The
Thursday, March 2,1978
Vol. 22; No. 42 •
Citizen 4
20' Copy
Prince George, British Columbia
CHARLIE CHAPLIN
Coffin vanishes
LAUSANNE, Switzerland (Reuter) — Charlie Chaplin’s coffin has disappeared from the grave where the comedian was buried above Lake Geneva, police said today.
A police spokesman told reporters he could give no further details but that a police statement might be issued later.
The comedian died at his home in Corsier-sur-Vevey, near Montreux, on Christmas day last year. He was buried in the local village cemetery on Dec. 27.
A police official in Vevey said the coffin had apparently been taken away last night.
"The grave is empty, the coffin has gone,’.’ he said. “Judging by the state of the disturbed soil it looks as thougn it was taken away last night.”
Rhodesian black rule pact near
. SALISBURY (CP) - Prime Minister Ian Smith and three black nationalist leaders will [sign an internal settlement 'agreement on majority rule in ! Rhodesia Friday, a govem-;ment spokesman said today.
The cabinet secretary told reporters the accord would be signed by Smith, Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Rev. Ndabaningi Sithole and Chief Jeremiah Chirau.
"The conference has reached agreement and they .are meeting in plenary session tomorrow morning at 10 o’clock (local time) after which they will sign the agreement," • the secretary said.
The talks, which began Dec. 2, reached agreement on the principle of one-man, one-vote in a biack-run Zimbabwe on Feb. 15 and followed up with accord on the composition of the new state's armed forces.
Since then, blacks and whites have been struggling over the make-up of the transitional government designed to lead the country to majority black rule on Dec. 31.
Details of the agreement reached today on the transitional government were not immediately disclosed.
On Wednesday, it was
Local man held in gun incident
A Prince George man, in his 20s, was taken into police custody Wednesday after he had threatened to shoot himself after an argument with his family.
Police blocked off an area around Tamarack Street Wednesday afternoon, but the man gave up without firing a shot.
He was to appear later in court today to face a charge of dangerous use of a firearm.
Shooting spree leaves 18 hurt
JACKSON, Mich. (AP) - A man armed with a shotgun went berserk in a factory lunchroom Thursday, wounding at least 18 persons, officials at Jackson Foote Hospital said.
Police, who confirmed 13 injuries, said a 21-year-old employee of the Pittsburgh Forgings Co. plant was taken into custody.
No motive for the shooting spree was . determined immediately.
learned, however, that the delegates to the conference had agreed that each of the four leaders would be chairman of a transitional government in rotation. Today's discussions concerned composition of the government itself and division of cabinet posts.
Canada's
reserves
plummet
OTTAWA (CP) - The Bank of Canada intervened heavily in foreign exchange markets in February, spending 1706.6 million in foreign reserves to cushion the fall in the dollar’s value.
As a result, official monetary reserves have fallen to their lowest value in nearly eight years, figures released today by the finance department show.
By Feb. 28, total reserves had fallen 19 per cent in the month to $3,698.8 million. It was the lowest level for reserves since March 31,1970, shortly before the government freed the dollar to float and find its own value in currency markets against other currencies.
All figures are in terms of U.S. dollars.
Finance Minister Jean Chretien announced Feb. 20 the government was borrowing $200 million U.S. from a special $1.5billion standby credit set up with chartered banks to defend the dollar’s value.
The money, which was not received before today’s reserves figures were published, will be put into the official currency reserves. The borrowing from chartered banks is only an interim step in advance of an undisclosed amount of foreign borrowing not yet arranged.
Sinclair Stevens, Progressive Conservative finance critic, said the reserves loss was “about 40 per cent higher than we had expected.” He said he expects the government will be forced to raise interest rates now in an effort to attract foreign capital.
The dollar has been under pressure for the last 15 months, falling from a peak value of $1.03 U.S. in late 1976 to a 45year low of 88.9 cents U.S. last week.
MLA LLOYD
pfeata bjrDml
Rich Goudie puts price of regular gas up to99.9 cents a gallon at Victoria Shell.
GAS PRICES UP TODAY
Motorists7 wallets hit
Gasoline prices in the Prince George area increased from three to five cents today, according to a Citizen survey of local stations.
