Top Stories – July 8 – Westside Daze

Westside Daze is underway in West Kelowna. Most events take place at the Annette Beaudreau Amphitheatre in Memorial Park through Sunday. Festivities include a Show & Shine, children’s activities and evening concerts. There’s a parade tomorrow morning starting at 10:30 along Old Okanagan, Drought and Brown roads and a midway has been set up in the field behind the A&W. All the info and times are at westsidedaze.com/schedule .

While many parts of the country are seeing a dip in gas prices, we’re not so lucky in the Okanagan. As tourists flock to the water and beaches, the price in the Kelowna area remains around $2.14 a litre. Compare that to even Metro Vancouver with all its extra taxes, where some prices are just over 2 bucks. Most stations in Vernon were at 2-05 yesterday.

Canada Mortgage and Housing says residential mortgage debt grew by nine percent last year compared with a year earlier… the fastest growth since 2008. However, with interest rates going up, the Bank of Canada warns that those who recently bought with variable rate mortgages, could see significant increases in monthly payments on renewal.

Don’ t forget the Snowbirds aerobatic team will perform over Okanagan Lake in Kelowna this weekend. It’s part of the 75th anniversary of YLW. The performances will take place north of the bridge, so the waterfront from City to Waterfront Parks will be your best viewing area. The shows start at 1pm tomorrow and Sunday (and you can also tune into 104.7 The Lizard to listen to live commentary on the show.)

Passengers and advocates say Air Canada is giving them the runaround on refunds, compensation and reasons cited for flight delays and cancellations. The country’s largest carrier informed some passengers their flight to Lisbon would be delayed due to “bad weather,”
… 14 days before it was to leave Montreal. Air Canada says the weather explanation was “an incorrect notification”.

The Canadian government says the ousting of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson by his party will not affect Canada’s negotiations on a free-trade agreement. Johnson said he will be stepping down as prime minister after demands he go from Conservative MPs and the resignation of a bunch of his ministers. There have been complaints about Johnson for months, but in the end it was the PM’s handling of sexual misconduct allegations against a senior MP that did him in.

The RCMP is asking for help with their investigation into a two-vehicle crash that claimed the life of one person on May 24th. It happened about 9pm at Enterprise and Spall when a grey Volkswagen Golf collided with a red Kia Rio. An 88 year old woman who was a passenger in the Kia, died from her injuries in hospital. Anyone who witnessed the accident or might have dashcam footage is asked to get in touch with the Kelowna RCMP.

BC Wildfire says cool and wet conditions in June in the southern BC have tempered overall fire activity. However it says we can expect a transition to warmer and dryer conditions this month, signalling an increase in overall wildfire risk and fire danger ratings as the season progresses. In the Kamloops Fire Centre, there were reports of two very small fires yesterday including one on Gillard Forest Service Road, south of Kelowna on the east side of the lake

As BC enters the 3rd wave of the Omicron covid variant, we’ll get some information from our government this afternoon. Health Minister Adrian Dix and Dr. Penny Ballum, who leads the immunization program, will give an update at 1pm. There have been calls for the government to open up second booster shots to everyone, not just those over 70.

Sport

In the 1st round of the NHL draft yesterday, the Vancouver Canucks chose 17 year old right winger Jonathan Lekkerimaki from Sweden. He’s not a big guy at 5’10” and 165 pounds. Montreal had the 1st overall pick and chose Juraj Slafkovský, who’s a left winger, from Slovakia. The draft continues today at the Bell Centre.

The BC Lions have signed American offensive lineman Kent Perkins to a two-year contract extension that keeps him in orange through the 2024 campaign. He was the club’s nominee for CFL Most Outstanding Lineman last season and has played a big role in helping the Lions’ offence rack up 1,561 total yards through the first three games of 2022.

The Rangers traded goalie Alexandar Georgiev to the Avalanche in exchange for a pair of third-round picks and a fifth-rounder. He posted a career-worst .898 save percentage in 33 games with the Rangers last season.

In the CFL, 0 & 3 Ottawa takes on the 3 & 1 Roughriders in Regina later today, while the BC Lions host Winnipeg tomorrow at 4. The Bombers have 4 wins and no losses, while the Lions have won all three of their games.

The Formula 1 teams have moved to the Red Bull Ring in Austria for the weekend. Qualifying goes today with a Sprint Race tomorrow and the full race on Sunday.