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Two-time cancer survivor trades blows with angry Lake Winnipeg in epic 12-hour fundraising swim

After 12 hours of wind, waves and a painful shoulder, Jonathon Fenton has finished what he started, making it across Lake Winnipeg.

The 62-year-old two-time cancer survivor completed the roughly 26-kilometre swim Sunday, a year after shoulder problems forced him to stop 16 kilometres into his first attempt.

The swim was the second year of Fenton’s Jonny’s Big Swim fundraiser, which supports the Alberta Cancer Foundation, CancerCare Manitoba Foundation and Health Sciences Centre Foundation.

He raised roughly $48,000 this year, bringing the two-year total to about $90,000.

Officer who shot dog dead after it bit him won’t face charges

A Manitoba First Nations police officer will not face charges for fatally shooting a dog last year, despite the Crown describing the officer’s conduct as “concerning.”

The Independent Investigation Unit of Manitoba announced it would not recommend charges Monday, more than a year after the incident was reported to the police watchdog.

A Manitoba First Nations Police Service officer went to a home in Swan Lake First Nation to make an arrest in June 2025, the IIU said. No arrest was made as the person police were looking for was not there. As the officer was leaving, a dog chained outside bit him.

The officer later returned with a carbine rifle and shot and killed the dog.

Indigenous peoples are deeply invested in Canada

Elections Canada released a report this week that stated that, in the 2025 federal election, approximately 41 per cent of eligible First Nations, Inuit and Métis voters cast a ballot and contributed significantly to the federal Liberals and Prime Minister Mark Carney making a political comeback.

For anyone curious about how Manitoba fared, the numbers in this province were slightly lower — but still very strong, with 34 per cent participation.

This is a far cry from the highest rate of Indigenous participation in a federal election — that would be the 60 per cent who cast a ballot in 2015, when Justin Trudeau’s Liberals defeated Stephen Harper’s Conservatives — but it’s still higher than the abysmal numbers seen in decades previous.

First Nations voters have only been allowed the legal right to cast a ballot in Canadian elections since 1960, but many in the past — perhaps rightly — felt a sense of complicity in the country’s colonization or, worse, that voting didn’t make a difference.

Take advantage of hydroelectric potential

Manitoba Hydro tells us that we are going to need significant new electricity generation over the coming decades.

Trial project lauded in the fight against pollution

A city project aimed at reducing water pollution is being deemed a success, despite some challenges in adding it to an aging sewage treatment plant.

The city used strategically placed doses of ferric chloride to reduce the amount of phosphorous, a key algae-promoting nutrient, in effluent leaving the North End sewage treatment plant between June 2024 and September 2025.

The chemical additives increased the removal of phosphorous through the plant’s treatment process. It went from 61 per cent of the nutrient being removed pre-trial, to reach 74 per cent in 2024 and 67 per cent in 2025.

“It’s a success, because we’re removing more phosphorous than we were before … Any improvement in phosphorous removal will help Lake Winnipeg,” said Michelle Paetkau, a senior planning engineer for Winnipeg water and waste.