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TIE HERALD Wednesday December Page Patti Starr just the facts Walt ft Elliot Hallon North Liberal Two generations share Christmas The George Kennedy Public School Choir consisting of Grade and students brought good cheer to the seniors of the Bennett Health Care Centre Dec Teresa Mercer was one of the students who went ipto the audience to sing alongside with Cripps Herald photo Earlier this week I was wat the television news the evening While playing the great Canadian game of channel flipping I happened to see the same news item on two different stations At least I think it was the same news item The principals were the same and the report that was mentioned was identical but nothing else seemed to match at all The two news readers were talking about the recent auditors report prepared to examine Patti Starr yes that Patti Starr two years as the chairperson of Ontario Place Station A recounted Ms Starr had reduced the deficit of On Place by approximately SI million and had only taken very lit tie money for her services despite the fact that she was quite entitled to a great deal more Station B discussed how her management style had caused a large turnover in staff and the fact that some restaurant equipment purchased her tenure was sold a after its purchase at a loss To be fair the first station did mention her management pro blems and neither station said thing untrue However the same set of facts produced two ferent stones one negative and one positive After getting over my astonish at the two quite different stones I began to think about how we all get our facts As an I am lucky enough to get about 20 per cent my information firsthand and another 50 per cent secondhand Unfortunately this means that about 30 per cent of the fact that must use when com to a decision are filtered through three or more people Anyone who has played the old par ty game of starting a story at one end of a room and having each per son relay it to their neighbor will realize that the accuracy of any story is inversely related to the number of people it passes through on its way to you The ideal solution would be to go out and get all the information about a subject for myself fortunately anyone who has ever worked a large and busy bus will realize that time simply does not permit this The best that can be done is to have the main parts of pertinent questions checked e by yourself or so meone you trust When you con sider the fact that I get a pile of in formation at least six inches deep in my office every day you can begin to see the difficulty The genera public has an even worse problem My job is to assimilate large amounts of in formation and then try to make decisions that help mv tuents directly or indirectly Your job may be anything from selling to a taxi or teaching school Believe me as a former teacher and business owner I realize working all day and spending t me with your fami 1 leaves you little time for in formation if want to get am sleep at all Clean Up Vour Act PitchIn MY GENERATION Fash For The Young Heart 11 MAIN ST S GEORGETOWN in ram Knox Church 873 The best approach that can be taken in these circumstances is the critical approach I mean cntical not negative Cntically ex amine all the information you get regardless of whether it comes from your fnends the newspaper TV or even a Queen s Park report If what you are hearing does not sound logical reasonable or pro bable then ask your politicians Regardless of what you may have heard we are not here just to think up new and creative ways of ding your money No politician should be afraid of criticism but complaints based on a second news clip are not really all that useful most of the time Reporters do their best to be ob jective and honest but it would be a poor reporter indeed who had neither ideas nor beliefs What you read in the paper and hear or see on the radio or TV may be only part of the story If your govern ment is not explaining things clear ly then let us know so that we can do a better job of getting you the facts Big business has lobby groups Doctors have lobby groups Daycare advocates have lobby groups Even garbage dumps have lobby groups But you have only yourself Rather than be a weakness I think this is a strength Your message is not filtered through other people but can be delivered exactly the way you want it Every few years I have to seek a formal vote of confidence from vou Every day I need to know what you are thinking At the bot torn line I cant help with pro blems if I don t get your informa don Holidays Have an old fashioned Christmas with to be remembered and love to be cherished long afterward To Ait Our Customers and Friends We Wish The Season Best Photography Hillside Drive Georgetown 8772322 a Egbert CRABTREE EVELYN Toiletries Gifts of Distinction Made of the finest natural ingredients free of animal testing manual sprays smith Downtown 821