The Social Page: Art on the edge

MPI donates auto repair gear to RRC Polytech

Manitoba Public Insurance’s donation Thursday came without an oversized cheque or physical money.

Instead, the Crown corporation announced $1.2-million worth of collision repair equipment for Red River College Polytechnic.

“We knew that the equipment wasn’t being used to its full value,” Carmen Nedohin, MPI’s board chair, said outside the Winnipeg post-secondary’s auto repair shop at its Notre Dame Avenue campus.

Inside, students assembled golf carts. More than 200 pieces of equipment — frame racks, dent pulling systems — have been added to the facility. “It was just a perfect fit,” Nedohin added.

Province orders mosquito fogging owing to increased risk of West Nile virus

Parts of Winnipeg and several rural communities will be sprayed for mosquitoes in the coming days as the heat wave across southern Manitoba has created a higher risk of exposure to West Nile virus.

The province has issued a fogging order under the Environment Act in response to a high number of Culex tarsalis mosquitoes — the primary transmitter of West Nile virus — in Manitoba.

Surveillance data from last week showed evidence of the West Nile virus.

“High temperatures across southern Manitoba have shortened the time required for West Nile virus to develop within infected Culex tarsalis mosquitoes and be transmitted to humans,” the province’s first bulletin on West Nile virus this summer, published Thursday afternoon, reads.

Girl pleads guilty to assaulting fellow student

A high school student who admitted to attacking another girl in the hallway says she is taking responsibility for her wrongdoing.

Downtown Winnipeg comedy club Yuk Yuk’s closes

A downtown Winnipeg comedy club, Yuk Yuk’s, closed after being one of the company’s worst performing locations across Canada.

“We’ve opened many clubs,” said Mark Breslin, Yuk Yuk’s founder. “They’re like oil wells — some of them gush, some of them trickle and some of them are just dry.

“You never absolutely know which is going to be which.”

The franchise counts at least 10 locations nationally.

Health Sciences Centre hit with 12-hour power outage

The cause of a power outage that affected several areas of Health Sciences Centre is under investigation.

Giant Tiger to close downtown, area residents bemoan dwindling grocery options

One of the only remaining grocery-store options for people living downtown and in the Exchange District is closing its doors.

Red notices on the windows at Giant Tiger’s Donald Street and Ellice Avenue location advised passersby the store will close on Nov. 7.

Chain spokesperson Jessica Charbonneau said in an email the decision to shutter stores is “not taken lightly and is made with careful consideration and thorough analysis.”

The store was busy Thursday afternoon.