(TLN) On Oct. 8, the City of Laval announced the winners of its “Mon quartier fleuri” beautiful gardens contest, which is now in its third year.

According to the city, around 2,600 Laval residents voted for their favourite garden through a Facebook page between Aug. 12 to 31.

The winners are…

In the end, a garden located on Chomedey Blvd. between city hall and the 1333 building, won. In fact, the team from Chomedey garnered the most votes – 647.

In the meantime, a jury chose a garden overseen by a team in Sainte-Rose, which received a 90 per cent grading. It is located on Curé Labelle Blvd. near the exit ramp for the Marius Dufresne bridge.

Martin C. Barry

As long as anyone can remember, children have loved fire trucks. There’s just something about their bright red colour, their loud sounds and their flashing lights that gets kids going. But more than that, fire trucks bring out the child in all of us.

Open house all day

Once a year, kids and parents from all over Laval get an opportunity to get up close to the trucks and to meet the firefighters when the Laval Fire Department puts out the welcome mat at its nine firehalls across the island.

During this year’s event held on Saturday Oct. 12 in conjunction with fire prevention week (Oct. 6-12), kids of all ages had the opportunity to get up close to the shiny, bright red ladder and pump trucks parked in firehall garages.

Like big toys for kids

For children probably more used to playing with scale-models, actually being able to climb behind the wheel of a huge shiny red rig and touching the intricate controls was something they will probably remember for years to come. It may also inspire a few to become firefighters one day.

From morning to late afternoon, the kids got a chance to learn all about the work of firefighters, to watch and take part in equipment demonstrations, to receive fire prevention advice, and even to climb into a truck and feel what it’s like to do the work of a fireman or firewoman.

On Friday, September 27, The Sacred Heart School of Montreal held a groundbreaking ceremony at the site of its new auditorium. The event was attended by dignitaries, major donors, alumnae, students, parents and school representatives. The 300-seat state-of-the-art performance space was designed by Architecture49 and is being constructed by JCB General Contractors. It is expected to be ready in the spring of 2020. It will host the all girls English Catholic high school’s drama and music programs, as well as school-wide functions and community events. The Sacred Heart School of Montreal was founded in Montreal in 1861 and has occupied its current location on Atwater Avenue since 1928.

The auditorium is part of Sacred Heart’s $5 million capital campaign entitled The future at heart, which also includes a wellness centre and other major renovations to the students’ learning environment. “We are fortunate to have the support of current and past families, alumnae, students, faculty and staff, and private corporations and foundations, including the St. Patrick’s Foundation, the DGDM Family Foundation and the Cianci Family, among others,” said Shawn O’Donnell, Head of School.

The Sacred Heart School of Montreal

Since 1861, The Sacred Heart School of Montreal, the city’s only all girls English Catholic high school, has been graduating exceptional leaders. The school is committed to developing young women of intellect, wisdom, compassion and with a sense of justice.  The Sacred Heart School of Montreal is part of a worldwide network of schools that share common goals, mission and values.

Martin C. Barry

The head of Canada’s largest chain of vaping supply shops says he isn’t concerned about a wave of negative publicity that has impacted the vaping industry. All the same, he and other vaping shop owners have launched a trade association to counter what they regard as misinformation.

With headquarters on Dagenais Blvd. in Laval, Daniel Marien’s La Vape Shop chain will soon have 40 outlets, making it the nation’s largest company of its kind, Marien maintains. La Vape Shop was founded by Marien seven years ago along with two partners.

New trade association

The Vaping Industry Trade Association (VITA), which was launched in September, claims to be Canada’s largest such grouping for the industry’s manufacturers, importers, distributors and retailers. Marien sits on the VITA board and is the organization’s spokesperson for Quebec.

If some of the media coverage vaping has received lately is an indicator, VITA has a considerable amount of work ahead. Both Time magazine in the U.S. as well as Maclean’s magazine in Canada recently had major coverage of vaping – in Time’s case a feature that described it on the magazine’s cover as The New American Addiction.

“What’s needed at this time is for the electronic cigarette business to work with the government and to have the proper information, reports and studies delivered the proper way,” Marien said in an interview with Newsfirst Multimedia.

