Hydro plans to reopen downtown HQ to public next week with new safety measures in place

Employees are happy their downtown Winnipeg headquarters will be reopening to the public, but the issue of public safety in the downtown core remains top of mind.

Winnipeg police HQ flood leaves more than $1M in damage

City is continuing to work with its insurance provider to completely assess the damages.

Art used as framing device in PTE drama coloured by charged family dynamics

The world première of Drew Hayden Taylor’s art-world thriller, The Undeniable Accusations of Red Cadmium Light, opened Wednesday at Prairie Theatre Exchange’s Cherry Karpyshin Mainstage, delving into the games people play when maintaining their personal, convenient status quo.

Sens captain Brady Tkachuk unhappy with White House AI video that insulted Canadians

OTTAWA - Brady Tkachuk’s first game back with the Ottawa Senators wasn’t an easy one.

The Senators captain returned to the nation’s capital riding the high of a gold medal with Team USA at the Olympics, but his on-ice performance hasn’t been the headline.

Earlier this week, Tkachuk was one of 20 American players who visited the White House and attended the State of the Union following an invitation from President Donald Trump. 

But what many Canadian and Senators fans took issue with was an AI-doctored video shared by the White House that made it appear he was disparaging Canadians. The altered clip, shared by the White House's TikTok account, inserted fabricated audio of Tkachuk referring to Canadians as “maple syrup eating f---s,” with the expletive bleeped in the video. The video carries a note saying it “contains AI-generated media.”

Conditional discharge for chiropractor who placed hidden cameras in clinic

A Winnipeg chiropractor, who pleaded guilty to voyeurism for recording patients with hidden cameras in what a judge called a “very misguided attempt” to catch potential theft, has been handed a conditional discharge.

As deficit rises, province to release budget March 24

The Manitoba government will release its budget on March 24 amid concerns about health care and affordability.

In its latest estimate, Manitoba has projected a near doubling of the deficit: $1.6-billion deficit in fiscal 2025-26, up from the last spring budget’s $794-million deficit estimate.

Dry conditions leading to wildfires and losses at Manitoba Hydro have contributed to the change, the province has said.

Finance Minister Adrien Sala promised some “big-ticket affordability items” in the upcoming budget.

OpenAI says Tumbler Ridge shooter evaded ban with second ChatGPT account

OTTAWA - Artificial intelligence firm OpenAI says the shooter involved in mass killings in Tumbler Ridge, B.C., got around a ban on her problematic use of ChatGPT by having a second account.

The revelation came as the firm outlined in a letter to Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon a series of "immediate steps" it was taking in response to the killings, and that if these had been in place at the time, police would have been informed of the activity on the account.

Ann O'Leary, OpenAI's vice-president for global policy, said the company only discovered the second account after Jesse Van Rootselaar's name was announced by RCMP.

She said the shooter who killed eight people and then herself on Feb. 10 somehow evaded systems to prevent banned users from creating new accounts, and Van Rootselaar's second account was shared with law enforcement upon its discovery.

St. James-Assiniboia School Division proposes nine per cent tax hike

St. James-Assiniboia School Division is proposing a nine per cent hike in education taxes to make “minor improvements” next fall.

Officials hosted a public meeting Wednesday to share how they plan to spend $146.6 million during the 2026-27 school year.

The draft budget includes new dollars to hire secretaries to support small schools, expand extracurricular programming and reduce student fees.

“Overall, the budget reflects, mostly, a status-quo operating model,” said Tara Smith, chair of the board that oversees 26 schools across west Winnipeg.

Almost 12% of city parks, open spaces in poor condition: report

Nearly 12 per cent of the city’s parks and open-space assets are in poor or very poor condition and it would cost $108.5 million to replace them, a new city report says.

The city rates 60.9 per cent of the assets to be in good or very good condition, 23.1 per cent as fair and 11.6 per cent as poor or very poor. Another 4.4 per cent are not yet rated.

The poor and very poor rating reflects assets nearing the end of their useful lives.

“Assets in poor or very poor condition may deliver services with reduced quality,” writes Dave Domke, the city’s manager of parks and open space, in the report.

US military used laser to take down Border Protection drone, lawmakers say

The U.S. military used a laser Thursday to shoot down a “seemingly threatening” drone flying near the U.S.-Mexico border. It turned out the drone belonged to Customs and Border Protection, lawmakers said.

The case of mistaken identity prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to close additional airspace around Fort Hancock, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of El Paso. The military is required to formally notify the FAA when it takes any counter-drone action inside U.S. airspace.

It was the second time in two weeks that a laser was fired in the area. The last time it was CBP that used the weapon and nothing was hit. That incident occurred near Fort Bliss and prompted the FAA to shut down air traffic at El Paso airport and the surrounding area. This time, the closure was smaller and commercial flights were not affected.

Washington U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen and two other top Democrats on the House Transportation and Infrastructure and Homeland Security committees said they were stunned when they were officially notified.

Tories’ partisan event at legislature broke election rules: report

Manitoba’s elections commissioner has found the Progressive Conservatives broke election laws by conducting a partisan event in the Golden Boy Room at the legislature in 2023.

Commissioner Bill Bowles launched an investigation in relation to an event in May of that year, in which the Tories were accused of making “explicitly partisan remarks” during a speaking engagement with University of Manitoba students.

His report, released Thursday, says the party applied to host a speaking engagement in the Golden Boy Room. The space can be reserved free of charge by people with permanent offices in the legislature, but the rules prohibit campaigning in the legislature.

Former premier Heather Stefanson and former cabinet minister Sarah Guillemard were listed as the speakers on the event application, but the PC caucus allowed the co-chair and campaign director of the party’s 2023 election campaign to address the students. They encouraged them to become involved with the Tory campaign.