A good read

Sing it!

Stepping up

district plan for the
future\NEWS A5

A new report helps the school

Northwest singers get invited to
attend an international choir
festival \COMMUNITY B1

A Kitwanga team sneaks into third
in Terrace’s competitive men’s
futsal league \SPORTS B6

WEDNESDAY
January 19, 2000

$1.00 PLUS 7¢ GST
($1.10 plus 84 GST. outalde of the
Terrace area) | ~

VOL. 12 NO. 44

Boom in regional health service eyed

Could be centre for
cancer, trauma and

kidney dialysis
TERRACE COULD be the centre
for more regional medical services

if plans now underway come to’

pass.

The city is already host to a core of
regional specialties.

But the end result of the new serv-
ices would be a dramatic increase in
health care, leading to vast improve-
ments in the quality of life for patients
and their families in the northwest. - *

The Terrace and Area Health Coun-

cil is in talks with the Prince George-
based Northern Interior Health Board
to have it manage a kidney dialysis
program at Mills Memorial Hospital.

In conjunction with local: specialists
and the B.C, Cancer Agency, a com-
prehensive non-radiation cancer treat-
ment program here is in the very early
stages of development.

And a province-wide review on es-
tablishing trauma treatment centres
could result in Terrace being the hub
for trauma service in the northwest.

Health council administrator Tom
Novak says the kidney dialysis pro-
gram, if approved, would see a capital
expenditure of $1.4 million to establish
six patient stations.

It would be established in unused
space on the hospital’s second floor.

“We had talked about four ‘patient
Stations, but the catchment population
of the northwest with prospective (Pa-
tients caused us to increase it to six,”
said Novak.

Some kidney dialysis patients are
able to use portable, suitcase-size de-
vices in their homes, at work or while
travelling.

But for others, a complete blood
exchange is required, causing them to
need advanced treatment.

The closest such service is in
Prince George, meaning patients have
either to travel there depending upon
the frequency of their treatment or to

move there or other places where the
service is offered.

“This will have a direct patient
benefit,” said Novak.

Mills Memarial already provides
non-radiation cancer treatment such as
chemotherapy through local physicians
and visiting specialists from the B.C.
Cancer Agency.

But now, agency officials and local
specialists feel a more formal, com-
prehensive treatment program is viable
given the population in the northwest,
says Dr. Jack Chritchley, who manag-
es the agency’s communities oncology
network.

“Terrace is ideally situated ‘to serve
a lot of communities,” he said,

Before and after ireatment services
are just as important to a cancer pro-
pram as the medical procedures them-
selves, said Chritchley.

“You need a network to provide
support to cancer patients. There are a
whole range of people that need to be
involved both within the medical com-
munity and in the community itself,”
he said.

“What’s involved here are ‘services
to address the quality of life for
patients.”

Key players include professionals
from a variety of areas and volunteers.

At the top of the list is a specialist

willing to take on a leadership role

Continued Page A2

Nurse deficit
builds surplus

Skiing at Shames
Local skiers John Bartlett, Carol Evenchick, Wendy Shymanski
Gee and Rod Gee were all smiles at Shames Mountain on Jan-

uary 9. Already five weeks into the mountain's 10th season,
Shames' orgranizers have planned Grand Slalom races, ava-

lanche awareness demos, adult snowboarding lessons, and
waekly theme days to keep skiers and snowboarders hopping.
Gea Is scheduled to offer an avalanche awareness course at the
mountain February 5-6.

MILLS MEMORIAL Hos-
pital has saved nearly
$200,000 by operating with
fewer nurses.

The hospital is running

a $190,479 surplus from
unspent nurses’ wages be-
cause it has been. unable
to fill- permanent and tem-
porary nursing positions.

Health council chair
Bob Kelly said at a board
meeting Jan. 13 he’s been
told nurses aren’! applying
for the jobs because of
poor morale on the ward,

“But my understanding
from the people I’ve talked
to is it’s improving,” Keily
said.

Marg Petrick, director
of nursing, said it’s hard
far every hospital in Cana-
da to recruit nurses be-
cause of a national nurses
shortage.

She added that many
casual nurses — wha work
on an part-time, on-call
basis — aren’t applying for
the temporary full-time
work that’s being adver-
tised because they’re get-
ting full-time hours work-
ing when they want to
work on a casual basis.

“That’s why they’re
casuals,” Petrick said.
“They call the shots.”

.  Petrick announced two
more full-time nursing po-
sitions would be advertised

starting Jan. 10.

But the problem with
offering more full-time po-
sitions is that if casual
nurses move up to take
those jobs, it will deplete
the casual pool even more
and make it harder to find
backup.

