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Pandora wows at Provincials

The Hanley School Drama Club production Pandora exceeded the expectations of its writer and director this season thanks in large part to the hard work and fantastic performances displayed by the various students who put the play on.

“I like this production the best personally probably because I’d had some opportunity to do it twice before, so it was a lot of fine-tuning,” said Prairie South School Division special education resource teacher Leanne Griffin. She recently served as director of her play Pandora at Provincials earlier this month in Regina after Hanley School won Regionals.

“The first time I did it at Hanley we had younger actors whereas this script I worked with most of them for a couple of years (already). They are still a pretty young group, but they’ve had some experience working with me,” she added. “I painted the set this year. I had a vision of how I wanted that to look, so I was happy how that turned out. And (it was) just a really strong group of kids, so that worked out really well.”

Pandora is the story about twin sisters Becky (Nicola Classen) and Pandora (Hannah Fehr). The title character is disabled and can’t talk or move independently, but through a magical musical ritual can enter a child-like fantasy world inhabited by a chorus (Taylor Seymour, Morgan Lester, Lauren Griffin, Megan Fehr and Lizzy Ettinger) where she can speak and move.

The play concerns Becky who is about to leave school and is faced with the difficult decision of whether she should leave home and her sister knowing that their mother cannot care for Pandora by herself. In essence, it is a play about transitions, hope and despair.

“I’ve enjoyed every time I’ve done it,” said Griffin, noting she first staged the play 16 years ago when she worked at Allan School and then again 12 years ago at Hanley. “I had the benefit of learning from what I’ve done before and adding it to this group’s performance.”

The play had a dream finish at Provincials held May 8 to 10 at the University of Regina Riddell Theatre. Pandora crew stage manger Alana Pauli won the Debbie Baker Cheer Award and Hanley School Drama Club actors Hannah Fehr, Nicola Classen and Taylor Seymour each won a certificate of merit for acting.

Also, Pandora’s lighting crew member Truman Griffin took home a best technical performance award, Alana and assistant stage manager Shelby Millions shared the best stage manager award and the play itself took the runner-up to best visual production award.

Griffin said this is quite the achievement considering Hanley has an extra-curricular drama program where rehearsals and instruction takes place solely outside regular school hours, while the 10 other plays they competed against involve city school productions with hundreds of students studying drama as part of their high school credit programs.

“In a way we’re like an underdog because 100 per cent of what we do is after hours, but that being said I think we have a very tight group,” she said. “We call it the drama family. They are a really tight group of kids and they take a lot of pride and ownership and work extra hard because it is 100 per cent their own time.”

Record year for deaths and injuries prompts spring ATV safety campaign

An alarming increase in all-terrain vehicle deaths and injuries has prompted the Saskatchewan All-Terrain Vehicle Association (SATVA) to launch a province-wide campaign this spring to promote the use of helmets for ATV drivers and passengers along with other general safety measures.

John Meed, general manager of SATVA, said there were eight fatalities involving ATVs in this province last year and in five of those deaths the rider of the machine wasn’t wearing a helmet. He said this is a “record” mortality rate in Saskatchewan, so SATVA feels they have to remind people of the dangers of operating the vehicles without taking appropriate safety precautions.

Wearing a helmet “can obviously save your life,” said Meed. “It can save you from serious brain injuries and we think it is a message that needs to get out.”

Meed said it is the law in Saskatchewan to wear a helmet when riding an ATV on public property. He said a person also has to wear goggles when operating an ATV if the helmet doesn’t have a face screen.

“We’d love people on their own property to wear their helmet too,” he said. “We know that the farming community is one that rides a lot on their own property, on their own land, and we’d like to promote that they wear their helmets as well.”

Along with eight deaths involving ATVs in 2013, there were also 47 injuries resulting from ATV accidents. This was the second highest injury rate in 14 years.

Since 2000, 50 people have been killed and 442 have been injured while riding an ATV. There has already been one death and injury in the province involving unsafe ATV use in 2014 after a 40-year-old man was killed and his 14-year-old passenger injured in what is believed to be an alcohol-related accident near Togo earlier this month.

