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Friday, December 28, 2018 | Your community newspaper since 1916

CITIZEN PHOTOS BY BRENT BRAATEN

Year in pictures LEFT: Firefighters enter a four-plex on Westwood Drive that was engulfed in flames on March 29. BELOW: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, centre, poses with BC Wildfire staff in Prince George on Aug. 24.

YEAR IN REVIEW

Snowfall warning issued Frank PEEBLES Citizen staff fpeebles@pgcitizen.ca

CITIZEN FILE PHOTO

Tape marks bullet holes on a house in the 1300-block of Strathcona Avenue after an alleged drive-by shooting on Oct. 5.

ATM heist among unsolved crimes of 2018 Mark NIELSEN Citizen staff mnielsen@pgcitizen.ca A brazen theft of an automatic teller machine from a local business is among the crimes committed in 2018 for which an arrest has not yet been made. The heist occurred on the night of Nov. 11 when, at about 8:45 p.m., two men wearing masks, overalls and gloves smashed the glass door at the Spotless Dry Cleaners and Laundromat at 15th Avenue and Johnson Street, across from Value Village. From there, they carried out the ATM and loaded it into a pickup truck and took off. Images from a surveillance camera at the business were released but the two remain on the loose. That might be understandable given how well they were disguised but the images did provide a good look at their getaway vehicle – a grey late-model four-door Dodge Ram 1500 with running boards, factory rims, split dual exhaust, trailer hitch and a large scrape on the passenger side front door. It was not the only crime committed this past year that remains unsolved – some because the victim refused to cooperate with police but others because either the perpetrator was a complete stranger or simply not seen. That was the case in a pair of shots-fired incidents. Just before 6 a.m. on Oct. 5, RCMP received multiple reports of shots fired near the corner of Strathcona Avenue and Norwood Street in the VLA. RCMP found a home that suffered damage that appeared consistent with bullet holes but were unable to nab a suspect. Sev-

Today’s Weather Hi -4° Low -9°

LOCAL HOROSCOPE OPINION NEWS SPORTS

eral people were inside the home but there were no injuries from what police suspect was a targeted attack. Mystery also continues to surround the discovery on Nov. 25 of a semiautomatic rifle on a walking path between the 2400 blocks of Oak and Victoria streets after a number of nearby residents reported hearing shots fired. Police were notified at about 8:45 p.m. Arrests are also still to be made in a pair of attacks – one in which a man was hit with a hammer when he refused to hand over his phone, the other when an 18-year-old girl was the target of an attempted sexual assault. The first occurred on Oct. 8 at about 9:30 a.m. on 17th Avenue near Larch Street. The attacker was described only as a lone male wearing a mask and the victim was treated in hospital and later released. The second occurred on the evening of Dec. 3 as the girl was walking along the 200-block of Ruggles Street. The assailant is described as dark-skinned, possibly African descent, 20-to-30 years old, six feet tall with a medium build and very little or no hair. He was wearing a grey sweater, jeans and a tuque. Anyone who has information that could help police break these cases can call Prince George RCMP at 250-561-3300 or anonymously contact Crime Stoppers at 1-800222-8477 or online at www.pgcrimestoppers.bc.ca (English only). You do not have to reveal your identity to Crime Stoppers. If you provide information that leads to an arrest, you could be eligible for a cash reward.

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The snow is coming. Local residents had almost forgotten what the white stuff looked like, with the winter drought that covered (meaning not covered at all, by anything) the region this season. That’s about to change. An overnight snowfall warning from Environment Canada promises a significant dump across the eastern half of the province from the Yukon border all the way to the Alberta border, and south to 100 Mile House. Prince George is right in the middle of that precipitation. On Thursday afternoon the overnight amount was anticipated to be about 25 cm. “In addition to heavy snow, this system will also produce strong winds beginning Friday afternoon and continuing through Saturday,” said a spokesperson from Environment Canada. “These winds combined with falling snow may locally reduce visibility further

in blowing snow. Be prepared to adjust your driving with changing road conditions. Visibility may be suddenly reduced at times in heavy snow.” The Pine Pass and the Cariboo Mountains were specified as probably getting higher amounts of snow. The temperatures for Prince George were easygoing, as the snow began to fall. The mercury was anticipated to fluctuate from a daytime high of -2 C Thursday afternoon to -6 C overnight. Making the driving conditions more dangerous is the expected weekend weather, which Environment Canada expects to get above zero on Saturday, bringing with it the threat of cold rain on top of all the fresh snow. By Sunday, the skies are forecasted to clear and the temperatures dip to -18 C on Sunday and Monday nights, with daytime highs around -8 C. Tuesday could have a small dip to -14 C in the day, but that is expected to ease to -8 C by Wednesday afternoon. Monitor the Environment Canada website and DriveBC.com for the latest information most pertinent to you.

Environmental, economic issues divide First Nations Citizen news service A Vancouver-area First Nation’s decision to support the Woodfibre LNG project may have come as a surprise to some, considering the nation’s role in helping to derail the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion earlier this year. The Squamish Nation community was one of a handful of First Nations that lined up to convince the Federal Court of Appeal in August to overturn National Energy Board approval of the controversial oil pipeline expansion from Edmonton to the West Coast, leaving its future in doubt. But the nation’s acceptance of the liquefied natural gas export project last month reinforces a simple truth, says historian Ken Coates: while Canada’s first people may approach tough questions differently than non-native Canadians, their decisions are motivated by many of the same factors. “These are complex issues and you’re always going to have people on both sides,” said the Macdonald-Laurier Institute’s senior fellow in Aboriginal and northern Canadian issues and the author of several books and publications on Indigenous relations. “These are communities that need real sustainable, substantial economic benefit, where Indigenous people have been

B.C.’s glaciers melting NEWS 5

See page 2 for more details and short-term forecasts

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locked out of the market economy for 150 years, since Confederation. “They’ve been wanting in for a long period of time.” Woodfibre LNG gained trust through five years of consultations and by agreeing to abide by conditions under the nation’s environmental and cultural assessment process (which operates separately from federal and provincial regimes), said Khelsilem, a spokesman for the Squamish Nation council, and one of its councillors who voted against the proposal in a close 8-6 vote. In return for its support, the community is to receive annual and milestone payments totalling $226 million over the 40year life of the project, and its companies will be in line to bid on up to $872 million in contracts. Hundreds of jobs are expected to result for the nation’s 4,000 members, nearly half of whom live off reserve in the Greater Vancouver area. Khelsilem, who uses one name, said the product involved in each project – Woodfibre LNG’s relatively benign natural gas versus the “extreme risk” of diluted bitumen from the oilsands in the Trans Mountain pipeline – was just one of several factors in the decision to back one and fight the other. — see ‘IT’S NOT ABOUT, page 3

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