What I learned on a week of the Food Bank Diet

I’m trying to decide how to wrap up my day on this Friday, Dec. 7, but I’m pretty sure a good meal and a glass of Chardonnay will figure prominently. Since last Saturday, at the request of CBC radio, I’ve been on what I call the Food Bank Diet.

Today is their Food Bank Day, in which CBC studios all over the province raise funds and food for food banks. I was asked if I would be interested in living off a Food Bank hamper for a week, to which I agreed, but I figure up to but not including dinner tonight is close enough.

I began by getting a list of items from the Food Bank that are normally included in the monthly hamper provided to single clients. Some of it was already in the cupboard, so I made a stop at a grocery store and added the rest.

This is what’s included in the hamper: 1 tomato sauce/ pasta sauce, 1 dry soup, 1 small bag of rice, 1 can of beans, 1 can of meat/tuna/salmon, 3 cans of soup, 1 can of vegetables, 1 can of fruit, 1 small bag of dried pasta, 1 bag of cereal, 1 rice dish/Sidekicks, 1 KD.

That won’t get anyone through a month; I found that, by stretching things (for example, making two meals instead of one from a can of beans or soup), the hamper could likely last about 10 days. But then, it’s not expected to last a whole month; food bank clients provide the rest of their own food needs, helped out by twice-weekly offerings of perishable goods — bread, produce, pastries, etc. — from the Food Bank.

I allowed myself a loaf of bread and some greens in keeping with the perishable allotment and that definitely helped. But I wasn’t able to keep my meals totally in synch with the food available, and had to mix it up a bit, sometimes eating something for lunch or breakfast that would normally be reserved for dinner, and vice versa.

While the hampers are designed with the help of nutritionists, the non-perishables are pretty low in calories. My daily intake has easily been under 500 calories a day compared to the 2,000 a man of my age, weight, height and level of activity needs.

The result has been that I’ve dropped a few pounds. I was actually down five pounds until a couple of days ago, when one of them came back. Four or five pounds might sound pretty good to weight watchers, but I’ve been thin for the past while already so I can imagine the difficulty some hungry people have staying healthy.

What did I learn? A small insight into the challenges of not having enough food in the cupboard, and a re-affirmation of my admiration for those who make our amazing Food Bank possible, and for those who rely on it.

Thanks to CBC for inviting me to do this, and to Bernadette and Cori at the Food Bank for helping me set it up. I will toast you this evening when I uncork a fresh bottle of Chardonnay and enjoy a nice dinner.

Sharp’s candidacy adds interest to B.C. Tory nomination

Busy times in River City these days. I stopped by Gaglardi Square today for Peter Sharp’s announcement of his candidacy for the B.C. Conservative nomination in Kamloops-South Thompson.

Peter is a former council colleague and a personal friend of mine, and I know his work ethic, but I’ve seen nothing from the B.C. Conservatives and leader John Cummins to get excited about. Should he get the nomination, though, it will add interest to next spring’s election campaign. The Tories will have some catching up to do, with the Liberals’ Todd Stone going so far as to put his campaign vehicle in Saturday’s Santa Parade.

Great parade, by the way. Syd and I were judges again this year, judging the elves category (photo above is a winning entry by the Horse Barn and donkey refuge). It was a fun bunch of entries to review because of all the kids and animals on the floats. The youngsters clearly had a hand in the decorating of some of them, and it was great to see.

Last Thursday, I was honoured to present a bursary to journalism student Paige Kimberley at TRU’s awards ceremony in the gym. The format for this event is fantastic — just a couple of speeches, and then the donors make their presentations to the winners in groups at tables. Short and sweet, and lots of good feelings.

The bursary I presented to Paige is named the Mel Rothenburger Journalism Bursary and comes from The Daily News and Glacier Media Group. I couldn’t have received a better retirement gift than that, and as I joked on Thursday, it’s especially gratifying to have an award named after me while I’m still living and breathing.

Saturday night, on Daily News publisher Tim Shoults’ request, I did the honours in introducing Master of Ceremonies Jack Knox at the Rotary West’s Manhattan Nights fundraiser at the Colombo Hall.

