Vernon news
City of Vernon to enter race for B.C. Seniors Games
VERNON - The city is preparing to bid on a major sporting event, but it needs a little back-up from its neighbours. The City of Vernon wants to host the 30th anniversary of the 55+ B.C. Games (formerly called the Seniors Games) in 2017 at its new sports track next to Okanagan College. It was...
NEW VERNON WELCOME SIGNS: ‘We’ve been waiting for you’
VERNON - They’re supposed to be inviting, but the signs that welcome travellers into Vernon are looking a little worse for wear and no one is sure exaclty who is reponsible for the upkeep of those signs. Installed at each of the three main gateways to the city the 'Welcome to Greater Vernon' signs greet...
Vernon night market to proceed despite concerns
VERNON - A Friday night market in downtown Vernon will go ahead this summer, but there’s still some unease among city councillors about the event. Coun. Catherine Lord says she’s been contacted by several businesses, some anonymously, wishing to express their concerns about the market. “We’ve been getting some really upset people with it because...
Airport names former Kelowna mayor and councillor to advisory committee
THOMPSON-OKANAGAN - The group that advises Canada’s largest municipally-run airport will soon be joined by a couple of new faces familiar to people in the Central Okanagan. Kelowna’s former mayor Walter Gray and former city councillor Andre Blanleil, along with industry representative Meryle Corbett were all appointed to four-year terms on the Kelowna Internnational Airport...
UPDATE: Crews battle grass fire in Enderby
ENDERBY – Smoke could be seen for miles as volunteers with the Enderby Fire Department fought a grass fire tMonday afternoon. The fire was reported at about 1:30 p.m., April 13, in a field on Meadowview Road in Grindrod. Deputy fire chief Shane Williamson says the property owner lit the fire earlier in the day...
Vernon RCMP investigate possibility of impaired driving in weekend crash
VERNON - Police are treating a car crash which knocked out power to hundreds of residents as an impaired driving case. The crash happened around 12:30 a.m., Saturday, April 11 when a 24-year-old woman went off Kalamalka Road in Coldstream and struck a hydro pole, RCMP spokesperson Gord Molendyk says. Over 1,800 homes in Vernon...
Vernon senior could face charges after five hour standoff with police
VERNON - An elderly man arrested after a five hour standoff with police is looking at possible charges. The 70-year-old Vernon man was allegedly involved in a confrontation with a neighbour over some loud music around 1 a.m., April 10. When police arrived, the man had barricaded himself inside his unit of the fourplex. With...
Teen killed in fatal fall from cliff not using climbing gear: RCMP
VERNON - It looks like an 18-year-old wasn’t using any safety equipment when he decided to go rock climbing and wound up taking a fatal fall from a rock face near Vernon on the weekend. The teenager, who has yet to be identified, was camping with three friends when the group decided to go rock...
Fire at Vernon apartment building quickly doused
VERNON – If a passerby hadn’t noticed smoke from a small fire burning on the outside wall of a Vernon apartment building Saturday afternoon, it could have turned out much worse. Vernon Fire Rescue crews were called to the Sundance Suites at 2902 43 Ave. near MacDonald Park around 4:04 p.m., April 11, to a...
Fall from rock face claims life of teen in Coldstream
VERNON – An 18-year-old fell to his death from a rock face on the King Edward Forest Service Road in Coldstream last night. Vernon RCMP officers and B.C. Ambulance Service paramedics were called to the scene at around 7:30 p.m., April 11. “The male had suffered significant injuries as a result of the fall, and...
More snow falling on Coq and Hope-Princeton
THOMPSON-OKANAGAN – A dump of snow on the Coquihalla and the Hope-Princeton highways overnight is being following with another heavy snowfall today. A vigorous cold front passed through the Southwest Interior overnight dropping 10 to 15 centimetres of snow on the Coquihalla Summit and the Allison Pass, according to a Special Weather Statement from Environment...
Salmon Arm Roots and Blues Festival bucks the trend and survives
SALMON ARM - We’ve got Joni Mitchell to thank for the words ‘You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone’ but the community of Salmon Arm gets the credit for acting on that epiphany before it was too late. Six months ago, things were uncertain for the Roots and Blues Festival. A number of...
Okanagan rail corridor proponents pledge $5 million for community trail
VERNON - A citizens group has committed to raising $5 million to build a rail trail from Vernon to Kelowna if local municipalities secure the land. Brad Clements of the Okanagan Rail Trail Initiative says several community members have already expressed interest in making donations toward the creation of the trail. “People say, 'Let us...
Okanagan Spirits has a taste for expansion
VERNON - When the shiny pieces of Okanagan Spirits' new state-of-the-art copper stills arrived, there was only one problem: The instructions were in German. With no one fluent in the language, setting up the 50-plate still and 1,500 and 2,000 litre copper pots—now the largest in Western Canada—was an entertaining process, laughs owner Tony Dyck....
Province pledges $7.2M for CN Rail corridor purchase
KELOWNA - There are some strings attached, but the provincial government is pledging $7.2 million to help make the purchase of the CN Rail corridor a reality. The money is conditional on a successful referendum in Lake Country later this month, according to a press release from the province Tuesday, April 7. “We believe in the...