Niagara At Large

By Don Smith

(A short note from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper – As a long-time environment writer, I often noted to audiences I have been invited to speak to that any concerns they may have over the possible health effects of wind farms, or parts per billion or trillion of chlorobenzenes and other industrial chemicals in the air we breathe or water we drink, people should be followed by this question – ‘If our governments are not prepapred to ban a known killer like cigarettes due to the profits they bring to the economy and to government tax coffers, why should anyone expect our governments to act on other potentially lethal assaults on persons and the environment?

 In other words, the continued legal manufacture and sale of cigarettes are proof positive that our governments are still willing to lace dollars ahead of public health. As long as our goverments are prepared to allow for the suffering and deaths of countless ten-of-thousands of people over a confirmed carcinogen like tobacco for profit, why should we expect our governments act on any other proven or potential danger from a product with wealth-producing potential in our economy?

Remember that we now live in a world where the accumulation of wealth, by whatever means, ranks above almost anything else. Forget about the collateral damage. Now let’s move to Don Smith’s commentary.)

 This is a current headline taken from a national newspaper – “Is it not time to ban this addictive and lethal drug? “

Every time I see a headline such as this one I think back to a discussion I had with my son’s late father-in-law, a tobacco farmer in the Tillsonburg area in the late 1990s. At that time, he told me that if and when cigarettes are declared illegal and banned that his tobacco growing friends, neighbors, and relatives all agreed they would willingly sell out their farms to the federal government and change to planting corn, gin sing, or peanuts. Continue reading →

A Submission by Niagara Action For Animals

 (Niagara At Large is posting the following submission for your information and opportunity to comment.

 The planned deer hunt in Niagara’s Short Hills Provincial Park was approved by the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and is restricted to Native peoples only using hunting bows. The park will be closed to the rest of the public while the hunt is in progress on the dates of January 5,6, 12 and 13.)

 January 2013, St. Catharines, Ontario – Niagara Action for Animals (NAfA) is strongly opposed to  the deer hunt scheduled to take place in the Short Hills Provincial Park on January 5-6th and 12-13th. NAfA does not condone the hunting of animals for any reason; killing animals for sport, tradition, or food is unnecessary, inhumane and unjustified.

Courtesy of Dan Wiison, this photo was taken of a deer in another Ontario park near Georgian Bay.

 While we take little quarry with people who have absolutely no choice but to hunt to survive, in contemporary society, “meat”, “fur”, and “leather” are not necessary for survival. We strongly believe that morality, not tradition, should be the standard for our actions as moral human beings.

Given the sensitivity and complexity of the issue at hand, we would like to be clear is stating that our objection with the deer hunt is not about human versus animal rights, legal versus illegal activities, or respecting versus rejecting treaties. For us, as animal activists, the issue is about the rights of the animals who reside in the Short Hills to live peacefully and free from exploitative human interference. Continue reading →

 A Submission from the Office of Ontario Education Minister Laurel Broten

 (Niagara At Large is posting the submission below from the Ontario Liberal Government As Written, and will strive to post the reaction of provincial opposition parties and teacher union representatives as they become available.

 Already Sam Hammond, president of the Ontario Elementary School Teachers Federation, is calling the move “a surprise and an extreme disappointment,” and unprecedented in the almost 100 years the federation has been in existence and been negotiating with the province on behalf of its members.

 NAL will also be weighing in to this serious matter with our own take on it in the days ahead. Now her is the release from the Education Minister’s office.)

McGuinty Government Putting Students First – Fair and Balanced Collective Agreements Introduced, Putting Students First Act (Bill 115) Will Be Repealed

Ontario Education Minister Laurel Broten

 January 3, 2013 – Ontario is moving forward with the implementation of collective agreements for all teachers and support staff that meet the province’s fiscal targets while protecting the classroom experience and the gains made in education. All new contracts are retroactive to Sept. 1, 2012 and will expire on Aug. 31, 2014.

Today, Laurel Broten, Minister of Education, approved all 65 locally negotiated and ratified  agreements submitted by school boards prior to the Dec. 31, 2012 deadline set out in the Putting Students First Act.  CUPE has been given until Jan. 14 to ratify 110 local agreements. Continue reading →

A Commentary by Doug Draper

 “They’ll go into this pool,” Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Immigration Minister Jason Kenny was quoted saying in The Globe and Mail this January 2 of unemployed people in other parts of the world, “and then employers (in Canada) or my department and/or provinces will be able to fish out of that pool.”

Canada’s Immigration Minister Jason Kenney. ‘Citizenship Not for Sale?’ Not unless Kenney and his Harper Conservatives can find someone from another country that will work cheaper for their corporate bosses than one of our young Canadians.

 “It’s like a dating site,” Kenny continued, as if to make it sound like all our loving nation of Canada wants to do is get up close and cozy with unemployed people in other countries on the planet – just to see if we can fix them up with a nice job here.

 Well, isn’t that nice and how generous of us –  and at the risk of sounding like I’ve got something against immigration, which I bloody well don’t coming from a family of immigrants –  what about our own young people here who are looking for a job and a promising future? Don’t they deserve to have their place in this pool and be apart of this dating game too? Continue reading →

 A Commentary by Doug Draper

It could very well be the most important election in Ontario in decades.

 That election is expected to be called as early as this coming spring when Tim Hudak’s Conservatives and Andrea Horwath’s NDP finally pull the plug on a floundering minority Liberal government, at which point the stakes could not be higher for young people struggling to get through school and find a job, aging people in need of health care and other social services, and everyone in between.

Tim Hudak, left, and Andrea Horwath – the only two clear choices in an upcoming Ontario election where the stakes will be high for all who live in the province.

So here is a New Year’s resolution I urge everyone of voting age in Ontario to embrace – get engaged, if you are not already, in what is going on in politics in this province, and get engaged now! There is, I will stress again nothing less than our future as individuals, families and communities in this province at stake.

To paraphrase one of my favourite bumper sticker lines; ‘If you are not outraged (at what has been going on in this province for the past 16 years or so of Mike Harris/Dalton McGuinty government), you are not paying attention’. So start paying attention, goddammit. If for no other reason, do it for yourself. Continue reading →

By David Boese

Because of the STUPID NHL lockout, I think it’s time to re-think how we manage and view the game of hockey.

If I had the power, I would drop out of the NHL and create an All Canadian Hockey League, with 10 or 12 teams. It could be patterned after the very successful Canadian Football League and players would be playing more for their fans, than for the money. I would create an atmosphere, where there would never be another lockout! It is after all Canada’s game and it belongs just as much to the fans, as it does to the owners of these teams. Continue reading →

By Wes Prankard

(A brief foreword from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper –

 Wes Prankard, a 14-year-old, now possibly 15 or going on 15 from Niagara Falls, Ontario, is someone I feel privileged to have met on a ‘Meeting on the Bus’ – an event held by other local citizens to promote use of regional transit in Niagara.

 Wes was there to discuss the amazing work he and others were doing to make like better for Native peoples in the northern Ontario community of Attawapiskat, by raising money for playgrounds for the children there and promoting support across Canada for other needs in that community.

 This extraordinary young Niagara resident became and friend of the Native peoples of Attawapistat and of its beloved Chief, Theresa Spence, who is now on a hunger strike she is prepared to carry through until death unless Canada’s prime minister, Stephen Harper, agrees to meet with her and other Native representatives across the country to discuss treaties Canada once signed with First Nations peoples that should have afforded them a better life than many of them are living today.

Niagara At Large is pleased to run this piece by Wes Prankard. Please read it with an open heart and do what you can to convince Canada’s federal government to show even a fraction of the interest it has in tar sands and spending billions of our dollars on fighter jets on improving the lives of Canada’s First People.)

