Food Bank Fill Up

• 
  
  For those of you in the Tri-Cities area the Food Bank fill up will be at:
  
  
  Parking lot of PriceSmart Foods (at the corner of Pinetree and Lougheed Hwy in Coquitlam)
  
  
  If you are not in the Tri-cities I encourage you to support your local Food Bank and give generously, our Food Bank is not unique, at this time of year all Food Banks are down in their food supply. Help if you can!
  
  
  The food bank has just over twenty days of food left at this time, and with the start of school  the need for donations couldn’t be greater.
  
  
  Come on down to PriceSmart Foods and help us fill a semi-trailer with donations for the SHARE Food Bank! Bring some non-perishable food donations and enjoy a hotdog and some popcorn, too.
  
  
  Plus..Kelly Holmes of 93.7 JRfm will be doing live cuts at the event from 12-2pm!!
  
  
  Ways to support:
  
  
  1. Purchase a pre-packaged hamper inside PriceSmart Foods
  
  
  2. Host a food drive of your own! Collect food with your friends, families, colleagues, and bring down your donations!
  
  
  3. Simply come on down with your own cash and/or food donations.
  
  
  The most urgently needed items are:
  -           Rice
  -           Pasta and pasta sauce
  -           Canned meals (ravioli, beans etc.)
  -           Canned fruit
  -           Lipton Sidekicks, Hamburger Helpers, Shake & Bake, Kraft Dinner
  -           Juice
  -           Canned tomatoes
  -           Cereal
  -           Peanut Butter (medium size)
  
  
  4. SHARE is also recruiting volunteers for this event! An event like this could never be possible without the support of our volunteers. If you would like to volunteer, please contact Heather at 604-529-5107 or email heather.stacey@sharesociety.ca.
  
  
  The SHARE Food Bank Fill Up is a great opportunity to get involved. Come on down to drop off your donations, enjoy the festivities, and make a difference in the community!

Harper Conservatives bailed out banks, but is letting your pension die

Harper government bailed out the banks, but they're about to let your pension die.

The following is from the Occupy Canada movement and was posted on August 29th 


"Canada is taking a different tack than Washington on the thorny issue of helping companies fund their widening pension gaps, shrugging off corporate pleas for relief even as the United States lets businesses slash their contributions.

A frightening prospect for workers, retirees and companies, yawning pension deficits have gone from arcane accounting entries to front page news on fears that massive shortfalls could even cause some corporations to fail.

As a growing number of employers look to roll back benefits to the alarm of unions, others are pouring cash into their pensions funds only to see the hole get deeper.

Canada is not unique, and as in the United States, generous public sector pensions are a hot-button issue. But the federal government is taking a more hands-off stance than U.S. President Barack Obama, who signed a bill last month that changes how companies calculate what they must contribute to their pension funds, effectively allowing them to pay less.[..]

Softening the rules implies letting plans stay underfunded for longer, a risk financially prudent Ottawa may be reluctant to accept. After all, the country’s conservative banking culture helped it survive the global financial crisis better than most.

As in other countries, the scope of the Canadian problem is huge. 90% of the roughly 400 defined-benefit pension plans overseen by Canada’s federal regulator are underfunded, meaning they cannot meet their liabilities should their plans be wound up today, as is required by law." - Louise Egan and Susan Taylor, Reuters. -b

The Global Demise Of Pension Plans:
http://www.businessinsider.com/the-global-pension-ponzi-scheme-is-collapsing-2012-8

Canada takes tough stance on pension fund relief:
http://www.torontosun.com/2012/08/03/canada-takes-tough-stance-on-pension-fund-relief

Canada's bank bailout concealed by government:
http://digitaljournal.com/article/323997

Harper’s Methodical Campaign to Silence Democracy

The plan is revealed in a book by the PM’s former top strategist Tom Flanagan. and the article was written by  Keith Reynolds,  on 18 Aug 2012,  and published in TheTyee.ca

Tom Flanagan, University of Calgary professor and a top advisor to the Conservative leader made much of this very clear in a largely forgotten section of a book he published in 2007. 

