Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - March 22, 2024, Winnipeg, Manitoba STARTS TOMORROW! There’s so much to do at The Leaf and the Zoo! Join us for a full week of family-friendly fun and learn more about the amazing plants and animals we share the planet with. Visit assiniboinepark.ca for a full list of activities scu.mb.ca/bonus SERVING MANITOBA SINCE 1872. FOREVER WITH YOUR SUPPORT. FRIDAY, MARCH 22, 2024 TODAY’S WEATHER SUNNY. HIGH -7 — LOW -19 CITY BE FAIR, KINEW TELLS FUEL FIRMS / B1 City hall votes to open Portage and Main, close concourse Tear down barricades: council I N the end, the final vote in a debate that has raged since 1979 wasn’t even close. Next year, after 46 years, pedes- trians will once again cross Portage and Main at street level: city coun- cil Thursday voted 11-3 to open the intersection and close the underground concourse. ‘ The landmark intersection, which has been called the windiest in Cana- da, has been the place to where Bomb- ers fans race to celebrate a Grey Cup win, where protests are routinely held and where the military was celebrated for helping out during the 1997 “flood of the century.” The vote came after city officials estimated it would cost $73 million and disrupt traffic for up to five years to replace the leaking membrane that protects the underground concourse and keep it open. Mayor Scott Gill- ingham has repeatedly argued that assessment makes a clear case to close the underground instead. “I believe the practical alternative (is) to open the intersection to pedes- trian traffic at street level, avoid up to five years of traffic delays and decommission the concourse,” said Gillingham. The mayor joined Couns. Matt Allard, Jeff Browaty, Shawn Dobson, Evan Duncan, Cindy Gilroy, Janice Lukes, Brian Mayes, Sherri Rollins, Vivian Santos and Devi Sharma to sup- port the proposal, while Couns. Ross Eadie, Jason Schreyer and Russ Wyatt voted against it. Couns. Markus Cham- bers and John Orlikow were absent. Not everyone at Thursday’s council meeting agreed: the trucking industry questioned the effect on traffic, while one councillor argued for another plebiscite to let citizens have their say and another councillor said he backs opening pedestrian access but opposes closing the indoor walkway. JOYANNE PURSAGA School misapplied threat assessment, he says Son’s toy mistaken for weapon, father fumes A MANITOBA father is accusing school officials of misapplying safety policies after he was asked to partic- ipate in a violent threat assessment after his autistic son took a toy made from Popsicle sticks to class. The child, a 13-year old student at École John Henderson Middle School, was reprimanded by school officials last month when a teacher caught him showing an “imitation weapon” to a friend. Despite acknowledging the child pos- es no threat to his classmates, school officials initiated a violent threat risk assessment, asking his parents to par- ticipate in an in-depth interview. The incident has called into question how and why school officials choose to invoke such assessments, said the boy’s father, who spoke to the Free Press anonymously to protect his son’s identity. “I feel very strongly that this has been misapplied to my son,” he said by phone. “This is an important policy… we have to keep schools safe, but when you apply it to a Popsicle stick, does that not diminish the seriousness of this policy?” The item in question was construct- ed from Popsicle sticks, paper and a rubber band. It was modelled after a character from one of the child’s favourite video games and was not intended to be a weapon, the man said. The game, Brawhalla, is something the child plays exclusively at school, where he is a member of the e-sports team, he added. The assessment, developed by the North American Centre for Threat Assessment and Trauma Response, is designed to identify and intervene when school students exhibit potential- ly violent or threatening behaviour. It asks parents 39 questions about their child’s home life and relation- ships, as well as a review of their social media presence, online search history and school work. It may also include searches of a student’s locker, backpack and personal notebooks or journals. Typically, a report detailing the findings of an assessment is added to the student’s permanent academic file, along with intervention recommenda- tions. The father refused to participate in the interview, but fears the fact an assessment was triggered will make school more difficult for the boy, who lives with high-functioning autism, he said. “This questions my son’s integrity and my family’s integrity, and yet we have no recourse,” the man said. “What biases are going to be applied because of this in the future, and by whom?” He has asked the River East Transcona School Division to strike the incident from his son’s record, but officials have declined to do so, he said. TYLER SEARLE Each spent a lifetime in another man’s shoes TWO men who were switched at birth at an Arborg hospital ex- pressed relief and gratitude follow- ing an official apology from Premier Wab Kinew for the Manitoba govern- ment’s failure to protect and care for them nearly 70 years ago. Richard Beauvais and Edward Am- brose were invited to the chamber floor at the Manitoba legislature Thursday to receive a formal apol- ogy on behalf of the provincial gov- ernment — one that’s been owed to the men since their shared birthday in the same rural hospital in 1955, Kinew said. “I feel relieved,” Beauvais, 68, told reporters following the premier’s address to the chamber. “He did a fantastic job. I think he put every- thing at peace.” Beauvais and Ambrose were sent home from hospital with the wrong families in 1955 and the switch was not discovered until a few years ago when Beauvais took an at-home DNA ancestry test. Beauvais was raised in St. Laurent in a Métis home where he spoke French and Cree, and attended residential day school. He was taken from his family and placed in foster care. About 100 kilometres away in the town of Rembrandt, Ambrose was raised in a Ukrainian home. His parents died before he was a teen- ager and he was placed with a foster family who adopted him. The two met for the first time recently in Winnipeg. Ambrose de- scribed the encounter as an honour. “The feeling was very emotional, for meeting someone who is you, but I am him — it’s a reverse,” he said. Ambrose said the premier’s apolo- gy was what he’d hoped for. “It touched me. That was very, very close to my heart,” he said. Kinew apologized directly to Beau- vais and Ambrose and remarked on their deep compassion and empathy. “Such is the distance that each of them has walked in another’s shoes,” the premier said. Beauvais and Ambrose were wronged by the Manitoba govern- ment and the institutions they were supposed to trust, Kinew said. The province of Manitoba made a terrible mistake and the government is ac- cepting responsibility, he said. “What happened to you cannot be undone, but it must be acknowledged and it must be atoned for,” Kinew told the men and their family mem- bers seated in the gallery. “While we cannot take back the series of failures that caused your pain, we can perhaps make things a little easier for you now in offering our sincere regret in response to the questions you have long asked. “On behalf of the Manitoba gov- ernment, we sincerely apologize for our failure to care for you, to protect you, to ensure that you would grow up with the love of the families who welcomed you into this world.” The premier also apologized to the Beauvais and Ambrose families for being deprived of their rightful inheritance, culture, identity and family. “For these things, we are sorry,” Kinew said. DANIELLE DA SILVA ‘WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU CANNOT BE UNDONE’ MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS Premier Wab Kinew shakes Richard Beauvais’s hand after apologizing to him and Edward Ambrose (left) Thursday afternoon in the Manitoba Legislative Building. Premier apologizes to men switched at birth at Arborg hospital in 1955 ● TOY, CONTINUED ON A2 ● APOLOGY, CONTINUED ON A2 ● BARRICADES, CONTINUED ON A2 ;