Now here is Wes Prankard’s message

Wes Prankard, a Niagara Falls, Ontario resident and young advocate for Native Peoples, gives a necklace to his friend, Chief Theresa Spence, on day eleven of her hunger strike in Ottawa.

‘I am very worried about Chief Theresa Spence of Attawapiskat. Right now (as of this writing on Saturday, December 29, 2012) she is on day 19 of
her hunger strike and, because I know her and have spent time with
her, I know that she is prepared to die for her people. She has always been.

When I first met Chief Spence, she was living in the homeless shelter with
her daughters because she had given up her house to a single mom whose
house burnt down. That is the kind of selfless leader Chief Spence is – and
that’s why I worry about her. Continue reading →

By Dan Wilson

Being a Canadian and living in Canada, I’m not very familiar with American gun laws. And either by ignorance influence or just plain stereotyping, I’ve always thought of members of the National Rifle Association as gun nuts, rednecks and weekend warriors.

Guns, guns, guns. Do they look like hunting rifiles to you or military-style mass killing machines?

 Basically, I’ve thought of NRA members as people who love to kill others (including animals) but can’t because of the law (except animals). This is probably wrong on my part.

I’m also a peace advocate, and live my life by a simple rule: Do whatever you want, as long as it doesn’t harm others. I devote my life to ahimsa, which means kindness and non-violence to all living things (including animals), unless my life, or the lives of those around me are in mortal danger. Continue reading →

 By Don Smith

(A brief foreword from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper – As a reporter who spent many years writing about environmental issues for a daily newspaper in the Niagara region, I have often wondered to what extent stories produced by reporters like me about the dumping of hazardous substances in our rivers and lakes contributed to the growth and prosperity of the bottled water industry.

The madness of buying water in plastic bottles has got to end. Rediscover your kitchen tap.

 I had people as far back as 20 to 30 years ago calling me up, having read my stories and others like them, and telling me that they had switched to bottled water because they no longer trust the water coming from their tap. These calls always disturbed me for the following reasons:

• I got the impression from many of the callers that they now felt ‘safe enough’ in their personal lives. They had found security for themselves in a bottle and therefore no longer had to worry or bother governments over the pollution being dumped in our rivers and lakes.
• There was little or no recognition among these callers that even if bottled water were the answer, not everyone in the community can afford to buy enough of it to satisfy their domestic needs.
• There was also little or no recognition of the possibility that the water in that plastic bottle is not necessarily any cleaner, according to comparison tests published by the Toronto Public Health Department and other agencies, and reported by this writer and others, than the water pouring from a home tap after it has been filtered through a municipal treatment plant.
• Finally, there seemed to be little or no concern over the fact that all of those plastic bottles had to be recycled or, worse yet, ended up buried in a landfill site. Continue reading →

From Rory O’Conner

(When Dave Brubeck, one of the great jazz artists of the last 60 years, passed away early this December, Niagara At Large paid a little tribute to him with a post titled Goodbye To A Jazz Giant Who Was A Great Friend Of This Greater Niagara Region .

NAL received a number of nice comments to that tribute, including this latest one from Rory O’Conner from the Buffalo, New York area which we feel is worth highlighting as a post on its own, given the close contact Rory had with Dave Brubeck as he lent his talents to a good cause in the region in the last years of his life.

Here is Rory O’Conner’s tribute to the great artistry and generosity of Dave Brubeck)

Jazz icon Dave Brubeck

Dave Brubeck was … ‘a very wonderful and solid citizen of the world. I live in Buffalo and was fortunate to sit on the Board of Directors of a wonderful not-for-profit entity called Computers For Children.As part of our mission to minimize the digital divide, we raised funds in a variety of ways, one of which was our Annual Gala Event, usually right before Christmas. Continue reading →

A Holiday Season Note from NAL publisher Doug Draper

 “It’s coming on Christmas, They’re cutting down trees. They’re putting up reindeer, And singing songs of joy and peace. Oh, I wish I had a river I could skate away on.”

There are all those upbeat Christmas carols like ‘Jingle Bells’ and ‘Santa Claus Is Coming To Town’. Then there are the opening lines above from this 1970s Joni Mitchell song called ‘The River’. 

‘The River’ speaks to a Christmas season that may not be as happy or joyous as all of the hype would have us believe it should or even must be for all of us.  Continue reading →

By Robert Reich, December 23, 2012, Robert Reich’s Blog

(One of my favourite American  public policy people is this guy, Robert Reich, who was a secretary of labour for former U.S. president Bill Clinton, and who remains a strong advocate for fair play for the 99 per cent of us who are getting more and more screwed each day by the upper one per cent. Here is a piece from him Niagara At Large wishes to share with you this Holiday Season. It was written with the United States in mind but we think it is just as relevant, in many, to the state of things in Canada these days.)

‘It’s easy to feel discouraged about the bullying by right-wing Republicans and their patrons over everything from gun control to taxes and social safety nets to trade unions and jobs.

Robert Reich

Every year about now I watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” again to remind myself what Frank Capra understood about America — its essential decency and common sense.

In many ways the nation is better than it was in 1946 when the movie first appeared. Women have gained economic power and reproductive rights; we enacted Civil Rights and Voting Rights and, through Medicare and Medicaid, dramatically reduced poverty among the elderly; we began to tackle environmental devastation; we stopped treating gays as criminals and have even started to recognize equal marriage rights. We elected and then re-elected the first black president of the United States. We have enacted the bare beginnings of universal healthcare. Continue reading →

A Brief News Comment by Doug Draper

Four years ago, when General Motors  operations across North America were on the verge of total financial collapse, Ontario, along with Canada’s federal government, invested more than $10 billion of our tax dollars to help bail the automaker out. 

Ontario’s unionized auto workers did their part to save GM jobs in Ontario by agreeing to an unprecedented number of  wage and benefit concessions – all on faith that the corporation would do everything possible to keep its production lines in the province running.

Now General Motors is paying workers and governments in Canada back by announcing its plans to cease production of its Chevrolet Camaro in Oshawa, Ontario – a decision that could reportedly wipe out more than 3,500 good-paying jobs in that already struggling auto-manufacturing town – and could affect jobs at GM operations in Niagara, Ontario where engines are built for the car. Continue reading →

A Brief News Commentary by Doug Draper

You may have read stories in some of Niagara, Ontario’s mainstream media this late December that there are more than a thousand carcasses of whales and other mammals buried on the back grounds of the sprawling Marineland amusement park in Niagara Falls, and that the province’s Ministry of Environment is finally investigating in the event the remains may be contaminating surrounding groundwater.

A killer whale – orca – in one of Marineland’s ponds – pre-burial site.

Let me respond by saying this. There is nothing knew about this news that Marineland has been backfilling the remains of whales, dolphins, bears, deer and other mammals that have expired at the park toward the back area there, near the coaster ride or whatever it is. That has been going on for most of the more than four decades Marineland has been in business. Continue reading →

A Submission from the Niagara Health System

(This post, submitted by the Niagara Health System, the organization responsible for the operation of a majority of the hospital services in Niagara, Ontario, reports that the NYHS has received an “excellence-in-quality” seal of approval for its performance. We share this post with you – free of commentary from Niagara At Large – for your information.)

December 21, 2012 – The Niagara Health System is accredited for another three years following an extensive process that evaluated the organization’s performance against national standards of excellence in quality and safety.

Niagara Health System interum CEO Sue Matthews

“We are extremely pleased to receive full accreditation from Accreditation Canada,” says Interim President and CEO Dr. Sue Matthews. “The value of accreditation is both in validating our strengths and learning how we can improve quality in specific areas.”