Meed said an ATV tends to be a more bumpy and rocky ride than what someone experiences in a car, so people need to be in control of their faculties when driving the machine. He said a wrong decision or wrong reaction could cause the vehicle to flip over or hit something resulting in a bad injury or death.

Proper ATV training is also important for any riders of the machines. Meed said this can be accomplished through taking either the SATVA training course or one offered by the Canadian Safety Council.

To read more please see the May 19 print edition of The Davidson Leader.

Farmers waiting for Mother Nature to cooperate

Farmers around Davidson may finally be able to get into the field this week to begin spring planting, but that is only if Mother Nature abides.

Davidson farmer Kevin Farden said producers are facing cool and wet conditions and the start of seeding this year really depends on how much heat the area gets in the next little while. He said the sloughs are “just huge right now” because the frost hasn’t come out of the bottom of them yet, so farmers first need some warmer weather to help the water drain.

“I think within a week there’ll be some action hopefully,” said Farden. “We have some land at the Outlook area and we’re hoping to maybe start over there (this week), but it also depends on the soil temperature and how things progress with the heat.”

Farden said the late start this spring is similar to what farmers experienced last year and that actually seems to be the trend over the past few years. He said seeding beginning later in the year hasn’t changed their planting intentions, but the grain backlog in the western provinces has.

“I’d say we’ve cut back on our wheat because we have a lot of wheat in the bin still,” he said. “We’ve cut back on our acres we’re going to plant to that and some cereals I guess for that reason.”

Shannon Friesen, regional crop specialist with the Agriculture Knowledge Centre, said they’ve heard from producers and crop reporters around the province that there may be quite a few more soybean acres going in this year along with more flax and canola. She said that has to do with producers not being able to move grain, so farmers are thinking about other crops they’d like to seed and harvest this year.

“Certainly we may see some decreased acres (of wheat), but of course there is still some time,” said Friesen. “If the ground remains wet we may see those cereal acres go up a little bit because you can seed them a bit later and still have plenty of time for a good harvest.”

Friesen said dry field peas seem to be “gaining a stronghold” again this year after many producers moved away from the crop in the last couple years. She said peas are a fairly easy crop to grow, so there seems to be a renewed interest in it.

Another crop that may be gaining acreage this year appears to be feed corn. Friesen said there is more interest in corn not only for seed, but also on the grain side and Saskatchewan producers have seemed “interested” in it for the last couple years.

To read more  please see the May 12 print edition of The Davidson Leader.

Small gathering turns into big charity event

Helen’s Run was first organized five years ago as a small gathering of friends and family to honour a loved Dundurn grandmother while also raising some funds towards a cure for the disease that took her life.

Considering Helen’s Run 2014 already has participants registered from as far away as British Columbia and a goal of raising over $5,000 for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation, this year’s five-kilometre charity walk and run is shaping up to be much more than originally envisioned.

“It’s kind of exciting that it’s getting that big,” said Logan Williams, co-organizer of the May 31 event that takes place at the Dundurn Military Base. “It’s a lot more professional. We have t-shirts now and we’re working with The Running Room for our registration and event planning. It’s becoming more of an actual event instead of just some friends getting together.”

Logan said people who register for the walk and run through The Running Room website or by emailing her at helensrun@yahoo.ca for a small fee that is donated to the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation can basically expect a morning of food and fellowship. She said her grandmother Helen enjoyed spending time with family and friends before she passed away in 1993 after a courageous battle with breast cancer, so the race is meant to celebrate those values.

“My grandmother was well known for hosting get-togethers,” said Logan. “She loved seeing her family. I’ve had lots of comments lately about how many kids at the time in this community called her ‘mum’ even though they weren’t related to her. She loved to have people over and see her family get together, so I think this is a good way to remember her in that way.”

Logan and co-organizer Donna Williams have raised a total of $11,399 for breast cancer research since first putting on the Dundurn event that attracted 28 family and friends in 2009. Logan said each year since the event has gotten bigger and better with Helen’s Run 2013 managing to attract 58 adult participants and 17 kids who raised more than $4,800 for the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation.

