L E T   'E R   R I P !!!!! 

Hey,what's with the street lights by the new bridge construction?? With all the changes in traffic at that location you'd think they would actually turn those lights on. It's so dark in that area and so many changes being made I can see an accident happening. The lights are up but there just not on.
Patricia

Good question qwaszxter...what DID happen to the Owl?
Hmmm.....

I was at the PG airport recently in the early evening (around 7pm) waiting for a plane that became delayed. I was dismayed to see that we have no coffee shop available at that time for the waiting public. Even a rolling kiosk would have made the bunch of us feel valued.

Worse yet - we STILL have no convenience store in the airport. I had found myself in the same situation a year ago and excused it to the Horizon renovations. But this is apparently the status quo and I am embarrassed that an airport with the biggest runway in the world doesn't offer such basic services to it's public.

Good rant, qwaszxter! The market share of FORD (Driver Returns On Foot),GM and Chrysler has been diminishing for a few decades now. One would think that they would have gotten a message from that and by *they* I mean the top brass that runs the show.

It gradually dropped from 90% to 30% while the top officers received billions in compensation.

The *big* Three will probably receive a bailout, and then another and another. Will they ever repay the money to the taxpayers? Not very likely.

Unfair subsidies (unfair to the competition) are supposed to be not cool (illegal) and we know that argument very well coming from the US side in the softwood lumber dispute.

If they get bailed out the government has to take over control, fire all the top honchos which got the industry into the mess it is in and replace them with people who know how to run the show without subsidies from the public purse.

Corporate welfare we can do without.

BTW: After many many years of purchasing only domestic vehicles I would never buy another one, bailout or not. Most of them were a pain in the backside and of mediocre quality anyways.

NO BAILOUT for Ontario. Where is the bailout for BC Lumber Companies? Why no bailout for Mackenzie? What a load of crap! Lumber companies are victims of circumstance. They didnt kill themselves with crappy products or ridiculous labor costs (ok, maybe the pulpmills are, but not the sawmills).

A friendly reminder.......

Friends of the Library are having their mega book sale on at the Kinsmen Community Complex this weekend. I peeped in there yesterday to help set up books.They were waiting for the next cube van to arrive full of boxes of books to unload.

Thousands to choose from. Being a reader it was very hard to keep the focus on the sorting and not the browsing.:)

Was immpressed as usual with this event.

I went for a walk last evening (despite air quality readings of "fair" downtown and "poor" at BCR. I noted many residences using wood heat and much smoke coming out of chimneys and then settling down over all of their neighbours' residences. When I returned after my walk I could not believe that my hair actually smelled like woodsmoke. THis is one of many problems with the unenforceable clean air bylaw of the city of PG. These people who choose to use wood heat should be charged a particulate levy as should industries that discharge particulate -- for driving up health care costs and driving down quality of life for everyone else around them.

""Lumber companies are victims of circumstance. They didnt kill themselves with crappy products or ridiculous labor costs (ok, maybe the pulpmills are, but not the sawmills).""

How do you define a "ridiculous labour" cost? I've worked for over 30 years in our local pulpmills, and thankfully we enjoy generous wage and benefit packages. Our industry generates huge revenues and profits for the company shareholders and I consider my remuneration as a "fair share" for the work I do. We work 24 hours a day, 365 days per year, and sometimes in conditions that would horrify the average person. When was the last time you worked in spraying Sulphuric Acid wearing full rubber suits and self contained breathing apparatus??

And, because our family gets a "fair share" of the company profits our governments collect huge taxes off our incomes [over $20,000 in deductions last year alone] which provides hospitals, schools, roads etc for everyone else that lives in Canada. Without these so-called ridiculous labour costs all of us would not be enjoying the standard of living we do now.

I consider $250 million dollar sports contracts over the top, and half million dollar severance packages a bit hard to swallow, but puleeeese when you consider the wages the average working person makes you should be thankful we aren't all on minimum wage.

""These people who choose to use wood heat should be charged a particulate levy as should industries that discharge particulate -- for driving up health care costs and driving down quality of life for everyone else around them.""

Perhaps we should provide lower cost electricity for electrically heated homes instead of always suggesting another tax or levy?? Electric heat is clean...but expensive and with so many people living on fixed incomes and losing their jobs they will always look for ways to reduce household expenses. Or perhaps uncap some of those natural gas wells that dot the northern part of the province and provide cheap affordable natural gas as an alternative to wood heat?

The smoke from wood burning fireplaces is an issue unto itself but the actual percentage of fine particulate generated has been shown to be minimal when compaired with particulate from industry and diesel locomotives.....and it is the find particulates that are causing the majority of the health concerns.

