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THE HERALD Wednesday July ll Page Opinion Page 30 years ago The Rotary Anns of George adopted a sevenyearold Ko boy as a foster child The adof of Pak Soon Suk was through Foster Parents of Can t Soon Suk Is living in a Korear He lost his father she 1 following the Korean War A took the life of his mother years ago Besides providing boy with material aid the Anns write him and send him books and toys Soon Suk aspires to be a teacher The YMCA dedicated a plaque in memory of John Morden Neilson at the official opening of the West End Camp Mr Neilson was the grandson of the late Neilson who donated property for the camp in 1927 A scroll was also presented to Gor don Shipp who completed the din ing hall in time for the opening 15 years ago About SO residents show ed up at the Halton Board of Education meeting with placards in hand to fight the boards deci sion to close Public School The placards had logos saying We pay tax dont use the axe and This is Canada- Russian dic tatorship not welcome here Residents have been trying to pre vent the schools closing for the past six months GUARD accused that the Ministry of Environment was operating the landfill site in Georgetown below the ministrys own standards William Johnson the chairman of Group United Against Rural Dumping was quoted as saying Ministry stan dards are set down to protect the environment Operation below these guidelines can cause irrever sible damage Mr Johnson ex plained that six inches of fill are re quired to cover the daily load but this is rarely met The site was un popular with many because of its proximity to Credit Valley River 10 years ago Approximately 70 people show ed up at the Alcott Memorial Arena in support of the Vietnamese boat people The meeting was organized by the Georgetown chapter of the Torontobased Save the Boat Peo ple During the meeting dozens of people offered their assistance People offered accommodations furnishings clothing jobs and even meals at both restaurants and private homes Rockwood resident David Lasby won the overall trophy at the Halton livestock judging competi tion held at the Hills farms of Ernie Wilson and Jeff Nurse Mr Lasby was one of three Halton Hills residents who took home prizes during the competition Others were Georgetown residents Bill Robinson who won the Cham pion Dairy Judge Trophy and Amanda Kuncia who won the Champion Swine Judge Trophy Wendy Chaplin also of Georgetown was chosen as one of the 150 delegates selected from across the province to attend the Provincial Homemaking Con ference held at the University of Guelph Delegates were to focus their discussions on the theme The International Year of the Child 5 years ago Georgetown residents Peter and Betty and their 16yearold son Jack participated in a 300mile roundrobin motorcycle drive dur ing which they hoped to help raise for the Georgetown Cancer Society The ride started and end ed in Wetland Ontario Mr and Mrs Bot are part of the Retreads Motorcycle Club a motorcycle club where the only prerequisite besides having a motorcycle is that members have to be at least years old The Bots hoped that the clubs involvement in the round robin would among other things improve peoples perception of motorcyclists Kevin Flynn was acclaimed as the Halton New Democratic Party federal candidate The nomination meeting was held at the Chemicals Workers Hall in Oakville Chipping away at the food Keifs Donna KM Hen SUIT The Canadian beaver is one nas ty tough little camper My image is irrevocably altered my illusions irreversibly shattered and my camping food supply totally gone after a weekend in Algonquin Park Normally a weekend in the woods put you on guard for bears raccoons squirrels and other hungry creatures in hot pursuit of your carefullyrationed food supp ly- But last weekend the innocent symbol of Canadian work ethic looked a little more like an American or something When it was obvious a creature bad entered our food bag my cam ping buddy and I clapped our bands screamed and tried to shoo whatever it was away Thats a rodent said my friend but its too large to be a squirrel And whatever it was was too small to sea bear We put the matter and ourselves to rest for the night At am I checked my watch there was a scurrying Bad commission members stick blindly to NEC plan Dear Sir We are responding to the two ar ticles in your July 1989 edition entitled Hewitt under fire at NEC from environmentalist group and Eight members op pose plan We believe these ar ticles are based on four assump tions that are incorrect 1 development is not permitted under the Niagara Escarpment Plan 2 the way to protect the escarp ment is to ha ve no development 3 any member of the Niagara Escarpment Commission who votes in favor of any form of development is opposed to the Plan and Commission members who re ject any form of development are good and those who vote in favor of development are bad First of all the Niagara Escarp ment Plan describes the type of development permitted on the escarpment It does not prohibit development The 725 kilometres of land that make up the escarpment corridor have been dlvidecFinto seven land- use designations each with its own specified level of permitted development For example land which falls into the protection or the natural designations can on ly be developed in very limited ways whereas land with the designations of rural or of ur ban can have more development It is therefore incorrect to assume that the Niagara Escarp ment Plan prohibits development It is designed to provide a balance between development and preser vation of this Important resource Indeed a blanket prohibition would be the equivalent of ex propriation without compensation and a level of government in tervention that is not in our democratic tradition The second incorrect assumption is that the way to protect the escarpment is to have no develop ment The plan is the result of the input from many different groups representing many different points of view across the develop mentpreservation spectrum This diversified input reflects On tarios growing population of peo ple with increasingly varied backgrounds and landuse in terests To suggest that a kilometre corridor running up the centre of Ontario should be entire ly unavailable for norma uses in vites wholesale rejection of the plan A fullscale prohibition on development in the escarpment comdor would be overturned and put the escarpment lands at greater risk than the current policy of controlled development The third assumption is that any member of the NEC who votes in favor of development is opposed to the plan As discussed earlier the plan permits certain types of develop ment depending on the lands classification and the proposals merits within the plan Some pro posals will comply with the plan some will be borderline and some will not comply at all Accordingly every proposal must be judged on its own ment It is important for commission members to know the plan ana be able to apply it in a fair and objective fashion and not be in fluenced by pressure groups or personal biases Clearly a member who votes in favor of a development proposal can not be assumed to be opposed to the plan The fourth incorrect assumption