In their report, the Accreditation Canada team of surveyors noted that they were impressed by our commitment to patient/client centred care, improved community partnerships, resiliency as an organization, and dedication to developing a culture of patient safety. Some of our challenges and opportunities lie in the flow of patients in hospital and the standardization of some processes across our sites. Continue reading →

By Doug Draper 

There are only a few shopping days left until Christmas and Niagara At Large reminds you to celebrate the Holiday Season by giving one of the greatest gifts you can to the economic well-being of the greater Niagara communities we live in – buy what you can and all you can, through this Holiday Season and in to the New Year, from our local, independent retailers. 

We all know that it is so tempting to go in after the ‘door buster’ sales that big box corporate chain stores like Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Target and K-Mart advertise in the flyers stuffed in corporate-owned newspapers we get shoved in our doors every week. And some say; ‘Well, that’s a good buy and I ‘m not doing so well in the income department right now. I can’t afford not to take advantage of it,”  Continue reading →

A Brief Comment by Doug Draper

It was two months ago, October 15, that Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty announced his intention to pack it in as the province’s top boss and, at the same time, shut the doors on our legislative assembly until his ruling Liberals pick a new leader.

Queen’s Park – Now one of the most useless public buildings in Ontario. Maybe we should sell it.

The decision by McGuinty – who still serves as Ontario’s lame duck premier – to prorogue parliamentary democracy in this province has gone on for two months now and, quite depressingly, there seems to be very little outrage one hears on main streets or the back streets of our communities in Ontario over it. Continue reading →

By Karl Dockstader –

A collective in Hamilton to support the Idle no more movement! Meet at City Hall to voice our discontent with Steven Harper’s agenda and Bill C-45. First Nations people are here to protect Mother Earth. We need to stand in solidarity to exercise that right.

This message has been circulating for only a few short days.

 Niagara’s First Nations are buzzing that this is our chance to stand up to the Canadian government’s arbitrary rule changes in an effort to erode our rights and merchandise Mother Earth’s gifts on Turtle Island.

The Government of Canada has a long and contentious relationship with First Nations people. From breaking the Queen’s treaties, kidnapping our children and adopting them out in the 60’s scoop, the raping and murder of young innocent Native children at the hands of the administrators of residential schools, to systemic racism and tendencies akin to over a hundred years of attempts at cultural genocide, there is a laundry list of atrocious and egregious government sanctioned attacks against the once proud and free Native persons of Canada.

It took until 1996 to close the last residential school and it will take a lot longer to rebuild the relationship between the government of Canada and the First Nations, Metis and Inuit people of Canada. Continue reading →

A Commentary by Doug Draper

 (At least some of our readers on the Canadian side of the border may wonder why Niagara At Large is weighing in on the gun issue in the United States at a time when people in that country and around the world are mourning the murder – by rapid gunfire – of young children and their teachers in a small-town school in Connecticut.

Canada’s Harper government blows away national gun registry in deference to gun lobby.

 Those readers may say it is one thing to share our prayers for the victims and their families, but what business do Canadians have addressing the issue of guns in America?

 Well, for starters, there are a number of us on the Canadian side of the border who have friends and relatives who live in communities like the one in Sandy Hook, Connecticut and to that extent, searching for ways to prevent further blood baths like this is one we should all share.

 At the very least, many Canadians travel across the border to shopping malls, movie theatres and other places where random gun murdering like this is now occurring far too regularly and that, at the very least, should tickle our interest.

 To bringing the whole thing closer to home, our own police departments in the Greater Toronto Area have estimated that about 70 per cent of the guns now being used in violent crimes here are likely being smuggled across the border from regions in the United States where gun controls are so lax.

 Finally, we have a Conservative government in Canada, headed up by Stephen Harper and supported full heartedly by his justice minister, Niagara Falls MP Rob Nicholson, who celebrated the gutting of a gun registry most police forces in Canada supported as an important crime-fighting tool. And who knows how many concessions Harper, Nicholson and company will continue to make to a lucrative gun industry in the United States and its National Rifle Association affiliates, determined to grow markets in Canada for its killing-edge weaponry in Canada.

 Now let’s move on to the commentary.)

 “Happiness is a warm gun.” – from a song by the late Beatle John Lennon who was gunned down in America 32 years ago this September by someone who had a record of mental illness and yet was able to purchase guns and ammo without any background checks.

Like many of us this past Friday, December 14, I turned on the television to scenes of adults with horrified looks on their faces, clutching young children near an elementary school in a sleepy little New England town in Connecticut. Continue reading →

A News Commentary by Doug Draper

The Toronto Star – the newspaper that featured a number of front-page stories this past summer and fall on alleged cases of animal abuse at Marineland in Niagara Fall, Ontario – reported this December 14 that Marineland has slapped a $1.25-million lawsuit against one of its former trainers.

Marineland protester at a demonstration in front of the park last summer. File photo by Doug Draper

The Star story says that Marineland filed the suit in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in St. Catharines , Ontario against Christine Santos, who worked at the amusement park for 12 years before she was fired this fall. In an October 18 story in The Star, Santos alleged that Kiska, Marineland’s one and only remaining “killer whale” (more kindly known by marine biologist as an orca), had been bleeding “off and on” since last July. 

The Marineland suit, according to the latest Star story, claims that cuts on the whale were minor and that Santos’ allegations were “calculated to disparate Marineland in its business. The paper reported Santos responding that the allegations in the suit filed against her are “ridiculous” and she plans to fight them “all the way.” Continue reading →

A Submission from Brock University

 St. Catharines, Ontario, December 14, 2012 – Besides being Canada’s most famous criminal lawyer, Edward Greenspan has also made his mark as a journalist, author, television host, legal commentator and social advocate.

Renown lawyer Eddie Greenspan to teach at Brock

Now the Niagara (Ontario) native can add another notch to his resume: Brock University teacher.

Greenspan has stood before packed courtrooms to defend everyone from Premier Gerald Regan to Conrad Black, Karlheinz Schreiber, Robert Latimer and the leading death penalty case in Canada, Burns and Rafay.

Now he brings his passion to Brock, where he will teach a credit course in political science during the winter term. The weekly class will be offered to top students over 12 weeks, starting Jan. 7. And, as one might expect with Greenspan, the focus will include a strong and lively examination of the link between crime and politics. Continue reading →

A Submission from the Niagara Health System

(Niagara At Large is posting the following news, as submitted, for our readers’ information from the Niagara Health System, the body responsible for managing most of the hospital services in Niagara, Ontario.) 

Thursday, December 13, 2012 – Today the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) will release its annual Hospital Standardized Mortality Data.

We are pleased to announce that Niagara Health System continues steady improvement year-over-year in reducing the number of preventable deaths in hospital. Continue reading →

 A Submission from the Office of Ontario NDP Leader Andrea Horwath

QUEEN’S PARK, December 12, 2012 – New Democrat Leader Andrea Horwath says the Auditor General’s Annual Report paints a picture of an arrogant and out-of-touch government that’s ignoring the challenges facing families in tough times.

Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath .

“Today’s report has shown that the McGuinty Liberals are wasting hundreds of millions of precious public dollars when families are being asked to sacrifice more,” said Horwath.

In his Annual Report, Auditor General Jim McCarter found numerous examples of across the board mismanagement of public money that will cost people more:

• Ontario’s Diabetes Strategy has done little to stop or slow the rapid growth of Continue reading →

Like A Piece of Raw Meat, Harper Throws Canada’s Sovereignty On To Chopping Block

By Mark Taliano 

“Those skilled in war subdue the enemy’s army without battle.  They capture his cities without assaulting them, and overthrow his state without protracted operations.  Your aim is to take the opponent’s country intact.  This is the art of offensive strategy.” 

These are the words of legendary Chinese general and tactician Sun Tzu, thought to be the author of The Art Of War, written before the time of Christ. 

