B.C. landlords turn to screening company to weed out grow-ops

By LYLE JENISH

The Globe and Mail

May 26, 2007

VICTORIA -- British Columbia landlords and rental property owners are going to remarkable lengths to weed out potential marijuana grow-ops, crystal methamphetamine labs, deadbeats and rogue tenants more likely to trash their suites than pay the rent.

Credit checks and referrals are now just a starting point. Complete credit histories, Canadian Police Information Centre criminal record checks and a delinquent tenant list are being used and, if stung, landlords are even launching "electronic surveillance" of former tenants to monitor their financial status and then aggressively collect debts.

"The best way to get rid of a bad tenant is to not let them in the first place," said Jan Robinson, chief operating officer of the B.C. Apartment Owners and Managers Association.

A controversial new tool helping to bar the door is a registry of problem tenants.

"The credit bureaus do not accept data on the pay habits of renters," said Marv Steier, president of the Surrey-based TVS Tenant Verification Service Inc.. "So we decided to create our own database of delinquent tenants our members can access."

The database contains information submitted by landlords, he said.

"TVS had better be sure the information they are collecting is reliable and accurate," said Tom Durning, a spokesman for the Tenant Resource & Advisory Centre, a Vancouver-based tenant advocacy group.

"Tenants should check to see if they are on the blacklist and if the information is not correct, take action and hire a lawyer."

He says that a fair counterbalance would be a database of bad landlords.

Critics of aggressive background checks argue that students, the unemployed and individuals who have old criminal convictions are marginalized, unable to find rental accommodation - especially so in the current rental environment: The 2006 Canada Mortgage and Housing Rental Market Survey reports a 0.7-per-cent vacancy rate in Vancouver and 0.6 per cent in Kelowna while Victoria at 0.5 per cent has the lowest vacancy rate in Canada.

"It is a landlords' market," Mr. Durning said. "A two-bedroom basement suite in Mount Pleasant rents for $1,500 and there is a lineup around the block. There are a lot of good renters out there and that means landlords are less willing to take a chance on young tenants."

Mr. Steier discounts the contention that young renters who lack a solid credit rating or individuals who made bad decisions long ago are being marginalized. Along with the credit and criminal checks - which can proceed only after a prospective tenant has signed an authorization that is faxed to the police - "tenant worthiness" is determined by documentation potential tenants must have current, or previous, landlords fill out.

"People ask me: 'If a person has put their fist through a wall at their old apartment and cannot find a new place to rent, where do they go?' I say; 'That is not my problem,' " Mr. Steier said.

TVS clients must sign a waiver, guaranteeing that criminal record information and credit information is destroyed. To discourage identity theft, Mr. Steier says landlords are encouraged to view information online and then erase it. He says landlords are prescreened and are required to sign agreements with TVS, encouraging accurate tenant reporting.

Fears of rattlesnakes and radiation in the Okanagan Valley

By LYLE JENISH

The Globe and Mail

Thursday, May 24, 2007 – Page S1

Rattlesnakes and a fear of radioactive dust have one north Okanagan retirement community on edge.

Residents of Kal Pine Estates, a trailer park located on a hillside west of Oyama and 50 metres from a gravel pit known as Posh 1, say drilling and excavation activity has driven timber rattlesnakes out of the hillside and into their midst.

But what they fear the most is that the heavy equipment is sending radon-emitting dust into the air, onto their homes and into their lungs.

"Last summer, when the drilling and vibrations started in the gravel pit, it was the first time anyone had seen a rattlesnake inside the community," said John Templeton, a three-year resident of the trailer park overlooking aquamarine-hued Kalamalka Lake. "The snakes came down in the dozens.

"During the summer, the dust comes right down from the gravel pit and covers homes," Mr. Templeton said.

The pit, part of the construction industry's insatiable appetite for aggregates, began drilling activities last summer. Mr. Templeton, a former provincial corrections branch employee, says locals are "terrified" of the health risks it may pose. Kal Pine residents recently commissioned a radiation test of the gravel pit and are now asking the provincial government to perform their own tests to confirm or dispel fears.