The price increase follows a Jan. 1 increase of $1 a barrel in the price of crude oil. Oil companies were forbidden to pass on the increase for 60 days to allow consumption of existing, lower-priced stocks of crude oil.
The price increase also includes some adjustments of earlier federal anti-inflation board rulings.
"It’s a combination of both
the price increase on crude oil and an adjustment for the AIB,” explained Brian Chrysler, the local branch manager for Gulf Oil of Canada Ltd.
"But I don’t know how much the increase is in each category. It means a 3.8 cent a gallon increase here at the wholesale level."
A survey of several local station shows the increase today will range from three to five cents at the retail level.
Each retailer may decide what his price will be, although
the usual practice is to pass on his increase in cost.
A Shell Canada Ltd. spokesman said the company will raise the retail price of its regular gasoline at self-service stationto98.9centsagallonfrom
94.9 cents, unleaded will got to
103.9 cents from 99.9 cents a gallon and premium will rise to 103.9 cents a gallon.
The Shell spokesman said that prices at self-service stations are usually two cents a gallon lower than at other stations,
The Jan. 1 crude oil price increase also raises the price of motor oil and heating oil.
Apartments to be torn down
The Glen Shea apartment project, abandoned for more than five years, is to be demolished.
Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation officials said today the investment required to complete the partially-built high-rise apartment complex near the west end of 15th Avenue is too great.
It would cost about $4 million to complete the project in
which CMHC presently has $800,000 invested.
CMHC took over the property after the owners got into financial difficulty. Loans to build the complex were guaranteed by the federal housing authority.
“We had a full study of the proiect made," said CMHC assistant manager Glen Fuller, and the additional capi-
tal costs would make the rents too high.
He said it was decided the most economical thing to do was to demolish the two buildings and sell the land. The property is worth about $180,000.
Fuller said a demolition tender will be drawn up, a contract awarded and actual demolition should begin by early summer.
Cultural plan report blasted
QUEBEC (CP) -The minister responsible for Quebec’s French language charter read a brief statement—in English— Wednesday to denounce news reports outlining the alleged contents of the government's white paper on cultural policy.
Camille Laurin, cultural development minister, protested that an article in the March 6 issue of Maclean’s magazine is “false, distorted and vicious."
He also complained that the CTV television network on Tuesday "added the unlimited power of a film blow-up to this perverted analysis, provoking porential fanatics to violence.” The Maclean's article says the white paper, still unpublished, contains proposals that “would mean a new Quebec in which the degree of state control would surpass anything known in North America.”
The white paper deals with such matters as compulsory assimilation of Quebec's minority groups and covers communications, labor relations, housing, health, entertainment and the arts as "elements of national culture deserving direct government planning and guidance,” Maclean's says.
Raw deal seen for city, region
by ELI SOPOW
Citizen Staff Reporter
Fort George MLA Howard Lloyd said today Victoria and Vancouver are getting a better deal from the provincial government than the Prince George district.
Lloyd said he recognizes there are more people on the Lower Mainland but residents here end up paying for such things as bus service in Vancouver and beautification of Victoria's inner harbor.
He also said it is not right that residents here should be paying more for natural gas from Inland Natural Gas Ltd.
than Lower Mainland residents pay for gas from B.C. Hydro.
"Victoria is getting grants that we don’t seem to be getting here. Work on Crystal Gardens is an example. I don't see comparable projects here,” he said.
The provincial government announced last year that massive renovations to the Chrystal Gardens swimming pool in Victoria would be taking place.
Lloyd said people here should get together and take advantage of cost-sharing programs available from the provincial government.
'Seed money' needed
He said what Victoria receives in money for tourist promotion is "way out of proportion" to what many Interior centres get, particularly the Prince George area.
Lloyd pointed out the Interior and the Okangan area specifically has better summer weather than Victoria and it would make sense to have better tourist promotion in those areas.
He also said city council here • J could have asked the provin-
D Cl I Cl cial government for a grant to
t help build a new library.
Lloyd said it’s important for groups in Prince George to become familiar with how much this area gets in comparison to other regions of B.C. and how grants can be obtained.