In Harpers Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power, Flanagan writes about an episode in the 2006 election when it looked like abortion might become an issue. 

He writes:

"The door, however, had been opened for a final wave of attacks. Liberal outrider organizations -- feminists, gay-rights activists, law professors, aboriginal leaders, environmentalists -- came at us in human waves, claiming that Harper would roll back abortion rights, use the notwithstanding clause to quash gay marriage, and repudiate the Kelowna agreement and the Kyoto Accord. The Conservative Party simply can't compare with the Liberals in the depth and breadth of these external linkages; Real Women and Campaign Life can't compete with EGALE Canada and the National Action Committee on the Status of Women in terms of public funding and media clout. (We did score one minor coup when the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples broke ranks with other aboriginal organizations to support us instead other Liberal.) If the Conservative Party can stay in power for any length of time, it should be a priority to de-fund the support groups that the Liberals have cultivated so long with grants, subsidies and access to government."Flanagan recommended these groups be defunded and denied access to government and that is what happened. After all, these are the people who dared to suggest a Conservative government would repudiate Kyoto and the Kelowna Accord with First Nations.

That is how the current federal government views organizations who do not share their world view; the professors and the gay rights activists, the aboriginal leaders, women and environmentalists. They are just Liberal outriders. They are the enemy.

There is a straight line between Flanagan's musings in his book and the actions of the federal government. It is all about controlling the narrative. It is all about reducing the voices that might speak out against the current government's agenda.

Civil society organizations; groups like charities, unions, women's organizations and others play a critical role in our society. They provide a voice that is not clearly heard at the political level. It is organizations of women who drive the fight for equality. Charities working for prisoners and immigrants made public the dangerous direction new policies on crime and immigration were taking us. Environmental groups and First Nations moved us as British Columbians to oppose the Gateway pipeline. Unions have fought for health and safety protections for immigrant workers.

Sometimes these views are not popular. Sometimes they don't even agree with the government. But sometimes they mobilize us as a society to change the way we think. For our current federal government, that appears to be unacceptable.

But there is an even worse outcome than defunding, closing organizations and attacking others through Revenue Canada. That worst outcome is the chill that comes from the fear government will act against you. Many organizations will simply choose to withdraw from public debates rather than risk making themselves a target.

When a government silences the voices it does not want to hear, or when we silence ourselves out of fear, it is not an attack on individual organizations, it is an attack on democracy

SHARE Food Bank Fill UP

The Food Bank Fill Up is coming soon!  Come on down to PriceSmart Foods and help us fill a semi-trailer with food donations for the SHARE Food Bank.  SHARE Food Bank has just over twenty days of food left at this time, and with the start of school around the corner, the need for donations couldn’t be greater.

When: September 7, 2012

Time: 9am-6pm

Where: PriceSmart Foods – 2991 Lougheed Hwy, Coquitlam (corner of Pinetree Way & Lougheed Hwy)

Donations can be made by simply purchasing $10 or $18 pre-packaged hampers inside PriceSmart Foods. Or, just come on down with your own food and/or cash donations!  If you are not able to drop by, you can also make an online donation at www.sharesociety.ca

1. How you can Help…
2.  Tell your friend, families, colleagues about our event
3. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter
4. Make a donation of food or funds
5.   Host a food drive this week

SHARE is also recruiting volunteers for this event.  We are looking for enthusiastic individuals who can help with a variety of tasking including:

1.          Greeting
2.          receiving  and weighing food donations
3.          loading the food bank trucks 
4.          setup and clean-up

If you’re interested in getting involved please contact Heather Stacey at 6004.529.5107 or by email heather.stacey@sharesoceity.ca

Thank you so much for supporting vulnerable children, individuals and families in the Tri-Cities!