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Losing faith on both sides
› Cover Story
Patience for a fair settlement also being lost
BY PAUL J. HENDERSON phenderson@chilliwacktimes.com
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Safe as houses
Greg Laychak/TIMES
Englewood Courtyard, a 45-plus adult lifestyle, wood-framed condo structure in Chilliwack was designed to the SAFERhome building standard, allowing each unit to change with its occupant’s needs as they age. GREG LAYCHAK glaychak@chilliwacktimes.com
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an organization that wants a world of housing where specialization isn’t in the picture at all. “The only job of design is to enable users,” says McCannell. “All users.” “Inaccessible design is the product of lazy designers.” McCannell and Pat Simpson, executive director of SAFERhome Standards Society, want universal housing design that can easily accommodate everyone—design where “inclusion” is the motto.
“For every Brad there are 1,000 grandmothers with exactly the same needs in housing,” says Simpson, who was with McCannell during the inspection. “So why is it a disability issue? It’s not. Fix the home so that our seniors can remain independent and you get Brad a normal home as a byproduct.” McCannell and Simpson are aiming to revolutionize how builders design homes, and in all likelihood, the revolution will be quiet, simple
and subtle. It just takes a proactive way of planning how housing structures are built. Small changes, big difference Simpson points to the wide 36-inch doorways, explaining that the inclusive design saves a stud for each of the five doors in this unit. No additional labour is needed and material is saved. { See SAFER, page A24 }
{ See TEACHERS, page A3 }
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rad McCannell moves his wheelchair around an unfinished condo unit at Englewood Courtyard, inspecting the rooms and bathrooms. McCannell, a quadriplegic, wheels through the entire apartment structure’s first floor with ease, assessing the very design that allows his freedom of movement. But there’s nothing special about that, according to McCannell. He’s inspecting for SAFERhome,
Revolutionizing how builders design homes
rovincial leaders of both sides in the current school labour dispute say the other won’t negotiate in good faith, a sentiment echoed by local representatives for the government and the teachers’ union. “Our children need to be in school, and we need an affordable settlement,” Chilliwack-Hope MLA Laurie Throness said this week. “Meanwhile, patience with both parties is evaporating with every passing day.” On the other side, Chilliwack teachers are “nervous but resolute,” according to the president of the Chilliwack Teachers’ Association. “I think that we are resolute in that we know we are doing the right thing, defending education, working for a fair deal for ourselves, but a bit nervous that we seem to be dealing with someone that is quite intransigent,” Clint Johnston said. Johnston said the union has been told in recent days that the government’s proposal in June was the “absolute bottom line offer,” which makes bargaining impossible. As for his sense of what the majority of his constituents think, Throness echoed statements the BC Liberal government have been saying for days, namely, that the BCTF demands are unaffordable. “I think the silent majority would
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