Thursday, July 30, 2009

98th Kenora Fair

The Agricultural community will be front and centre starting today at Kenora kicks off its 98th fair.

Organizer Carol Kurz says there will be plenty of entertainment and activities for young and old.

Kurz notes the Farmer Olymics will be held on Saturday.

The fair opens its doors this evening at 6 and closes at midnight.

2009 Roads Work

Kenora City Council will be spending over a million dollars on improving area roads.

The 2009 Roads Program tender was awarded to Pioneer construction, and includes five streets and one lane.

Operations Chair Dave McCann explains how much of the bill the City will be responsible for.

McCann notes resurface and grading work will begin in the near future.

Health Unit Funding

The Northwestern Health Unit is getting over 300 thousand dollarsfrom the provincial government to test water systems in the region.

Starting this year, the Health Unit is taking over testing smaller water systems at resorts and fly-in fishing camps from the Ministry of the Environment.

The money will help train health unit employees and pay for travel to remote parts of the Kenora and Rainy River Districts.

The Health Unit estimates it will take about three years to inspect about 12 hundred water systems.

Shoal Lake #39 on Highway 17

A first nation community located near the Manitoba border says itsconcerned about plans to twin the Trans-Canada Highway to Kenora.

Chief of Shoal Lake #39, Eli Mandamin says his community has neverbeen consulted about the multi-million dollar project.

Mandamin says he has written to Kenora M.P. Greg Rickford asking fora meeting about plans to double lane Highway 17, but so far he hasn't heard from anyone from either the federal or provincial governments.

NAN Self Governance

After 12 years of talks, the Nishnawbe Aski Nation is closing inon self-governance.

NAN representatives and federal officials signed two agreementsin principle yesterday to allow the First Nation to move into the next phase of its ultimate goal -- self-governance and jurisdiction over education.

The northern Ontario First Nation's negotiating committee will now take the agreements in principle back to its respectivecommunities and ask for their support to move onto the next phase of negotiations.

Caribou Wildlands League

An environmental group is urging the Ontario government to haltall logging and road building in endangered woodland caribou habitat.

The Wildlands League says six out of nine known populations belowthe 51st parallel are at risk of collapsing.

The group says former habitats of six caribou populations havealready been disturbed by logging and wildfires and may no longersustain the species.

Woodland caribou are protected under Ontario's new Endangered Species Act but the government is still developing its conservation plan.

Anniversary Bus Beheading

A vigil to mark the one-year anniversary of the beheading of a Winnipeg man on a Greyhound bus will be held tonight at the Manitoba legislature.

The death of Tim McLean still haunts passengers who were aboardthe bus where Vince Li attacked McLean.

Li was found not-criminally responsible for his actions at ashort trial in March.

Thunder Bay Labs Amelia Earheart

The decades-long mystery of the disappearance of American aviator Amelia Earhart might finally be solved next year with the help of two Thunder Bay, Ontario, labs.

American Ric Gillespie and his team from TIGHAR will head to thewestern Pacific island of Nikumaroro next May.

That's where they think Earhart was left stranded and died after her plane crashed as she tried to fly around the world in 1937.

They hope to collect items that have her D-N-A on them.

Gillespie says they already have a D-N-A sample from a relative.

During a 2007 expedition, Gillespie's team collected a sample that had human D-N-A.

Two Thunder Bay labs -- Genesis Genomics and Molecular World -- tested it and the results came in this spring.

But the sample didn't match a great-niece of Earhart.

It turned out to be contaminated with Gillespie's own D-N-A becausehe handled the sample.

NW LHIN Funding

The North West Local Health Integration Network is investing over 188-thousand dollars in the region.

The money will go towards 16 supportive housing units to help people living with addictions increase stability and security in their lives.

The supportive housing units will also help reduce pressure on hospital emergency rooms.

The local announcement is part of a larger funding initiative of 16-million province-wide.

A list of specific housing units benefiting hasn't been released.