On March 24, Kelowna architect and residential radon-gas-monitoring specialist Peter Chataway performed a radiation test of the pit at the request of Kal Pine residents. A scintillometer - a scientific device used to measure atmospheric disturbances caused by radiation - indicated radon gas levels as high as 500 becquerels per cubic metre in the gravel pit.

A becquerel is an internationally accepted measure of radioactivity.According to recently revised Health Canada safety guidelines for exposure to radon gas, 200 becquerels per cubic metre is the upper limit (it used to be 800). In the United States, safety levels are 150 becquerels per cubic metre.

However, David Morley, head of the Burnaby-based Environmental Radiation Assessment Program, part of the Environmental Health Division of the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, believes the potential danger is being overestimated.

He says he knows the Kalamalka region, having done a radiation survey in the early 1980s for the department of highways. "The area has a well-known abnormality that runs between Oyama and south of Vernon," he said. "There is a pleasant-looking rock formation, but the rock has some uranium in it."

Mr. Morley says radon gas "dissipates rapidly" and does not usually concentrate in an outdoor environment.

Mr. Chataway, however, contends that, no matter how small, there is a risk. "These results should be enough to kick the authorities into gear and do the proper readings."

Mr. Morley says rather than worrying about the dust in the air, Kal Pine residents should worry about the ground under their feet.

"The risk to people living in that subdivision is associated with the natural radioactivity underneath their soil," Mr. Morley said.

"Depending on the composition of their soil, they may have a radon problem in their homes. The concentration is three or four times what it would be in Kelowna or other Interior towns."

According to residents, Kal Pine was built in the basin of a former gravel pit.

Mr. Templeton says he submitted the March scintillometer readings to the ministry of mines in early April along with a request for a formal radiation survey. He said he heard nothing from the province until May 16, at which time The Globe and Mail was investigating the story. Yesterday, Mr. Templeton received a letter from Kiersten Kirkpatrick, executive assistant to Kevin Krueger, Minister of State for Mining. The letter assured Mr. Templeton that "[m]inistry staff are looking into your concern and you will be receiving a letter from us shortly."

Calls to Mr. Krueger were not immediately returned.

Kal Pine's elderly residents, meanwhile, are uncertain about the safety of their homes and health, and say they are being surrounded by other gravel-pit operations.

Kal Pine manager Don Wakeham says there are currently five pits within a two-kilometre radius of Kal Pine and a sixth is on the way.

Mr. Wakeham says Kalamalka Lake, once named by National Geographic as one of the 10 most beautiful lakes in the world, is being denigrated. "In any given spot on Kalamalka Lake, you can look in a southwesterly direction and look into three to five fairly large gravel pits."

James Baker, mayor of the District of Lake Country, says changes made in 2002 to provincial mining legislation streamlined the gravel-pit application process and effectively tied the hands of municipalities. He believes the current radiation scare and pockmarked hillside could have been prevented had there been more local input.

Mr. Baker said Mr. Krueger would be touring Posh 1 and other area pits on June 18. He says he will be blunt when speaking with Mr. Krueger.

"These are mining activities that do not really suit this environment," Mr. Baker said. "It seems ludicrous that practices from the 18th century are carried into the 21st century."

Some Kal Pine residents say they can deal with rattlesnakes on their streets and under their porches, but most simply want to know whether the dust and gravel-pit activity pose a health risk, and they want assurances the region will not be completely excavated in the pursuit of aggregates.

"The B.C. timber rattlesnake is one of the shyest rattlers in the world. It is not likely to strike for no reason at all; you pretty much have to step on it," says resident Robert Roy, a former environmental officer for the Canadian Armed Forces. "We know about wildlife, but the radiation is something nobody knows anything about.

"This is fear of the unknown."

Victoria enjoys a million-dollar day

Shops, cafés, pedicabs race to keep up as five cruise ships drop off nearly 15,000 people in the heart of downtown

LYLE JENISH

The Globe and Mail

May 12, 2007

VICTORIA -- Regimented rows of taxi cabs, tour buses, limousines and pedicabs welcomed a record 14,790 cruise ship passengers and crew arriving in Victoria yesterday. Almost 12,000 eager tourists disembarked, touring, dining and filling Government Street shops and cafés.

