New Executive Director For NCDS

The agency responsible for delivering a number of employment programs in the Rainy River district has a new executive director.

Nikki Baird takes over at NCDS from the retiring Jenny Greenhaulgh.

Baird joins the organization after three and a half years with Riverside Foundation for Health Care.

The Foundation, meantime, will soon begin a search for Baird's replacement.

NDP Likes Chances In Northwestern Ontario

Provincial NDP Leader Andrea Horwath is optimistic with where the NDP stand in Northwestern Ontario.

Horwath says Sunday's selection of Mary Kozorys to challenge Liberal MPP Bill Mauro in Thunder Bay-Atikokan as a step forward.

Kozorys beat out former Schreiber mayor Madge Richardson for the right to represent the party in the next provincial election.

ONA Launches Campaign For More Nurses

The Ontario Nurses Association has launched a new ad campaign aimed at raising the awareness of the need for more registered nurses in the province.

President Linda Haslam-Stroud says Ontario continues to have the second-lowest ratio of RNs-to-population in all of Canada.

The ONA blames underfunding for hospitals having to cut more than one-thousand nursing positions in the past two years.

Rickford Feels First Nations Optimistic About First Nations Education Act

Kenora MP Greg Rickford says first impressions of the federal government's newly announced education act for first nations is being well received.

Rickford says regional chiefs he's spoken with feel optimistic about the act.

The act is intended to give more control for first nations over their education system.

School Board Considers Expanding High School

The school board responsible for public schools in the Dryden area is looking at having grade 7 and 8 students attend classes at Dryden High School.

The Keewatin-Patricia District School Board will hold public meetings later month.

The model is already in place at Kenora's Beaver Brae school.

Board officials say the addition of the intermediate grades at that school has been well received by teachers, students and parents.