It is my understanding that the newer wood burning appliances emit far fewer find particulate than their older counterparts.

bigmom - the airport is a business, not a charity service. If you feel there is value in late night coffee shops and convenience stores, I am sure the airport management would be more than happy to discuss leasing some space to you. Give them a call.

Who wants to talk about the Performing Arts Center. $51,000,000.00. My prediction.

"Dan Rogers is known for not making a decision, he will use the Performing Arts center as the fall guy, to say, go back and find something to build for under 25 million"

That is if he has half a brain and understand that it will be a good publicity measure.

Did you know that Burling Ontario is building a 720 seat and a 200 seat performing art center this year for $22,000,000.00..... Hmmmmmmmmmmm you wouldn't suppose that our local PAC gang can check this out.... oh its not in China or Portland.

We have the lowest rates on electricity in the world @ $0.06 per KW/h
It is the lowest because our government already subsidizes it.
How much more subsidy do you want?

bigmom. The Airport doesnt have enough business to keep the restaurand or lounge open. :People seem to eat and drink less at Airports these days.

Also they shut down the book store to make way for the Horizen fiasco.

Most of the Airports available money was spent on the **seldom used** customs expansion. The seldom if ever used increase in parking from 500 spaces to 800 spaces, and of couse the **never used yet** $33 Million runway expansion. Maybe they dont have enough money left to buy cup of coffee.

He speaks, you are absolutely correct, except I bet the final cost would be closer to $60,000,000.00 by the time the land is purchased and everything else is done if these dreamers get their way. It had better be put to a referendum as Dan promised in his election platform. One of the largest groups in P.G., which is the Theatre Northwest, doesn't even want anything to do with it. This would be ridiculous to build for the 1 percent of the population that would use it.

Jim
"How do you define a "ridiculous labour" cost? I've worked for over 30 years in our local pulpmills, and thankfully we enjoy generous wage and benefit packages. Our industry generates huge revenues and profits for the company shareholders and I consider my remuneration as a "fair share" for the work I do."

Ridiculous=
I know people that work at the pulp mills and one of them has a laptop to take to work to watch movies all night. Does that seem reasonable to you?

Ridiculous=
When someone makes $30 or $35 per hour at one job but the reality is that if they lost that job they would likely have to accept something in the $20 range (if they are lucky) then that is also ridiculous. It means that they have strong armed a company into overpaying, plain and simple (see CAW in Ontario).

Dont get me wrong I dont hold it against anyone, if someone wanted to pay me to watch DVDs all night I would be all over it too, but when the mills are all shut down everyone will scream mismanagement and the union will play the victim, when they desverve a share of the blame for greed, then what?

See "Killing the golden goose."

Well said Jim13135, thanks for speaking up for the working class. At least one of our local pulpmills has the lowest operating cost (per tonne of pulp produced) of any mill in north America, or so I have been told. Thank goodness the wages and benefits paid are generous, it does not take a genius to observe that the high wage earners pay a lot of tax, and are definitely one of the prime movers of local economy.
metalman.

It is really coming down. Make sure you are carefull when you are driving!

Sure would like to know where Campbells "carbon tax" is going now with money drying up?

My opnion, on high wages in the industrial plants. Go for it, if someone is buying the product, it is a win for our community. It is true that it is sad when these plants get shutdown, and hundreds of people are effected. But do they ever talk about all the years they made more than what they were worth to the companies.

We live in a province with good resources. We have technology to convert it to useable product. We give away our resources to countries that want to buy it raw. Thus when we run it through our plants then we should ensure that the company and its workers maximize there wages and profit, thus we are not giving it away. Lowering the wages in the plants does nothing but saves money to the buyers. Provincially it costs us money.

Keep our primary industry wages high, and we as a province will be better off. Stop shipping out non value added products out of country. Lets employ people with our resources. if we don't cut down our trees this year. There is 3 to 5% more tree next year to harvest. If we do not sell our copper, its not going to run away is it? Our oil, I don't think Alberta is doing any horizontal drilling to siphon out our oil and gas.... yet.

The sun will rise again tomorrow.

Getting paid 30-35 $'s?hr to watch DVD's. Sounds like a management problem to me to allow this to happen. Blameing a worker or the union for mismanagement of anything of the corporation is ridiculous. Poor management is solely to blame if watching DVD's is not what his job requires. Of course the right wing anti-union supporters will blame the union for the problem if it is a problem. Anytime a worker or the union has control of a corporation there is generally something fundamentally wrong with the corporation [Management] to let it get to that point.

Lets do the serious stuff first. I don't know what happened to owl or where he is but he did NOT run for city council. I have hie email address and I guess I will give him the word that he is neede on this site.

I do recall that at one time he mentioned, "Ottawa is starting to look better all the time" when talking about living in PG.

So there you have it.