They are also words which describe the brilliance of modern day China’s strategy to control what is currently Canada’s “economic engine”.  Continue reading →

A Brief from Doug Draper

(Well here we are again. Less than a week after saying goodbye to jazz legend Dave Brubeck, we are back to say goodbye to another towering figure in the world of music. The passing of the great figures in music from the past half century is coming all too fast now. Who will it be next week?)

 This December 12^th morning, I took out my original copy of The Beatles’ Rubber Soul, album  that I ran out and bought with my saved-up school lunch money, the day it was released around the world – 47 years ago this December.

The great sitar master Ravi Shankar and his most famous student to the left, Beatles guitarist George Harrison

I was 13 years old at the time and followed everything The Beatles recorded with passion, including who wrote and sang each song, and who played what instrument on them. On the back cover of the Rubber Soul album, under the song “Norwegian Wood, one of the credits read; ‘George on sitar’. Sitar, I thought. What is that? Continue reading →

A Submission from Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath

(Niagara At Large is a non-partisan news and commentary site with a record of posting submissions from all of Ontario’s political parties. This one is from the province’s New Democratic Party leader Andrea Horwath.)

Friends,
 
As the holiday season approaches we often think more about our friends and families, and what an important part they play in our lives. It’s the wish to see our loved ones healthy, happy, and well cared for that makes Ontario’s health care system such an important issue for all of us.

Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath

Today, we’re asking to hear your experiences when trying to access health care in Ontario. We want to know where you’ve seen the system fail or succeed, so that together we can continue to focus on the things that most need to be fixed in Ontario’s health care system.

• Your experiences in ER?
• Wait times?
• Caring for older family members?

 
My team and I recently released Delivering Access, a consultation paper that asks Ontarians for feedback about their experiences with our health care system, and how they think it might be improved. Continue reading →

This image came from Stop 100

A Foreword by Doug Draper

When I began receiving media releases from this group – calling itself Stop100 – a year or so ago, I thought it was some sort of spoof. But apparently not.

This Oshawa-based citizens body, which has received some publicity for its cause in The Toronto Sun and other mainstream publications, is pushing the Ontario Ministry of Transportation to have the speed limits on the province’s 400-series highways from 100 to 120 to 130 kilometres per hour (and that is somewhere between 75 and 80 miles per hour for you Americans out there).

Now I always thought a couple of things about the speeds we drive on our highways, but perhaps I’ve been sorely misinformed. Continue reading →

Overall Hike Kept Below Two Per Cent. Regional Councillors Settle For Zero Salary Increase

By Doug Draper

It was a long night but Niagara, Ontario’s regional council final got it approved – a budget for 2013 that will mean a 1.97 increase on the regional government’s portion of the property tax bill, adding up to an additional $25 next year for the average homeowner.

Niagara, Ontario’s Regional Headquarters

The passage this December 6 of the 2013 budget follows several weeks of debate over how much should be spent operating a host of regional services  from waste management, roads, water and wastewater to policing, health, affordable housing and a fledgling regional transit system., and on the capital costs of building and maintaining roads and other infrastructure. In the end, the council, made up of directly elected representatives and the mayors of Niagara’s 12 municipalities, settled on an operating budget of $303 million for the coming year and a capital budget of $218 million. Continue reading →

A Submission by Karl Dockstader

(Just a little foreword from Niagara At Large – While we are fighting over wind and solar energy and where these facilities should go, rapidly developing nations like China and India are moving forward with newer wind and solar technology that could blow us away, and win the future on safe, boundless energy production. U.S. Barack Obama once said that those countries that does the best job of making renewable energy alternatives work will be the leaders iofthe 21^st century. So far this tar sands nation of Canada is not looking like much of a contender.)

Toronto Convention Center, January 4th. Energy Minister Chris Bentley addressed a crowd of solar industry professionals, entrepreneurs and advocates yesterday and announced that 200 MW of Feed in Tariff(FIT) and microFIT contracts would be awarded starting December 14th.

Solar panels being installed on a residential rooftop in somewhere U.S.A.

This announcement is bittersweet as it has taken the entire calendar year to roll out the program that has become politically embattled due to PC opposition. It is also unclear what role FIT will continue to play in the provinces long term energy plan.

At the Canadian Solar Industry Association conference 2012 yesterday optimism amongst vendors was scarce. The future of FIT, despite it’s resounding success in countries like Germany, has become tangled into the unusually contentious relationship between exiting Premier Dalton McGuinty and PC leader Tim Hudak. Continue reading →

A Brief from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

(As those of you who are regular readers of Niagara At Large know, we go out of our way here sometimes to honour the death of the odd milestone person among us. And here is one now.)

 One of the great jazz adventurers from the mid-20^th century and on, in to this 21^st century, passed away this December 5.

Jazz legend Dave Brubeck

His name was Dave Brubeck and some of you who follow music closely and love jazz music in particular may remember him for the classic 1959 album ‘Time Out’. On that one was a tune called ‘Take Five’, an interplay between his piano and the alto sax of Paul Desmond, that broke barriers when it came to the typical 4/4 timing in jazz and the blues. It was a sound that everyone in jazz and blues and rock, including The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Frank Zappa, Sting and U2. Continue reading →

A Brief Foreword by Doug Draper

 Tim Hudak, a Niagara area MPP and leader of the Progressive Conservatives in Ontario, is recycling the idea of privatizing the province’s liquor retail stores.

Are the province’s profitable LCBO outlets on the chopping block again? Photo by Doug Draper

A media release circulated by Hudak’s office this December 4 reads as follows; “The province should consider all options for increase choice and competition, Hudak said, ranging from the sale, partial sale or greater private franchising of non-core assets like the LCBO.”

These words may tickle the hearts of that part of Hudak’s conservative  base that see privatization as a tool for shrinking government down to its bare-bone core. But what sense does it make to sell off an ‘asset’ like the LCOB  – as non-core as it may be – that generates billions of dollars in revenue that can be used to cover the costs of health care, education and other core services at least some of us may still want government to run? Why would anyone – even someone as dumb as too many of those we have serving in elected office these days – ditch a cash cow like this unless they are desperate for fast money? Continue reading →

By Doug Draper 

The waters of the world-famous Niagara River – at one time known for being plagued with some of the deadliest chemical contaminants in the world from notorious dumpsites like Love Canal and Hyde Park in Niagara County, New York – are showing significant improvement, according to a report released this December 6 by Brock University’s Niagara Community Observatory in St. Catharines, Ontario.

The world-famous Falls on the Niagara River has had more than its share of toxic wastes contaminating its waters over the past half century

“Overall water quality in the Niagara River has improved significantly … since 1987” when” remedial action plans” for both sides of the river were launched under the umbrella of the Canada/U.S. International Joint Commission – the official binational watchdog for Great Lakes waters, and other relevant federal, state, provincial and local agencies, says the report prepared by Niagara College instructor Annie Michaud for the Observatory.

Since the late 1970s and early 1980s, when tests found the Niagara River and its aquatic life loaded with dioxin, PCBs, mirex and a cocktail of other highly toxic chemicals – many of them oozing in from dumps along the American side of the river – continued testing shows concentrations of 18 priority toxic pollutants have declined by as much as 99 per cent. Continue reading →

Environment Commissioner Gord Miller

A Submission from the Office of Ontario Environmental Commissioner Gord Miller

(Niagara At Large is posting this important information on the status of efforts to address greenhouse gases and climate change in Ontario from the province’s provincially appointed environmental watchdog Gord Miller.)

