inman Teacher Taken To Task
page
5
UnTangling oil pipeline poliTics
page
6
new animal dance page aT shadbolT
12
wednesday
November 13 2013 www.burnabynewsleader.com
The life of former burnaby mp svend robinson is chronicled in a new book. See page A3
School district must refund fees Part of classaction lawsuit settlement Wanda Chow
wchow@burnabynewsleader.com
mArIo bArTeL/NeWSLeADer
A worker helps bring in the cranberry harvest at Mayberry Farms in South Burnaby on Wednesday. It takes about a week to collect the berries from the 70-acre farm. The fields are flooded with water and then the berries are loosened from the bushes with special beaters, then collected using large booms which are floated to a conveyer to be loaded onto trucks. The berries are destined for processing into juice and frozen at a plant in richmond.
Pipeline video touts Burnaby benefits Wanda Chow
wchow@burnabynewsleader.com
Kinder Morgan’s slick new video on YouTube touting the economic benefits of the proposed Trans Mountain pipeline expansion claims the taxes it pays could be a boon for Burnaby taxpayers. But Burnaby’s mayor and the councillor who heads the city’s finance committee aren’t convinced.
Against tranquil music, the tanker ships annually. video’s voiceover states that the The project, which runs from $5.4-billion project cost Edmonton to Burnaby, and $3 billion in operating would almost triple the costs over 20 years will bring pipeline’s capacity, from the economic benefits including current 300,000 barrels of billions in tax revenues. crude oil a day, to 890,000 “Every time a tanker barrels a day, to allow for docks at Westridge Marine johNSToN the increased export of oil Terminal in Burnaby, it sands crude to overseas brings $310,000 in value to markets. the local economy,” it says. At this “It means $2.1 billion in point, the graphic notes that will additional federal taxes and $1.7 mean $126 million a year, which by billion in additional provincial those figures would translate to 406 taxes,” of which $1 billion would
YOUR FUTURE. OUR FOCUS. THE MUIR INVESTMENT TEAM Your Retirement Specialists
604-451-3100 // www.muironmoney.com
exam mpleteonly with co tients new pa
Kinder Morgan points out upside of expansion, but mayor isn’t buying it
be to B.C., according to the figures shown on the video. It says Kinder Morgan will pay $500 million in additional municipal taxes over 20 years. “In Burnaby, in one year alone, tax revenues could be used to hire 132 extra firefighters or more than cover the annual garbage collection costs.” Kinder Morgan spokesperson Lisa Clement said by email that the company’s figures were calculated by an “independent economist.”
FRecEtrEic Creating beautiful smiles! El
rush TootRhFbamily 1 pE
canada way Dental Dental Practice
112 - 3787 canada way, Burnaby 604.559.8001 Raymond James Ltd., Member-Canadian Investor Protection Fund.
please see CompANy, A7
OPEN MON-Sat & EvENiNgS • NEw PatEiNtS wElcOME!
The Burnaby school district faces having to refund summer school fees from previous years but it’s not yet known how much it’ll be on the hook for, says its school board chair. The refunds are coming under a settlement reached last month in two class-action lawsuits against B.C. school boards that charged tuition fees for summer school courses that led to academic credit. The lawsuit had claimed the tuition fees for courses used to graduate were illegal. In 2007, theneducation minister Shirley Bond ordered districts to stop charging the fees for such courses and ordered fees for that year be refunded. Burnaby school board chair Baljinder Narang said by email that the class-action for Burnaby covers only fees charged for academic and remedial courses in the summers of 2005 and 2006. “It doesn’t cover things like summer camps, arts programs or see ‘Too eArLy’, A4