is that commission members who reject any form of development are good and those who vote in favor of development are bad If the members of the commis sion were to look at every applica tion for development within the 725 kilometre corridor and simply say No they would be In conflict with what the Niagara Escarp ment Plan says They would also be in conflict with the right of every citizen to have an impartial hearing How can anyone suggest that blanket rejection of all develop ment in the Niagara Escarpment corridor is the spirit or policy of the Niagara Escarpment Plan If it were why have a Niagara Escarpment Commission at all Why not save the taxpayers money by having a parttime employee periodically stamp all applications for development with the word Rejected and leave it at that Surely good commission members are those who know the plan and apply it objectively to each development proposal Bad commission members are those who are captive to the agenda of any singleinterest lobby group The Niagara Escarpment Plan is a major step on the road to sus tainable development It is a shield against both cut and slash developers and lets turn back the clock romanticists Yours truly Kent and Lois McClure Nuclear power is no bargain Continued from Page 6 the nuclear industry is good for us Couple this with billion federal subsidies over the past five years to an enterprise that hasnt sold a reactor for over a decade and cant even give one away This Is clearly a welfare case mas querading as a business Nuclear power is poorly understood by the public they say ill the advertisements The benefit of the doubt must go to the people who are forced to pay for the risks of nuclear power with their health i e taxpayers and not to paid experts in the nuclear business The nuclear ads also dont mention the first tally from cancer studies which shows an in crease in leukemia rates among Children living near Ontario reac tors Premier Peterson is still bound to his ejection promise to cancel Darlington So what is he waiting for more flaky cost estimates more cheap and nasty health studies courtesy of Canadas nuclear protectorate and more leukemia in the playground Future generations who will be forced to wade through our mess of radioactive waste will decide whether our nuclear power pro gram has been a bargain Yours truly Anne Hansen Kids see court in courtship Weirs View sound a whacking sound as something hit the ground and the sound of noses sniffing around the blue nylon tent propped a little too closely perhaps to the waters edge I poked my head out of the tent Im so brave and saw clearly In the moonlight two creatures with brown ping pong for tails They were ransacking our camp site knocking over metal cups paw marks were discovered in the cups the next morning They didnt seem too fearful of humans This was the second occasion one of these eager beavers had showed its aggression When I saw the animal pilfering my lunch and snacks for the next day I tried to scare him off He just made some strange sound and looked ready to make a nosedive for the food bag You expect this reaction from squirrels and rac coons you might anticipate this reaction from a bear if you had the guts to challenge one but to see this behavior in a beaver the symbol of Canada the little guy on our nickel is a bit dismaying At this point I should add that tying the food up in a tree would have solved the problem No food no animals looking for food So the beaver like any good Canadian pouncing on an open in vitation had some bagels cheese and trail mix for supper But gosh aggression from a beaver Its just astounding how much more sophisticated todays kids are than we used to be By the age of 13 as we know to days kids are hardheaded little computer whizzes who know that the key to future happiness lies partly in selffulfillment but main ly in leveraged takeovers And now it seems theyre discovering the joys of litigation According to the newspaper a West Palm Beach 15yearold nam ed Tomontra has suc cessfully sued a 17yearold boy who stood her up on a date to the junior prom Apparently young Marlon Shadd phoned Tomontra four days before the prom to announce hed broken bis ankle But she main tains she still expected him to show up and when be didnt she suc cessfully sued for to cover the cost of new shoes a hairdo and flowers Said People dont know what I went through It was my first date And she added Always be truthful especially with people my age Well certainly has a valid point Its Important to be and tokeep your word And no doubt this episode will be a valuable lesson for Marlon the lad who foolishly believed a broken ankle would get him off the hook with a young woman Next time hell know enough to break both legs instead In any case my first response to this article was quite frankly dismay If young women have discovered they can successfully sue their dates for letting them down then being a young male is about to become an awfully expen sive proposition And then suddenly the truth dawned I am still a sort of young ish male and I have never stood up a woman in my life Quite the contrary as a teenager I was left standing more often than many coatracks Oh granted Dear Heart flintily maintains that I am utterly unreliable that my word is useless and that Im Invariably an hour late for everything But this is different Were in a relationship No the plain fact is that tras lawsuit made me realize how appallingly stupid I was as a teenager All those years I spent delivering newspapers to make Instead of just suing the girls who didnt want to go out with me There were a few of my friends who couldnt have made much money this way Others could have realized a modest but regular in come I could nave quit school bought a golf and country club and retired I was 13 when I first worked up the nerve to ask a girl out to a movie Her name was Lynn Miller and she blushed engagingly when I told her Id drop by her bouse at six oclock on Friday In my boyish exuberance I ac tually arrived 15 minutes early But fortunately this didnt cause any awkwardness for Lynn since shed already left for volleyball practice It took me two years to recover sufficiently to ask someone else out But I did And I vividly remember my first date since as it turns out I wasnt even on it I had asked an apparently char ming redhead named Karen to company me to the school play Wbepwearrived I discovered we were sitting next to my old and valued friend Rocky Hudson I should of course have known what to expect from someone nam ed Rocky Hudson By the time the lights went down they were chatting animatedly By the second act they were sitting in the balcony And by the time the final curtain came down theyd already been at the Dairy Queen for half an hour My feeble effort at retribution was to spread the rumor that childhood nickname had been Stinky and that Karen had been observed kissing the chubbier of the Watson twins If only Id known enough to phone a lawyer Karen would have learned a terrible lesson and Rockys wages would be today As stands I cant do anything but sigh enviously at the example set by young Tomontra Theres a girl who understands how to cope with the agonies of courtship Just drop the last syllable and youre away to the races