Camps a concern Fall Fair winners - officers are worried about Health officials and conservation mushroom camps\NEWS A7 Who's best at raising rabbits, baking pies and making beer. Results \COMMUNITY B1 Timber!! Local loggers rev up chainsaws and sharpen axes to prove who's: the best\SPORTS B5 WEDNESDAY. September 10, 1997 . Miller mulls purchase of By JEFF NAGEL THE PROVINCE will consider buying Skeena Cellulose to keep the troubled company from toppling into bankruptcy, employment and investment minister Dan Miller said Friday. Seven northwest mayors spoke out the same day — at Miller’s request - urging the province to step in and purchase the operations. That idea will be one of the options discussed at a cab- inet mecting today, Miller's office confirmed. The Skeena Cellulose crisis reached a fever pitch last week after the TD and Royal banks announced Sept. 15 as anew deadline for a deal with both the province and unionized pulp workers in Prince Rupert. Terrace mayor Jack Talstra said affer talking to Miller he fears no deal will be reached and bankruptcy will B.C. pays I for roads | AROUND 50 local workers are back in the bush this week after the province kicked loose $4 million to bankroll logging road construction for Skeena Cellulose. It's the latest government effort to help head off a complete meltdown of forestry here from the Skeena Cellulose crisis. The money — about $2.5 million in the Terrace area and $1.5 million in the Kispiox — amounts (o a loan for construction of roads into SCI cutting permits. That work was suspended when the company ran out of money earlier this year. If the company restarted operations but logging roads weren’t built before winter freeze-up, lengthy logging and sawmill shut- downs would have resulted in 1998. © “Equipment started moving almost immediately,” SCI wood- lands manager Tim Fenton said Tuesday. “We've started on three fronts as of today — Kleanza, the Capper and Williams Creek.” Fenton said the company hopes to develop 200,000 cubic metres of timber before the end of October. That would keep area loggers and the Terrace sawmill busy for about two additional months in 1998, he said. “We're going to use 10 to 12 different contactors in the Terrace area to do that,” Fenton added. “We're going lo get as many peo- ple as possible out there working in that window.” When the company halted operations it had only a six-month supply of timber it could access. Normally forest companies pay for road construction up front and recover the cost through breaks in stumpage. “In this situation what they’l! do then is pay us back a levy, a development levy, some kind of dollar per cubic metre to account for the fact that we paid for the road,” said Prince Rupert forest region operations manager Tony Buckley, Even if SCI declares formal bankruptcy, the wood will eventu- ally be cut and the coct recovered, he added. “We don’t consider there’s much chance of us losing this investment,” he said. The wark won't be tendered because in some cases SCI had already put out tenders and selected contractors. “We need to get things moving.” Road permits weren’t fast tracked and the legislative require- ments of the Forest Practices Code will be followed, he said. result, as early as next week. “This is our last hope for the continuation of SCI’s operations and our last hope to save about 3,000 north- west jobs,” Talstra said of a possible B.C. government purchase. The mayors’ appeals came on the heels of comments by Miller that he would entertain the idea if it has broad public support. . “T’ve had a lot of people in the last day and a half say- ing “Dan, the government should buy it,’ “ Miller told the Standard Friday. “Believe me, we have no desire to get into the pulp business or the sawmilling business at all,” he said. “But if there’s a mood of the people — if people want to step forward and publicly say the government should take that position — then, as a minister of the government, I'm quite prepared to consider it.” Miller would give no indication of how much he thought the province should offer for the company in such a scenario. Miller did say that he is no longer optimistic for a three-way deal between the banks, the union and the province to restructure the company and avert bankruptcy. “[ don’t think there’s a deal possible with the banks,” Miller said. , The PPWC has resisted the banks’ demands for con- tract changes that would include contracting out and full job flexibility. Miller, formerly a Prince Rupert pulp worker himself and an ex-member of the union, said he has listened to the executive of the PPWC and asked for an “absolute 93¢ PLUS.7¢ GST VOL: 10 NO..22 _ Skeena Cel commitment” to make the company a Success. “They said “Absolutely’,” Milter said. “So that’s good enough for me.” The banks have also been unable to reach agreement with the province for an infusion of money that would help refurbish the Prince Rupert pulp mill. The banks and the government agree each side would invest $85 million of new money into the operation. But Miller contends that in the event of an eventual bankruptcy, the new money would be paid out on liqui- dation ahead of the banks’ old debis. The banks, however, want an undisclosed portion of their half-billion stake in SCI to get equal status with the new money. That would result in the province getting Continued Page A2 a Fruit medley