Dec 4, 2012 – Ontario’s Environmental Commissioner, Gord Miller, says the Ontario government is backing away from its plan to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG). Gord Miller today released “A Question of Commitment,” the 2012 edition of his annual review of the government’s Climate Change Action Plan. Continue reading →

By Mark Taliano

“Virtue is regularly redefined to reflect fashion,” writes John Ralston Saul, “Sometimes it refers to honesty, sometimes to personal virtue, sometimes to devotion to the people’s welfare.  Over the last twenty years, it has tended to refer to the virtue of personal enrichment.”

The “virtue” of the Harper Regime, sometimes cloaked in Christian evangelism, is the deformed notion that the 1% should enrich themselves at the expense of the 99%.  It is a “virtue” that teaches us that the poor of the world are not worthy of our care, that the poor and marginalized of Canada are obstacles to surmount, and that people are subservient to the parasitical needs of corporate entities and the managerial class. Continue reading →

Ontario Conservative leader Tim Hudak (right) and his former Tory boss Mike Harris. Hudak follows Harris in pushing privatization

A Submission from the Office of Ontario Conservative Opposition Leader Tim Hudak

(This December 4, Ontario PC leader and Niagara area MPP Tim Hudak was in Niagara Falls, Ontario to make a pitch for privatizing some gambling operations in the province and using the savings from that move to improve health care and educational services. In the following media release, Hudak is making a pitch to apply that same privatization medicine to the province’s profitable retail liquor stores.

Niagara At Large is posting this release for our readers and we look forward to any comments you may have on this news, which is likely to be a subject of debate in a provincial election expected next spring or summer, in the space below.)

TORONTO,  December 4, 2012  – It’s time to challenge why the government needs to run businesses that distract its focus from core services we all value, like health care, education and infrastructure, Ontario PC Leader Tim Hudak said today. Continue reading →

A Brief Foreword by Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

Governments in Ontario and Canada have never had the best record in the world of protecting biodiversity, which at the nub of it means protecting other forms of life we humans need to a healthy and fulfilling life on a planet that – believe it or not – is not all about us.

Indeed, whenever there has been a choice between the preservation of valued natural resources and bulldozing or asphalting over ever more land, the bulldozers and asphalt trucks win almost every time. Developers won’t tell you that. They want us to believe that there are too many rules and regulations and tree huggers, standing in the way of their enterprises, but all you have to do is study the past three decades of continued low density sprawl in this region to discover that that’s not true. Continue reading →

A Note from Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

Over the past 24 yours and up to now, at noon on Thursday, November 29, Niagara At Large has been experiencing technical problems around posting both news and commentary from our contributors, and comments from our readers. Due to difficulties that also involve our server, we have not been able to send or receive email messages.

We ask our many loyal readers and those of you who may have sent us comments within the past day or so to be patient. We will be back up and running as soon as the problems are resolved.

How About Hosting Some Wastes From A Nuclear Power Plant?

 By Doug Draper

 To all of those vocal opponents of wind energy in Niagara, Ontario and other regions of this province and others in Canada and the United States, here is a question for you.

The Darlington nuclear power plant cost Ontario energy consumers billions in over-riding costs

 If not wind or solar in your backyard or the backyard of someone else’s community, then what are the alternatives? Would you settle for more nuclear, coal or gas-fired plants to answer an ever-growing energy demand, unless we are prepared to turn off those air conditioners, etc. and get into some radical energy conservation.

 Would you be prepared to host a nuclear, coal or gas-fired facility in your community? How about accepting a depository for the spent radioactive waste from a nuclear power plant in our community? Continue reading →

A Submission to NAL from Niagara College

Niagara College graduate David Pratt has been announced as a winner of
College’s Ontario’s 2012 Premier’s Award.

Award-winning Niagara College graduate David Pratt

Pratt, who graduated from Niagara College’s Greenhouse Technician
program in 2007, was one of six Premier’s Awards winners honoured for
making significant contributions to their communities and achieving
excellence in their careers. The winners were announced at an annual
Colleges Ontario conference held in Toronto on Nov. 26.

His win in the Recent Graduate category recognizes the great strides he
has made in the industry since graduating only five years ago.

Pratt’s success as head grower at Sundrop Farms in Outback Australia
has the potential to make the world’s deserts come alive. While
agriculture uses about 70% of the world’s fresh water supply, Sundrop
discovered a cost-effective method of producing food using the sun’s
warmth to remove salt from seawater, saving millions of litres of fresh
water and millions of barrels of oil. Pratt has developed a sustainable
greenhouse growing system that enables the technology to be used
worldwide in coastal, arid areas. Sundrop is undergoing a $30-million
expansion, and starting a Sahara Forest Project in the Middle East. Continue reading →

A Submission from Lynda Goodridge, Fort Erie Arts Council Arts Council

 The Fort Erie Arts Council is mounting a posthumous art exhibit featuring works by a local legend and man of mystery, Tom Foster.

A Tom Foster painting. Image courtesy of Ken Trinka

 We are launching the show with an open house on Friday, November 30th, from 5 to 10 pm, at the Sanctuary Centre for the Arts as part of the Spirit of Christmas celebrations.  There will be articles about the artist on display, as well as taped interviews with those who knew him.

 Here is some background information about this colourful character.  If you need more information, you can contact Ken Trinka, who is coordinating the exhibition, at kjtrinka@gmail.com. Continue reading →

By Doug Draper 

As a supporter of renewable energy, I was pleased to look down from a bridge I was crossing to Cape Cod, Massachusetts this November and see two towering wind turbines, their blades turning proudly in the wind blowing off nearby Buzzards Bay.

One of the wind turbines on Cape Cod, Mass. Photo by Doug Draper

One of the first thoughts that came to mind at the sight of these wind turbines was this. If these turbines are spinning above the line of trees, and homes and businesses occupying a region that has become a haven for tourists and for people affluent enough to still be able to afford to live here, then what is all of the fuss over them possibly operating in rural regions of Niagara, Ontario or any other part of the province, for that matter?

To get closer to the point, if wind turbines cause the health problems and the depreciation of property values some people say they do, it is hard to believe that these two turbines would ever be erected in this picturesque New England town on Cape Cod called Falmouth, let alone turned on.

Then, a few days after we arrived on the Cape for an annual Thanksgiving gathering with our American friends, there was a front-page story in the Cape Cod Times about these turbines with a headline that read; ‘Closed for the Holiday’, and a sub-heading that read; ‘In a good will offering to abutters, Falmouth selectmen vote to turn off two wind turbines on Thanksgiving and Christmas’. Continue reading →

Posted by Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

Tragically, we don’t have too many reporters left in Canada who have the will or resources to fearlessly investigate this country’s tar sand follies and other environmental transgressions.

Canadian investigate reporter and author Andrew Nikiforuk visiting region.

That is why you might want to take the time to drive to Hamilton, Ontario this coming November 28 for a rare evening with Andrew Nikiforuk, one of the few journalists left in the country with the courage to challenge the propaganda the mainstream media seems only too willing to pipe out there for the tar sands industry Continue reading →

By Mark Taliano 

All governments use words freely to sell their deeds and misdeeds, but repressive governments do it with such regularity, that the words have basically become meaningless.

Historical perspective sheds light on the otherwise obscure origins on some of today’s pervasive nomenclature.

The “free market” theory originates from an economic theory of Milton Freidman and the Chicago school, and it was first implemented in Chile. 

Essentially, the CIA orchestrated a coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile, and replaced it with the infamous dictator Pinochet.  

Then, for the first time, Freidman and his free-marketeers had a blank slate upon which to test their economic theory.  Interestingly, the testing field required repressive governance, otherwise the people would not have tolerated it.  Free markets and repressive governments make good marriages. Continue reading →

By John Bacher

(Following a public hearing, a provincially appointed member of the Ontario Municipal Board recently tabled a decision that will allow a controversial plan for a giant motor-racing track to be built on more than 800 acres of land in Fort, Erie, Ontario. In this post, Preservation of Agricultural Lands Society member outlines the group’s reasons for appealing the decision.)

