There's some cash on the line as Port Edward wants you to spruce up your property

While Prince Rupert councillors continue discuss the state of property maintenance in the city's downtown and residential areas, down the road in Port Edward, municipal officials are being a little more action focused towards the goal of making their community look better.

With the District looking to achieve their goal of developing some community pride by putting up some cash to provide a little incentive for the residents of the District to spruce up the appearance of their properties.

In Port Edward's August newsletter, the District outlines the details of a community spirit initiative that issues a call to community pride and offers up a pair of cash prizes for those that have the best results in the summer's end clean up.

The way the project works is that residents are asked to call the District office to register, once residents are on the participation list a representative from Port Edward will come to their property and take a Before picture, residents will then have until September 30th to make their property look its best.

Once the civic pride competition comes to an end, two cash prizes will be distributed to those that have had the best results, with a 500 and 250 dollar prize up for grabs.

You can learn more about the project and a range of other initiatives and notes from the District of Port Edward's website

For more notes about developments in Port Edward see our archive page here.

Recreation Hockey League looking for players for 2017-18

If you listen carefully, you might just hear the new sheet of ice at the Jim Ciccone Civic Centre calling out to the regions hockey players that it's time to drop the puck.

With minor hockey players making their plans for the season ahead and the Prince Rupert Rampage almost ready to head into another CIHL season, the Civic Centre is soon to be the focus of all things puck for the fall and winter season.

Those that may be just a few years beyond their PRMHA days, or perhaps not quite up to the rigours of a long CIHL season still have an option though to keep their skates in the game, with the Men's Recreation Hockey League gearing up for another season.

The popular Men's league is accepting registration until September 8th, with the season set to start shortly after.

Registration fees for the year ahead are 500 dollars for the season and should you like to spend your times on the ice between the pipes, the Rec League has a deal for you, as Goaltenders play for Free.

You can find more information about the league and register for the season ahead at the Prince Rupert Civic Centre offices.

The Men's Rec League is one of a number of hockey options for residents of the city, you can review some of the organizations offering programs for adults in Prince Rupert here.

Adult Amateur hockey on the North Coast

Our archive of notes for 207-18 for the various hockey leagues above the Prince Rupert Minor Hockey Association level on the North Coast.

For PRMHA notes see our Minor Hockey archive here.
For the Prince Rupert Rampage see our archive here.


Prince Rupert Old Timer's Hockey League

Website

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Men's Recreational Hockey League



September

September 8 -- City completes arena upgrades

August

August 28 -- Recreation Hockey League looking for players for 2017-18  NCR




Prince Rupert First Timer's Hockey League

Facebook page

August 29 -- First Timers' Hockey League ready to drop the puck on 2017-18 NCR




If you are involved with Adult Amateur hockey on the North Coast and wish to share news of your league drop us a line at Northcoastreviewpr@yahoo.ca  or through our twitter portal at @CharlesMHays

With School but a week away, BC's schools continue to try to fill staffing requirements

When the school bell rings in the first students of the year next week, the attendance count won't only show the class roster for the 2017-18 school year,  but also offer up an indication as to how successful SD52 has been in recruiting teachers and filling in staffing requirements at District schools across the region.

Earlier this year, SD52 addressed some of their concerns when it comes to Teacher recruitment, with District officials discussing the issue during the course of their consultation process during the Budget process.

The theme of teacher recruitment and retention become one of significant interest following the provincial government's announcement of its plans to increase the number of teaching positions available in BC, that as a result of a 2016 Supreme Court victory by the BCTF.

School District notes need for help in filling positions in wake of BCTF agreement
Teacher recruitment, Aboriginal education among themes from recent SD52 meeting

As this new school year was approaching, Districts across the province have been competing to fill staff positions as teachers work on their own career plans and settle into new locations.

With the season migration in education of the summer, the North Coast is not the only area of the province seeking out teaching talent as we approach September, with statistics compiled as of last week by the teaching career site Make a Future indicating that Northern BC is the area of the province which is host to the largest volume of openings at 48.

The Make A Future site offers up further background on those opportunities, with links included to all of the province's school districts currently listing openings.

As SD52 heads towards next Tuesday's opening, four listings for employment options in the Prince Rupert region can be found on the Make A Future website.

