism’s pre-celibacy era while appealing to the faith’s future in Africa, where he believes it will have to reconcile with local customs as it grows.

“No one in the Vatican understands the African soul. They do not understand that for the African man, priest or not, the worst sin is to leave this world without siring a child,” said Njogu.

“Mandatory celibacy is thus the root of priestly sin, but they pretend all is well while their house is burning to the ground.”

The Catholic Church excommunicated Njogu after he defected for alleged “unbecoming behaviour,” including purchasing land and speaking openly about his intention to marry Berith Kariri, who remains his wife.

“These priests are not sincere, they are pursuing personal interests,” said Father Daniel Kimutai Rono, general secretary for the Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops.

“There is nothing about ‘African-ness’ or ‘European-ness.’”

The vow of celibacy, he said, “is about the vocation, about the call to serve God and the sacrifice which entails in serving God.”

Dozens of Njogu’s followers said in interviews that they left the mainstream church because they doubted their former priests’ devotion to the vocation.

“As a parent, I had to fear that a priest would impregnate my daughter if I took them to my old churches,” said Margaret Kimondo, who was one of Njogu’s first converts. “In front of the altar they may look one way, but at night, you don’t even want to hear those stories.”

Philip Muiga, 78, had been a Catholic priest for decades before joining the Renewed Universal church last year.

“One day I met a priest in the street who I have known for a long time, and he was drunk,” he said. “When I went home and looked at myself in the mirror, I just saw darkness. I could not justify continuing to call these men my colleagues.”

Rono, who represents the Kenyan Catholic Church, denied any sort of systemic abuse or existence of “secret families” but

acknowledged a global churchwide “trend of infidelity to the priestly vocation” and said priests should avoid any kind of “coverup.” The Vatican deferred to its Kenyan representatives for comment.

Celibacy has been expected of Catholic priests since its origins in the first century after Jesus Christ’s death, but the 12thcentury imposition of a celibacy vow was necessitated primarily by a priesthood that had begun using the church as a family business, said Chris Bellitto, a professor and church historian at Kean University in New Jersey.

“Priests were handing their parishes along to their illegitimate sons as if they were training them as cobblers, who inherited your shop and tools when you died. This complicated the integrity of the sacraments – what if the son didn’t have a vocation or disposition as a spiritual leader? – and the independence of the church, since the bishop was supposed to be naming parish priests,” said Bellitto.

But the vow always seemed at odds with certain parts of the Bible’s teachings, leading many within the church to question its purpose. Njogu’s faction is certainly not the first to try charting a new course without the celibacy vow, said Kim Haines-Eitzen, a historian of early Christianity at Cornell University.

“In Catholicism, there’s always been a pronounced preference for asceticism to prove devotion. But how do you square that with, say, ‘be fruitful and multiply,’ from Genesis? Are priests expected to be separate from all other humans?” she said.

That enforced detachment from the lives of their flock is what drives priests in Kenya to adopt “secret families,” said Father Matthew Theuri, 73, who was a catechist for nearly four decades before joining Njogu’s church as a priest. But it also presents a quandary in being a good priest, he said.

“Our churchgoers come to us with questions about wayward children, trouble paying school fees, marital issues – how can we help them if we know nothing of that life?” he said, while sitting at home with his wife, Jane, and two of his grandchildren.

After Njogu’s Mass on a recent Sunday in Gachatha, Joseph Macharia, a coffee farmer, said he thanked God every day for the new church.

“This is a more open way of being,” he said.

“The others, the ones who keep secret families, they come to the pulpit to lie. Maybe they think we are stupid.”

Rael Ombuor in Nairobi and Chico Harlan in Rome contributed to this report.

THE WASHINGTON POST PHOTO BY ANDREW RENNEISEN

Father Matthew Theuri, 73, his wife, Jane, and two of their grandchildren sit at their home in Ithe Kahuno. Theuri joined Njogu’s church after four decades as a catechist.

THE WASHINGTON POST PHOTO BY ANDREW RENNEISEN

Rev. Peter Njogu, center, celebrates Mass on March 10 in Gachatha, Kenya.