Cheers

Born in BC, you just don't get it. If the operator is watching a DVD at night he is awake and alert. It also shows nothing is broke and the mill is making money. If the operator is working his butt off that means something ain't right and money is not being made. Do not criticize something that you have no knowledge of. Why are you picking on the working man? Why not the ceo's and such with their massive pay, bonuses and perks.

Palopu the runway expansion project is not ready yet. The fueling and deicing stations for the big jets are still being built. Check out the construction at the north end of the runway.

hmmmmm which one on council is owl? Could it be Shari Green?

Owl is not on council

Can anyone explain what the fascination with Owl is?

Seamutt: "Born in BC, you just don't get it. If the operator is watching a DVD at night he is awake and alert. It also shows nothing is broke and the mill is making money."

Precisely. Why pick on the working man? When firefighters are in the fire hall and doing whatever they are doing - it means that there is NO fire to attend to at the moment! They are ready to pounce on a problem on a moment's notice.

I'd rather they sit in the fire hall than have them attending to fires all over the place. Same goes for nurses on the nursing station on night shift and the care of their patients!

Some people judge and condemn without having the slightest clue what they are talking about.

I just heard on the news that BC has a child poverty rate
6% higher than the rest of Canada. BC has lets its well paid workforce be downsized into lower paid part time possitions. We should support the few jobs left at enough pay to keep ourselves out of poverty. Who can keep a family on less than $20 an hour? That is with two people working in a household. The pulp mills have enjoyed a profit for many years and the employees deserve a fair wage for a days work.

I don't know if a bail out for large companies will help the current financial problems, but one idea that I heard seemed to have some merit. Many people have RRSP's. Why not allow people to take out an amount ( I believe in the US election $10,000 was mentioned ) tax free. I believe this might increase spending for the Xmas season and help get some money circulating.

The following link will take you to a one year stock price chart of Canfor's Prince George pulp mills.

http://cxa.marketwatch.com/TSX/en/Market/intchart.aspx?symb=CFX.UN&sid=2365021

RRSP stands for Registered RETIREMENT Savings Plan. The purpose is to make arrangements for enough income when you retire. It may appear attractive to take some of it and spend it now, but doing so will seriously reduce your income after 65. Living in poverty during your old age is no joke, as many people have found out. It's a bad idea.

Wikipedia say:"The Owls are an order of birds of prey. Most are solitary, and nocturnal, with some exceptions (e.g. the Burrowing Owl)."
I really like the Burrowing Owl!!!If you want to try it Winston's it on their wine list.

It would be nice to make $20.00 an hour, but even with all the training I have the industry that I am in does not pay that, nor do we have benefits.

I suppose you need a unionized job then kagee!

Change industry. Kagee

Born in BC says: ""Ridiculous=
I know people that work at the pulp mills and one of them has a laptop to take to work to watch movies all night. Does that seem reasonable to you?""

The last union meeting I went to they told us there were about 450 members in our local...I am sure they would appreciate your insinuation that all they do is watch DVDs on a laptop all night.

Born in BC says: "Ridiculous=
When someone makes $30 or $35 per hour at one job but the reality is that if they lost that job they would likely have to accept something in the $20 range (if they are lucky) then that is also ridiculous. It means that they have strong armed a company into overpaying, plain and simple (see CAW in Ontario)."

I would estimate that in our plant at least 300 out of the 450 are trades people of one sort or another. Those core trades [millwrights/elec/instrumentation/welders/steam engineers] people are in high demand in the oil industry and developing countries. The last time I checked those industries are paying higher salary [$45hr] than the pulpmills. For those of us that lack marketable skills $20 per hour for a starting salary is pretty decent as a starting salary in the pulpmill is around $24.

Born in BC says: "Dont get me wrong I dont hold it against anyone, if someone wanted to pay me to watch DVDs all night I would be all over it too, but when the mills are all shut down everyone will scream mismanagement and the union will play the victim, when they desverve a share of the blame for greed, then what?""

We already spoke about your fantasy job where you get to watch DVDs all night, you obviously have no idea what your talking about. If the mills ever shut down it will likely be for economic reasons, read: they cannot make enough return on their investment to keep running. If labour costs are reduced for the company, profits increase, and that increased profit is either put into capital investments or paid out to the share holders in the form of distributions. Most of those shareholder distributions are sent outside of our community to people who don't put an hour of sweat, pain, or labour into making the mills more profitable. How could you honestly say that the working man is greedy for accepting a good living salary at the expense of higher profit distributions??

Born in BC says: ""See "Killing the golden goose.""

Our Golden Goose is doing pretty good under the current conditions, and I can assure you as a union member we are all committed to keeping this goose on good solid ground for as many years as possible.

