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Kerth Sher Mews, founded in 1969 as en
independsat suburban newspaper and qualified
under Schedule 111, Paragraph 121 of the
Excise Tax. Act, is published each Wodnesday,
Friday and Svaday by North Shore Free Press
Lid. and distributed to every door on the North
Shore, Canada Post Canadian Publications Mail
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SDA OIVISION

Sy
aVANES
ce Fi
Ro uct”
61,582 {average circulation, Wednesda, Friday & Sunday)

Entire contents
© 1996 North Shure
Free Press Ltd.
All iaghts reserved.

Vs

fay
Wats ean Bic iiesyt ie SOREL i URIS TE ah i EERE A RN IE SELB T BYTOM IN ES BLEND MOR Le BNE TINS IEE ORE LEST

EAL CHANGE could be coming

to a schoo! near you. The debate

over education alternatives such
as charter schools may have crested, but
the debate over the better use of public
schcol resources is just beginning.

Maple Ridge’s Kanaka Creek school
will be at the forefront of that debate.

It will be B.C.’s lone volunteer in an
experiment aimed at retooling the
province’s tong-outdated school calien-
dar, which currently results in school
classrooms being closed for business for
about a quarter of the year.

The elementary school will adopt a
new year-round schedule this year that

pe be a model for schools on the
North Shore and elsewhere around the
province.

lis facilities will be available to stu-
dents hungry to learn for 12 months of
the year, not just a portion of it.

Under the pilot project, Kanaka stu-
dents will get the same number of
instructional days as other students in
B.C., but their vacation times will be
staggered.

An education ministry spokesman
has estimated that the 200-pupil school
could accommodate another 600 stu-
dents under the year-round system.

That means another 600 studenis

wis Viewpoint

learming

who wouldn’t need another school built
elsewhere at huge cost to the taxpayer;
another 600 students who would have
access to learning resources and teach-
ers all-year round.

And that translates to money saved
and resources maximized, which is what
parents and others concerned about the
runaway costs of education have been
demanding from school boards for
years.

We need more options for educating
our children so that they have every
opportunity to achieve their full poten-
tial. The province and everyone in it will
be the beneficiary of these options.

ART OR armpit? That could
be the grand issue in the
Greater Tiddlycove elections
this November.

Greater Tiddlycove, also known
as West Vancouver, is agog with the

possibilities.

Of course you will have guessed
that | am using colorful journalistic
symbols in speaking of the choice
between art and armpit.

“Art” stands for the proposed arts
centre. Everyone in the know knew.
It has been whispered about for
moniths.

And also that a private benefactor
is offering to put up a large sum in
aid of the project.

Our muscular mayor, Mark
Sager, made it official at Monday's
council meeting: Gur town has its
eye on the present, soon to be past,
post office at 17th and Bellevue for
an arts centre. The municipality has
taken an option to buy the property
from the federal government,

It has its second eye on the ‘
adjoining Masonic Hall. The two
properties would be joined to form
the site of the arts centre. Which
would include a theatre.

Greater Tiddlycove’s small, brave
knot of thespians must be excited.
They have no plaice in our wealthy
town to display their talents,

And “armpit” — that stands for
the proposed recreation centre on the
old British Columbia Railway prop-
erty across from Gleneagles Golf

Trevor

Course, way, way out on Marine
Drive. That's the Wild West of West
Vancouver.

Mayor Sager, accompanied by
recreation director Kevin Pike and
new recreation manager Josie
Chuback, met members of the
Western Community Services
Society at Eagle Harbor on Tuesday
night.

It tuned out to be a little more
like a public meeting. An estimated
50 enthusiasts for the project tumed
up. And possibly a skeptic or two.
(Lionel Lewis? Mary Fawley?)

They heard our mayor announce
iat a six-month study of Greater
Tiddlycove's recreation facilities —
including those at 22nd Street.
believed ripe for some serious reno-
vations — is under way,

They also heard Coun. Diana

Armpits vs. artists in

Hutchinson, in the audience, candid- .

ly state. that not all councillors Seemy:: ) «
‘ha F

to favor a new western recreation
centre. (Which wouldn't yet include *
such big-ticket items as a swimming
pool or ice rink, and would still ring
in at $4 million or more.) .

Could this be a little politicking
going on here?

Mrs. Hutchinson is surely placing
herself on the side of the angels. She
is a “western” resident herself. And
sue and Coun. Patricia Boname are
the customary advocates of the
“soft” matters before council, the
people side, the arts and recreation
and the old foiks and so forth. They
tend to leave the hardware like sew-
ers and budgets and ail that boring
stuff to the boys.

Municipal election year, remem-
ber, And also the certainty of a
provincial general election before
Noveinder -— probably in the spring.
Speculation time. Once again, time
to play a favorite West Vancouver
guessing game: What Makes Mark
Sager Run, and Where Will He Run,
and For What Party, If Any?

In short, our mayor, as weil as
other North Shore municipal players,
could move on to bigger political
leagues and leave such touchy local
matters for their successors,

I's already being bruited about
that Greater Tiddlycovers can’t
afford two big projects simultane-
ously, even with generous private
help for the arts centre — with its
hefty running costs, Council might

ailbox

Police pay.
already OK

Dear Editor: “
i can have no sympathy for. the ”
RCMP cost of living allowance. -

Constable (Catherine) Gulliford....

quotes in the North Shore News,
the high cost of living in Vancouver.
I would like to say to her, and all :

_ the RCMP, that the rest’ of us here ; oe

have to pay this high cost, too...
What about the federal - service,

workers and armed forces who are

paid the same across Canada?.
I'm sure there is'ne shortage.of =:

men looking for employment-who :

would be happy to take RCMP ‘Jobs oh
here. ‘

I would ; ‘add that the RCMP

members of} Signing up were well “

- aware of the conditions and wages: °.

if they.weren’ ‘phappy., they could. ;

. have tried othez et police forces.

have'to choose one‘or ‘ihe other: .
. So candidates for ‘the. November

municipal flat glen a
dodge'— the hard questi from the. ve
voters:

.Whick do you favor — “the aits?.
Or the armpit? The esthetes? Or the.
athletes?

"Wake up, West Vancouver! No
fooling. There’s a much more seti-.
ous and immediate threat to resi-
dents’ interests than the above.

It’s the prospect of forced school
amalgamation of the careful-spend-
ing West and the scandalously bank-
rupt North Vancouver school boards
under the diktat of the repulsive
New Democratic Party provincial
government.

‘The North Van board, with its -
bloated union contracts even down
to unionized school-crossing person-
nel, has plunged to a fantastic $5
million in the hole, and counting.

A West Vancouver mover and
shaker puts amalgamation in stark
terms: “They're going to take the $Z
million-plus for special enhance-
ment projects in West Vancouver
and spend it on ESL (English as a
second language) in North
Vancouver.”

And anything else they can
throw into that $5 million sinkhole,
no doubt.

West Vancouverites better get on
the phone to their representatives
and raise holy hell.