CHIEFS GLAD TO BE HOME AFTER ROAD TRIP PRODUCES SINGLE POINT Team remains atop Mainland Division, clinch playoff spot
times
I’m how old?
Chilliwack
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THURSDAY, JANUARY 28, 2016
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Old RCMP gun range goes silent UFV looking to convert building into rec centre BY PAUL J. HENDERSON phenderson@chilliwacktimes.com
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Shock & awe G
BY PAUL J. HENDERSON phenderson@chilliwacktimes.com
Senior afraid to bake and cook after her monthly hydro bill doubles and nobody can tell her why
ail Cross loves to make Christmas goodies but gave up her holiday baking this past season in an attempt to cut down on her electricity usage. “I like to bake and cook but I can’t afford to,” the 74-year-old told the Times in her downtown Chilliwack apartment. You see, Cross’s last BC Hydro bill was $255.10 for the two months ending Dec. 24. The year before, that billing period was $136.10. “And nothing has changed,” her
daughter Debbie Halladay said. Worrying Cross further is that her estimated bill based on usage so far in this billing period is $300. “I can’t afford $300 every month for hydro,” the diminutive if cheerful senior said. If she had been doing something different, or the weather was unusual or everyone in the apartment building’s bill also increased sharply, that might make sense, but Cross doesn’t understand why her bill nearly doubled yet others stayed the same. Halladay lives in the same building and her bill for that period was $87. { See HYDRO BILL, page A4 } Paul J. Henderson/TIMES
{ See RANGE, page A7 }
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Gail Cross checks the thermostat in her Chilliwack apartment. The 74-year-old was shocked by her last bill from BC Hydro and doesn’t know if she can afford the next one.
onspicuous in their absence, volleys of gunfire no longer ring out near the Vedder Bridge as regular weekday Rotary Trail users and University of the Fraser Valley (UFV) staff and students have noticed. It was April 2014 when those behind the RCMP’s Pacific Regional Training Centre (PRTC) announced $19 million in federal dollars to build the new indoor firing range to replace the open-air range, long the bane of UFV students and faculty, Vedder Crossing residential neighbours and Rotary Trail users. When first designed, the new range was to be used to train and re-certify RCMP officers as well as agents with the Canada Border Service Agency (CBSA), and was going to be a 4,000-square-metre building with two 16-lane, 50-metre ranges with advanced sound abatement technology. The structure was built by Chilliwack firm Preview Builders, and while no formal announcement was made, the RCMP quietly stopped using the outdoor range in recent weeks, according to UFV students and staff. (Despite requests to the RCMP to comment on the new facility and exactly when they moved in, the agency declined to respond.)
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