"I look out my window and I can see 1,000 people walking along Government Street right now," Phil Lavoie said at the height of yesterday's lunch rush. Mr. Lavoie, manager of Victoria landmark Sam's Deli, said the cafeteria-style eatery is "directly connected" to the cruise ship industry, enjoying an average lunchtime spike of 100 additional customers with each ship that arrives. Mr. Lavoie said yesterday was one of the busiest ever for the deli a block from the Empress Hotel.

It was the busiest day ever for cruise ships in Victoria, said Lorne Whyte, president and CEO of Tourism Victoria. Three ships - Serenade Of The Seas, passenger capacity 2,500; Diamond Princess, 2,600; Zuiderdam, 1,840 - began arriving at 7 a.m., filling the three berths at Ogden Point. Oosterdam, passenger capacity 1,840, and Golden Princess, 2,600, queued in the Juan de Fuca Strait, waiting for the Serenade Of The Seas and Diamond Princess to depart.

During the summer, three cruise ships usually visit Victoria each Saturday night, said Paul Servos, general manager of the Greater Victoria Harbour Authority. "It is a real challenge having three ships visit all day and then have two leave and two more come in during the evening."

Chandlery, servicing and waste disposal is handled by firms such as King Bros. Ltd. and Westcan Terminals Ltd. Neither firm was available for comment, both having pressed all their staff into service at the terminal. Mr. Servos said it is a routine he could get used to: "Look at all the activity downtown. We had a million-dollar day."

"I hope to make between $600 and $800 in fares on a day like this," said 31-year-old pedicab driver Brent Gleason, waiting for a customer outside the passenger terminal. "I study the cruise ship schedule and plan my shifts so I am working when the big ships arrive."

Mr. Gleason leases a tandem pedicab through Victoria's Kabuki Kabs. Owner Randal Phipps said he had 20 pedicabs working the Inner Harbour and Ogden Point precinct yesterday. Drivers are "independent contractors" said Mr. Phipps, with each driver leasing a pedicab for about $40 for a seven-hour shift.

According to Mr. Phipps, Kabuki Kabs - like taxi and bus operators - pays the Greater Victoria Harbour Authority an annual terminal access fee of $150 a vehicle. He considers the cruise ships enormous "floating hotels" and runs three shifts of pedicabs, from 7 a.m. to 3 a.m.

Darryl Anderson, business development manager at the Greater Victoria Harbour Authority, said 163 cruise ships will stop at the Ogden Point Terminal during the 2007 season with Holland America, Princess Cruises, Norwegian Cruise Line, Celebrity Cruises and Royal Caribbean International carrying 324,000 travellers.

Of these, an estimated 80 per cent will come ashore. He said disembarkation and therefore per-ship spending averages in the local economy are high in Victoria because of the deepwater harbour and the closeness to downtown. This allows ships to pull right along the pier and release passengers to board shuttle and tour services to downtown and all points beyond. At other ports, such as Nanaimo, a smaller boat is required to ferry passengers ashore.

Based on 2006 economic statistics and trends, Mr. Anderson said that passengers will have spent approximately $1-million during the 17 hours the ships docked in Victoria yesterday. Mr. Servos said that while most foot and shuttle traffic is headed downtown, 30 per cent of cruise ship visitors are going north along the Saanich Peninsula to the Butchart Gardens.

"Ninety-nine-point-nine per cent of passengers want to go to Butchart Gardens," said Dumitru Constantinescu, owner and operator of Vancouver Island Passenger Tours. Waiting for clients alongside his 14-passenger Ford van on the sunny-but-breezy afternoon, Mr. Constantinescu said that unlike Victoria retailers and restaurateurs, tour operators require nice weather to make money. "On a sunny, warm day I can do five or six hours worth of tours," said Mr. Constantinescu, who had at that point billed for one hour. With one ship on a much warmer, calmer day earlier, he said he booked six tour hours.

