TUESDAY, JULY 15, 2008

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Call centre hanging up local operation
by MARK NIELSEN Citizen staff A Prince George call centre is in the process of closing its doors. Synovate will cease operating in the city effective Dec. 12, company marketing manager Henrietta Sung confirmed Monday, saying 20weeks notice has been given to 90 full-time and four part-time employees. The closure will end a nearly four-year run in the city, where Synovate has been operating out of a section of the old Crazy Willy's building at Third and Brunswick. OSI Recovery Solutions, which shared the building with Synovate, closed in April 2007, putting 40 people out of work. Asked about the reasons for the decision, Sung limited her comments to saying the Prince George operation did not fit with Synovate's business strategy moving forward. But she added the company is helping employees make the transition to new jobs. "We're helping them with writing resumes, giving them career counselling, and finding jobs with our call centres elsewhere," Sung said. Asked if the lower cost of interviewing people via online surveys, rather than by phone played a role, Sung said online is growing, but there is still a need for telephone surveying. According to a Statistics Canada analytical paper, Canadian call centres have lost the advantage of a lower dollar and face more off-shore competition from China, India and elsewhere. Rob Myers, Synovate's managing director for Canada said the strong Canadian dollar played a minor role in the decision. "The Canadian dollar wouldn't necessarily help, but strategically we decided that we don't need such a large facility in Canada," he said. "We're not expanding and growing our facilities in North America really." Synovate, the research division of Aegis Group PLC, a London, England marketing and communications firm, will still operate call centres in Vancouver and Montreal, Myers said. Dallas-based Affiliated Computer Systems Inc. has no plans to close down its call centre at Third and Dominion, company spokesperson Chris Gilligan said. About 360 people work there full-time and part-time and "we're even hiring at that facility, right now, today," he said.

Burning faces hazy future
by GORDON HOEKSTRA Citizen staff A logger has been given the OK to burn waste piles of woody debris behind L.C. Gunn Park -- just above the city -- in the next few weeks. But the open burns, a concern because of the fine particulate air pollution they create, could be a thing of the past as the province eyes new rules on open burning in populated areas and is also looking to find uses for the wood waste. Last Friday, a plume of smoke could be viewed rising above the treeline south of Highway 16 East, past the provincial jail. In the partially logged forest between the highway and Gunn Road, half a dozen large piles of logging waste were being burned. Logger Terry Campbell had been given the green light by the B.C. Ministry of Environment to burn some of the piles if the venting and wind conditions were right. The logger was issued a permit from the Prince George Fire Department on that basis. B.C. Environment official Mellissa Winfield-Lesk said a disposal plan was negotiated where some of the piles on the eastern part of the logged property were allowed to be burned, but others nearer the highway would have to be moved to higher ground, chipped or incinerated with a forced-air burner. Winfield-Lesk, the head of environmental quality in Prince George, said while the open burning is not something the environment ministry likes to see, an effort was made to identify the pollution risk but be reasonable. "It's making the best of a bad situation," she said. The ministry is in the midst of consultations on proposed regulation changes that would severely restrict open burning in populated areas, labelled high-sensitivity smoke areas. The boundaries would encompass the logged area behind L.C. Gunn Park. -- See LOGGER on page 2

Citizen staff photo

Logger Terry Campbell has been given the green light by the B.C. Ministry of Environment to burn waste piles of woody debris behind L.C. Gunn Park -- just above the city -- in the next few weeks.

Man saves moose calf
by MYRISSA KRENZLER Citizen staff A Houston man is being called a hero after rescuing a moose calf from a barbed wire fence recently, all under the watchful eye of mama moose. Jan Spaans and his neighbour were checking out a popular fishing spot on Walcot Road in Houston when they saw a cow moose standing along the side of the road. "She wasn't moving, which was really unusual," he said. "Usually they see a vehicle and they're gone into the bush. So I just rolled very slowly up to her and she just stayed right where she was. And then I looked down in the ditch and I could see her calf down in there." -- See MOM on page 2

The kid is alright
Baby goat born healthy after mom attacked by bear
by BERNICE TRICK Citizen staff A goat that was badly injured in a bear attack gave birth Monday to a healthy kid, much to the surprise of its Willow River owners who scared the bear off with a stick. The tiny, black, female was born a few days after its mother, Swirl, had been attacked by a large black bear, said Susan van Dijk. "I fully expected this to be a stillbirth af ter what t he mot her had been through, so you can imagine my surprise to find a perfectly healthy newborn standing by its mother and nursing early Monday." Just a few days before, Susan and husband, Eduardo, had rescued Swirl from an attacking black bear that had knocked down a fence rail to enter the goat pasture on their quarter section farm near Willow River, about 20 minutes drive east of Prince George. "When I went to milk the goats about 9 p.m. Tuesday, I could hear a goat squawking like it was in distress or caught in something," said Susan. "As I ran to the goat area, I saw two dead goats on the path and found another dead along the way. Then I saw the bear trying to kill Swirl. I grabbed a dead branch and started swinging it and shouting at the bear. The branch broke, of course, and I was left swinging a three- foot stick, but it startled it enough so that it retreated a short distance away. By then Eduardo had let the dog through the gate and the bear retreated a little further away." While the dog held the bear at bay, Eduardo and Susan rescued the goat, which was badly hurt with bites and punctures, its chest ripped and its neck injured and swollen. -- See BEAR on page 2

Citizen photo by Brent Braaten

Victory, right, a one-day-old doe kid goat, stands with its mother Swirl, who was attacked by a bear prior to giving birth.

INDEX
Annie's Mailbox . . . . . . . . 21 Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Business. . . .. . . . . . . . . 14-16 City, B.C. . . . . . . . . . . 2,3,5,17 Classified . . . . . . . . . . . 23-27 Comics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 Crossword . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Entertainment . . . . . . . . . . 20 Horoscope . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Nation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6,7 Sports . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9-13 World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8,18

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