Paul Manhas, the hos-
pital’s accountant, expects
the $190,479 ‘surplus,
saved on unspent nurses
wages, will be spent over
the next three months as
the hospital enters its nor-
mally busy winter period.

The hospital usually
tuns a $200,000 to
$400,000 deficit in Janu-
ary, February and March,
which would leave Mills
with a year-end budget an-
ywhere from balanced to
$200,000 in the red.

Don Ritchey, a spokes-
person for the Terrace
Health Watch Group,
wants the hospital to spend
its surplus on cither hiring
more nurses or creating a
better working environ-
ment for nurses — through
educational workshops and
other incentives — not pay-
ing overtime.

“That money was de-
signed for nursing,” he
said. “It was budgeted for
nurses. If they've hired no
nurscs, that money should

be there for nurses.”

Seniors housing

Pilots face stringent new requl

Aircraft landings threatened

By JEFF NAGEL
TRAVELLERS trying to
fly in and out of the Ter-
race airport will have to
contend with many more
missed or diverted flights
if new federal regulations
take effect.

The key change is that
when the weather is bad
airline pilots will no longer
be allowed to even ap-_
proach the airport and look
for breaks in the clouds
through which to ‘descend
-- what pilots call a “look °
and see” approach.

The new rules — pro-
posed by Transport Canada
‘in response to a 1997 Air
Canada crash in fog at
Fredericton — would re-
quire reported: visibillty at
the airport of. at least
three-quarters of a thile for
pilots to -continué . ape

‘mum,

proaching the airport from
the south once they passed
an ‘electronic beacon at
Lakelse Lake.

“This is a regulation
that would take the deci-
sion making completely
out of the cockpit,” Ter-
race-Kitimat airport man-
ager Rick Reed said.

If the reported visibility

_ wasn’t at least close to the

three-quartér-mile ‘nini-
Reed added, the
flight wouidn’t come clo-
ser than Kitimat, and
could even be scrubbed at
Vancouver if the Terrace
weather reports had been
consistently bad.

“They wouldn’t even be,

coming up the {Kitimat}

valley,” Reed said. “There.
-would be. no discretion in |
the cockpit at all.”

» A report prepared ‘for

Air B.C. estimated the re-_

‘gulation change, which in-
itially called for a one-
mile visibility requirement
here, would drive up the
annual number of missed
flights at this airport by
325 per cent.
The report’s author, Air
_ Canada manager of train-
ing and regulatory stan-
dards Kevin Kandal, said
the minimum visibility for
Terrace has since been re-
duced to three-quarters of
a mile, easing the impact
somewhat.
_ He said the change
means the number of mis-

‘sed flights will likely dou-

é ble, rather than triple.

That will still have a.

major effect on the reli-
‘ability of the Tertace air-

port, particularly in the:

winter when weather con-

Rick Reed
ditions are at their worst.
“The reliability of your
airport would decrease,”
Kandal said,

- In December, 24 Air .

B.C. flights and 30 Cana-
dian Regional Airlines
flights into Terrace - about
a third of the total flights
scheduled by the two air-
lines — didn’t arrive, said
Reed.

Doubling that rate could
leave Terrace travellers
facing the likelihood that a
clear majority of flights in
the poor weather months of
December and January
won't arrive.

“We're very
concerned,” Reed said of
the proposed regulation.
“There's nothing to back it
up empirically. There’s no
indication that the existing
rules are endangering
flight safety.”

Past reports peg the
overall annual landing

Cont'd Page Al2 -

plan gets subsidy

PLANS TO build a supportive seniors housing project
beside Terraceview Lodge pot a major lift last week’
with word B.C. Housing will subsidize a third of the 22
units.

The affordable housing subsidy for eight of the units
at the proposed Terrace Mountain Manor site means
lower-income seniors who qualify through the province’s
Homes B.C. program could live there and spend no more
than 30 per cent of their income on rent.

The subsidy is worth $746,000 over 25 years.

“This will be a benefit for people who do not have the
wherewithal to buy into a complex like Twin River
Esiates,” said Skeena MLA Helmut Giesbrecht.

The rest of the units are being sold to local seniors by’
the Terrace Supportive Housing Society.

The subsidy greatly improves the financial viability of
the whole Terrace Mountain Manor project, which had
battied a series of financial and regulatory obstacles.

. Uncertainty about the project had made it difficult for
proponents to attract enough seniors willing to b ——
enable the society to begin construction. — ,

Construction of the housing complex, which is Ter-
tace’s first supportive seniors housing project, is now ex-
pected to'begin as early as March. It’s being built by lo-
cal contractor Progressive Ventures.

The location next to Terraceview Lodge is expected
to mean residents can get meals, social activities and
other support next door.

Continued Page A2