At 9 a.m. this past November 13^th, 2012, the Niagara-based Preservation of Agricultural Lands Society filed an appeal with the Ontario Municipal Board of its decision to allow plans for a giant motor racing facility in Fort Erie, Ontario to move forward.

A stretch of Miller Creek on the property where a proposed motor-racing track would go in Fort Erie, Ontario. Photo courtesy of the Preservation of Agricultural Society

Our appeal of OMB member Susan de Avellar Schiller’s decision following a public hearing to approve the zoning for Canadian Motor Speedway seeks to maintain the current Good Agricultural zonings and official plan designations with the Niagara Region and Fort Erie that now protect the 827 acres of land where the raceway would go.

In making the appeal, PALS was careful to confine ourselves to the limitations of such cases that are considered under Section 42 of the Planning Act.  Such appeals cannot attempt to repeat the arguments of the hearing. They must confine themselves to errors of fact and law made by the OMB member who heard the case.

One of the most serious errors in law, in our view, was the disqualification of PALS expert witness Dr. Hugh Gayler in land use planning on the grounds that he was a self-defined member of our society. In making her decision Schiller relied upon the notion put forward by the raceway proponents of PALS as an “advocacy group.” Continue reading →

From Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

There is this fragile finger of sand curling out into the Atlantic Ocean off Massachusetts that my family migrates to each late November for a gathering of close friends for American Thanksgiving.

The Old Sea Pines Inn on Cape Cod will be Niagara At Large’s point of dispatch for the next week. We will be back in Niagara with a journalistic vengeance by the end of the month. Something has to be done to make up for the gutting of chain newspapers here.

That is where this publisher will be by Sunday evening and for the next seven or eight days, yet I want you to know that we will continue filing dispatches for Niagara At Large from there. There are issues I’ve covered in recent days and weeks I have yet to comment on, and there are some posts on issues contributed to some of our many supporters.

No doubt, we will be on slow speed during this period because I have to take a bit of time off to walk on a beautiful ocean beach every once in a while. We all do, and I am just thankful that in spite of some tough economic and family challenges over the past 12 months, that I still can. Continue reading →

By Doug Draper

In a letter he is sending to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Niagara, Gary Burroughs, the chairman of Niagara, Ontario’s regional government is urging the EPA not to remove one of the notorious toxic waste dumps in the Niagara River/Lake Ontario watershed from list of priority hazardous waste sites in need of attention.

Niagara, Ontario Regional Chair Gary Burroughs

“This is a concern for the Niagara Region because we are located on the shorelines of both the Niagara River and Lake Ontario where there are concerns that hazardous waste from the Hyde Park site may still be migrating,” says Burroughs in his letter. “Water quality in Lake Ontario is an important issue for the Region because it is a major drinking water source for resident of Niagara. … There are (also) aquatic biota (fish, birds and other creatures living in and off the river and lake) that are dependent on these waterbodies.”

What Burroughs and the Niagara, Ontario regional council are responding to is a burial ground for about 80,000 tonnes of some of the most chemicals ever created by human science, including a ton of the deadliest form of dioxin, sitting on a floor of fractured bedrock rock just above the Niagara River gorge, in the Lewiston, New York area. Continue reading →

Submitted from the office of Welland Riding MPP Cindy Forster

Saturday, November 17, 7:00 p.m. (doors open at 6:30 p.m.) Club Social, 810 East Main Street, Welland.

Ontario NDP leader Andrea Horwath will be there, at Welland, Ontario meeting.

This Saturday, November 17, MPP Cindy Forster will share some new ideas from the Ontario NDP, about Restoring Our Health Services and Tackling Poverty through Job Creation.

Dalton McGuinty may have prorogued the Legislature, but Andrea Horwath and the Ontario NDP caucus are hard at work planning policy for a better, fairer Ontario. And they want input from the people of this province.

 The Welland NDP Riding Association presents Cindy Forster, Malcolm Allen, Peter Kormos, and special guest, Ontario NDP leader, Andrea Horwath, in an evening of discussion—over pie and coffee—on major issues of concern to local residents.

A Commentary by Doug Draper 

Elwy Yost, the original host of TV Ontario’s Saturday Night at the Movies, must be spinning in his grave like a film reel on a projector.

Elwy Yost, one of the late great ambassadors for TV Ontario, would likely be heartbroken to hear about the province’s cuts to that public broadcasting network now.

The current Liberal government, in an effort to reduce a multi-billion-dollar deficit and make up for its squandering of hundreds of millions of dollars on eHealth, moving sites for gas-fired power plants to protect the butts of some of its caucus members and other chicanery, had to include its only public broadcaster as a target with a cut totaling about $2 million. Continue reading →

–         Where Is The Regional And Provincial Government On This?

 A Commentary by Doug Draper

Most of us, if not all of us, look up to our police as models and protectors of the law, and almost each and every one of our police officers earn and deserve that kind of respect for the difficult and dangerous work we expect them to do.

Niagara Regional Police officer continues to collect pay while awaiting sentencing for “international criminal activity” in a Buffalo, New York court

 They, along with our firefighters and our paramedics, are among the first responders we count on during times of trouble and emergency.

But there are times when that respect is shaken and the news that came first from CBC this Tuesday, November 13 may, for at least some of us, be one of them. 

According to a CBC report, Niagara Regional Police Constable Geoff Purdie, who pleaded guilty in a Buffalo, New York courtroom this past October of smuggling thousands of dollars of steriods across the border from the United States to Canada, and “flashing his badge” at customs authorities while he was doing it, will be allowed to continue collecting his salary – money that comes out of the wallets of Niagara, Ontario residents – at least until he is sentenced this coming February 28 to up to 10 years in jail and a $500,000 fine.

Yet a so-called “disciplinary tribunal,” run by the Niagara Regional Police, decided at a hearing in St. Catharines, Ontario this November 12 to allow Purdie to go on collecting his salary, which could easily range above $80,000 annually give the wages of police these days, until he is sentenced. And that is apparently because Purdie reportedly “declined to enter a plea” during the tribunal hearing.

The fundamental question we all should be asking our elected representatives at the regional and provincial government level is this? Why should we go on paying the salary of anyone in public service who has been found guilty in a court of law of committing a criminal act? Continue reading →

–         Regional Group Invites You To November 17 Annual Meeting     Featuring Guest Speakers On Heritage Topics

Submitted to Niagara At Large by Pamela Minns

 ANNOUNCEMENT.

I am a member of the Steering Committee of the Niagara Heritage Alliance, which is an organization formed about 3 years ago and which represents communities across Niagara.     N.H.A. is committed to heritage preservation and enhancement, including natural heritage, agricultural lands and built heritage which are considered to be of cultural, environmental, historical and/or architectural significance.  A full explanation of this organization can be viewed on their web site at : www.niagaraheritagealliance.org 

The Riverbrink Art Museum in historic Queenston, Ontario is the venue for this forum on preserving our region’s heritage resources

  They are holding a general meeting Saturday, November 17th, 2012 from 9 a.m. until 12 noon, (coffee at 8:30 a.m.) at the picturesque Riverbrink Art Museum, 116 Queenston Street, Village of Queenston (Niagara on the Lake).   Their web site at :  www.riverbrink.org   shows a map with the exact location. Everyone is welcome !  It is free ! Continue reading →

By Doug Draper

 The Niagara Health System – the decade-old almalamated body responsible for most of the hospital services in Niagara, Ontario – is reaching out for applicants to fill a new hospital board.

Debbie Sevenpifer, the former CEO and board chair of the NHS, and some of the other screwballs on the former NHS board that turned this hospital system into such a mess, at one of the board’s annual meetings just a couple of years ago, File photo by Doug Draper

 It may not be the way some want to do it. There are no elections being held here for hospital board members. If you are interested, concerned or outraged over where we have and are going with hospital services in this Niagara region, you have got to apply if you feel that being a member of a new NHS board will make any difference.