Jack, of course, writes the Slightly Skewed humour column for The News once a week, but also writes several columns a week for the Victoria Times-Colonist. He’s a home-grown Kamloops guy (he once worked for The News as city editor) and has a hilarious sense of humour.

Needless to say, he was a big hit, and so was the program of magic and dancing put together by the club.

Movement to free spirit bear doomed to failure

Free him, or cage him? (Kamloops Daily News photo)

“Petitions fly over Clover,” says the front-page headline in today’s Kamloops Daily News. As surely as a petition was started to set Clover the kermode bear free, there was bound to be one urging that he be kept in captivity. So far, the “Free Clover” side has a substantial lead.

Some have taken the latter as an attack on the B.C. Wildlife Park, which is a first-class zoo and does a tremendous job looking after its animals, they say. Our zoo does, indeed, do an excellent job of caring for its wildlife, but that has nothing to do with the Clover case.

Clover falls into the philosophical question of whether we should keep wild animals in captivity if setting them free is an alternative. Nothing has been said to suggest there is any benefit to keeping this bear in a cage other than that he will be a major attraction. He will not advance our understanding of kermode bears, nor will he be “an ambassador” for his species, nor will his life in captivity educate us about wildlife in general.

Rehabilitating wild animals for release back into the wild is a lot more sophisticated than hauling them back into the woods and letting them go, which is about all that has been tried with this bear. What a triumph it would be to successfully return a spirit bear to his natural habitat, rather than keeping him for display.

Nevertheless, that’s a highly unlikely scenario. The “free Clover” petitions will fail, because a bureaucratic and political decision on his fate has already been made.

I am perplexed, incidentally, over the name that has been given this bear. “Clover” is a name that might have come out of Walt Disney Studios for an animated movie, or from Winnie the Poo. It evokes a picture of cute and cuddly, good for marketing purposes.

But this is a powerful, regal wild animal. He wouldn’t need a name at all if he wasn’t in captivity.

Surefire method for keeping poppies firmly attached

I received several emails today in response to my Daily News column on the controversy over using Canada-flag pins and such to keep Remembrance poppies from falling off. Here’s a particularly helpful one:

Mel:

I happened to read your column on the Poppy during my lunch period.

Keeping the Poppy pinned to a piece of clothing has been an ongoing issue for many years.

I have forwarded to you a photo I took, of a trick I was shown several years ago to keep my Poppy from going astray and I have never lost one since.

You push the pin through a piece of your clothing – through the plastic edge of the Poppy and then back into your clothing.

Hopefully this will be of benefit to you and your readers.

Cheers,

Chuck McKenzie

Past Zone Commander

Central B.C.

The Royal Canadian Legion

City trying to bring escort agencies into the open

I wrote in Thursday’s Armchair Mayor column for The Daily News about the City’s planned change in business-licence fees for escort agencies.

Under amendments to the business-licence bylaw, Kamloops escort agencies, body-rub parlours and exotic dancing services will only have to pay $2,000 a year instead of $3,000. It becomes effective next calendar year.

The $3,000 fee has been in place since 1997, since the council of the day under Cliff Branchflower decided it would be a way of raising money to support a program called SHOP — Social and Health Opportunities for Persons in the sex trade.

It was akin to charging high taxes on tobacco to fund anti-smoking campaigns.

The SHOP program struggled for many years. At one point, six businesses in the above categories actually did pay for business licences, but for a long time there’s been only one. A few years ago, the City gave up on the concept of business fees paying for SHOP, and began funding it directly.

Originally hosted by the Phoenix Centre, SHOP has been under the wing of the ASK Wellness Centre for the past half-dozen years.

Escort agencies and related businesses, meanwhile, now operate largely underground. The Social Planning Council has been discussing the issue since late last year, and made the recommendation on the lowering of the business licences to $2,000 in hopes it would encourage some of them to come out in the open.

As I wrote in yesterday’s column, it won’t work, of course, but credit to the City for trying. While researching for the column, I talked with Randy Lambright at the City to find out more about what’s behind the change.

