Government

The Canadian economy remains in overdrive, combining stellar job-creation numbers with healthy growth in gross domestic product (GDP) forecast for both 2002 and 2003, according to the Conference Board of Canada's Canadian Outlook - Fall 2002.

With the future of the Ontario Northland Transportation Commission still in doubt, unionized engineers, conductors and trainmen have voted for strike action.

Kirkland Lake's dream of a major tourist project dedicated to Canadian hockey received a $3.5-million boost from the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund. Minister of Northern Development and Mines Jim Wilson delivered the cheque in Kirkland Lake Oct. 1.

Each year, trucks cross the Canada-U.S. border over 13 million times; that is approximately one truck every 2.5 seconds, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.

FedNor has announced funding of $1.4 million to assist a cutting-edge biotechnology company in Thunder Bay and provide funds for the development of a new industrial park on local First Nations land.

The Northern Ontario Heritage Fund announced it will pump $5.5 million for infrastructure improvements in the Thunder Bay area. Most of the money will go towards local roadwork. Over $800,000 will be used to attract more call centres to the city.

Representatives at a Northwestern Ontario Associated Chamber of Commerce meeting in Dryden agreed to a proposal which suggests the entire region of northwestern Ontario should be designated as one of the province’s new tax-incentive zones.

Business, aboriginal, government and community leaders gathered in Timmins Sept. 24 to exchange ideas on telecommunications.

Snowmobile tourism in the North received a $15-million provincial boost for trail development over the next four years.

With a dwindling population and a shrinking tax base, Sudbury taxpayers may be placed in a financial pinch in paying for the rising costs of operating the Greater City of Sudbury.