Replay: New Country Rehab performs live in the News Café

Police HQ report ‘outrageous’: Kinew

Premier Wab Kinew says public inquiry findings that taxpayers were overcharged more than $40 million for the Winnipeg Police Service headquarters project and two city leaders broke the public trust are “outrageous.”

Inquiry commissioner Garth Smorang’s report, which was released Monday, concluded former mayor Sam Katz “violated the public trust” and council code of conduct, while the city’s former chief administrative officer Phil Sheegl suffered from a “complete lack of a moral compass.”

Smorang also found the city was overcharged $43.3 million for the project, with $42 million of that going to key contractor Caspian Projects.

“It’s outrageous that people who were elected betrayed the public here in the city. It’s outrageous that there were people in business who ripped you off, ripped me off — I was paying property taxes in Winnipeg at the time — and ripped all of us off to the tune of $43.3 million. That’s crazy,” said Kinew.

Policy change gives Manitoba renters a break from proposed hikes

Aidan Wilson said he was reduced to tears after getting a call from Premier Wab Kinew’s office.

He’d just learned tenants of a West Broadway apartment, including himself, would no longer pay a hundreds-of-dollars monthly rent increase as of Nov. 1.

“It’s been a lot to deal with, it’s a lot to push for, and it’s a lot to speak up. All of these emotions just kind of came flooding out,” Wilson said Tuesday at a news conference alongside Kinew.

The premier announced that renters will not have to pay the increases until the provincial Residential Tenancies Branch hears landlords’ arguments and issues its decisions.

Replay: New Country Rehab performs live in the News Café

Half of the Canadian quartet New Country Rehab arrived in Winnipeg and performed at the Winnipeg Free Press News Café this afternoon. Champagne James Robertson and John Showman made it into town, while band mates Ben Whiteley and Roman Tome were held back by an overbooked flight. All four will be live at Times Change(d) High and Lonesome Club tonight.

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The Toronto-based foursome has turned heads and pricked up many ears since forming six years ago as devotees of the music of the original Hank Williams.

Since that time, the band has developed its own, genuinely infectious sonic motif, sparked by the fiddle and voice of John Showman, the guitar and banjo of Champagne James Robertson and rooted in the standup bass of Ben Whiteley and the earthy rhythms of drummer Roman Tome.

Limited visibility, radio communication among safety issues cited in mid-air collision

An investigative report into a mid-air plane crash that killed two student pilots in southeastern Manitoba cited concerns about radio communication, situational awareness and visual detection methods.

Two small planes collided twice and crashed into a field after one aircraft ended up flying above the other while both approached a runway at Steinbach South Airport the morning of July 8, 2025, a Transportation Safety Board report said Wednesday. The planes belonged to the Harv’s Air Service flight school.

“Once they’re on final (approach), the ability to see each other would have been very limited,” said Eric Vermette, a TSB regional manager in Winnipeg.

Tall Shadows brings original compositions to Faust screening

In a time of plague and crisis, a good man makes a deal with the devil, in hopes of saving his community from death and destruction. But when his community turns on him, he finds his newfound power too much to resist.

The German folktale of Faust and his bargain with Mephisto dates back to the 15th century, while Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s tragedy was first published over 200 years ago.

In 1926, F.W. Murnau’s German-expressionist take on the tale debuted on the silver screen. A century on, viewers remain entranced with the fantastical images of Faust, Mephisto, demons riding skeletal steeds through the heavens, and more, created using cutting-edge practical effects for the time.

Just in time for Halloween, Montreal-based avant-goth duo Tall Shadows will bring Murnau’s Faust to the Park Theatre on Wednesday, Oct. 28, performing an original score in celebration of the classic silent film’s 100th anniversary.

Can’t have our cake and eat it, too

Last month, the City of Winnipeg said it would soon begin to study ways to improve pedestrian and cyclist safety along Osborne Street, which runs between two of the city’s densest neighbourhoods, where residents walk and bike for many of their daily activities. As someone who lives in South Osborne and who has frequented the shops and restaurants of the Village since my university days over 20 years ago, these changes can’t come soon enough.

Imagine my frustration when I read that this study of the street between Broadway and the St. Vital Bridge will take place “over the next year” to find “quick” solutions. We’ve all been through the COVID-19 pandemic, during which cities around the world found rapid solutions to improve safety and encourage more walking, biking and transit. Entire manuals have been published on easy things our city could try, literally this weekend, to improve the safety of Osborne Street.

Perhaps the reason this project is going to take a year can be found in this quote from David Patman, the city’s manager of transportation: “Osborne Street is currently serving multiple, competing functions … It exists in a dense, pedestrian-oriented development area that is close to rapid transit, which is at odds with the high flow of motor vehicles that travel daily along the corridor.”

Mr. Patman has correctly identified Osborne Street as a “stroad”. A stroad is a dangerous, inefficient combination of a street and a road. Stroads try to be the best of both worlds, and they fail at both. Charles Marohn, author of Strong Towns, offers the best analogy — a stroad is like a futon, which is both a terrible couch and an uncomfortable bed. You try to save money on two functions, but neither is right.