The value of licensing such businesses, or any business for that matter, is that it provides a means of monitoring them for safety and health issues and so on. For example, the escort-agency category requires proof of age of employees, to make certain under-aged workers aren’t being exploited. It also requires criminal-record checks by police when deemed advisable.

What do other cities do? According to Lambright, they vary but the new Kamloops fees are general in line with other places. Some cities still charge more; others don’t try to regulate sex businesses at all.

The column is on The Daily News website under the Columnists section.

Stories of pit-bull attacks just keep on coming

We’ll likely never reach consensus on the pit-bull issue, though a growing number of people are coming down on the side of banning them rather than trying to manage them through penalties.

The trouble with the latter is that by the time a fine is handed out the damage has been done.

One of my correspondents tells me of yet another pit-bull incident last week in which a Setter was attacked by two pit bulls that ran out from a house in Westsyde.

The Setter’s owner screamed for help and someone ran up and kicked one of the dogs until it broke off the attack.

“She (the attacked dog’s owner) took the bleeding dog to the vet right away while the witnesses stayed there to be interviewed by the RCMP and City Bylaw members. I don’t believe the story reached the media,” he writes.

“The attack was vicious and left the dog with horrible injuries to its hind quarters and neck…. Most people agree that the point has been reached where a decision has to be made for the good of public safety…

“What people don’t realize is the emotional damage such a serious dog attack inflicts on the innocent people involved.”

He then points out his own dog was attacked by a Golden Retriever a few months ago.  “Again, my wife was walking our dog, on a leash, in our own neighbourhood when the other dog rushed out of its house and attacked our dog on Westmount Drive. The dog required stitches and the owners of the other dog paid the vet bill of just over $500.”

One reaction might be that if a Golden Retriever — one of the gentlest of all dogs — can attack unprovoked, it proves that dealing with dangerous dogs by banning breeds isn’t going to work.

But the owner goes on to make the point, “In comparison, the attack was very minor compared to the level of viciousness displayed by the two pit bulls.”

The point being that there are two reasons banning pit bulls makes some sense: the high incidence of attacks by this particular breed, and their frightening power, which often results in serious injuries (and sometimes death) to dogs and humans.

Conflict, conflict and more conflict in council chambers

Council in action at today’s meeting.

There was so much conflict in council chambers today it’s a wonder our lawmakers got any work done. As council worked its way through its agenda, bodies were popping out of chairs and running from the room so fast, at times it was hard to keep track.

At one point, Councillors Marg Spina, Donovan Cavers and Tina Lange all excused themselves, declaring conflicts of interest on a carriage house application. Cavers was the only one with a direct conflict, because he was the applicant. Spina left the room because she was an earlier applicant on another site, while Lange noted she owns some suites.

Pat Wallace was out of the room at the time, so the meeting cooled its heels for a few minutes until she returned so council could achieve a quorum to carry on.

Then, on the next item, Lange declared another conflict, and so did Cavers. This time, Spina remained in the room.

No sooner was that item dealt with than Mayor Peter Milobar excused himself on a liquor matter, since he’s in the liquor sales business.

Then, it was Arjun Singh’s turn — a strata-title matter to do with storage buildings — because Singh is a landlord.

I don’t know what kind of advice council is getting on declaring conflicts of interest, but I think they’re over-doing it. While perception is key when it comes to conflict of interest for politicians, there’s also a point when they have to be crystal clear as to whether the conflict is real or imagined.

If you don’t have a direct pecuniary interest in the outcome of a decision, you usually don’t have a conflict. Today, the conflict merry-go-round was dizzying.

Making it to the Daybreak Kamloops studio, just in time

Armchair Mayor (on right) chats with others outside CBC Kamloops studio this morning. (CBC photo)

At 6:38 this morning, Josh Page, associate producer for the new Daybreak Kamloops show, sent a polite e-mail asking me if he’d need to reschedule the interview he’d scheduled between me and host Shelley Joyce.