 Let’s just hope that enough good people from the working class and what Mitt Romney, the failed U.S. Republican Party candidate for the presidency, might call the 47 per cent of us that are bums because we pay little or no income taxes, get a fair shot at these board positions. Let us hope that we don’t end up getting the same usual suspects from the narrow band of elites in this region. We had that the last time on this board, and it was a disaster. Continue reading →

A Brief Comment by Doug Draper

Just when some of us began to think that the governing Ontario Liberals won’t win enough seats in the next provincial election to fill a broom closet, Gerard Kennedy has thrown his hat in the ring for the besieged party’s leadership.

Gerard Kennedy enters Ontario Liberal leadership race

Kennedy, who was a popular MPP and cabinet minister for the provincial Liberals until he left six years ago to win and later lose a Toronto area seat federally, might be the one individual who could keep the party from being reduced to a rump if he manages to replace outgoing Premier Dalton McGuinty in a leadership contest scheduled for this coming January.

Unlike the other individuals who have declared their intention to run for the party’s top job, including recent Liberal cabinet ministers Charles Sousa, Kathleen Wynne and Glen Murray, and former cabinet minister Sandra Pupatello, who did not run in the 2011 provincial election to take a job in the private sector, Kennedy has been away from the provincial party scene long enough to put some distance between himself and the so-called “scandals” facing the Liberals over the costly cancelation of gas-fired power plants in Oakville and Mississauga, and such health care messes around eHealth and the ORNGE air ambulance service. Continue reading →

One More Remembrance Day note from NAL publisher Doug Draper

This just about sums it up around the travesty of wars and what Remembrance Day in Canada or Veterans Day in the United States should be all about.

It comes from the legendary folk singer Buffy Sainte Marie, and it comes out of her great song from the 1960s called ‘Universal Soldier’, which was also made famous or infamous, depending on your take on it, by the Irish folk singer Donovan.

This Youtube video, featuring Buffy, pretty well tops every thing this NAL publisher has tried to say about remembering our soldiers – well on top of some government voices that choose to blow bluster for more wars.

I thank Fiona McMurran, a Niagara representative for the Council of Canadians, for sharing this with Niagara At Large.

Check out the Buffy video by clicking on – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGWsGyNsw00&feature=youtu.be .

(Feel free to share your views below.)

A Comment by Doug Draper

In Canada’s capital of Ottawa there is something called a “national war memorial” and there is also a “war museum.” I am not so sure that that the United States, as much as militarism has been part of that country’s culture, has a national “war” memorial or museum quite like that.

Canada’s “War Memorial” in country’s capital of Ottawa, Ontario. Why isn’t it a ‘Peace Memorial’?

On this Remembrance Day – call it Veterans Day in the U.S. – I keep reading and hearing on radio and TV the same sad stories we all keep hearing each year at this time about the waste of life at battles no one can now justify fighting during World War One, in particular. Isn’t it interesting how the older these wars get in history – the First World War goes back almost a century ago – the smarter we get in realizing what a waste in human life wars are. 

Yet we have government in Canada  today – this Conservative government in in particular, that is so inclined to prorogue or shut the doors on a democratically constituted parliament any time it suits its special interests – that is so bullish on war and military might that it would rather focus a solemn day like Remembrance Day on war than peace. Continue reading →

A Submission to Niagara At Large from the Toronto-based Ontario Health Coalition

(A brief foreward from NAL – Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews was in Niagara, Ontario earlier this November for an economic summit wherein she told reporters that if mayors of municipalities in Niagara Falls, Fort Erie, Welland, Port Colborne and Wainfleet and others can’t get their act together and agree on one site, rather than “squabble over two possible sites – one in Niagara Falls and one in the Welland area – for a new hospital – they might not get a new hospital.

This after her government went along with the former Niagara Health System board of Debbie Sevenpifer, Paul Leon and Betty-Lou Souter to locate the only new super hospital now being constructed and ready for opening this 2012 in west St. Catharines rather than at a more central location in the Niagara region. There might not be any need for a discussion of where a possible second new hospital should go in the region if the Liberal government had the guts to tell Sevenpifer and company that the hospital now about to open should have been sited somewhere in the centre of the region.)

The Ontario and Niagara Health Coalitions responded to Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthew’s threat to cancel the proposed new hospital for Niagara. According to Matthews, if Niagara municipal leaders criticize her appointee’s choice of location for a still-fictional new hospital, the project – which has never been approved anyway – may be cancelled.  Legitimate concerns about cuts to and loss of hospital services in local communities have been termed “bickering”.

Ontario Health Coalition Natalie Mehra accuses the province’s health minister of “bullying” Niagara over hospital services.

“Whether or not a new hospital is planned for a community – and its location — should be a result of a sound planning process, based on community need for health care services, not crass politics,” she added. Continue reading →

A Brief Note from Doug Draper

“I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
But they’re never the ones to fight or to die.”

–         From the Jackson Browne song, Lives In The Balance

This Remembrance Day – Sunday, November 11 – is once again a time to pay homage to those who fought and died in wars which, after all, are so often a failure of the ones at least a percentage of us entrust to resolve conflicts between peoples and nations in more peaceful and constructive ways.

An iconic Veterans Memorial in Chippawa Park, Welland, Ontario.

As for the men in the shadows, and they mostly are men (except for the odd few women like former Bush secretary of state Condoleezza Rice who helped push the lies for justifying an invasion of Iraq that ultimately wiped out more than 100,000 American and Iraqi lives), Remembrance Day should never be a time for celebrating a militaristic agenda or culture.

I’ve always found it interesting that those who talk toughest about going to war are so often those who have never gone to war themselves, and have often gone to some trouble to dodge any duty that might place them in a combat zone. Both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney managed to dodge the draft during the Vietnam War years. And most recently, the U.S. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who gave the impression in his rhetoric that he might be prepared to engage in a war against Iran, exercised a Mormon missionary duty option to avoid going to Vietnam and none of his five sons, all of eligible age, volunteered to serve in the armed forces in Iraq or Afghanistan.

In Canada, there is tough talking Prime Minister Stephen Harper who, if he had been prime minister with a majority government at the time, would have sent young Canadians off to fight and die in a war in Iraq that most Americans now agree was a tragic mistake. We also endure the hawkish bluster of Harper’s minister of defense, Peter McKay, and minister of foreign affairs, John Baird. None of them have ever served in uniform on some killing floor where the bullets fly.

A memorial to those who died in past wars in Memorial Park, Thorold, Ontario.

 But enough of the chicken hawks.

I’ve also always been struck by the fact that some of the most moving speakers against the War in Vietnam during that period were Second World War veterans, just as some of the most passionate opponents of invading Iraq or the continue war in Afghanistan are Vietnam War veterans – people who know what bloody hell war is for both the soldiers and the civilians who happen to be in the way of the bullets and bombs.

Unlike the men in the shadows and chicken hawks, they have witnessed the blood and the horror, and beg us all to find a way to resolve our differences without war. They know what Jackson Browne sings in that song.

“There are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire.”

(Niagara At Large invites you to share your views on this post below.)

A Commentary by Doug Draper

Let me start this with a few predictions you don’t have to be any kind of a soothsayer to make.

Liberal elites Sandra Pupatello and Dalton McGuinty during better times for their governing party. Pupatello has announced her intention to fill McGuinty’s position as the province’s premier, and is also declaring that if she wins the top job, she will keep the doors on the provincial legislature locked until she wins a riding seat somewhere in Ontario. That could keep parliament closed for the better part of next year or more.

