NO PROPER MEDICAL CARE... NOT ENOUGH Foob... MAKESHIFT SHELTERS... - SQUALID CONDITIONS... . vincial governments must finally come to grips with the issue of aboriginal title. Canadian native Indian frustration with the lip service the country’s politicians have been paying to the issue has finally boiled over into drastic actions across Canada. It is now three weeks since a band of Mohawk Indians in Oka, Quebec, began its armed standoff with Quebec police. The incident, which claimed the life of a Quebec police officer, was triggered when the Mohawks set up a roadblock after the town council tried to claim disputed land for a golf course. And now B.C. Indians are showing, in a campaign of civil disobedience, that they are fed up with hearing the same old aboriginal title tune from Victoria. But the Dear Editor: restrictions. At the risk of offending indig- nant cat owners, I feel I must res- pond to the July 6 News article, Cat killings trouble pet owners. Although I do feel sorry for those who have lost their pets to hungry coyotes or other wild animals, people can hardly be surprised. Those of us who live on the North Shore should expect coyotes to come down from the hills and gravitate toward a food source — namely cats — which thrives in abundance throughout neighborhoods without any plants in wandered in window or door. Publisher Peter Speck Managing Editor Timothy Renshaw Associate Editor ..... Noet Wright Advertising Director . Linda Stewart North Shora News, founded in 1969 2s an independent suburban newspaper and qualified under Schedute 111, Paragraph Il ol the Excise Faa Act. 1s published each Wednesday, Friday and Sunday by North Shore Free Press Lid and distributed to every door on the North Shore Second Class Masi Registration Number 3885 Subsenptions North ang West Vancouver. $25 per year Mauing -ates avaiable on request Submissions are welcome bul we cannot accept responsibility fot unsolictteo matenal including manuscupts and pictures which should be accompanied by a slamped. addressed envelope SUNDAY V7M 2H4 SDA DIVISION 6 - Wednesday, August 1, 1990 ~ North Shore News < Even though 1 consider myself an animal lover, I am appalled by the number of cats roaming free- ly. People often complain how noisy and messy dogs are, well cats are worse! And their owners should be held responsible. . I am sick of the screeching cat fights on my front steps; bedding the garden up-rooted with cat droppings in their place; and having to chase cats out of my house after through an open As far as I am concerned, any- THE VONCE OF HONTH AND WEST VaNCOUDEN * WEDNESDAY 1139 Lonsdale Avenue, North Vancouver, B.C. 59,170 (average, Wednesday Friday & Sunday) Entire contents © 1990 North Shore Free Press Ltd. All rights reserved. if VOT Gare Se & u NEWS VIEWPOINT Home and native land ECENT EVENTS across Canady dictate that both federal and pro- Social Credit government continues to state that it will not recognize the existence of aboriginal title. The issue, Victoria maintains, is federal. As the buck is bounced back and forth between Victoria and Ottawa, Indians in B.C. and elsewhere are blocking roads and demonstrating in a bid to get their point across. On the North Shore, the Squamish and Burrard bands set up information pickets Monday to raise local awareness of the two bands’ histories and government refusal to negotiate aboriginal title. Premier Bill Vander Zalm said Ottawa should follow his lead in negotiating wit? the natives after he convinced the Seion Indian Band to remove its BC Rail line blockade last week. But if the premier really wants to set an example, he‘il sit down at the negotiating table and talk to Indians about aboriginal title. _. LETTER OF THE DAY Missing cats owners’ fault one with more than two cats should live on a farm, unless they are strictly house cats. This brings me to a possible solution to the disturbing killings, and my problem of not wanting a cat but having to live with them on a daily basis. Simply, cat owners should keep their pets in- doors. If this is impossible, they should be let out only in the daylight hours when the owners are at home and can keep an eye on their pet, because if they don’t, the coyotes will. Brian Platts North