Rainy River Resources Adds More Land

Rainy River Resources has purchased more property in its search for gold in the district.

The company is paying $150-thousand, along with 70-thousand shares, to acquire almost 13-hundred acres in Tait Township from an unnamed seller.

The site includes 32 unpatented mineral claims.

Cellphone Ban Charges

It appears some motorists don't get it.

During the first month of Ontario's new distracted driver law, provincial police issued 470 charges to people caught breaking the rules.

The law, which bans drivers from using hand-held devices such as cellphones and looking at display screens such as laptops, came into effect on October 26, but police did not start enforcing it until last month.

Twenty-two of the charges were laid by OPP in northwestern Ontario.

The fine for using a cellphone or texting while driving is $155.00.

Jurisdictional Change for Trustees

There will be no additional seats added to the Rainy River District School Board this fall.

Instead, trustees elected to represent Fort Frances will also represent public school supporters in the Mine Centre area.

Education Director Jack McMaster says the board did investigate the possibility of adding a trustee.

"The new regulations that came out said you can request to add a trustee if your board amalgamated with a district authority in 2009-10," says McMaster. "We inquired because we amalgamated in 2008-09, but we were told 'no - the regs say 2009-10, it's 09-10."

The change in jurisdiction was required to reflect the 2008 amalgamation with the former Mine Centre School Board.

Sunset Country Frustrated

A northern Ontario tourism official is frustrated with the McGuinty government's new tourism regions.

Gerry Cariou of the Ontario Sunset Country Travel Association says the huge northern Ontario tourism zone will do more harm than good.

Cariou says they've been tied up in conference calls with bureaucrats from Toronto talking about the new tourism regions, rather than spending time on new marketing initiatives.

"We were going to do a social networking site for northwestern Ontario," says Cariou, "but that's three or four months behind now because of the crap the provincial government is doling out with its regional tourism stuff."

Cariou calls the McGuinty Government the worst government ever for the tourism industry.

Throne Speech Panned

Yesterday, the Harper government laid out its plan to whittle away the projected record $56-billion federal budget deficit.

There are no plans for major spending cuts in the throne speech, but there's also none of the big new spending of past budgets.

The Speech from the Throne doesn't sit well with Thunder Bay-Rainy River MP John Rafferty.

He says it doesn't have much when to comes to the forest industry.

"Six-thousand words was the throne speech," says Rafferty. "Twenty-six recycled words in a mention for forestry and no clear direction."

Rafferty does agree with a move to freeze MP salaries.

Budget Day in Ottawa

It's budget day in Ottawa today.

Federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty delivers the budget this afternoon.

Thunder Bay-Rainy River MP John Rafferty hopes it's one that meets the need of all Canadians.

"I'm going to be looking Mr. Harper to give us some kind of indication that he's interested in making Parliament work for every Canadian,"say Rafferty. "There's 1.5 million Canadians unemployed. Now is the time for Mr. Harper to invest in job creation. With senior poverty doubling in the last few years now is the time in this budget to ensure we don't have any seniors living in poverty in this country."

Rafferty also expects approval of the $4.3 billion dollars to Ontario for the implementation of the HST to come through the budget which he says would be disastrous for consumers.