Two-year-old giraffe dies at Toronto Zoo while under general anesthesia

NDP touts health-care gains, but critics question impact on ER wait times

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara doesn’t mince words when describing how bad things are in the province’s emergency departments and urgent-care centres.

“The wait times that we are seeing in Manitoba are unacceptable,” said Asagwara in an interview with the Free Press.

“I hear from families, I hear from providers, I hear from Manitobans who are concerned about the wait times that they’re seeing, that they’re experiencing, and those concerns are valid — I share those concerns.”

So what is the NDP, who promised voters nearly three years ago it had the answers to bring down wait times, doing about it?

Judge decries ‘senseless acts’ during sentencing for killers in Berens River manslaughter

Two men have admitted their guilt in the beating death of a 45-year-old father in Berens River First Nation last winter.

Michael Oliver Franklin, 32, and Thomas Bryton Goosehead, 24, pleaded guilty to manslaughter Thursday in the Feb. 13, 2025 killing of Leslie Neil Mason.

“These types of senseless acts happen far too often in Berens River and every other small community in Manitoba, including here in Winnipeg,” Court of King’s Bench Justice Kenneth Champagne said.

The men had been charged with second-degree murder, but admitted to the lesser offence as part of a plea bargain struck between their defence lawyers and Crown prosecutor Thomas Boult, largely due to concerns with the strength of the case Boult developed after meeting with witnesses in Berens River.

Brandon’s Nachtigall comes up short of Canadian Mid-Am title

Evan Nachtigall was about 12-feet away from making history.

But a slippery downhill birdie putt for the win on Friday afternoon in Ontario proved to be a bit too aggressive, leaving the 25-year-old Brandon golfer with a nervy comeback attempt that ultimately fell painfully short.

The resulting bogey, on the 72nd and final hole of play at the Canadian Men’s Mid-Amateur Championship, left him one shot behind playing partner Garrett Rank, who tapped in his par to claim victory.

“It kind of stings,” Nachtigall told the Free Press shortly after finishing up at the Brantford Golf & Country Club. “At the end of the day, second place in my first time playing this event and losing to a guy who’s now won it four times, I guess I’ll have to take it.”

Costco breaks ground on new West St. Paul store

Construction has begun on the American retailer's newest Manitoba location which developers expect will open in August 2027.

Summer flooding sinks some fall harvest hopes

A number of Manitoba farmers say they are expecting this year’s harvest to be one of the worst they’ve seen after major flooding decimated fields at the start of summer.

Bob Elliot, who has been farming east of Stonewall for 43 years, said he’s expecting the operation’s 5,500 acres to produce roughly half their normal yield.

Stonewall has logged the most precipitation this summer, with 523 millimetres of rainfall between May 1 and Aug. 16, according to Manitoba’s weather conditions report.

Elliot said the amount of rain has created a “unique” situation for farmers. “This is something that I don’t think anyone around here has ever seen.”