6 — Friday, November 1, 1996 — North Shore News The North Shore News Is published by North Shore Free Press Ltd., Publisher Peter Speck, from 1139 Lonsdale Avenue forth Vancouver, 8.C., ¥7M 2H4 PETER SPECK Publisher 985-2131 (101) Dee Dhatiwal Human Resocices Manager Doug Foot Cornptrotier 985-2131 (133) F. ah ; 4 Timothy Renshaw Managing Editor Sales & Marketing Director 985-2131 (116) 980-0511 (319) aA i ° i Linda Stewart Display Manager 980-0511 (103) Terry Peters Photography Manager 85-2131 (160) Trixi Agrias Promotions Manager 985-2131 (218) a +t 2p’ ' Jonathan Bell Creative Services Manager 985-2131 (127) Barbara Distribulion Manager 988-1337 (124) Administration Display Advertising Real Estate Advertising Ctessified Advortising _ __Distritertion _Daapiay & Real Estate Fox “ Newarcom Fax Ciansified, Accounting & Mala Office Fax 3828277 Michael Becker-News Editor 985-2131 (114) Andrew McCredia-Sports/Caminunity Edites 985-2131 (147) LETTERS TG THE EDITOR Letters must include your name, full address & telephone number, VIA Internet: trenshaw @ direct.ca COMPUTER BBS - 980-6027 User tO:mailbox « Passwort:letters Internet: bttp://eww.nseaws.com Korth Shore Nows, fared in 144 as cr vkpenkent suburban newspaper and qualified under Schedubs UL, Mangraptt 111 of the Excise Tax Act, is patlished cach Webhcsakty, idiry arnd Stanahay bry North Short: Free Pres Lt and drantuted to every dour on the Neth Shure. Canaats Pet Canaan Pudbcations Mail Sues Prodiat Agivemert Nav QURTIIR, Machi cates avilable on neyuest, member. coal ie CZenry S04 OIVISION rN $e 9 38S. Entire contents © 1996 North Shore Free Press Ud. All nghts reserved Bhs nbwaDKAt ansaS tacytled htse SK Get it t T’S a question of efficiencies. Is more government better than less? Logic would argue no. But in the current run-up to the municipal elections, many candidates are arguing against less government and for maintaining the status quo in their opposition to the amalgamation of North Vancouver City and District. Leading the charge against amalga- mating the two North Vancouvers is, predictably, incumbenc city council members. Their turf is threatened. North Vancouver City Mayor Jack Loucks heads the forces of separate North Vancouvers. FINALLY! .. RECOGNITION. to oO \ Feds TO PROTECT \ CANADAS mare He argues that it would not be in the best interests of the city’s taxpayers to be included in a larger North Vancouver entity. The city’s accumulated reserve funds of $30 million, he claims, would be plundered by district spendthrifts. He concedes, however, that there are economic benefits to shared services. And the elimination of service dupli- cation and resource expenditure is what the amalgamation issue is all about. The city, for example, is about to embark on a $2.8 million overhaul of city hall. Late last year, North Vancouver District completed the $12 million overhaul of its own district hall. ENN Bone aE Sain i gether No one would argue against munici- pal employees enjoying good working conditions and a municipal hail that the municipality can be proud of. But does North Vancouver need two municipal halls? Two sets of local burcaucracy? Does North Vancouver need two sep- arate fire services with separate dispatch ' centres? The two North Vancouvers would be better served as a single entity that packs more political punch united than | separated. It’s a question of efficiencies that should be put to cach candidate in the current municipal election campaign. North Vancouver ~ hunter’s no hero Dear Editor: _ One for the animals — almost. What a sad state of affairs it is that you thought fit to report the Grizzly bear attack on a North Vancouver man the way you did in the Oct. 27 : North Shore News. ‘ Granted, its a good story and ° should be reported, but do you have to treat him like a conquering hero? After having spent many years asa.“ y hunter killing countless animals just for the fun of it (what a he-man), he almiost got his just deserts, ” What gives him the right to shoot a bear while it’s doing what comes naturally? Was it jealousy that the bear got to the moose before he did? Your photogn'ph shows that he’s killed moose befGse, so why the desire to kil. more? Pity the hapless bear -. didn't de a better job and notch up one for the animals. : a Steve Britten ; West. Vancouver , Letter spreads meeting rose manure’ | IT is a pain to have to , waste time and space to crush the scurrilous and highly suspicious letter of one I, Hodges in last Friday’s News, champi- oning a (former?) Liberal party functionary who tried to hijack Reform MP Ted White's Oct. 16 forum on Quebec