3 - Friday, March 2, 1990 - North Shore News 540,000 LiTRES OF CHLORINE DIOXIDE SOLUTION FROM PORT MELLON MILL Toxic chemical spills into H. Sound A MECHANICAL and computer malfunction is being blamed for a chlorine dioxide spill that resulted in 540,000 litres of a chemical solution being discharged into Howe Sound earlier this month from Canadian Forest Products Lid’s (Canfor) Port Mellon pulp mill. Canfor’s vice-president of en- vironment Kirke MacMillan said the Feb. 7 spill tasted for between four and five hours and was the result of a malfunctioning pipe valve and a computer system breakdown. He said a total of 540,000 litres of solution flowed through an out- North Vancouver shipyards eye federal contract WHILE THE proposed $689-million Polar Class 8 icebreaker contract was torpedoed Feb. 20 in the federal government’s budget, a spokesman for one of two North Vancouver-based shipyards vying for a separate contract for the construction of up to 12 federally-contracted naval vessels, says he is optimistic Ottawa will award some of the work to the B.C. shipyards. In 1988, North Vancouver-based Vancouver Shipyards Co., and Allied Shipbuilders Ltd., teamed up with a national shipbuilding consortium and made a proposal to the federal government to build 12 mine patrol vessels. That proposal was rejected by Ottawa, but the federal govern- ment has now put out to public tender a similar contract te have 12 naval vessels, including mine sweepers, built between 1990 and 1998, Ward said the project would translate into 200 jobs for both Vancouver Shipyards and Allied Shipbuilders. ee Two different shipbuilding con- sortiums are now vying for the contract. Vancouver Shipyards and Allied Shipbuilders have joined forces with Ontario-based Port Weller Dry Docks, New- foundland-based Marystown Ship- yards Ltd., and Nova Scotia-based Pictou Industries Ltd., and fornied Canadian Shipbuilding and Engineering (CSE). Vancouver Shipyards general manager Tom Ward said he is op- timistic CSE will be awarded the contract, and added that the con- tract would mean that up to six of the 12 vesseis would be built by the two North Vancouver shipyards. Ward said the project would translate into 200 jobs for both Vancouver Shipyards and Allied Shipbuilders. The contract for the 12 vessels is pegged at $450 mil- lion. “We are very optimistic that the CSE group will be accepted,’’ he said. ‘‘We worked on this for three years. Mary Collins (Associate Minister of Defence and Capilano-Howe Sound MP). has been very supportive of our pro- gram.” Automotives Classified Ads Ecolnfo Home & Garden What's Going On By SURJ RATTAN News Reporter Ward added that both com- peting consortiums are expected to have their proposals for the con- tract into the federal government by June and that the government has indicated it will award the con- tract by the end of this year. Meanwhile, North Vancouver City Ald. Bill Bell has charged that the provincial government is giving North Vancouver-based Versatile Pacific Shipyards Inc. the ‘‘green light’’ to move its operations from North Vancouver to Naniamo. Bell was reacting to a letter Regional and Economic Develop- ment Minister Stan Hagen sent to city council earlier this month con- cerning reports that Versatile, which had been awarded the Polar 8 contract, is negotiating to move its North Vancouver shipyard to the Duke Point area of Nanaimo. Hagen’s letter was sent in response to a letter the city sent to him last November, calling on the provincial government to throw its support behind the Lower Mainland’s shipbuilding industry. While Hagen said he could ap- preciate the city’s concerns in wan- ting to keep Versatile in North Vancouver, he added he ‘‘can also appreciate that the company must have the flexibility to respond to the realities of the market place.’’ ‘*Therefore, I do not think it would be in the interests of the province as a whole to interfere with Versatile’s plans to improve their competitive position as a British Columbia shipbuilder,’’ wrote Hagen. Bell said Hagen’s letter ‘‘con- firms my suspicion that this Social Credit government will do nothing to stop the move of Versatile from North Vancouver.’” ‘*A statement of this kind, at this time, by a minister of the pro- vincial government, wil! only worsen the situation as it pertains to a possible move by Versatile to Nanaimo,” he said. But in an interview earlier this month, North Vancouver-Capilano Social Credit MLA Angus Ree said he was not aware of any plans for Verstaile to move its operations to Nanaimo. WEATHER Friday, cloudy with a chance of showers. High near 18°C. Saturday, cloudy with showers. High near 11°C. Second Class Registration Number 3885 fail pipe into Howe Sound and thal the concentration of chlorine dioxide in the discharge was 7% grams per litre. MacMillan addua what the chio- rine Cioxide amounted to less than one per cent of the total solution that was discharged. The solution, he said, ‘‘was fur- ther diluted in the normal effluent stream" with 30 litres per second of solution being discharged into an effluent stream of 1,300 litres per second. But MacMillan said, ‘We were extremely concerned about the spill. The equipment malfunction- ed, but there does not appear to be any environmental damage as a result of the spill.”* Fred Barnes, spokesman for the conservation officers service branch of the provincial environ- ment ministry, said the ministry is still investigating the spill to determine if it resulted from mill employee neglizence, ~ NEWS photo Terry Peters Bank robber suspect arrested CUSTOMERS W’RE locked out of the Lynn Valley branch of the Canadian Imperial Bank Of Commerce (CIBC) after it was held up Feb. 23. On Monday, a team of North Vancouver RCMI officers arrested a bank robbery suspect at gunpoint in the area of Marine Drive and Philip Avenue in North Vancouver. Police confiscated a replica hand- dgun. The arrest came as a result of an investigation of the armed robbery at the Lynn Valley CIBC and a recent robbery at the North Vancouver Pemberton CIBC branch. Burnaby RCMP an¢ Vancouver City Police assisted in the investigation. Charged with six counts of armed robbery is 26-year-old John Gregory Bezdan, of Burnaby. CLOSING DATE MOVED BACK TO MARCH 27 Park Royal sale delayed THE SCHEDULED closing date for the sale of West Van- couver’s Park Royal Shopping Centre has been postponed for the third time. A spokesman for British Pacific Properties Lid. (EPPL), the Guin- ress family company that owns Park Royal, said Wednesday finalization of the deal to sell the 50-acre property, most recently scheduled for Feb. 28, would likely be delayed until March 27. BPPL president Peter Finch said his company was awaiting a tax ruling from the federal government before completing the deal. He declined to elaborate on the nature of the tax ruling, but in a Feb. 2 News story he said it was ““purely technical."” The sale of the 870,000 square- foot West Vancouver shopping centre to an affiliate of the Van- couver-based Larco Investments Ltd. group of companies for an estimated $160 million was origi- nally scheduled to close at the end of January. That closure was delayed to mid-February and delayed again until the end of February. But Finch said he was ‘‘almost certain’’ the sale would now be closed by the end of March. “*These things always take a long time,’’ he said. Finch added that the delay would in no way jeopardize the deal. By TIMOTHY RENSHAW Managing Editor Both seller and buyer, he said, were cooperating in what he described as a ‘‘transitional stage”’ for Park Royal. southern portion of which sits on land leased from the Squamish In- dian Band, includes the shopping centre, the Lions Gate Lanes bowl- ing alley, a Famous Players twin theatre and the Kapilano 100 building. | . Tt also includes the potential for approximately one million square feet of. development on the site's southern portion. The sale of Park Royal to an affiliate of the Vancouver-based Larco Investments Ltd. group of companies for an estimated $160 million was originally scheduled to close at the end of January. a 8 BPPL’s chairman of the board Gerald McGavin announced in the Nov. 15, 1989 News that the shop- ping centre would be sold to a sub- sidiary of Jaffsons Properties Inc. Jaffsons is an affiliate company of Larco. Initially 13 companies had tendered purchase bids for the multi-million dollar West Van- couver property. The Park Royai_ site, the Through its family of com- panies, Larco owns properties in- cluding the Courthouse West rac- quet sport club and the Lions Gate tennis club on the North Shore, and the Arbutus Village Shopping Centre and the Delta Piace Hotel in Vancouver. To press-time Thursday, Larco representatives were unavailable for comment on the delays in clos- ing the Park Royal deal.