Editor:
Re: Editorial dated March 30, 2010: Supply and Demand Project falls a bit flat
Your recent editorial reminded me of the Mark Twain quote, “Everybody talks about the weather, but nobody ever does anything about it.”
Climate change mitigation is certainly critical, but we really need to both reduce carbon emissions AND prepare for the future.
Climate change adaptation is about responding in a direct, pragmatic way to things that we can see and feel – like putting on a hat to prevent a sunburn.
For example, the Okanagan Basin Water Board’s recent Okanagan water supply and demand study shows that if you and I and all our neighbours do half as much outdoor watering – by tuning up our irrigation systems and replacing some lawn with beautiful drought-tolerant plants – we can double our domestic water supply without building dams or other expensive new infrastructure.
Call it climate change adaptation or call it being a responsible citizen.
My experience is that while many “know” about the Okanagan’s water issues, it has been hard to solve them.
Where does one start?
What would have the biggest benefit for the cost?
People have been quick to blame agriculture, but no one knew how much we were wasting on our own back yards.
The supply and demand study gives a base of science for practical actions that can be taken by local governments and individuals to reduce the pain of shortages for all water users.
Most importantly, it gives powerful computer models to help planners and water managers guide these actions.
I strongly agree that we need to focus on change – this is not something to let sit on the shelf.
The federal grant announced on March 26th will help put this science into action.
I’ll be making a presentation on the water study to the Osoyoos Lake Water Quality Society, along with Osoyoos Mayor and OBWB Chair Stu Wells, on May 20th.
Please come and bring your ideas.
Contact the society for more details.
Anna Warwick Sears,
Executive Director
Okanagan Basin Water Board

OSOYOOS TIMES-April 7, 2010

VITAL PARTS OF ANTI-HST MESSAGE MISSED

Editor:
It would appear that your reporter Laurena Weninger missed a few important segments of Mr. Vander Zalm’s town hall meeting.
Probably the most important thing that Mr. Vander Zalm said is that Saskatchewan had the HST and the electorate of that province, once it was in place, decided that it was a tax that they did not want.
So they voted their provincial government out and the new provincial government got rid of the HST.
Then there was the fact that the HST is a tax whereby the Provincial government will have given its right under the Canadian Constitution to ‘make laws in relation to the raising of money by any mode or system of taxation.’
The HST is a Federal Tax.
And the Federal government can then raise or lower, or change the rules, as they see fit.
Near the end of the meeting an interesting question was posed: is there anything preventing the Provincial government from enacting a ‘new’ PST after we have all ‘accepted’ the HST?
The response was that there is nothing that would prevent the Provincial government from doing that.
She also missed the part where they explained the legal challenge.
Before it ever got to a trial, the organizers will try to get a Court injunction, based on the fact that the tax goes against the Canadian Constitution and possibly with evidence of the fact that the residents of B.C. are angry with the government regarding this tax which would be shown by them signing the petition in all 85 ridings giving Mr. Vander Zalm’s HST movement the required 10 per cent needed to demand his legislation go before the B. C. legislature.
That injunction could stop the tax dead in its tracks.
Those parts of Mr. Vander Zalm’s anti-HST message were important.
They let people know that instead of just ’tilting at windmills.’
Mr. Vander Zalm may actually be showing us a way to send our elected representatives who go off to Victoria and then forget about those who voted for them that that can have repercussions.
Teresa Calwell,
Osoyoos

OSOYOOS TIMES-April 7, 2010