Monday, November 16, 2009

New Green Leader

Ontario's Green Party has a new leader who hopes to help elect heir first MPP to Queen's Park.

Toronto entrepreneur Mike Schreiner was chosen to replace Frank de Jong at the party's leadership convention in London.

Schreiner says the party will fight to win a seat in the 20-11 election.

Local Sports for Monday November 16

Fort Frances Muskies girls hockey team has started the season 0-2 after losing games to Kenora and Dryden on the weekend.

Saturday, Muskies fell 6-3 in their home opener to Dryden.

Anikka Mctavish, Ericka Tymkin and Taylor Dixon scored for Fort Frances.

Friday, the Muskies lost by the same 6-3 score to Kenora.

Jillian Langtry had a pair and Danielle Jean the other goal.


Fort Frances Muskies boys hockey team scored the winner with 1-second left to play en route to a 3-2 victory over Dryden in the final of the Morden Manitoba High School Tournament.

Muskies open their NORWOSSA season tomorrow.


The Fort Frances Nor-Fab Flames Peewee Girls Rep team earned a pair of wins on the road, defeating Cloquet 3-2 and Proctor 11-2 in games played Saturday.

Amber Jourdain, Myla Angus and Amy Penner scored in the game against Cloquet in which the Flames outshot their opponents 31-9.

In the game against Proctor, Madisyn DeGagne had four goals, Amber Jourdain with a hatrick and Jessica Coran with two.

Myla Angus and Abbi Perreault rounded out the scoring


In Atom girls hockey in Emo Friday, Fort Frances Kaemingh Esso beat Nestor Falls Marine 7-1.

Maighyn Degagne had four goals for Esso with Emma Noga collecting a pair and Khali Degagne the other.

Avery Cates scored for Nestor Falls

At a bantam boys hockey tournament in Emo, Fort Frances Canadian Tire won the b-side championship with a 4-1 win over Emo.

Jordan Windigo had a pair with Josh Gwinn and Jayme Taylor adding singles for Canadian Tire.


Rainy River Community College Women's hockey team swept Minot State University on the weekend.

Brenley Anderson had 4-goals in the Voyageurs' 6-4 win Sunday in Minot.

Saturday, Anderson got the winning goal with 4-minutes left in the third to give Rainy River a 6-5 decision.


On the court, the Voyageurs' men's basketball team split a pair of games, defeating Hibbing 81-70 Friday before falling 77-75 in overtime to Mesabi Range.

The women's basketball team opened its season with a win Friday 75-63 over Hibbing.

HST Introduced Today

Ontario's Liberal government will introduce legislation today to harmonize the province's eight per cent sales tax with the five per cent G-S-T.

In addition to creating a single, 13 per cent sales tax next July, the bill also includes a series of cuts to income, small business and corporate taxes that take effect in January.

Finance Minister Dwight Duncan says the province needs to make businesses more competitive so they can hire more people and lower prices for consumers.

He says the tax package is about creating jobs and rebuilding Ontario's economy as it emerges from the recession.

The bill also provides for tax rebate cheques of up to one-thousand dollars for families to help offset the impact of the H-S-T in the first year.

The opposition parties call the H-S-T a blatant tax grab which will add eight per cent to many items now exempt from the provincial sales tax, including gasoline, home heating fuel and hydro bills.

The National Citizen's Coalition estimates the H-S-T will cost the average taxpayer an additional 800 to one-thousand dollars annually.

Thunder Bay-Rainy River M-P John Rafferty is still confident people can still halt the Harmonized Sale Tax from moving ahead.

Rafferty says opposition to the blended tax is growing as more and more people begin to realize the true impact HST will have on their budgets.

Rafferty has asked the federal government not forward $4.3 million to Ontario toward the harmonizing of the sales tax, a motion that expected to come up for debate early in the new year.