The Similkameen News Leader
Editorial
October 23, 2007
MORE THAN A ONE TRICK PONY
Remember the group formed locally called SOS?
The name stood for Save Our Similkameen and they basically banded together when a company named Compliance was snooping about in the area with plans to build a coal-fired power plant upstream from Princeton.
Long story short: SOS (along with Friends of the Similkameen in Keremeos) made a lot of noise, hosted meetings, information seminars and collected signed petitions.
Then the BC Liberals went green and pulled the pin on proposed coal-fired power generation at about the same time SOS was starting to make some tracks.
Blame it on melting ice caps if you will, but suddenly a lot of people wanted to go back to just leaving boot marks in the snow rather than carbon footprints on the planet.
While SOS wasn't entirely responsible for Compliance's decision to move away from it's original project concept, the group did have something to do about it and will probably be best remembered as a voice of the community.
Even if you didn't side with them, like their methods or totally understood what they were doing shooing away those apparently high paying jobs we were promised you had to admit that at least for once in recent memory someone decided to stick up for Princeton in ways we've never seen it done before.
After Compliance folded it's tent and left, SOS soon did the same, which we have stated in the past, was probably a bad idea.
We need a group like SOS to keep sticking up for Princeton.
There have also been other local issues since SOS disappeared that we thought would be a perfect fit for an SOS-inspired forum or public information session or insanely expensive and comprehensive advertising campaign.
Issues that come to mind at the moment include the landslide into Similkameen River, which occurred on former Similco Mines property and the problem with recruitment and retention of doctors in Princeton.
That's just stuff on our minds today.
There's probably a file folder full of other concerns, issues and causes just screaming for the attention of a group such as SOS.
We hope the group suddenly reappears and starts kicking up a fuss because as far as we're concerned, there's never a bad time to stick up for Princeton.
