Addition to D.E.S. Environmental Services Inc

The Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry Provincial and Federal NDP riding associations elected their executive members for 2014 at their joint annual general meetings on March 5, at the Navy Veterans Association in Cornwall.  

Brian Lynch was re-elected as President of both the SDSG provincial and federal NDP riding associations.

Lynch told the crowd that the local NDP, as a result of their outreach activities in recent years,  are in a good position to run a strong campaign in SDSG in the next provincial election with nominated candidate Elaine MacDonald.  

MacDonald, a twice-elected Cornwall city councillor, was nominated as the provincial NDP candidate in SDSG at a nomination meeting last year on March 27, 2013.  

A provincial election in Ontario could come as early as this spring.

“Across Ontario, people are coming to see the NDP as the party that gets results to create jobs, make life more affordable, strengthen healthcare, and make the government more accountable,” said Lynch. 

“Ontarians deserve better than the tired, discredited Liberals and the ‘slash and burn’ Hudak Conservatives” who want to cut essential public services and make Ontario a low wage province.”

Candidate Elaine MacDonald praised the work of NDP leader Andrea Horwath and the Ontario NDP caucus at Queen’s Park to get results that make life better and more affordable for everyday people. 

“If elected as MPP, my first responsibility will be to the people of SDSG.  I will work for good-paying jobs, youth employment, access to post- secondary education and training, healthcare we can count on, and greater affordability for everyday people,” said MacDonald. 

She also wants to see greater assistance to agriculture and rural communities and a fairer tax system that will pay for essential public services and help the province balance its books.  

On the issue of skyrocketing hydro rates, MacDonald said, “The Ontario NDP will stop the expensive private power deals, cap hydro executive pay and cut down on waste and duplication by merging Ontario’s hydro agencies, and stop the $1 billion annual subsidy of electricity exports to jurisdictions like New York and Michigan.”

Also elected to serve on the 16 member local NDP riding associations’ executives were Elaine MacDonald as vice president; Paul Aubin, recording secretary; David Denneny, chief financial officer; Madeleine Lebrun, women’s representative; Carilyne Hebert, youth representative; Trevor Tolley, Darlene Jalbert, Marion Adams, Jason Setnyk, Ian Wilson, Jack St. Thomas, Patricia Sylvia, Alison Parker, David Mcilveen, Bonnie Lauzon as members-at-large.  

Brian Lynch and Carilyne Hebert were also elected as the local NDP provincial councillors.

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More than 100 people gathered at Matilda Hall in Dixons Corners to celebrate the 75th Anniversary of the Iroquois Fire Department Saturday (Sept. 24) night. Deputy chief Philip Thompson welcomed firefighters, along with their friends […]

“Dr. Carmichael put me up for 10 minutes of daily exercise. I haven’t been on exercise since 1942, eight years ago, so it will certainly be strange walking down the street again. I am very happy. This has been a great day.”

Clara Raina was 24 years old when she wrote those words on October 26, 1950, in her detailed and meticulous diaries. She entered the Royal Ottawa Sanatorium in 1939, diagnosed with tuberculosis. In 1952 she was able to leave the hospital.

Clara would see seven members of her immediate family enter the same sanatorium. She would see her father, and her brothers John and Billy, die of the deadly contagion. And she, herself, would undergo several therapies used for treating TB sixty years ago. One such treatment cost her 11 of her 24 ribs. 

Clara had “her own yardstick for measuring happiness,” said her sister, Anne Raina, author of the book, Clara’s Rib, written from the diaries and records and papers the young girl kept during her years of medical confinement. 

“Our mother taught us that “every single day has something beautiful in it,” Raina told the Leader. “Some days you have to look harder to find it, but always look. Clara’s story is one of hope, humour and strong faith.”

Anne Raina is presenting  book talks based on Clara’s Rib, on Monday, October 15, at 7:30 p.m. at the Lost Villages, and on Thursday, October 18, at 2 p.m., at the Morrisburg Public Library.

Clara’s diaries paint a picture of the nature of the disease of tuberculosis, its treatments (“Some seem barbaric by our modern standards,” Anne Raina said, “but doctors were not trying to be cruel. They were doing their best with the knowledge available at the time.”), and TB’s affects on families and on the sufferers themselves. 

“Clara persevered,” Anne Raina said. “She found humour and hope. Readers of all ages, will, I think, be drawn into Clara’s life.” 

Anne Raina was entrusted by her sister with the diaries and a manuscript Clara had written just before her death. “I always felt that this was a story that needed to be told,” the author explained. 

Clara’s Rib, as Peter Jessamine, MD, son of the former superintendant of the Royal Ottawa Sanatorium put it, concerns a woman whose life “is truly a miracle and an inspiration.”  

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