It’s time to turn over a new maple leaf – Strained relations with Canada go against the tide of history, Bert Caldwell says.

Business and government representatives from Northwest states and provinces got together in Boise this week to remind one another and the region that the United States and Canada are friends, really.

Bert Caldwell
The Spokesman-Review

http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=012204&ID=s1475759&cat=section.business

Inland Northwest residents could be forgiven for losing sight of the long-running beneficial relationship between the two countries. Recent tension over a variety of issues, first among them the discovery of mad cow disease in cattle imported from Alberta, has strained the ties that bind.

Too many cattlemen have taken the position that if we put the blame on our northern neighbors, our own deficiencies in tracking and testing animals can be explained away. The Japanese are not buying that dodge, nor are most other countries that buy our exported beef. They see our meat market for what it is — North American.

But the sore points go way beyond a few dozen cows. To a few million trees, for example. U.S. lumber tariffs have done little or nothing to slow importation of Canadian softwood, to the detriment of many mills in the Inland Northwest.

The Environmental Protection Agency wants Teck Cominco to submit to a U.S. plan for studying Columbia River pollution downstream from its Trail, B.C., smelter. The Canadian embassy pointedly suggested EPA jurisdiction does not extend north of the 49th parallel. (And wouldn’t a few states like to say the same, or something similar.) If only the province had stepped in decades ago to stop the dumping.

British Columbia, too, may license a dam proposed for the Kettle River just above the border, to the consternation of Ferry County landowners.

The United States, for its part, shows little regard for Canada’s idea of security, drug testing or pricing, or its position on the conflict in Iraq. Barring Canada from bidding on reconstruction contracts was an undeserved slap to an ally that was beside us at Normandy, and many other places since. Fortunately, President Bush and new Prime Minister Paul Martin resolved that issue last week.

As two longtime friends, we can do better, and the Boise meeting of the Pacific Northwest Economic Region was a welcome reminder of our mutual interests.

Trade between Canada and Washington, Idaho, Montana and Alaska totals about $16 billion annually. Despite the stresses created by the 9-11 attacks, we still move relatively freely across the border. With the value of our dollar shrinking against Canadian currency, Inland Northwest attractions like Silverwood stand to build on already-good trade from Canadians.

On the flip side, Vancouver, B.C., anticipates surging visitor numbers for the 2010 Winter Olympics, a vision this region could share if we draw some cross-border traffic away from the Olympian congestion that already plagues the Interstate 5 portal at Blaine, Wash.

Spokane officials have made a special effort to build relations with Alberta by exchanging visits with their counterparts in Calgary and Edmonton. The International Trade Alliance and Spokane Convention and Visitors Bureau and plan another mission north later this year. And ITA Executive Director Roberta Brooke says a visit by the new Canadian Consul General in Seattle is scheduled for next Wednesday.

"We’re not hearing any negative fallout" from the cross-border feuding of late, she says.

Sure, the United States and Canada have always had issues. But we are probably as interdependent as two countries with distinct societies have ever been. Overall, everyone has kept the current blowups in perspective. The long view — historically and geographically — is good.

Business columnist Bert Caldwell can be reached at (509) 459-5450 or by e-mail at [email protected]