Heather O’Neill among Giller jurors

A life's story: From wartorn Poland to Winnipeg’s streets, Kazimierz Patalas worked to help others

Kazimierz Patalas left Poland in the late 1960s to make a new life for him and his family elsewhere, but he never forgot the lessons he learned as a young man in the country of his birth.

Perhaps no one lesson stuck with him more than the importance of giving back to the community. It was something he first endeavoured to do as a teen in his native Poland and continued to do for many decades after arriving in his adopted home of Winnipeg in 1967.

“He was always trying to do good for the community. I guess that was sort of ingrained in him from Poland,” says son Jacek, one of three children born to Patalas and his wife Józefa.

“Everything you did you kind of did for the community, for making sacrifices. Your life was geared towards or focused on helping society or the community where you live.”

Opening of Portage and Main shows even seemingly insurmountable impasses can be overcome

There are places in a city that become more than places. Portage and Main is one of them. For generations of Winnipeggers, the intersection has represented downtown, traffic, development and civic identity. Its reopening to pedestrians in 2025, after 46 years of closure, was about more than crossing a street. It was a reminder that decisions made by one generation can shape the choices available to another — and that even seemingly permanent decisions can be reconsidered.

I have spent much of my professional life thinking about Winnipeg as a planner, working in public, private and non-profit settings. My PhD research gave me an opportunity to examine Portage and Main differently: not simply as a debate about cars and pedestrians, but as a window into how power operates in a city. I reviewed 569 archival documents spanning the 1960s to the present, interviewed 48 planners with experience in Winnipeg, and mapped the relationships between planners, politicians, developers, engineers, residents, businesses and advocacy groups.

What emerged was a story about how planning decisions become embedded in a city’s institutions, agreements, infrastructure, professional practices and political expectations — shaping not only what gets built, but who gets to influence what gets built.

The closure of Portage and Main in 1979 did not remain a decision confined to a particular political moment. Over time, it was reinforced by development agreements, physical infrastructure, property relationships, traffic-engineering practices, administrative routines, and public narratives about mobility and downtown revitalization. The people who made many of those original decisions eventually left office. The arrangements they created remained. Later planners inherited them.

Winnipeg Jets trade Connor Hellebuyck to New Jersey Devils

Connor Hellebuyck has been traded.

The Winnipeg Jets announced Friday morning they have sent the netminder to the New Jersey Devils for four players and two draft picks.

The Jets are receiving: Dawson Mercer, Alexander Command, Nico Daws and Nick Bjugstad.

More to come.

Chief medical officer quits, cites work environment ‘challenges’

Manitoba’s provincial chief medical officer is resigning from his position at Shared Health, citing the role’s demands and work environment challenges in an email viewed by the Free Press.

Dr. José François, who’s held the executive position since April 2024, sent an email to provincial medical specialty leads that said his final day will be Jan. 17, 2027, after he submitted his resignation Wednesday. Several other senior leaders have departed the provincial health authority in recent months.

“Serving in this role has been a privilege,” François, a longtime family physician from Ste. Anne, wrote in the email.

He said his “greatest pleasure” was working alongside and supporting an “exceptional group” of provincial medical specialty leads and chief medical officers.

Province orders ban on private teacher-student messaging

Manitoba teachers are no longer allowed to text or use social media to contact a student – regardless of whether they coach a school sports team or supervise other activities outside typical instruction times.