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Prince Rupert Regional Information Site

March 26^th	SQCRD Meeting
	No budget passed

The most significant part of the meeting is what did not happen --- the Budget was not passed

Seems the province wanted it to balance ‘as is the law’ ---- never bothered SQCRD last several years –

More below and later

	But First – more plaques to hang on wall commemorating 100^th anniversary
	Here Mussallem, who just showed up, was asked to take off his outdoor coat and then do the photo op for PRDN

	Mussallem shows judgement and ‘old boy’ status
	When it became evident that the last MIMIC meeting’s minutes had not been accepted (pending next meeting), Jack said best to receive and file but not accept until MIMC has finalized,

Names etc later	Perhaps most interesting segment of meeting was Enbridge presentation
	Here Jack knew Kevin Brown who apparently once worked for CBC locally. Jack quipped, ‘the RCMP always let me know when Kevin shows up in town’. Most of the presentation was by ‘Road Team’ shown here who had varied expertises ----- this was followed by questions in which Pages made the most obvious: ‘we get all the risks and none of the benefits’ --- more detail later

I will deal with Fisheries questions/ letter from minister etc later	How does the Media and public get access to these meetings

Macho man

Some discussion about openness to public etc

There was some pun/ playing on Rinfret who wanted ‘observer status’ – was the paper willing to pay long distance fees to hook into meeting? – Some interpreted the letter as public wanted ‘input’ which can only happen once at end of meeting Funny – when I tried to broaden Rinfret’s query to ask what about somehow allowing PR to have live access to meetings held on Haida Gwaii --- Mussallem went into his Alpha Male role and attacked me (as he did at last SQCRD meeting too) --- ‘Where is the question?’ Others translated it for him --- I will come back to this issue of public input and ‘we accept only questions’ later --- for me it gets to foundations of democracy and ‘representative government

Here is where the ‘Observer Status’ came from – what role Regional Districts in Treaty negotiations and how pay for it etc

More later

Very large budget deficit coming from QC land fill and Sandspit water facility I will deal with this in more detail tomorrow Note too CUPW had observer at meeting and told to return Wednesday for outcome on Charlottes	Budget has to be passed by March 31^st --- both these items tabled until that date

See this previous page on SQCRD Budget for links etc	Is the SQCRD building for sale?
	The question was asked during public input part of meeting – the media person asking the question had heard Lax Kw’aalams wanting to have office space locally --- more later --- Personally I think this would ‘solve’ several issues ---For example the SQCRD meetings could be held in PR Council chambers which are already set up for ‘live’ feed to internet etc

	Another Store closing in PR
	Dollar Store in Mall turns off the lights --- I was told it was a surprise to Mall staff too --- but highlights the lack of consumer $$ plus the fact that only one cruise ship coming to town in foreseeable future

Created by LG on 28/3/2010

Last updated on Monday, March 29, 2010