| A process to hash out an end to the bitter teachers’ dispute in Alberta was agreed upon by Alberta Premier Ralph Klein and Alberta Teachers’ Association President Larry Booi on March 4.
Klein agreed to ask caucus to consider Booi’s recommendation that a legislative process be used to end the dispute. If accepted, it could put into place a method to enable school boards and the teachers’ union to reach settlements across the province.
Klein also agreed to set up an panel to examine education in Alberta, including a look at barriers to education and challenges the system faces.
The meeting also raises hopes that job action in the province is finished for the time being. Booi is asking teachers not to strike or work-to-rule until further notice.
Calgary’s most well-used recreational facility has adopted the name of Calgary’s most controversial corporation under a $10-million, 20-year sponsorship deal.
The sports facility will now be named Talisman Centre, after Talisman Energy Inc. – the Calgary-based company accused by Amnesty International of supporting the human rights violating Sudanese government through their petroleum operations in that country.
Wayne Arvidson, president of the Lindsay Park Sports Society, says the sponsorship deal guarantees long-term investment in the facility, and will better allow it to meet its expansion plans.a
The deal was also approved by Calgary city council.
Talisman president Jim Buckee, who says the company’s operations are helping, not hurting, the Sudanese people, says the deal will allow the company to "play a part in maintaining Calgary’s position as one of the best places in the world to live and do business."
The park surrounding Talisman Centre will retain the name Lindsay Park.
The group fighting to save the historic St. Mary’s Girls School in Calgary from demolition is making a last-minute appeal to the Calgary Catholic School Board to take part in a study examining preservation costs.
The Society for the Preservation and Restoration of St. Mary’s School, built in 1909, wants an independent study done to determine the costs of offering the board’s planned special needs program in the existing building.
The school was slated for demolition by the school board last year so a replacement building can be constructed to offer school programs. The school is currently vacant.
The results of the meeting weren’t available by press time.
The city is taking a closer look at new ways of cutting down the amount of residential waste hitting Calgary landfills, including residential garbage bag limits and expanded recycling programs.
Council agreed to a motion by Ald. Druh Farrell that would look at different financing mechanisms used around the world to fund solid waste services, wastewater and drainage.
As an example, Farrell suggested the use of bag limits to encourage residents to reduce the amount of garbage left out for collection each week.
The study will look deeper into alternatives for funding not only the city’s solid waste system, but its wastewater and storm water drainage systems.
Studies suggest nearly three-quarters of Calgarians support the use of garbage bag limits and about 70 per cent of garbage currently deposited in landfills is recyclable.
Harvey Cohen, a critic of the East Village development, is an economist. Inaccurate information appeared in Fast Forward stories in February. |
