Severud, St. Pierre join News team TWO NEW columnists will join the North Shore News this week. Starting today and running every second Wednesday in the News, alternating with con- troversial) columnist Doug Col- lins, will be guest columnist Norm Severud. His Out of the Norm column, on page 9 of to- day’s News, will deal with a wide tange of local and national topics. Severud is a local writer who formerly worked as a reporter for the Columbian newspaper and numerous leading Canadian dailies, including the Vancouver Sun, the Montreal Gazette and the now-defunct Ottawa Journal. And starting Friday, renowned author, playwright and newspa- per columnist Paul St. Piene will also joir: the North Shore News. His Paulitics and Perspectives column will appear Fridays in the News, providing the newspaper’s readership with the unique and perceptive insights that have es- tablished St. Pierre as one of a Canada’s: most respected news- paper columnists. St. Pierre, who has been 2 reporter, feature writer and edi- tor with various newspapers since the mid-1940s, is also the author of such books as Breaking Smith’s Quarter Horse and a host of plays for stage and ?zlevision. Critics have hailed St. Pierre as ‘‘an unsung literary giant in the grand, populist mould of Mark Twain, Bret Harte and...William Faulkner.” While he served as a Liberal MP for Coast-Chilcotin from 1968 to 1972, St. Pierre claims no fixed political position beyond the simply philosphy that ‘‘all governments lie, cheat and steal.” He is a champion of the com- men folk and an opponent of al those in the higher hierarchies of church and state, those who. he says, “occupy the commanding heights of the field of higher nonsense.”’ Severud and St. Pierre join a high-profile stable of News col- umnists that includes Bob Hunt- er, Doug Collins, Gary Banner- man, Mike Grenby, Noel Wright and Joy Metcalfe. News scoops six awards THE NORTH Shore News advertising team has scooped up six awards, in- cluding four first-place showings, in the prestigious Suburban Newspapers of America 1990 Advertising and Promotion Awards Contest. The News won first place for best special shopping area pro- motion, first place for best single black and white ad, first place for best single ad using process color, first place for best signature page or signature sec- tion, second place for best sales promotional materials and third place for best single ad. Said News advertising director Linda Stewart, ‘‘! am extremely proud of the staff who created these award-winning ads. It is very important that we do our very best for our advertisers. It is indeed an honor to win six awards for the North Shore News, and I took forward to entering many more competitions in the future.”” NEWS photo Neil Lucente BARRIE BOATTER (left) and Tom Wotton hold up their pink stips after they, along with 63 others, were laid off Friday from Versatile Pacific Shipyards Inc.'s North Vancouver facility. Marine and Boilermakers Industrial Union president George MacPherson, who along with Versatile chief executive officer Peter Quinn, are members of a provincial government lobby group aimed at refloatin, the Polar Class 8 icebreaker contract, said he was pleased with recent negotiations on the issue held with federal Justice Minister Kim Campbefi. McPherson said the loss of the Polar 8 contract, axed in last month’s federal budget, was in part responsible for the layoffs. He added that Versatile, which had been awarded the Polar 8 contract, is now down to a skeleton crew, and he fears any further layoffs will result in the closure of the North Vancouver shipyard, whose work force has now dropped to 220. More meetings are planned between the B.C. ship- building lobby group and the federal government. ‘If we can convince her (Campbell) that what we're say- ing is correct, then we can get her on side,’’ said McPherson. WV wins Collingwood hattle APPEAL COURT RULES THAT PRIVATE SCHOOL’S EXPANSION IS LEGAL THE BATTLE between a group of British Properties homeowners and the District of West Vancouver over the expansion of the Collingwood private school is over, now that the B.C. Court of Appeal has ruled against the resi- dents, 2 spokesman for the group said Tuesday. The March 7 court decision rul- ed against an appeal brought by Collingwood area homeowners Lorne Rettie and Anna Grant, who argued that the Collingwood school expansion bylaw con- travened the district’s 1988 official community plan. The two launched the appeal after Madam Justice C.M. Hud- dart of the B.C. Supreme Court ruled last April