ROSSARIO RINO’S hobby is grafting branches from different trees Macintosh, Granny Smith, Golden Delicious and aven Bartlett onto one tree, Here he's created a tummy-tempting tree bearing a pears. He's also managed to fuse together branches from a pear amazing five different kinds of fruit —- Red Delicious apples, tree onto a Mountain Ash. Garden’s success for more TERRACE’S FIRST community garden worked so well this year that organizers are asking city council for donations of more Jand. The community garden, organized by the Terrace Anti-Poverty Society, is for low-income people who don’t have ac- cess to garden land. The idea is that gardeners could save money on grocery bills, while having im- proved access to fresh, nutritious food. The city loaned the Anti-Poverty sociely a city lot at the comer of Greig and Apsley, fenced it and provided water. Gardeners and volunteers built raised SRST ARRAN CETGRTEZE aa i COMMUNITY GARDENER Linda Murphy = grew tomatoes, corn and herbs. vironment, cabbages, cherry Public meetings likely this fall RESIDENTS OF the Greater Terrace area will likely get a chance this fall to have their say about where they send their garbage. That’s when the regional district is planning to hold public information meetings on the two potential landfill sites for the area. The RD recently finished a year- long environmental impact study on the Thornhil] Landfill. The study gives the dump a thumbs-up as a can- didate for a sub-regional landfill, It says that if properly maintained, the site would not pose a threat to the en- The other potential landfill sile is near Onion Lake. The regional district sludy. cheap. And RD manager of works and ser- vices Roger Tooms says he hopes to have all the information available by the end of the year so he can present it to the public for discussion and to the board to make a decision. “The sooner the better,’’ says Tooms. ‘I want to be able to stand - there and say that on one hand we have: the Thomhill site that we can further develop for a certain cost. But on the other hand, we have the Onion Lake site option at a certain cost.” Neither site, Tooms notes, will be Preliminary estimates for the Thorn- hill site show a potential price tag of $27.39 per tonne, or about $25 million Dump sites compared is currently working to get a Jack on a piece of land in that area to further over the dump’s estiniated 50-60 year lifespan (plus a 20-year shutdown pe- riod of monitoring). ; That works out to some $500,000 annually, should the landfill conserva- tively last 50 years, “We're talking lots of money,’’ says Tooms. “‘It’s not going to be cheap wherever you go.”” Tooms also warns that current estimates are just conceptual, He is currently working on similar estimates for the Onion Lake site. Once a location is chosen, a more detailed filling plan will be conducted. “The filling plan ieils you how to build it, Gil it and close it,’ Tooms says. ‘That's the next step.” Tooms says he hopes to be able to compare the two study sites directly by November, beds, with materials donated from the community. They leamed plenty of gar- dening tips, from what type of fertilizer to use to what plant varieties grow best here. Now as summer draws to a close participants are preparing to do a second batch of canning. There was also an unexpected bonus for gardeners, said coordinator Leila Burton. Gardeners made new friends, and enjoyed a sense of belonging toa group. Burton asked city council for one or ideally two more garden plots — another in the downtown area and one in the southside. mitice of the whole meeting for discus- sion in September. However, city councilors so far seem receptive. Councilor David Hull said the current garden is a testament to the efforts of the gardeners. ‘““What used to be a small corner lot Full of weeds is very productive now," he said. Councilor Val George — agreed. “'They’ve sure done a good job in utiliz- ing that space,” he sald. Huil sald some big plots of land off Haugland in the arca of the Skeena- Kalum Housing development might be suitable, The matter has been referred to a com- Wolf attack called a rare incident CONSERVATION officers here say that a wolf altack hear Prince Rupert last week was an isolaicd incident and - the public should not be alarmed. A pack of four wolves at- tacked and killed a couple’s Labrador. retriever while they were out hiking near Rainbow Summit during the long weekend. The couple said the wolves just appeared out of the woods and started to tear at their dog. They attempted to fight them off, but when more wolves arrived and they saw their dog was not going to survive, they ran. Conservation Officer James Hilgemann says that there are a number of wolves living in ihe Terrace area, but attacks on people are very unusual, “Wolves are largely un- seen,” he says, ‘'They’re usually watching you and you never know it.”’ Hilgemann says ‘Wolves are free-ranging animals that travel over large areas. They are difficult to find and ¢ven more difficult to trap. ; He recommends using the same precautions to prevent wolf attacks that are used to keep bears away — keep your dog on a leash and make lots of noise while hiking in the woods. Carrying pepper spray |s another option, but Hil gemann points out that com- mon sense is often the best defence. “Certainly don’t put all your faith in pepper spray,” he says. “‘Use your head,’’