|
Comments? |
|
Prince Rupert Regional Information
Site |
||||
NATURESea, land, river PEOPLESCommunity
|
That ALL City ‘employees’ (RCMP,
CityWest) have free use of the Civic Center while giving ‘charity’ to
taxpayers families is one of the most common gripes I hear around town |
|
And of course
the cold weather hanging in there We See·
Museum
fire ·
SQCRD free lunching
on PR taxpayers ·
Wood smoke
as health hazard |
|
Fire was Thursday
evening in an electrical box – the smoke was first clue – fire department
eventually found the source before it spread or became worse --- I am told
that water leaking in from outside building (Back porch?) was cause of short |
Museum fire
shuts down facility until Tuesday |
|
As
reported earlier the building that houses museum has been sold—or at least
the non-museum parts of it--- as I understand it the museum owns the bottom
floor (outright now as opposed to mortgaged) --- but that presents some
difficulties as now heating, electricity, etc all built as if one building
--- thus have to bill non-museum parts on square footage basis etc |
|
Irony:
At
Council meeting |
I
am told the Museum director was at Thursday evenings Council ‘meeting’ to plead
for funding when she heard about the fire – but as fire department there by
then and had fire located– she stayed on to give her presentation to Council
– trying to explain to a sometimes sceptical Council(lor) the complexities of
the condominium like arrangements and need for continued support not only for
tourism values but more importantly the heritage values maintained locally at
museum |
|
|
Fire in
derelict car |
|
The
car was ‘parked’ in a lot next to Slickers --- people familiar with the lot
reportedly said that a homeless person had been sleeping in the car during
period immediately prior to blaze ---- In same neighbourhood (motel across
street) juveniles were seen trying to start fires in dumpster around same
time, I was told) |
|
Now
that the province is going to use Haida Gwaii instead of Queen Charlotte –
will SQCRD change name?? |
Free
Riders?? SQCRD pays medicals for Directors ---
I will work it up later – but I suspect almost all this is paid by Prince Rupert taxpayers (75%??)
--- part of the ‘problem too is that weighted votes are by population (1 per
2000) – not assessed values – thus 1st Nation Reserves count
towards total numbers but pay no taxes --- example Area D on QCI gets 2 votes
but has an assessed value one tenth of Rupert’s – (Note Area C (Oona River
etc) has 1/100th assessed value of PR but we pay his medical – in
fairness that expense should be billed to his Area – as is his salary &
expenses (see previous) |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
I
will come back to this later – But you can see the main problem (Table
below) --- Prince Rupert has 75% of
the tax base --- but has a minority of the votes (even when weighted for
‘financial’ matters etc) – this is one of the unforeseen outcomes from when
SQCRD set up – at that time Rupert alone could control the weighted votes (based
upon population of 2,000 residents per 1 weighted vote |
|
There is both a problem and an opportunity here --- Presently we have ‘joke’ of say Area C where Oona river population 37 and 1% of assessed value has same vote as Masset with almost 3 times the population and 4X the assessed value --- this became more glaring when Electoral Areas given Gas Tax money (see previous on Gas Tax, > details last October and here) based upon total population (including reserves) --- but used the $$ for Oona River But that is the opportunity too – to somehow incorporate the 1st
Nations into both regional governance (here I am thinking of the Community to
Community forums type model) but also SQCRD --- as can be seen from numbers
below Electoral Areas A, C and D are dominated by First Nations (if they
voted) |
|
|
population
- Reserves |
Total Pop
|
Directors |
Weighted |
2008 Hospital Purposes
Assessment |
2008 General Purposes
Assessment |
|
|
City:
Prince Rupert |
12,815 |
12,815 |
2 |
7 |
987,503,718 |
994,446,918 |
75% |
|
District:
Port Edward |
577 |
577 |
1 |
1 |
46,113,995 |
47,754,095 |
4% |
|
Village:
Masset |
940 |
940 |
1 |
1 |
56,099,201 |
56,620,887 |
4% |
|
Village: Port
Clements |
440 |
440 |
1 |
1 |
20,497,300 |
20,602,650 |
2% |
|
Village:
Queen Charlotte |
948 |
948 |
1 |
1 |
65,358,048 |
65,774,793 |
5% |
|
Electoral
Area A |
52 |
849 |
1 |
1 |
19,837,783 |
19,837,783 |
2% |
|
Electoral
Area C |
37 |
611 |
1 |
1 |
9,277,227 |
9,301,077 |
1% |
|
Electoral
Area D |
607 |
2,082 |
1 |
2 |
65,995,729 |
70,576,319 |
5% |
|
Electoral
Area E |
402 |
402 |
1 |
1 |
32,161,052 |
32,462,302 |
2% |
|
Totals |
16,818 |
19,664 |
10 |
16 |
$ 1,302,844,053 |
$
1,317,376,824 |
100% |
|
For health
effects of fine particulate matter – especially PM2.5 see the Wikipeda
article and links from there |
Where there
is smoke |
|
Presumably the fire
had a permit – and may have been done by City as well above built up area – but
it does show the problem well of allowing open burning like this – I could
smell the smoke which was settling into Rupert area – and it is not the smell
which is harmful but the fine particulate matter that is ‘deadly’ gets from
lungs into arteries etc) |
|
|
Again the
Artic high pressure re-asserts itself |
|
While
not in focus – I like the ice crystals when ‘grow’ on grass etc – presumably
cold dry arctic air moving into our marine humid air mass near shorelines etc
|
|
|
From the 2008 Audit
|
|
Will
come back to this later – but meant to show how Rupert pays but others
benefit --- later I will argue that QCIs disproportionately benefit |
Created by LG on 12/12/2009
Last updated on Sunday, December 13, 2009