Pros and cons of vaping

Although there has been support for as well as criticism of vaping by public health officials and parents of teens who have become regular users of electronic cigarettes, there is general agreement that there are positive and negative aspects to vaping. However, while vaping is now accepted as a far safer alternative to tobacco smoking, it is nonetheless addictive.

And then of course there are the cases over the past few months of respiratory illness associated with vaping. Initially reported in the U.S., a first case surfaced in Canada this past September.

One of the largest stakeholders, the U.S.-based e-cigarette maker Juul with an estimated market value of $38 billion and a more than 50 per cent share of the Canada and U.S. vaping market, is facing devastating publicity as well as calls for much stricter government oversight of the e-cigarette industry.

‘Big tobacco’ on VITA board

While Marien said La Vape Shop hasn’t been significantly affected by the news, he added that VITA has nonetheless seen the necessity to step up its public relations efforts. Just as Juul is now 35 per cent owned by the multinational Altria tobacco corporation, VITA’s board has three “big tobacco” representatives, three major players from the vaping sector, as well as other members with smaller interests, according to Marien.

On Sept. 27, VITA issued a statement saying it is “closely following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) investigation into cases of respiratory illnesses in the United States.” The association noted that initial findings pointed to most cases of respiratory illness being linked to the use of illicit vaping liquids containing unregulated cannabis oil (THC) as well as vitamin E acetate solvent.

Says incidents THC-related

Marien said he personally agreed with the findings. He pointed out that the THC cartridges in question are currently illegal and available only through the black market.

“Eighty-five per cent have been proven without a doubt that they are related to illegal THC cartridges,” he said. “The product inside these has oil-based product that can’t be vaporized. When you are inhaling some kind of oil like this, that oil can sit on your lungs. It’s not the same product as an electronic cigarette product. It’s totally two different things.”

He also noted that over the past decade when vaping grew so much in popularity, there hadn’t been any reports like the ones that came up recently, which only seemed to occur with the clandestine introduction of the THC cartridges.

‘Black market’ distribution

Although officials in the U.S. have since shut down the producer of the cartridges, Marien pointed out that the illicit product (‘Dank’) was “branded” and the company had a large black market distribution network in place which was growing quickly.

According to Marien, current Canadian law allows e-cigarette manufacturers to use only propylene glycol, glycerine, flavouring and nicotine. The law does not allow them to add ingredients containing psychoactives, energetics or vitamins.

Marien maintains that vaping is scientifically proven to be safer than smoking because it doesn’t involve combustion – which is the main culprit when tobacco is consumed through cigarettes.

“The problem is that when you’re burning anything, whether it’s tobacco, leaves or wood, the combustion creates thousands of chemicals,” he said. “That’s the difference between combustion and vaporization.”

(TLN) During the most recent public meeting of Laval city council, Mayor Marc Demers announced the winner of a multidisciplinary contest to create a new plan for the design of Laval’s downtown core.

The winning architectural team is a consortium made up of the firms Conscience urbaine, Collectif Escargo and Petrone Architecture.

Laval’s future downtown

“Laval is affirming itself where cultural development is concerned,” Mayor Marc Demers said in a statement. “Thanks to this competition, we can finally see the outline of a future and important quadrant for the city centre. The Montmorency sector will from now on by associated with creativity, innovation and the culture of knowledge.”

The president of the jury, Ayana O’Shun said the jury was impressed by the narrative theme presented by the architects, bringing together citizens around an art and design project with the power to ignite the imagination.

The jury was impressed

“As a Laval resident living in the downtown, I can’t wait to see my city become transformed under the influence of this vision,” she said. At the same time, the jury gave honourable mentions to architectural teams from Sans façon and Architecturama and their partners, Balistique, Amery Calvelli and Claude Gosselin.

In order to allow the public to get to see elements of the winning concept as well the design competition finalists, an outside exhibition is being presented in the Claude-Léveillée outdoor gathering space from Oct. 3 to Nov. 11.

The members of the winning architectural team:

Conscience urbaine
Artistic direction: Fanie St-Michel

Collectif Escargo
Architect landscaping: Karyna St-Pierre 
Designer: Pierre-Yves Diehl
Designer: Julie Parenteau

Pétrone Architecture
Architecte landscaping: Déline Petrone

In all, twelve candidacies were judged admissible to the competition, including four finalists. The City of Laval is awarding a $130,000 contract for the work of rendering the architectural design into plans.