Williams Lake news. As it happens.

By LeRae Haynes

Williams Lake City Councillor Surinderpal Rathor was the sole dissenting voice at this week’s City Council meeting during a vote to decide whether to spend approximately $7,000 to send Mayor Cook and City CAO Brian Carruthers to the 2012 Federation of Canadian Municipalities in June.

Several interesting evenings are coming up this week, so mark your calendars. You will want to check these out:

Friday January 27

The Library hosts Preschool Storytime from 10:30am to 11:15am for ages 3-6.

The Royal Canadian Legion hosts their Friday Meat Draw from 5:00pm to 6:00pm this evening. They also hosts their popular Steak Nite tonight at 5:30pm, followed by a dance to Perfect Match.

By LeRae Haynes

New Community Policing president Andy Sullivan says that the new board is working to improve all the programs under that ‘umbrella’ and looking for ways to inspire and recruit more volunteers.

(Andy Sullivan invites the public to explore the many volunteer opportunities available through Community Policing.)

A Williams Lake resident said that he had contact with ‘missing’ teen Davey Auger yesterday afternoon – or at least someone using Davey Auger’s Facebook account. The adult male said that Davey ‘sounded’ alive and well.

“His mom’s been in contact with him on Facebook, and on one of the posts I suggested that maybe the RCMP could track him through his Facebook profile,” he said. “Davey, or whoever is accessing his Facebook account, took offense to this and basically told me to mind my own business, just not in those words.” Since then the communication has completely degraded and open threats have been made to the gentleman.

(Photo:  Part of a screen shot of the man's 'conversation' with Davey Auger or someone using Davey Auger's Facebook account yesterday afternoon.  The balance of the comments were removed to protect other posters' privacy.)

Monika Petersen shared this beautiful shot of the Aurora Borealis over the Springhouse area this morning.

Click the photo to see a larger version.

'Avalanche Awareness Days' is held annually in January in over 40 Canadian communities. Community events are planned at ski and snowmobile areas in mountain communities across Canada, from Crowsnest Pass, Alberta to Whitehorse, Yukon to Pond Inlet, Nunavut. Day-time activities include hands-on demonstrations of safety gear such as avalanche transceivers, probes, and shovels, and tips on how to use public avalanche bulletins. In every community, avalanche professionals and many volunteers share their expertise to help people learn how to manage their risk in avalanche terrain.

Rick Jelley, president of the Williams Lake Powder Kings Snowmobile Club stated today that they do an avalanche awareness course every year, including one coming up in the next two weeks. The courses are done with Mark Savard from Red Shreds and Powder Kings safety director Sue Price.

Unlike Premier Campbell when we never knew if the legislature would sit, Premier Clark has posted the full legislative calendar for this year and it shows we’ll have full spring and fall legislative sessions.

Since we did not prorogue the last fall session, Premier Clark’s Throne Speech from the fall carries over and so does some of the outstanding legislation from that session, particularly the Local Government Auditor General Act that has been called into question by the Union of BC Municipalities.