sov- ereignty. J smell, distantly, a rat. A very sly rat. Hodges, supposed advocate of forthright speech in the let- ter, hides behind the fashionable gender-dodge of coyly not revealing his/her first name. So Tam obliged to refer to her/him as it. On the letter’s evidence, it isa person so illog- ical that God couldn’t have put anyone on earth thar stupid, So the stupidity must be a ruse to hide the real purpose, trying to embarrass White and expose as hypocrites and false friends of free speech News columnist Doug Collins and me. The annoyance is that because | have to walk readers patiently through this, you may get bored, stop reading and go away with the vague impression that where there’s smoke there’s re, and J must be doing, a self-serving number on a guy who’s just trying to light a little candle along demoeracy’s dusty way. But try to stay with this. {t began at the start of the btn : sumeone at the front of the Ce : JL catre venue started shouting at White, ii 81 togeth- er the sovereignty forum with invited guest and Blo- Quebecois MP Pierre de Savoye. Now, it happens that, having examined the program and seeing no break listed, 1 decided to follow George VI's famous pre- cept: never pass a washrooms with- out using it— 1 was offstage when this began. | I came back to hear the fast seconds of the harangue. : The chief target was White, who, puzzling to me, was explain- ing his membership almost 15 years ago inthe Western Canada Concept, which was or became dominated by a few very right wing figures but to the fresh immi- grant’s eye (White is front New Zealand) might just look like a boisterous Westerty separatist party. f The meeting — being taped for television — went on. Successfully. Informatively. Case closed? Not so. The guy who had shouted turned out to be one Warren Kinsella, described on the flyleat of a 1992 book as a former journalist, law profes- sor specializing on the media at Ottawa's Carleton, and (wait for it) “special assistant to the Leader of the (Liberal) Opposition.” Kinsella has worked for other Liberals and wrote a 1995 book on right-wing extremism, unread by me. With the clock ticking toward the TV-driven start of the program, White asked the audience if they wanted this unexpected “debate” to go on, The audience heid up cards previously distrib- uted to give final say on whether (tiresome) ques- tioners (rom the floor should be cut off. I saw only a sea of unanimity. Hodge purports to think Collins and [atutens should have jumped to their feet to champion this guy’s “right” to commandeer the meeting and harness it to his peeve, while a captive audience sat through it, a captive TV crew dutifully taped it, and guest de Savoye, mystified by this local tempest in an old teapot, waited and wondered when the purpose garden of biases for which he had travelled several thousand miles would unfold. a cna That, reader, is the source of this lerter’(which we I'm glad the News printed — absolutely’ fair)... 0°~,, Even with the presence of Lautens and-Collins, " : who “spew forth their weekly rhetoric” about’: freedam of speech, no one “came to the rescue” of Kinsella, and here’s the best stuff for making your roses grow — didn’t see that Kinsella “was ° the victim ofa special interest group of ‘golden-" aped grey hairs,’ " of a “tyranny of the majority.” , Rose manure: Victimization of Kinsella bes |. damned. More rose manure: The meeting was open, and free, to all. All ages present. Most rose manure: No, even if Pd known whai Kinsella was shouting loudly about, | wouldn’t have come to his “rescue.” There are countless situations where I wouldn't stake a right to free speech, I wouldn’t break into the International Conference of Vegetarian Lesbians singing “There Is Nothing, Like a Dame” from South Parific either. And Pd expect to be silenced, if not arrested, if [ rode some personal hobby-horse into a television studio where Chretien or Glen Clark was seconds away from recording a talk with a visiting politician or even mere reporters, Ata Whire political rally, Kinsella could rightly exercise free speech till it sweated. Now, some interesting coincidences: First, this caper by a guy with Liberal all over his resume, Then, a lawsuit by a former constituency office secretary against White for unlawful dismissal —~ amazingly, the fourth such against Reform MPs, three of then in B.C. where the Liberals have been weak, the fourth in Liberal-untriendly Alberta, and all filed by the same Ottawa-area lawyer, reported to have Liberal party ties, And an election on the horizon. Gee, What coincidences. Or did Tsay that?