One features an overview for a number of Teacher's On Call positions,  which appears to be the one area that SD52 will be concentrating on, while the other positions posted are more specific to the city's schools.

A review the full list of opportunities is available here

You can get a glimpse as to how SD52 puts out the word on Prince Rupert and what it and the School District have to offer, through their the District's anchor page on the Make A Future website.

More information from School District 52 is normally available through their website.

Over at the city's Independent School, Annunciation currently has one employment position posted, that for a Primary Teacher for Grade 2 at the school.

Some background on the province wide quest for teachers can be found below:

Greater Victoria School District hire 200 new teachers
Schools will struggle to find subs this year
BC still has hundreds of teaching vacancies with school year weeks away
Nearly 50 teacher jobs unfilled in (Prince George) region
BC School Districts in hiring crunch, face teachers shortage
Incentives needed to attract teachers to 'unaffordable' Vancouver: teachers' federation
Abbotsford school district has 90 unfilled teacher positions with school year just days away
Hundreds of Vancouver teaching jobs being posted, ahead of start of school
No teacher shortage here (Penticton)
Provincial teacher shortage will not impact Comox Valley
Teacher staffing remains an issue, with start of school just a couple of weeks away


More background on education across the Northwest can be found on our archive page here.

School Openings set for next Tuesday

As the 2017 Summer vacation for students across the region winds down this week, Parents, Guardians and the youngsters of the North Coast will be packing a lot of activities into this one final week of togetherness, all with an eye to the excitement of another school year just around the corner.

In the annual summer's end ritual, Calendars on walls everywhere now indicate that the seven day countdown is underway until the doors to the region's schools swing open across the region on Tuesday, September 5th.

For those students returning to their studies for the 2017-18 year, next Tuesday's opening won't make for too long a day, as students, parents and teachers ease into the new school year.

As a guide for students and their parents, SD52 has released the timetable for the first day of school, which looks as follows:

All elementary schools: Prince Rupert/Port Edward

Kindergarten students and their families will be notified of their start times by their individual schools.

For Grades 1 through five, Tuesday's return takes place from 10 AM to the Noon Hour

Prince Rupert Middle School

Students in Grades 7 and 8 report from 10:30 AM to Noon
Students in Grade 6 will report from 1 to 3 PM

Charles Hays Secondary School 

Students in Grades 11 to 12 report at 9:45 AM
Students in Grades 9-10 report at 1 PM

Note: Attendance is required for students to ensure placement in their classes at CHSS.

Pacific Coast School

Students in Grades 9 to 12 report at 10 AM

Regular Class Schedules and school hours will begin on Wednesday, September 6th

This final week of summer is also Registration week for those who are new to the School District or have moved to a new school area over the summer.

For those with children of elementary school age, all of SD52's elementary school offices are open from August 28 through September 1st from 9 AM to Noon for registration.

You can review the catchment area for the elementary schools in Prince Rupert from the Map above to see which school is the one that serves your area of the city.

New students that may be attending Charles Hays Secondary, Prince Rupert Middle School or Pacific Coast School can register this week as well at offices for each of those schools.

More background on School District 52 can be found through their website here.

Prince Rupert's Independent School also returns to studies next Tuesday, updates for parents of those children attending Annunciation can be found on the Annunciation website.

Further to the North and up Tuck Inlet, the Coast Tsimshian Academy in Lax Kw'alaams will also open the doors to a new school year on Tuesday, updates on the year ahead at CTA can be found through their Facebook page.

For a review of items of interest on education in the Northwest see our archive page here.

Real Estate Tracker: Week ending August 27, 2017

Our weekly review of the listings of the local real estate agents, tracking those properties which appear to be driving the local price structure for the North Coast.

Every Monday, we look over the listing prices of the past seven days and outline the Top 10 asking prices in the area, providing a snap shot as to where the Real Estate market may be trending on a week to week basis.

The listings below are purely for information purposes, for further background on the properties recorded, see our links page for access to the individual real estate listings.

The Archive for our weekly review can be found here.

Our list of the top ten priced homes for the week ending August 27, 2017 is below:

Prince Rupert Real Estate, East Side, Week ending August 27, 2017

Prince Rupert Real Estate, West Side, Week ending August 27, 2017

Two changes came to our review of the listings this week, one the return of a property on Graham to the active listings file, taking the top spot in asking price in the city this week. The other change saw a new property added to listings for the east side of the city.