 The first prediction is that there will be a provincial election in Ontario sometime in the coming year unless the governing Liberal Party can somehow weasel its way out of one by pushing its current and most arrogant and undemocratic prorogation of the legislature into 2014. And given the amoral, give-a-flick-of-the-finger-to-the-people-of-the-province compass the Liberals seem to be guiding themselves by these days, I would not be surprised if they drag this suspension of parliamentary democracy on that long.

Second, some of the scandals closing in on the province’s Liberal government will continue to metastasis whether the legislature is sitting or not. Most particularly is the scandal over the use of possibly hundreds of millions of our tax dollars to abandon plans to build gas-powered power plants in Liberal ridings in Mississauga and Oakville, for fear the opposition would harm the chances of Liberal candidates, before last year’s provincial election.

According to a story on the front page of The Globe and Mail this November 8, the governing Liberals allowed some $190 million of that money – our money to fall in the hands of hedge-fund manipulators in the United States and to financial fixers in the Cayman Islands were our money can make profits for them.  For this reason alone, this Liberal government and everyone in it should be impeached as soon as possible.

Third, Sandra Pupatello, a former Ontario Liberal cabinet minister until she decided not to run in the 2011 provincial election and a darling of the party by many accounts, has just announced her intentions to replace outgoing Dalton McGuinty as the party’s leader and the province’s premier. However, she noted in her announcement to run for the leadership that, should she win her party’s leadership, she would not end the prorogation or suspension of the legislature until she wins a seat in some by-election somewhere in the province. That, as CBC radio news reported this November 8, could put off any return to legislative democracy in this province until sometime into late 2013, if not later. And all so Pupatello can dawn what many party faithfully feel is her rightful crown. Continue reading →

A Commentary by Doug Draper

The late Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau once had this to say about Canada’s relationship with our neighbours to the south. – “Living next to the United States,” he said, “is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even tempered is the beast, … one is affected by every twitch and grunt.”

Obama campaign office at work in Buffalo, New York. Photo by Doug Draper

Given the close economic and cultural ties Canada continues to have with the United States, there is no reason to believe that Trudeau’s observation is any less relevant today than it was 30 or 40 years ago. And with that in mind, it continues to matter a great deal to the interests of Canadians (whether some of us care to believe it or not) who Americans elect as their president and commander –in-chief.

This November 6 presidential election, which saw U.S. President Barack Obama thread the needle to wind a second term in what was one of the tightest races for the White House in recent American history, held a good deal at stake for Canadians and Americans alike. For progressives in both countries and for everyone else among us who want to see us move forward with environmental protection and addressing the causes and impacts of climate change; who want to see a continued shift away from our dependence on coal and oil and to toward more sustainable, renewable sources of energy; who want to see us  move toward more sustainable transportation systems; who want to see us spend less on military ventures and more on educating our young people; and who want to ensure work toward the continued delivery of health care and other public services in ways that best serve those who need them at an affordable cost, a win by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney would have been a disaster. Continue reading →

A Brief Note from NAL publisher Doug Draper

On Saturday, November 3, I reported seeing a long caravan of hydro trucks from Ontario crossing the Peace Bridge border crossing, on their way to hurricane-ravaged regions of New York State and New Jersey to help restore power to millions of people there.

Ontario hydro trucks line up at border, on their way to hurricane-stricken regions of northeastern U.S.  – Image from Hydro One website

It isn’t the first time Canadians have come to the aid of our American neighbours during times of pressing need, of course. As recently as this past June, when a monster wind storm swept through Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia, leaving millions of people in those and adjoining states without electricity during a near record heat wave. A friend of mine – a former Ontarian now living in Maryland – called me later to say how grateful he and his neighbours were to see hydro crews of Ontario assisting their local utility workers in restoring their power. Continue reading →

 By Zainab Elghul

Hunger is a vital issue. In order for humans to be able to focus on enhancing their personal life they must satisfy their basic needs which include but are not limited to water, food, and shelter.

Working to bring people out of the cold.

In the Community and Justice Services (Correctional Worker) program at Niagara College, our Professors Michelle Swaerdens and Terry Holub encourage us be active in our community and support those in need. 

A very important part in assisting a person better their life is to help them be able to take care of all their basic needs on their own.

One of our assignments is to fundraise for the Out of the Cold program hosted by Harvest Kitchen in Welland. We will host an All-You-Can-Eat pasta dinner at Casa Dante in Welland on Saturday, November 10th from 6 PM. Continue reading →

A Submission from Niagara Region’s Public Health Department

(Niagara At Large is pleased to post the following information from Niagara Region Public Health for your information.)

 Are you a parent? Concerned with bullying issues? Attend our free parent workshop

 NIAGARA REGION, Nov. 6, 2012 – Niagara Region Public Health is hosting a free workshop on bullying featuring keynote speaker Michael Reist. Reist is a teacher with over 30 years of experience in the classroom and is a frequent speaker to parent groups and at health and education conferences across Canada.

WHAT: Free parent workshop addressing bullying for parents with childrenfrom kindergarten to grade 12. Continue reading →

By Doug Draper 

Start your engines. You are off!

Architects’ rendition of NASCAR speedway facility planned for Fort Erie, Ontario.

The Ontario Municipal Board – a body appointed by the provincial government to hear concerns about proposals for development – has said no to any and all concerns expressed over plans for a giant NASCAR speedway facility in Fort Erie, Ontario. Continue reading →

A Niagara At Large Brief

Should federal, state and provincial governments around the Great Lakes allow the discharge of chemically contaminated water used in extracting natural gas from bedrock to a Great Lakes basin tens-of-millions of Americans and Canadians rely on as a source of drinking water?

Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario councillor Jamie King was among the first to stand up against the unregulated dumping of chemical wastes from gas fracking in the Great Lakes.

That question came close to home over this passing year when petro-chemical companies made a bid to use the wastewater treatment plant in Niagara Falls, New York to discharge continuous volumes of  chemically contaminated water from a gas-extraction process called “fracking” to the Niagara River and Lake Ontario.

The first Ontario politicians to step up to the plate and say; ‘No (and I paraphrase), this can’t happen if there aren’t even any laws in the United States to tell us what chemicals are contaminating that water,’ was Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario councillor Jamie King. His efforts, combined with those of a few other groups, including those of Buffalo, New York -based Great Lakes United, a major coalition of non-government and government groups dedicated to protecting the lakes in both countries, may have played a role in a decision by Niagara Falls, New York’s council earlier this year to ban fracking wastes from the municipality. Buffalo, New York’s council quickly followed with a ban of its own. Continue reading →

By Doug Draper

Here’s what I think might be a nice story for you – a bit of news that people on both sides of the Canada/U.S. border can truly feel good about.

Peace Bridge carries a caravan of help and hope from Canada to hurricane-stricken regions of northeastern United States.

The story began for me when my wife and daughter and I were driving a friend to Buffalo, New York this Saturday, October 3 for her flight back home to Florida. As we approached the Peace Bridge crossing the mouth of the Niagara River and border, we looked up and the bridge looked clogged with trucks. Our first response was; ‘Oh know, we are going to have a 40-minute wait at the bridge and we only have an hour to get to the airport.’

Then came the good news. The trucks were only taking up one lane of the bridge and the second lane was relative free for us to pass. And as we passed, we looked over and noticed that most of these trucks where hydro trucks from Halton, Guelph and other regions all over Ontario. It was a caravan of what seemed like 40 or 50 hydro trucks from Ontario, on their way to hurricane-stricken, coastal communities in New York, New Jersey, Delaware and Connecticut, and we found ourselves welling up with feelings of warmth and pride as we passed this caravan of hope for more than a million people still freezing in the dark almost a week after Hurricane Sandy’s cruel landing. Continue reading →