Vancouver they have Display Advertising 980-0511 Classified Advertising 986-6222 Newsroom 985-2131 Distribution 986-1337 . Subscriptions 986-1337 rmopay Fax 985-3227 North Shore owned and managed ‘Richville’ hard on both young and old A CIVILIZATION is said to be ultimately judged by how it treats its young and its old. Hf so, Canada’s ‘‘Richville’’ isn’t doing too well these days. In a recent thought-provoking survey by the West Van Youth Advisory Committee teenagers blamed the adult population of the country's wealthiest communi- ty as the main cause of pressures on them. Over half the 345 secondary students who completed a detailed questionnaire on their problems cited ‘ta general lack of adult respect for teens,”’ poor police relations and racial prejudices. Last week it was the turn of middle-income West Van seniors badly in need of affordable hous- ing to be rejected by the com- munity. Caving in to local NIM- BY (Not In My Backyard) war- riors, council unanimously axed a plan by the Baptist Church for 40 reasonably priced seniors’ units on land it owns in the extreme southeast corner of British Pro- perties. Not in quite the same category, you may think, as a halfway house for ex-cons, but that didn’t stop the familiar cry of ‘‘there goes the neighborhood!”’ “To make a change (in zoning} ... there must be a compelling reason. I am not convinced there is,’ said Ald. Alex Brokenshire. Thus he neatly summed up the dismal four-year record of West Van council on accommodation for many of the community’s more than 7,000 over-65s. For the majority who failed to make the millionaire class only 163 units have been approved dur- ing the same four years. The past 30 months have seen two other seniors’ housing projects killed. And the 86-unit addition to the Kiwanis Park complex is only now beginning to move ahead — with costs inflated over a two-and-a- half year ordeal with municipal red tape which almost strangled the project at birth. Admittedly, the Baptist pro- posal for the 400 block Mathers was not entirely ideal for seniors, due to its distance from stores and services, and limited public tran- sit. But carless seniors living much closer to such amenities must still often depend on others to get out. And the site was, in fact, one of the few remaining possibilities. According to municipal planner Graham Stallard, West Van no longer has any suitable, undeveloped, reasonably priced parcels of Jand available which would not spark the same NIMBY opposition from the neighborhoods affected. So talk now by council members about ‘‘some bold initia- tives”? at long last on affordable seniors’ housing smacks of little more than a deathbed repentance. Certainly, Mayor Don Lanskail and his 1986-90 councils can hard- ly expect many bouquets for their stewardship from the hundreds of West Van seniors who, in their sunset years, stand to be priced out of the community they helped build. Nor from their grandchildren, many of whom won't be able to afford a home of their own in the “*Richville’? where they were born and raised. keke POSYSCRIPTS: Late West Van councillor Ed Paulson was remembered last moath whea Sarah Hunter and Nancy Dam- Noel Wright Beas SITHER AND YON mkoehler unveiled a plaque at “‘Paulson’s Curve’’ — the deep curve on Marine Drive at Eagle Harbour which their father designed 25 years ago ... Pet lovers should flock to Nezth Van Legion's ‘Gigantic Thrift Sale” Saturday, Aug. 4 from [1 a.m. to 3 p.m. at 123 West 15th — the proceeds go the the Animals in Distress Society ... A special salute today, Aug. 1, to West Van's Lucy Elliott — living with her son in their own home, still in remarkable health and still walk- ing with a cane as she marks her 10Ist birthday! ... And greetings tomorrow, Aug. 2, to new “Golden Club’ members Munro and Margaret Tully of West Van who'll be celebrating their 50th anniversary on the Island with sons Brent (a noted astronomer in Hawaii), Blair from Toronto and Vancouver writer Brock. eee WRIGHT OR WRONG: How comforting it is to know that the advice your son rejected is now being given to your grandson! ... Sarah and Nancy, watched by Mayor Lanskait, unveil plaque to their REMEMBERING ED father at ‘‘Paujson’s Curve” (see column item).