Canfors corporate responsibility to the people of this area is JOBS. Good paying jobs and in return they get to poison the air, pollute the rivers, rape the forests and shorten the life spans of those that work in the plants. Most people that blather on about the over paid underworked pulpmill worker has no idea of what goes on out there as they have never seen the inside of one of these mills.Nuff rant!

This is a difficult discussion for all involved. All I have to contribute is my personal experience.
I was a child in the Depression and we have a different mentality to others who weren't in it.
The most negative part as a child was watching the men coming to the house who had just ridden the rails looking for work and wanting food and just anything to do. My Mom made her own bread and they always had bread and cheese and then would pile the woodpile for us.
The most posotive part was learning from my Father that the way we survived was that the CNR gave each employee a six week layoff so that all employees could work.

I appreciate each day that I had as a child because I learned a lot. The affluence that we have had since the depression is overwhelming.

We were so lucky to have bread to eat and clothes were not warm in those days and school was wonderful even if we were cold getting there because there were no cars.

My wish would be that you never had to go through that because I don't know if you would make it.

thanks for adding a little perspective Lamb....

I thought I had put this in the Free for All, but evidently I accidentally posted on the Astoria thread. Sorry about that! Anyway, here is the post . . .

Onto another subject, does anyone know what the hell is going on inside the building on Quebec Street (pretty sure it's Quebec) where the Chee Duck Tong Society is located?

Every single day now for about two weeks (I work downtown so I get to see that area), I've noticed loads of people going in and out of that building on a regular basis. Usually walking, sometimes dropped off by cabs but almost always high as a kite when they leave the building. I've had 2 or 3 people almost walk into the side of my car as they leave the building and I'm driving down Quebec Street and it's obvious they are oblivious to what's going on. Let's also just say that the crowd going in and out of there are not folks that you would approach to ask for the time. Perhaps the RCMP should take a walk down there and see what's going on. Given what I've seen, I'd suggest going in with at least 4 or 5 guys with hands on the hip just to be ready. I don't think it's your average squatting location.

I should also add that I'm pretty sure they aren't going into the Chee Duck Tong premises. I just use that to describe the building I'm talking about. Pretty sure they head upstairs.

Ben, if this post is offside (I don't think it is but I'm no expert on that), please delete.

News Flash:
First Nations get 2.5 million to get high speed internet, while the white folks in Pineview, and other local communities still have to contend with dial-up.

He spoke and said: "Did you know that Burling Ontario is building a 720 seat and a 200 seat performing art center this year for $22,000,000.00..... "

He might speak, but does he read?

"Project Costs
$36.2 million total project costs"

http://www.burlingtonpac.ca/quickFacts.php

Off by $14 million. Do you work at UNBC "he speaks"?

For those that have never worked in a pulp or paper mill, take a tour and see what really takes place, especially during upset conditions. The wage garnered is for working in a very difficult and dangerous environment, experience and education. Most employees are provincially ticketed tradesmen. Perhaps you should attempt to pass the 3rd Class power Engineer Examinations before knocking off about overpaid and underworked unionized employees. Could or would you work in a hot and humid environment for 12 hours, performing physical labour? I'd suggest many of you wouldn't last one tour. Even paying these wages the empires still maintained a profit for decades, the economy has changed and will hopefully rebound soon.

Some good reponses to the DVD viewing. It should be noted also that this extravagance is performed only on the nightshifts. Try staying awake and alert for a 12 hour nightshift. Many read, study to stay wake and alert, you can only drink so much coffee. Anything that engages your mind and prevents drowsiness is a bonus. Management certainly doesn't condone this, but as many have been in the lower ranks, I believe they can appreciate the conditions and circumstances. At the end of the shift the job is done, everyone goes home safe.

Drove home from PG on Friday. Snow, slush, heavy and thick. 600K, one snow plow anywhere on #16 going west. 4 cars in the ditch, 2 obviously from stupidity. OMG going 80-90 when moderately possible and was passed. I let many morons past. Note to drivers, All Season tires will kill you, just ask the drivers in the ditch.

Obviously the plows hadn't touched the Highway for 6-8 hours, or the night before. Did see 3 plows however driving in caravan to maintain the road servicing McD's and Horties House.???

I'm glad the Highways management and PRIVATE contractors are dedicating such monumental effort to keeping one of the main corridors in such pristine condition. Should be bonuses all around this year.

Best maintained stretch, Fraser Lake to Burns Lake to Houston. KUDOS!

Whats the fasination with Owl? I guess its his approach to the way that the sees things like most of you on this site. Some of you are fasinationg and others well I wont go there.

I have emailed Owl and he tells me he is alive and well but is very busy these days.

and dont forget not all owls burrow or fly.

I guess 250 forgot to cut this blog off.

Cheers

Yeah, his approach or his views didn't really fascinate me at all, but each to his own.

It's great we can keep posting here after Friday is all done with. Is this a sign of things to come?