At 6:39 a.m. I hustled in to the new CBC radio studio on Victoria Street, trying to look as though I always show up for interviews with 60 seconds to spare. Rob Polsen, who heads up the studio, took me directly into Shelley’s control booth and we were quickly on the air.

A few minutes before, I’d been rattling into town in the cornbinder thinking I was cutting it a little close and mentally calculating whether I’d be able to find a parking spot close enough to the studio to actually make it in time. Radio people must pull their hair some days, not knowing if their guests are going to show up.

All is well, however. And, to my surprise, about three dozen people were hanging around inside the studio and out on the sidewalk to welcome the city’s new CBC bureau and morning show. Not usually being awake that early, I hadn’t realized so many Kamloops residents are up and about before the sun even rises.

My on-air talk with Shelley was about a weekly commentary piece — radio people call them “columns” — I’ll be doing with Page about Kamloops issues. But rather than simply commenting on local issues, Page and I will go to various locales around town and have conversations about what’s in the news. The format is Josh’s idea, and I’m looking forward to it.

“Josh and the Armchair Mayor” will air Thursdays.

Touring the Ajax site — a sense of magnitude

At the Ajax open-pit site, looking toward Knutsford.

Four times a week, KGHM loads about 30 people onto a bus and takes them on a bumpy ride from Inks Lake up into the grasslands to the future site of the giant open pit copper-gold mine it wants to operate if it can get all the official permissions.

I took the tour yesterday. It wasn’t the first time I’ve been in the area, but after having looked at maps, read reports and viewed both scale models of the proposal, a 90-minute visit to the area provides a more complete perspective of the size of the proposed mine.

On a map or model, you get a feel for comparison — the pit will be as big as…. the waste rock pile will be as big as…. etc. And, by now, surely every resident of Kamloops knows the general layout, knows how many jobs would be created, how much would be spent building and operating this mine, knows about Inks Lake and Jacko Lake and diverting Peterson Creek and where the water will come from and where the roads will go to and on and on.

But, being there, when you can look to the horizon where a waste pile will begin and turn your head in the opposite direction to where it will end, and try to imagine how high a hundred meters is, and stand in the middle of where the pit will be, and scan the huge piece of land that will become a massive hole in the earth — it’s almost hard to believe that man could alter our planet on such a scale.

The tours were supposed to end this month but the company will continue them into October to meet demand.

Fabric buildings — when City Hall takes the fun out of life

Not things of beauty, but they get the job done.

It goes without saying that the fabric-covered garages and storage tents that have proliferated throughout the city and region are not the most attractive of structures.

They’re economical, practical, and a bit of an eyesore. I’ve got two of them.

In the city, they sit, staked to the ground, keeping cars and lawn mowers and firewood out of the weather. Out in the boonies, they cover everything from farm equipment to hay.

They aren’t the sturdiest of shelters, but they’re a step up from tarps. In the wind, they flap and rattle around on their aluminum frames, and in a few years they have to be taken down or replaced.

I see by today’s Daily News that the City of Kamloops is cracking down on them. Neighbours in Brocklehurst have complained about them, and several homeowners have received notice that they’re breaking City bylaws, which prohibit fabric structures in residential areas.

While the City says it’s partly a safety issue, the real problem is one of looks. Nobody cares if one of these things is set up behind a fence in a back yard, but when they show up in a driveway or visible side yard, neighbours aren’t always impressed.

One can see the point. But is it really so wrong to use a cheap alternative to building an expensive wood-frame or steel building to protect your treasured “baby” or keep odds and ends out of the rain and out of sight? Must everyone take out an extra mortgage to give cover to the toys of life?

Cripes, City Hall already legislates everything from the colour and trim of buildings to whether people can burn wood in a fireplace and have a couple of chickens in their backyards.

Maybe our lawmakers should ease up a little and stop taking the fun out of everything.

PS: Though your typical storage tent costs only a few hundred dollars, there are upper-end varieties that will rival stick-built structures. In fact, early in the planning for the Tournament Capital Centre, a proposal was made that a steel and fabric design be considered.