Louis C.K. mocks Parkland students in audio of stand-up set

Ottawa commits $8.1 million for downtown Y redevelopment

The federal government is backing a major redevelopment of Winnipeg’s Downtown Y that will expand community programs and update the century-old Vaughan Street building.

On Monday, Ottawa committed $8.1 million toward the Y’s plans to expand newcomer and mental-health programs.

The project will also upgrade elevators, change rooms, aquatics and fitness areas and energy systems. Construction is expected to begin in October, according to the Y’s website.

The YMCA-YWCA is contributing $3.5 million to the project.

City, province, Ottawa strike task force to battle meth

The city, province and federal governments are teaming up to create a tri-level task force that will fight distribution of illicit drugs and address the root causes of the province's meth crisis.

"As far as we know, this is the first collaborative initiative like this in the country and it’s something that I’m very proud to be a part of," said Winnipeg Mayor Brian Bowman, who had been calling for such a task force (with unanimous council support) since September. 

In interviews last week, officials from the three levels of government told the Free Press they hadn't yet met in the same room to discuss the surge in meth-related problems.

By Tuesday, it seems they managed to clear their schedules.

Stuck ship thrusts sleepy Suez Canal village into limelight

I yearn to see the man at the helm. Does he resemble the overgroomed Francesco Schettino, the captain who steered the Italian cruise ship Costa Concordia onto the rocks off Tuscany in 2012 and then hastily hopped off the ship? Are they the same man?

Hydro Québec faces issue we should avoid

You might be tempted to call it a canary in an electric power generation coal mine.

But instead, it’s just another heads-up into the already-obvious problem with the proliferation of data centres.

This week, Hydro-Québec went before the Régie de l’énergie, Québec’s public utilities board, to change the rules for new and existing large data centres.

Now, it was not that long ago that Hydro Québec was actively wooing data centres — offering bulk power rates to be used to lure labour-intensive, power-hungry heavy industry (think aluminum smelters) with rates substantially lower than they offer Québec’s own residential customers. It was a way to use surplus power to create jobs and drive economic activity.

Mayoral candidate Klein fires back at opponent Vogiatzakis over inducement allegation

Winnipeg mayoral candidate Kevin Klein fired back at rival Mike Vogiatzakis on Monday while the pair accused each other of dangling an offer in exchange for the other withdrawing from the race.

Klein doubled down on his team’s claim that Vogiatzakis’ camp made an offer at the Sept. 14 transit debate, a day after Vogiatzakis alleged that Klein’s campaign asked him to step down about two weeks earlier in exchange for a position at city hall.

“I was not involved in the conversation. They told (Vogiatzakis’ campaign director, Todd Dube) we are not stepping away,” Klein wrote in a social media post.

“He made an offer. We declined it. The account since offered does not match what took place. This campaign should be about Winnipeg, not about personal advantage.”