“Our goal is to raise $5,500 this year and have 100 walkers and runners,” she said. “Our family usually all shows up and our friends and now (there’s) more people, so that’s remembering her in a way that she liked to see.

“Then with the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation we just try to do pink. We’ll have lots of pink things there and all the money is going towards the Foundation.”

Unsecured garbage creates a mess

Untidy people not properly securing their garbage before heading to the Davidson landfill this spring has once again drawn the ire of many of this area’s ratepayers who must drive by the mess while travelling to and from town.

A number of residents have recently spotted garbage strewn along the road leading up to the landfill, which if not picked up eventually blows into a farmer’s nearby field.

Gary Edom, administrator for the Town of Davidson, said ratepayers hauling garbage to the landfill should tarp or tie down their load. He said the road leading up to the landfill doesn’t belong to anyone, but whenever garbage does fall off a truck it is the town’s ratepayers that must foot the bill for its pick-up.

“It would be our responsibility to clean up any garbage along it or to see that it is cleaned up,” said Edom. “It’s our landfill.”

Davidson has erected a fence around the landfill to keep any trash from escaping from the area. The town also has some “dirt mounding” in place to act as a windbreak, so nothing blows out.

Edom said it is the town’s employees who are tasked with the cleanup if something does find its way out of the landfill. He said they are also tasked with picking up any trash that falls off a truck before it gets to the dump, as they have no way to forcing people to properly secure their load before heading there.

“Even as far as making them come back, we have no idea whose truck (it was) unless there was a bag of garbage with their name on it,” he said. “You have no idea. You just got to pick it up and really that’s all you can do.”

It is common courtesy to other ratepayers as well as the town’s employees to make sure a load of garbage is secured so it won’t fall or blow off the back of a truck, he confirmed. Otherwise it’s a mess waiting to happen.

“Tie down or tarp (it),” said Edom. “Just make sure it is secured with the truck.”

Raiders win second SRML championship

The Raiders men’s basketball team are two-time Saskatoon Senior Men’s Basketball League (SRML) champions after beating the rival Pantologists 95-89 in a well-played back-and-forth ‘C’ division final in April before a loud crowd of over 100 fans at Saskatoon’s Aiden Bowman Collegiate.

Ian Kadlec, a guard for the Raiders, said they hoped to meet the Pantologists in the final because that would present the biggest challenge, but the game did play out a little closer than they wanted. He said the two teams, who both went 13-3 during the regular season and 2-0 in the playoffs leading up to their April 13 match, exchanged baskets during the game with the Pantologists holding a slim lead throughout most of the second half.

Kadlec said the strong inside play of Luke Edwards and brothers Anthony, Michael and Chris Eliason helped the Raiders stay in the game. He said their shots weren’t falling in the third and fourth quarter, but they kept battling and hitting their free throws before finally taking the lead for good with a timely steal and a few made foul shots in the last two minutes.

“Luke had a pretty big steal,” said Kadlec, who scored 13 points against the Pantologists. “He had a four-point swing for himself at one (point) in the game in the third quarter where we were down (by) six and he scored a basket and then they in-bounded the ball and there was some pressure in the front court and he got a steal and scored again. That kept the game close.

“Then right at the end we were trailing by two points actually and we had a full-court press on again and Reid (Thuringer) got a steal and went down the court and tied the game and we just closed it out with free throws down the stretch.”

Raiders guard Kattlyn Williams said the 60 or 70 Raiders’ fans that made the trek to Saskatoon to cheer on the blue and white made the final a fun game to play. He said the players don’t really hear the crowd when they’re on the court, but every time there is a stoppage the sound of the crowd cheering for either a big play the Raiders just made or a nice score by their rival makes a huge difference.

“When you hear your fans cheering it helps your momentum and it just makes you push a little harder,” said Williams. “Then when you hear the other team’s fans cheering you really got to try and slow their momentum down because they’re usually cheering for a good reason. It was a loud gym. It was super intense all the way through that whole game. It was just back and forth.”

To read more please see the May 12 print edition of The Davidson Leader.