Christina Blizzard is the Queen’s Park columnist for the Toronto Sun, the city’s daily tabloid newspaper. christina.blizzard@sunmedia.ca
Devastating downturn in forestry industry hurts Thunder Bay
THUNDER BAY — For Mary Kozorys, the soaring price of electricity isn’t just a wedge issue to be exploited in an election. She chokes up when she talks about how hydro rates have hurt people.
Kozorys, the NDP candidate in Thunder Bay-Atikokan, was door-knocking in a blue-collar part of town.
“We’ve had an unusually hot summer for the north,” Kozorys explained. “The door was open and the lady beckoned me into the living room. In front of her was a fan … She said, ‘I’m sitting here and I can’t afford to plug this fan in any longer. I have to make a choice whether or not I pay all of my utility bills, or I pay part of my utility bills and I eat.’”
Kozorys has known the family for years. They’d owned a small business. When the economy took a nosedive, they were forced to close.