"Prince George is growing and will continue to grow and all groups interested in tourism should get together," he said.
"We could get more of our share if we took a more active interest," he said.
"We shouldn’t be paying for someone else getting services we don’t,” he said.
As an example, Lloyd said various organizations promoting tourism here should coordinate their efforts more, raise "seed money” and then ask the government for a matching grant.
ICBC boss gets
regardless
VANCOUVER (CP) - Representatives of the Insurance Corp. of British Columbia (ICBC) will meet Friday in Ottawa with Immigration Minister Bud Cullen to appeal his decision that, in effect, bars American Robbie Sherrell from becoming the Crown corporation’s new president.
Cullen told the provincial government Monday that Sherrell would not receive Immigration credits for his 180,000-a-year job because a proper search for a qualified Canadian had not been made.
Pat McGeer, the provincial cabinet minister responsible for ICBC, said Wednesday the board of directors’ selection committee and a representative of Price Waterhouse, the firm that recommended Sherrell after an international search, will go to Ottawa.
Sherrell started picking up his salary Wednesday. He is still in England, waiting to hear whether he will be allowed to take up his new post. He was due to fly here today.
Sherrell worked in England for the Hartford Insurance Group until resigning to take his new job.
McGeer said in an interview Tuesday that ICBC and Price Waterhouse still have to learn where they went wrong in carrying out manpower and immigration procedures relating to the hiring of Sherrell.
Two-country space launch is first ever
MOSCOW (AP) - The Soviet Union has launched a spaceship manned by a Russian and a Czechoslovakian, the Tass news agency reported today.
It was the world's first two-country space launch.
Tass said the Soyuz-28 spacecraft would link up with the Salyut-6 space laboratory, in which Soviet cosmonauts Yuri Romanenko and Georgy Grechko will break the 84-day world record this Saturday for the longest single flight in space. They have been orbiting the earth since Dec. 10.
The agency identified the crew of the new space capsule as Alexei Gubarev, the Soviet commander, and Czechoslovak researcher Vladimir Remek. It said both reported feeling well and were carrying out their work program.
Shots at cattle costly
A Prince George land developer was fined $1,000 in provincial court today for wilfully wounding cattle.
Ron Adair, 43, pleaded guilty to the charge arising from the shooting of four of his neighbor’s cattle Oct. 16.
Judge R.S. Munroe also ordered Adair not to possess or use firearms for a period of two years.
Restitution of $1,500 had been paid previously by Adair to the owner of the animals.
Adair, in a statement to police, said the four animals
had been shot pccidentally while he was target practising, Adair’s lawyer Tom Cole told the court.
But Crown prosecutor Don Kennedy argued the three cows had all been shot twice in the same place — the right rear leg, and on the back above the udder. They had to be destroyed.
A steer, shot once in the leg, was not destroyed.
Cole said the cattle had been coming onto Adair’s property on a weekly basis for a period of two years.
TODAY
Sw-vfek*
Vs ft trua that you'ra so old that you can ramambar whan a doMar was worth a doMar?'
FEATURED INSIDE) ( THE WEATHER ) ( NOW HEAR THIs)
Winter festival. Page 25.
...............19
BuaineM............. Horoccopea............ ...........32
City, B.C............ ...2, 3, 9,26 International......... .............5
ClaMified........... .............7
...............30 8opow column.....
CroMword......... ...............18
Editorial............. .................4 Television.............. ...........31
Entertainment.. ..........30-32
A ridge of high pressure over B.C. is expected to bring Prince George sunny skies with northerly winds and cold temperatures today and Friday.
The forecast high today is -7, the low -20. The high Wednesday was -3, the low -17, with no precipitation. On this date last year the high was 6, the low -8.
# A city wit is trying to figure out the metric system in relation to his monthly travel statement. He’s trying to figure out how to say "mileage” in metric. Kilage?
• A local man claims he went to an aquarium store to get a suit altered. It was a sharkskin suit.
• After believing spring was here because of the recent warm weather, a pre-schooler took her tricycle outside and rode through the puddles. Today she was upset because the trike wouldn’t go and she couldn’t figure out why. The cold had frozen the wheels which had collected a considerable amount of muddy water.. .