The Rumour de-mongers

Monday’s council meeting featured a session of lets stop a rumour, as the ever popular Prince Rumour mill churns out some new material for the population of late.

The most impressive one, and the one that seems to have attracted the attention of council revolves around CN and employment prospects for the city. According to councilor Sheila Gordon-Payne, the rumour flying around the city had it that CN had come to town and offered up a bounty of jobs and that council had turned them down. She wanted to go on the record that this was totally untrue and that no CN delegation had arrived to discuss employment prospects, and thus, Council had not turned down any possible employment options for the city’s job seekers.

As part of the discussion on rumours the always controversial status of the pulp mill came up for discussion and a suggestion was made for a return of the Herb Pond mailings, those fancy flyers that the city used to put out with the latest development from the desk of the mayor.

Since the mayor has recently taken to sending his thoughts to the weekly paper Northern View, it’s doubtful that we’ll see the mass mailings any time soon. After all if the city can get the job done for free, why spend all that money on flyers and printing costs!

Of course there are those out there that suggest a few less of the in camera sessions Council frequently has, might go a long ways in cutting down on the wild speculation and the frantic pace of that rumour mill of all things Prince Rupert. As always whenever you close a door, for whatever the reason, somebody, somewhere is going to talk!

The Daily News had all the details of the busy work of council on Monday, including the recollections of those that attended the UBCM last week in Victoria.

HIGH LEVEL MEETINGS OFFER HOPE
Provincial minister talks of short-term solution
By Patrick Witwicki
The Daily News
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Page One

The Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) meeting held in Victoria last week was dominated by discussion surrounding welfare, E. I. and poverty in general.

Coun. Joy Thorkelson, who sat as deputy mayor at Prince Rupert’s council meeting last night, updated council on specific discussions held at the UBCM on the subject that is currently affecting North Coast fishermen and shoreworkers.

“We were able to get in and see (Minister) Claude Richmond,” she said. “We told him people are desperately trying to find work in our community. And while there are potential jobs in the future… people can’t fill their stomachs on future jobs.”

Thorkelson said Richmond listened and sounded genuine in attempting to find a solution.

“He was quite sympathetic, which I found surprising,” she said. “He said he would try to see if there is anything he can do for us short-term.”

“He seemed to think we can get action sooner than later”

Coun. Tony Briglio suggested that council come up with its own deadline for addressing the problem, as opposed to waiting for answers and solutions from the provincial government down the road.

“We should probably have a deadline date,” he said. “Words don’t feed the stomach.”

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Council then went on to address a problem that only seems to affect Prince “Rumour”.

Coun. Sheila Gordon-Payne expressed her frustration at the negative rumours that always seem to be commonplace in and around Prince Rupert, including the latest regarding CN.

“I had a call from someone regarding a visit with CN,” she said. “They had heard that CN had come to town, and offered jobs, and council had turned it down, which is totally untrue.

“CN has not come forward to council about this at all, and if fact our mayor is a speaker at a CN dinner down in Vancouver (right now).”

Coun. Joy Thorkelson added: “We should have a spot on the agenda for rumour-killing,”

Gordon-Payne went on to explain that she believed the negative rumours have the potential to negatively impact the community.

“I think that’s what hurts our community. If ( people) aren’t sure, contact a councilor and find out if it’s true, before it’s blown out of proportion.”

Coun. Tony Briglio then continued on that theme, wondering out loud about the latest developments with Skeena Cellulose.

“The Skeena mill rumours… maybe we need the PPWC (union) to come and meet with us about what might be happening with the mill,” he said. “Certainly, everybody wonders about Skeena.”

Briglio suggested that council go back to what was done in the past, and send out a letter from the mayor to keep the community up-to-date on what is happening in Rupert.

“I would encourage the mayor to do that to maybe alleviate some of the rumour mill,” he said.