Your forecast
A mix of sun and cloud, clearing late this afternoon. Wind up to 15 km/h. High 6 C, wind chill -7 this morning. UV index 5 or moderate.
Wildfire season may get off to a relatively quiet start in Canada but lingering drought and a warm summer could tip the scales towards another severe year, experts say.
Wildfire expert Mike Flannigan says this year will be his “litmus test” for whether Canada’s wildfire seasons, already in uncharted territory and fuelled by human-caused climate change, have entered a “new reality.” The Canadian Press has more here.
A burn pile of trees from a clear cut fire break that is part of wildfire mitigation steps being taken in Canmore, Alta., in March. (Jeff McIntosh / The Canadian Press files)
What’s happening today
🖼️ The biggest art show in the province, the Winnipeg Fine Art Fair, returns this weekend. The juried art show and sale features 77 local artists. Red River Exhibition Park, 3977 Portage Ave., Friday to Sunday, various times. Tickets: $10.50 daily; $15.75 weekend pass available online.
Winnipeg Fine Art Fair is back for a third year. (Supplied)
Today’s must-read
As Conrad Sweatman reports, most of us have come to accept eroding privacy as an unavoidable feature of modern life. We live in public, as the saying goes.
But the popular image of mass surveillance — the state encroaching on private life — now feels incomplete next to the technology that enables it.
A CCTV camera on Hargrave Street and Portage Avenue (Ruth Bonneville / Free Press)
Technology that relies on complex collaboration between government and private actors, as we’re seeing in Winnipeg.
All this contributes to a growing debate about what our privacy rights are, and what it even means to consent to surveillance and monitoring today. Many experts warn that relevant legal frameworks regulating surveillance are woefully out of date. Read the full story here.
On the bright side
After a two-year hiatus, the Manitoba Book Awards are returning for 2026, albeit on a slightly smaller scale.
Founded in 1988, the awards were presented annually until 2024, when a feasibility study recommended the Manitoba Book Awards, and the governing coalition — made up of Plume Winnipeg, the Association of Manitoba Book Publishers, the Winnipeg Public Library and the Manitoba Writers’ Guild — be dissolved.
In an April 9 news release, it was announced the 2026 Manitoba Book Awards, now run by an independent board of arts workers and writers, would be presented Sept. 19 at the Park Theatre after the short lists are revealed in August. Read more here.
On this date
On Sept. 10, 1980: The Winnipeg Free Press reported multimillion-dollar company Tan Jay Ltd. wanted to locate a garment factory in rural Manitoba in return for tax concessions from local municipalities, even though provincial legislation forbade such practices. The Manitoba government lifted the two-year tax freeze on the province’s property tax credit program, raising the minimum credit by $100 to $325.
Today’s front page
Get the full story: Read today’s e-edition of the Free Press.
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