PC Party to take stand against drugs

Caption: From left, Myles MacKinnon, Shirley Anne Campbell, Leader Olive Crane and Merlin Cormier of the P.E.I. Progressive Conservative party stand outside Three Oaks Senior High school Friday afternoon before a press conference where the Conservatives announce programs for youth addiction.

Island Progressive Conservatives say yes to addiction treatment

Ryan Quigley

Journal Pioneer

The Progressive Conservative Party in P.E.I. is committed to battling youth addictions, said Party Leader Olive Crane Friday at a press conference in Summerside at Three Oaks Senior High School.

The party announced a three-part platform aimed to help families with kids struggling with addictions.

The three programs in the party’s stand to address youth addictions including establishing a residential youth addictions facility on P.E.I., reinstating and investing drug prevention programs such as DARE, SAVE and Peer Education and creating a community fund to enhance community addictions treatments and prevention programming.

Provincial PC Candidates Myles MacKinnon, Shirley Anne Cameron and Merlin Cormier were also there for the event.

Crane said talking to families, drug prevention and rehabilitation is a big concern.

“For the last several weeks and months we’ve had our candidates out on the door step listening to Islanders,” she said. “One of the big issues that continually come up is the issue with youth addictions and how it’s impacting on the individual and their family and our entire communities.”

She said the province has been lacking a youth rehabilitation facility for too long.

“Right now what we’re committed to is a residential treatment facility. There’s a lot of work to be done to determine the best location, the best model of treatment.”

Crane used the Portage Residential Centre in Cassidy Lake, N.B., which offers up to a year for treatment, as an example of what she would like to see.

“Right now in the province we do have a day treatment program for young people, but this is a 24-hour seven days a week residential program many addicts themselves and their families have been asking for,” she said. “When you get to do this, we have to do it right.”

Shirley Anne Cameron, who’s teaching resume includes Athena Consolidated School and Three Oaks Senior High school, said the approach is critical in her experiences.

“They deserve this and we really need to make this happen for them to give them a fighting chance against addictions.”

STRONG MAN

CAPTION: John MacDonald lifts a Honda Civic Thursday night at the new Evangeline Recreation Centre during the P.E.I. Men’s 230-Pound Strongman Competition. MacDonald eventually won the event.

CAPTION: Ashley Profitt picks up two gas cans on her way to the finish line at the P.E.I. Ladies Strength and Fitness Championships Thursday night at the new Evangeline Recreation Centre. Profitt eventually won the event.

John MacDonald wins P.E.I. Men’s 230-Pound Strongman Champshionship

Ryan Quigley

Journal Pioneer

John MacDonald defeated Terry MacKay in a tie-breaker tug-of-war competition to become the P.E.I. Men’s Under 230- Pound Strongman Championship winner Thursday night at the new Evangeline Recreation Centre.

MacDonald, of York P.E.I. and MacKay, of Bridgewater, N.S. and reigning two time champion of the competition, were tied on the leader board after four events that seen them pulling tractors 50 feet, flipping tractor tires, lifting a car and a medley race lifting a log, a large rock, a keg and a cement weighted lobster trap.

The men then faced off in a tug of war to determine the winner, something MacDonald says he was intimidated by.

“‘I suck at tug-of-war,’ that’s what was going through my head,” he said. “I was kind of hoping we’d go for a pose down or a push-up competition, but tug-of-war it was.”

Third place finisher for the event was Summerside resident Allie Gallant.

MacDonald felt pretty good about his win Thursday night.

“I didn’t think it was going to happen. I don’t really train the strongman that often. I was just hoping to come out and have some fun and winning was a big plus.”

The natural power lifter said the dead lifting the car was the hardest event of the night for him.

“I got in the wrong position, kind of on my toes for it and hanging on for dear life,” he said. “(Dead lifting) is something I train everyday but it’s totally different when you’re lifting those kinds of implements and holding it there all day long.”

MacDonald wasn’t the only winner of the night.

Ashley Profitt took home the P.E.I. Ladies Strength and Fitness Championships crown, beating out her closest competitor by only a few tenths of a second.

“It was pretty intense, I knew I was going to be close,” she said. “It was scary too, I knew I was going to do not bad but I wasn’t expecting to be first, that’s for sure.”

The 23-year old Lot 16 native said she was happy to have won.

“I worked hard to get here and stuff. I did a major weight loss since last August so it was kind of a, ‘Good job Ashley, you’re going in the right direction,’” she said. “It tells me I can do whatever I want if I put my mind to it.”

Profitt beat out second place finisher Rachelle Arsenault and third place finisher for the title.

Evangeline Rec Centre set to host first event

Evangeline Recreational Centre set to host first event

Ryan Quigley

Journal Pioneer

In April 2010, the Evangeline community was struck hard as the Evangeline Recreational Centre burned down.

Thursday will help repair it, as only five months since construction began the first event in the newly built Evangeline Recreational Centre will be held as a part of the community’s Acadian festival.

The 400- seat centre, complete with a National Hockey League sized ice surface and a full work out gym, will be hosting the festival’s Strongman/ Women’s strength and fitness competition at 7:30 p.m.

Cedric Gallant, Evangeline Recreational Centre manager, was quite excited to be able to unveil it to the public Thursday.

“(It feels) unbelievable. It’s going to be so great to see people walk into this building and just look their faces saying, ‘Wow.” It’s going to be awesome, great.”

Gallant said people avoided coming in while construction was going on so they could just see the finished product.

“Definitely everybody will be pleased. Our old rink was great, but everything is brand new and that type of thing,” he said. “Their reaction is the main thing and they’re just going to love it.”

Gallant said though the old rink burning down was a “heart wrenching experience” it’ll be heartwarming to have the new one open.

“There’s always a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. The way the community got together with this and the fundraising that they did was just amazing. It’s their building.”

The complex is 95 per cent done with only minor details needing to be finished, like glass, boards and the ice for the ice surface and seats. Though they were on schedule, Gallant said they still had to scramble to finish a few things.

“Everything has been going smoothly but the last couple of days we may have scrambled a bit,” he said. “But everyone here has been working hard.”

Gallant said when he walks in tomorrow night with the Evangeline Recreational Centre filled he will be very emotional.

“It’s just because the old rink wasn’t supposed to burn but it did and now the new rink wasn’t supposed to be here yet, maybe another year or so, but everything went so quick and so fast,” he said. “We went from being very, very sad to being very, very oh my God type of thing. It’s going to be very emotional all weekend here.”

Elvis Burned

Police recovered a burning Elvis behind Elm Street School Thursday afternoon, said Summerside Police Service Sgt. Barry Arsenault.

At 2 p.m. Thursday afternoon police responded to a call from the janitorial staff of Elm Street school reporting a burning scarecrow behind the building in the playground area.

Upon arriving at the scene, Summerside police recovered the charred remains of who they suspected to be Elvis.

Friday morning blue suede shoes and a wig were recovered in the grass and surrounding area.

The Summerside Police Service is in the process of obtaining the video from the school’s outdoor cameras.