that the district’s Bylaw No. 3424, drafted in Febru- ary 1989, was consistent with the official community plan. “The chambers judge said that when she read the community plan as a total document she could see nothing in it that collided with the amending bylaw, and in her view section 2.9 (c) referred only to censity of housing and not to schools. I agree with this opinion of hers and for that reason I would dismiss the appeal,’? wrote Mr. Justice C.C. Locke in the March 7 B.C. Court of Appeal decision. While the homeowners’ group, representing about 100 area resi- dents, could appeal the court deci- sion to the Supreme Court of Canada, Rettie said the group will By SUR! RATTAN News Reporter now drop the issue. “What can you say...it’s over. It didn’t turn out the way we had hoped. As a group of residents who expected protection from the community plan. They refused tc pay.” In October 1988, the B.C. Supreme Court quashed a zoning bylaw that was intended to allow the Collingwood school expansion, after Mr. Justice J.J. Gow upheld a petition by the residents’ group, which had argued that the bylaw was illegal. Justice Gow had struck down the bylaw after he ruled that the public notice for a public hearing on the issue had stated the bylaw could be inspected on normal business days, but had failed to ““As a group of residents who expected protection from the official community plan, we now find out there is no protection.’’ —Collingwood area homeowner official community plan, we now find out there is no protection,” said Rettie. He also said the district should pick up all of the legal costs incur- red by the residents’ group. “They’re (court costs) very high,” Rettie said. ‘tI won't give you the exact numbers but they're very heavy. They (costs) should have been borne by the district because they were requested to ob- tain a legal opinion of the official Murder motive sought From page 1 a.m. at No, 3 Montizambert Wynd by a West Vancouver Police of- ficer. A motive for the murder has not been determined. While break and entry is in- dicated, Squamish RCMP Sgt. Rod Derouin said, ‘‘She lived in the house by herself so we don’t know what's missing, if arty- thing.’ RCMP divers, looking for clues to the killing, searched the waters near Sunset Marina Monday. But to press time Tuesday. police had no suspects and no murder weapon. The retired teacher had been in the News last year when she ap- pealed to the Federal Department of Fisheries, the provincial Ministry of Lands and the Greater Vancouver Regional District re- garding a dispute with a neighbor over encroachment to the beach fronting her property. The neighbor had scraped up rocks to shore up his property and provide a foundation for a boat ramp which Kermode claimed en- croached on her bank. Lorne Rettie specify which days. Municipal clerk Doug Allan said the district was ordered to pay court costs in that decision, but that the residents’ group had failed to pursue payment for their court costs, After that court decision, the district. drafted a second bylaw, which was again challenged by the residents’ group in the B.C. Supreme Court, and then in the B.C. Court of Appeals, which rul- Business .... Food......... Lifestyles...... North Shore Now Sports ....... TV Listings............ What's Going Or........ ed in favor of the district earlier this month. West Vancouver Mayor Don Lanskail said the district was ‘naturally confident’’ that its zon- ing bylaws did not contravene its 1988 official community plan. ‘“We were pleased with the deci- sion and we thought that we were correct.’’ said Lanskail, who add- ed that he hopes the issue will fi- nally be laid to rest. The court action was based on the argument that the bylaw con- travened the official community plan, particularly in ihat the rezon- ing would allow for higher density in an established neighborhood. Meanwhile, Sue Wolley, secre- tary to Collingwood headmaster Graham Baldwin, said the expan- sion project is now nearly complete and a grand opening will be held on April 2. The school, which now services Grades | through 12, has leased the former Glenmore Elementary School from the West Vancouver School Board since 1984. Wooley said the expansion will nearly double the school’s existing 46,000 square-foot structure. Also included in the expansion project, which began about one year ago, is a new gymnasium, a new music room and new classrooms. The expansion project cost approximately $7 milion. WEATHER Wednesday, sunny periods. High 14. Thursday, periods of rain. High 13, low 4.