News for Youse: Emergency room closure, pot and taxes, and Tel Aviv bus bombing

by The Georgia Straight Staff on November 21st, 2012 at 8:25 AM

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Surrey Memorial emergency room closure The latest update from the Fraser Health Authority suggests that the Surrey Memorial Hospital emergency room will remain closed for at least two weeks because of flooding.

Other hospitals busy Royal Columbian Hospital in New Westminster and Peace Arch Hospital are both dealing with a large increase in emergency-room visitors as a result of the flooding at Surrey Memorial. It has a temporary emergency triage in the parkade for acute and urgent needs.

B.C.'s child poverty The Child Poverty Report Card, which was released by First Call, shows that 119,000 B.C. kids lived in poverty in 2010 and the child-poverty rate of 14.3 percent was the second worst among the provinces.

Pot could bring tax revenue UBC and SFU researchers have concluded that there are more than 366,000 British Columbians who smoke marijuana. Based on the street value of cannabis, this could generate approximately $500 million per year in tax and licensing revenue if it were a regulated industry.

Abbotsford South Liberals quit The Abbotsford South B.C. Liberal constituency association executive has resigned over the party's decision to acclaim criminologist Darryl Plecas as the candidate rather than allowing Coun. Moe Gill to seek a nomination.

Bomb explodes on Tel Aviv bus A potential truce in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict became less likely when a bomb went off on a city bus in Tel Aviv, injuring 27 people.

Canadian home prices drop The Teranet-National Bank house-price index reveals that housing prices across the country fell by a quarter of a percent in October from September, but they're still nearly 3.5 percent above the price in October 2011.

Vancity backs reconciliation efforts This morning, Vancity will host a photo opportunity with Grand Chief Edward John, Chief Robert Joseph, and Margaret Dickson of Tides Canada Initiatives to announce how it will financially support Reconciliation Canada to host a "Partners Table" on December 5.