‘Meaningless’ parental meltdowns still leave marks

Ticked off by Trump’s tantrums

U.S. President Donald Trump recently threatened tariffs on Canadian products for the wildfire smoke that wafts across the border.

We have failed to manage our forests properly, he says, causing the smoke choking America’s big cities. And many of his Republican colleagues have joined the chorus, demanding sanctions against Canada for our unneighbourly behaviour. We north of the border should all be outdoors, rakes in hand, to clear combustible debris from our forest floors. Quite right.

Canada is missing a major economic opportunity. Just imagine an army of rake-equipped forestry workers. What a boost to rake manufacturers!

Canada’s boreal forest is only 2.7 million square kilometres. If we gave each Canadian, including infants and the elderly, a rake, each would only have to clear 6.6 hectares (about 16 acres). Piece of cake! Many, of course, would be raking the more than two-thirds of remote boreal forest without road access. This would boost the employment of highly trained search and rescue workers!

Fort Gibraltar events on hold until engineer issues report

Fort Gibraltar is closed and upcoming events are on hold pending an engineer’s report after a section of the historical site’s elevated walkway collapsed under the weight of students and a teacher during a school trip Wednesday.

The Seven Oaks School Division redirected two groups that were scheduled to visit Whittier Park – a popular destination for students of all ages, wedding parties and history buffs – on Thursday.

Owing to the uncertainty at the venue, the classes changed their plans and went to Kildonan Park instead, said superintendent Brian O’Leary.

Festival du Voyageur, which maintains and operates the trading post, declined to comment on how many field trips had been planned for June.

Paralympics open in empty stadium - just like Olympics

On Wednesday at 12 p.m. ET, Toronto Star baseball columnist and Deep Left Field podcast host Mike Wilner will answer your questions about the Blue Jays and anything else baseball-related.

Toronto’s alternative crisis response model deemed a success

A Toronto emergency response program that helped inspire Winnipeg’s proposed alternative crisis response model has already expanded city-wide, just four years after launching as a pilot project.

The Toronto Community Crisis Service, launched in 2022, has become the city’s fourth emergency service, providing a 24-7, community-based response to people experiencing mental health crises. The service has handled nearly 50,000 calls through 911 and 211, dispatched mobile crisis teams to more than 41,000 incidents, made more than 11,600 referrals to health and social services and resolved the majority of eligible 911 calls without police involvement.

Winnipeg Mayor Scott Gillingham last week proposed creating a similar “fourth crisis response pathway” that would allow 911 calls that aren’t violent or criminal in nature to be transferred to community-based crisis teams.

Under the proposal, which has support from both the Winnipeg Police Service and the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service, a centralized crisis dispatch and co-ordination hub would receive triaged calls and match them with citywide response teams, staffed in part through existing community organizations, including the Downtown Community Safety Partnership and The Link’s mobile crisis teams. The goal is to divert appropriate calls away from the WPS and WFPS.

Abortion rights poised to go before Michigan voters in fall

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Abortion rights are poised to come before Michigan voters in November after an abortion rights campaign turned in a record-breaking number of signatures Monday for a ballot initiative to the secretary of state’s office.

The effort will further increase attention on Michigan's elections, where the battleground state’s Democratic governor and attorney general have made abortion rights a centerpiece of their reelection campaigns.

The push to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution comes weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and gave states the power to decide whether to ban the procedure. The ruling is expected to lead to abortion bans in roughly half the states.

Michigan is among several states with a pre-Roe abortion law that was set to take effect if Roe was overturned. However, a judge issued an injunction that temporarily blocked it. The 1931 law would make abortion a felony in all cases, except when “necessary to preserve the life of such woman.”