Cuts to literacy unwise; Hold Bear Mountain
accountable
Vancouver Island News Group
Wed
22 Nov 2006
Page: 0006
Section: Goldstream News Gazette - Letters

Byline:
Source:

other views:

We elect governments to make decisions for the collective good and to collect
the necessary taxes to create programs and ensure the goals of a democratic
society are met. Literacy is something most of us take for granted and is
fundamental to functioning in society. For most people, it has been an easy
process to learn to read, but for some it is frustrating and challenging, for a
variety of reasons.

Recently the federal government announced sweeping cuts to adult literacy and
youth employment programs totalling $73 million, as they claim the programs were
not producing "value for money."

Just after cuts were announced, Prime Minister Stephen Harper's wife Laureen
volunteered to participate with 350 others in Ottawa in CanWest's Raise-a-Reader
fundraiser, saying "It didn't take much convincing to turn out and support the
cause."

In Victoria, the Raise-a-Reader initiative involved 192 volunteers, including
Minister of Education Shirley Bond, who said: "Nine million Canadians have
trouble reading a prescription or a bus schedule. There are children in this
province who show up for kindergarten who don't own a book, much less have ever
been read to."

Victorians donated $117,000 for the Raise-a-Reader fund this year, as did
other communities across Canada. As laudable as this initiative is, how does it
address the nine million Canadians who have problems with the written word?
Where is the federal government's responsibility to address this issue? How can
volunteer efforts address such a complex issue?

On the day before the Raise-a-Reader initiative was held, in a Victoria
newspaper there was an article entitled "Rapidly-aging society presents huge
problem". The article went on to describe how Canada would have to take in 2.6
million immigrants a year by 2020 and seven million by 2050 if it wants to keep
its ratio of retirees- to-workers at its current 20 per cent. Canada would be
better off creating policies to increase the number of people in the work force,
the CD Howe
Institute was quoted as saying.

My question to government is: What is the relationship between literacy and
employment? In my experience as an adult educator and advocate for innovative
approaches to literacy issues, there is a very direct correlation between
literacy levels and employment. Why then, are literacy and youth employment
programs being cut?

What about the value for money spent on literacy and youth employment
programs? In the past, I have spent a number of years on the External Review
Committee for the National Literacy Secretariat programs. At other times, I had
a number of very successful projects funded from this source. From my knowledge
of the value for the dollar spent through this program, it is the most
accountable and worthwhile of any I have seen in my working life of 40 years in
the public education system. Projects funded have been a catalyst for a variety
of initiatives that have leveraged community support and energy to enable people
to become contributing members of society.

What type of program is funded? There are many innovative program ideas that
are launched to provide service to groups of people that often "fall between the
cracks" of existing programs.

Profoundly deaf adults have been given the tools to read, write, attend
college and gain skills for the workplace; teen moms learned to cook, gain
employability and parenting skills;

Aboriginal teens and adults learned to create digital videos, participate in
an environmental cleanup and better understand their own culture and history;

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OTHER VIEWS continued

illiterate adults received tutorial support from volunteer tutors which gave
them the skill and confidence to enrol in literacy programs in school districts
and colleges. Pre-school children have been provided access to books through
family literacy initiatives at the local library when there is no role model for
literacy in the home.

The decision to axe funding for adult literacy and youth employment programs
is denying the most vulnerable in society a voice. As a society, we need their
skills developed, their participation in an increasingly complex and
technologically advanced society. We are in an aging society, in a robust
economy, requiring skilled labour, ans short of young people ready for
employment.

We should be spending more money, not less on literacy and employment
preparation programs.

- Donna Miller retired in 2004 as the district principal for youth and adult
programs, WestShore Centre for Learning and Training, a continuing education
program she created in 1986.

I can only think of one word that best describes my feelings about what
happened to the sacred caves on Skirt Mountain, and that is disgust.The
developer of Bear Mountain stated several months ago that if "he" wanted to blow
up a cave and put a hotel up "he" would.

This latest action should confirm to everyone this developer's blatant
disrespect and lack of knowledge for something so sacred and historical. This is
very disturbing to say the least. I am a longtime resident of Langford and I am
ashamed of our mayor and his council for allowing the almighty dollar to impair
their judgment when it comes to handing out development permits.

These so-called leaders of Langford have allowed this developer to destroy
the First Nations sacred site so Bear Mountain can have another road.This
developer should be held accountable for his actions. Enough is enough.It's time
our mayor started taking extreme measures in preserving sacred sites as well as
protecting the lakes and wetlands of Langford for future generations to enjoy.

Debe Rosset

Langford

Re: "Lest we forget about the past and present," Nov. 8, 2006 editorial

With Remembrance Day just passed, the voices of appeasement and pacifism in
Canada, calling for abandoning our NATO commitments in Afghanistan, demonstrate
yet again that no freedom is so outrageously and so often abused as the freedom
to do nothing.

Not just on this one special occasion but throughout the year we should all
perhaps reflect on some words written during the Second World War in the form of
a poem whose authorship remains disputed but whose sentiment remains true and
eloquent to this day and always:

"It is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the
press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It
is the soldier, not the campus organizer, who has given us the freedom to
demonstrate. It is the soldier, not the lawyer, who has given us the right to a
fair trial. It is the soldier who salutes the flag, serves under the flag and
whose coffin is draped by the flag, who allows the protester to burn that same
flag!"

Edmund Burke perhaps said it best when he observed: "All that is necessary
for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

Lest we forget !

E.W. Bopp

Tsawwassen

A series of uninformed letters have appeared in the Goldstream News Gazette
suggesting that Shirley Wilde pay her court costs from her Bylaw 444 challenge.
Shirley and her backers have paid their court costs and have not asked anyone
else to do it for them. Nor do they intend to do so.

There does appear to be some question about who should pay the District of
Metchosin's court costs. In this regard, allow me to observe that the Centre
Mountain Group filed an affidavit with the court in January 2004 that ended with
the assertion: "We are prepared to either join with the district in defending
the petition or defend it on our own behalf."

This signifies a clear intention by the developer to shoulder the court costs
of the entire action. If the taxpayers of Metchosin are reluctant to pay, then
perhaps they should ask the party who offered to pay to do so.

Bob Mitchell

Metchosin

Copyright 2006 Goldstream News Gazette

Edition:
Length: 1300 words