The Graham/Atlin Avenue area makes for half of our listings of ten, with the area west of McBride Street accounting for seven of of the the ten this week.

The east side of the city claims the remaining three spots, including the newest listing on Heron Road

With the return of the Graham property, the combined value this week of our ten high end listings edges up to  $6,648,500

The lowest mark for the list of ten now sits at $515,000, while our top end from the last week is listed at $829,000.

Below find our findings as of the Week ending August 27, 2017

2280 Graham Avenue                   $829,000 --  Remax (return)
1027 Borden Street                       $789,000 --  Realty Executives
1830 Graham Avenue                   $759,000 --  Realty Executive
1881 Graham Avenue                   $710,000 --  Remax
2230 Graham Avenue                   $689,000 --  Remax
1810 Graham Avenue                   $660,000 --  Remax
1232 Conrad Street                       $569,000 --  Realty Executives
226 Heron Road                            $569,000 --  Remax (new)
1208 Beach Place                          $559,000 --  Remax
184 Silversides Drive                    $515,000 -- Remax


   
For more items related to Real Estate see our archive page here.

For background on Housing issues in the region see our past items here.

Blog Watching: Week ending August 27, 2017

LNG and politics, both provincial and municipal dominate our list of the five most read items of the week.

Th week started with the latest news out of the Malaysian offices of Petronas indicating that while the days of terminal development in Prince Rupert may be at an end, the opportunity to invest in an ongoing project in Kitimat may be next up for the energy giant.

Some of our notes on politics also found a wide number of readers this week, with a fair amount of interest directed to the newest hires for North Coast MLA Jennifer Rice's Prince Rupert constituency office.

Two items from our review of Monday's City council session also attracted a large audience, with our notes on a presentation to Council from the detachment commander of the RCMP and the ongoing concerns of Councillor Barry Cunningham on the poor state of the downtown area both resonating with our readers.

And when they weren't looking to the sky, readers were looking to the blog for some notes on Monday's Solar eclipse, the much anticipated event even delivered some clear skies for the North Coast, with the clouds parting for occasional glimpses of the transit of the Moon and the sun.

The top story of the week however keeps the LNG files on the front burner, as we review another twist in the LNG prospects for the Northwest.

Will Prince Rupert's Petronas loss, become Kitimat's Petronas gain  -- The LNG door may be closed in Prince Rupert, but for Malaysia's Petronas, the door may be opening to a share of the investment in the LNG Canada project in Kitimat  (posted August 21, 2017)

That article was followed by:

Clouds will intrude on Prince Rupert's Solar eclipse experience -- Despite a gloomy morning and occasional rain, the clouds parted just enough for a one hour period to allow North Coast residents a glimpse of Monday's Solar eclipse   (posted August 21, 2017)

Joseph Jack's parachute lands at NDP offices on Third Avenue West -- A short stop over with Black Press on Fraser Street propelled the now former Northern View reporter on to a staff position with North Coast MLA Jennifer Rice. The MLA introduced her new Prince Rupert team through a post election newsletter  posted to her social media stream this week. (posted August 22, 2017)

Prince Rupert City Council hears of successes and challenges of policing in the city -- Members of Prince Rupert City Council received an extensive overview the current policing activities out of the streets of the city, as Blake Ward, the Commander of the local detachment provided a review of a number of themes in the community (posted August 24, 2017)

Councillor Cunningham keeps heat on City Council over conditions of downtown buildings -- With few signs of progress to be found for his point of view, City Councillor Cunningham once again raised a number of concerns that he has over the visual look to the city's downtown area (posted August 25, 2017)

You can find our weekly Blog watching featured posted every Sunday morning by 9AM, a handy way to catch up to the week that was, at a leisurely weekend pace.

You can also review the full listings of the week just past from our Blog Archive index page found on the right hand side of the page.

For those looking for updates to items as they are posted to the blog, don't forget about our email alert access.

A daily review of the latest items on the blog can be delivered to your email in box, simply by entering your email address into the information bar, items posted to the blog will be delivered to your e-mail account each day.

You can find the link to that feature on the upper, right hand side of the blog. It can be found underneath the Follow the North Coast Review by Email indicator.

Our archive of weekly Blog Watching can be found here