Mr. Whyte said the cruise ships offer immediate and residual value. Tracking done by Tourism Victoria indicates cruise ship passengers, having got a first taste of Victoria, will often plan an extended stay later on. "It is a great introduction to Victoria."

These people are not like us

Soldiers thwart plot to turn school into a bomb

U.S. soldiers discovered a girls' school being built north of Baghdad had been turned into an explosives-rigged "death trap," the U.S. military said Thursday. Military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell called it a "premeditated attempt to inflict massive casualties on our most innocent victims." The plot was uncovered when troopers found detonating wire across the street from the school, and followed its trail.

FULL STORY

Tsunami monitors offer nine-minute warning

Province testing detectors that could provide mainland with vital minutes to prepare for impact of significant seismic event

LYLE JENISH

The Globe and Mail

VICTORIA -- Federal government scientists are testing new GPS monitors on the west coast of Vancouver Island that could give British Columbians nine crucial extra minutes of warning in the event of a major earthquake.

The group of Sidney Pacific Geoscience Centre scientists hopes that the new approach to tsunami detection, which integrates GPS technology into existing seismic networks and tide-gauge monitors, could eventually encompass the entire west coast of North America.

The goal is to determine the location, type and severity of seismic activity, with each sensor instantly feeding its data over a wireless connection into a central computer. That could cut the current lag time by 60 per cent - or nine minutes.

"Currently, we feel intense shaking and then wait for information," says Jim Whyte, manager of operations for Provincial Emergency Preparedness. Often this can mean an agonizing quarter-hour wait, followed by automated distribution of warnings or stand-downs to municipal governments, media and community leaders.

By contrast, the new system provides instant alerts, since the GPS transmitters send information every second. When the transmitters are displaced during an earthquake, that stream of information is interrupted, alerting scientists immediately that there is a seismic event.

This shaves minutes off the current, Alaska-based system, which crunches data after the event and then has an average turnaround time of 15 minutes. A tsunami wave can hit a coast within as little as 15 minutes of an earthquake, meaning a warning from Alaska's seismic and tide-gauge sensors would be useless in that scenario.

"It is questionable whether Alaska could provide information on a tsunami off the coast of B.C.," Mr. Whyte says. "Any additional time that speeds distribution of warning information is welcome."

Research scientist Herb Dragert says the United States Geological Survey is exploring the use of GPS for tsunami detection in Indonesia, whose Sumatra Island was battered by massive tidal waves in 2004.

"GPS and tsunami warning has been floating around for years," Dr. Dragert says. "However, we are the first to really get the process started after being spurred on by Sumatra."

Key to the system, just now in trial phase with six Vancouver Island stations, is the ability to gauge the severity of the seismic event while it is occurring.

A big offshore earthquake does not necessarily make for a big, life-crushing tsunami, Dr. Dragert says. "It takes a megathrust event, where the seabed ruptures and displaces to generate a tsunami similar to the proportions that hit Sumatra."

When a megathrust hits, land moves. He says a megathrust event - 6.5-plus on the Richter scale - could move stations in Bamfield and Ucluelet seaward by a metre. Information collected from such an event would trigger an immediate tsunami warning.

Dr. Dragert says current GPS technology has remarkable sensitivity, able to report a movement of one to two centimetres horizontally and three to five centimetres vertically with a delay of only a few seconds.

"For a truly effective tsunami warning system that will save lives, it must be completely automated," says Fred Stephenson of the Canadian Hydrographic Service, who is Canada's representative on the United Nations tsunami-warning system. "This GPS system is a tool that will pump out data immediately."

The current system is focused on the Cascadia subduction zone. According to Dr. Dragert, this zone comprises three "oceanic microplates" between the Juan de Fuca Plate System and the western edge of the North America Plate.

That boundary is marked by extensive earthquake activity as well as a belt of active volcanoes stretching from northern California to southwest British Columbia.

Mr. Stephenson says that although the system is just in trial phase, he is optimistic about its potential, adding that U.S. involvement is critical.