Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - January 13, 2025, Winnipeg, Manitoba A2 ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM NEWS MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 2025 VOL 154 NO 53 Winnipeg Free Press est 1872 / Winnipeg Tribune est 1890 2025 Winnipeg Free Press, a division of FP Canadian Newspapers Limited Partnership. Published six days a week in print and always online at 1355 Mountain Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba R2X 3B6, PH: 204-697-7000 CEO / MIKE POWER Editor / PAUL SAMYN Associate Editor Enterprise / SCOTT GIBBONS Associate Editor News / STACEY THIDRICKSON Associate Editor Digital News / WENDY SAWATZKY Director Photo and Multimedia / MIKE APORIUS NEWSMEDIA COUNCIL The Winnipeg Free Press is a member of the National Newsmedia Council, which is an independent organization established to determine acceptable journalistic practices and ethical behaviour. If you have concerns about editorial content, please send them to: editorialconcerns@freepress.mb.ca. 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INSIDE Arts and Life D1 Business B4 Classifieds B6 Comics D4 Diversions D5,6 Horoscope D2 Jumble D5 Miss Lonelyhearts D2 Obituaries B5 Opinion A6,7 Sports C1 Television D2 Weather C8 COLUMNISTS: Tom Brodbeck A4 Aaron Epp B2 READER SERVICE ● GENERAL INQUIRIES 204-697-7000 CIRCULATION INQUIRIES MISSING OR INCOMPLETE PAPER? Call or email before 10 a.m. weekdays or 11 a.m. Saturday City: 204-697-7001 Outside Winnipeg: 1-800-542-8900 press 1 6:30 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday-Friday.; 7 a.m. - noon Saturday; Closed Sunday TO SUBSCRIBE: 204-697-7001 Out of Winnipeg: 1-800-542-8900 The Free Press receives support from the Local Journalism Initiative funded by the Government of Canada “Please rest assured that first thing Thursday we will begin talking about repopulation,” Marrone said. By Sunday morning, Cal Fire report- ed the Palisades, Eaton, Kenneth and Hurst fires had consumed more than 62 square miles, an area larger than San Francisco. The Palisades Fire was 11 per cent contained and containment on the Eaton Fire reached 27 per cent. Those two blazes accounted for 59 square miles. Crews from California and nine other states are part of the ongoing response that includes nearly 1,400 fire engines, 84 aircraft and more than 14,000 personnel, including newly arrived firefighters from Mexico. FIGHTING TO SAVE PUBLIC AND PRI- VATE AREAS Minimal growth was expected Sunday for the Eaton Fire “with continued smouldering and creeping” of flames, an LA County Fire Department incident report said. Most evacuation orders for the area have been lifted. After a fierce battle Saturday, fire- fighters managed to fight back flames in Mandeville Canyon, home to Arnold Schwarzenegger and other celebrities near Pacific Palisades not far from the coast, where swooping helicopters dumped water as the blaze charged downhill. The fire ran through chaparral-cov- ered hillsides and also briefly threat- ened to jump over Interstate 405 and into densely populated areas in the Hollywood Hills and San Fernando Valley. ARRESTS FOR LOOTING Looting continues to be a concern, with authorities reporting more arrests as the devastation grows. Michael Lorenz, a captain with the Los Angeles Police Department, said seven people have been arrested in recent days, with two suspects “posing as firefighters com- ing and in and out of houses.” Asked exactly how many looters have been arrested, Lorenz said he couldn’t give a precise number but that officers were detaining about 10 peo- ple a day. California National Guard troops arrived Friday to help guard properties. California Gov. Gavin Newsom post- ed on X Saturday that “California will NOT allow for looting.” HISTORICAL COST The fires that began Tuesday just north of downtown L.A. have burned more than 12,000 structures. No cause has been determined for the largest fires and early estimates indicate the wildfires could be the nation’s costliest ever. A preliminary estimate by AccuWeather put the damage and economic losses so far between US$135 billion and US$150 billion. In an interview that aired Sunday on NBC, Gov. Gavin Newsom said the fires could end up being the worst natural disaster in U.S. history. “I think it will be in terms of just the costs associated with it, in terms of the scale and scope,” he said. INMATE FIREFIGHTERS ON THE FRONT LINES Along with crews from other states and Mexico, hundreds of inmates from California’s prison system were also helping firefighting efforts. Nearly 950 incarcerated firefighters were dis- patched “to cut fire lines and remove fuel to slow fire spread,” according to an update from the California Depart- ment of Corrections and Rehabilita- tion. Though the state has long relied on prison labour to fight fires, the prac- tice is controversial as the inmates are paid little for dangerous and difficult work. Inmates are paid up to roughly US$10.24 each day, with additional money for 24-hour shifts, according to the corrections department. OVERFLOWING KINDNESS Volunteers overflowed donation cen- tres and some had to be turned away at locations including the Santa Anita Park horse racing track, where people who lost their homes sifted through stacks of donated shirts, blankets and other household goods. Altadena resident Jose Luis Godinez said three homes occupied by more than a dozen of his family members were destroyed. “Everything is gone,” he said, speak- ing in Spanish. “All my family lived in those three houses and now we have nothing.” REBUILDING WILL BE A CHALLENGE Newsom issued an executive order Sunday aimed at fast-tracking the rebuilding of destroyed property by suspending some environmental regu- lations and ensuring that property tax assessments are not increased. “We’ve got to let people know that we have their back,” he said. “Don’t walk away because we want you to come back, rebuild, and rebuild with higher quality building standards, more mod- ern standards. We want to make sure that the associated costs with that are not disproportionate, especially in a middle-class community like this.” The White House said as of Sunday more than 24,000 people have reg- istered for federal assistance made available by President Joe Biden’s ma- jor disaster declaration last Wednes- day. Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said Sunday that she has spoken with members of the incoming presidential administration and said she expects Donald Trump will come visit the devastated region. LEADERSHIP ACCUSED OF SKIMPING Bass faces a critical test of her leadership during the city’s greatest crisis in decades, but allegations of leadership failures, political blame and investigations have begun. Newsom on Friday ordered state officials to determine why a 117 mil- lion-gallon (440 million-litre) reservoir was out of service and some hydrants had run dry. Crowley, the L.A. fire chief, said city leadership failed her department by not providing enough money for fire- fighting. She also criticized the lack of water. “When a firefighter comes up to a hydrant, we expect there’s going to be water,” Crowley said. — The Associated Press Members also need community-wide support to stay open, he said, noting the chamber wants to see a local policing plan to better protect business owners, employees and their clients, and a federal government crackdown on bail and repeat offender conse- quences. For Gauthier, a string of recent bad luck at Blondie’s began around 10 p.m. on New Year’s Day, when a motorist who appeared to be intoxicated entered the self-serve facility at 2449 Main St., hit an entrance door while adjusting his truck in a bay and declined to pro- vide vehicle registration information to an attendant. The employee then called 911 and when a police cruiser showed up, the suspect who was mid-car wash jumped into his white Dodge truck and fled the scene by hitting the gas and smashing through the closed exit door, the owner said. Const. Claude Chancy confirmed the Winnipeg Police Service is investigat- ing the Jan. 1 incident, but no arrests have been made. Also on Sunday, Winnipeg police announced different charges related to a Friday incident at a Blondie’s site with vehicle cleaning services and a laundromat at 127 Watson Ave. Two people showed up to that loca- tion around 4 a.m. and backed a stolen commercial van into the glass-front entry door of the laundromat, Gauthier said. “They poked around with the ATM machine and the change machine, but these are pretty well bolted onto the ground and they’re very hard to re- move so they went to the cash register and took the whole cash register,” the business owner said. Chancy told the Free Press the in- vestigation is ongoing, but he declined to comment on how many suspects are believed to have been involved. A 41-year-old man from Winnipeg has been charged with break and enter, two counts of possession of property obtained by crime — one for items under $5,000 and another for costlier property — and failing to comply with a probation order. Patrol officers stopped an individu- al who was walking in the Mynarski neighbourhood in the early hours of the morning on Saturday because he matched the description of a suspect involved in the break-and-enter at Blondie’s, police said in a news release. Police said that mid-interview, the man attempted to flee and a short foot pursuit ensued after which he was ap- prehended and police found evidence that authorities believe was stolen from the laundromat. A major crimes unit investigation found the man stole a 2021 Ford Transit 350 valued at $28,000 from an autobody shop in the 1000 block of Arlington Street sometime between late Thursday and early Friday. The suspect is accused of then breaking into Blondie’s using the stolen van, which was later found unoccupied in the 200 block of Austin Street North, and fleeing with a cash register con- taining currency and gift cards. The owner of Blondie’s said the damage is estimated to be around $5,000, the equivalent of his insurance deductible, while the fallout of the Jan. 1 incident is anticipated to be around $15,000. “It certainly discourages you from operating in a full capacity,” Gauthier said. The Nor Villa Hotel, owned and op- erated by his son (Gauthier previously owned the business), was targeted by a trio of masked people who entered the beer vendor with baseball bats on a Friday afternoon in December, he added. The businessman said the group smashed costly equipment and punched an employee before taking off with $500 worth of merchandise. Break-and-enters accounted for 12 per cent of property crimes reported in 2023, per the city’s latest available report on crime statistics. There were 5,769 such incidents last year, or about 100 fewer than the five-year average. A Winnipeg police analysis shows motor-vehicle thefts represented seven per cent of incidents with upwards of 300 additional incidents recorded, compared to the average between 2019 and 2023. Data for 2024 was not immediately available Sunday. maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca WILDFIRES ● FROM A1 VANDALS ● FROM A1 JOHN WOODS / FREE PRESS Doors have been damaged at two Blondie’s Car Wash locations in Winnipeg. NOAH BERGER / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Firefighters from Oregon survey damage at a home levelled by the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades community Sunday. DATABASE ● FROM A1 The Tories did not widely advertise the school data-collec- tion overhaul as a way to bolster cybersecurity, but a government description indicated it would be “secure” and “confidential.” Families were also told they would be able to find class sched- ules and attendance, among other student data, more easily, while divisions were promised improved access to information, simplified workflows and faster response times to questions and concerns. Those details were deleted from Manitoba Education’s website shortly after the October 2023 election. Gustavo Valle, an information security director at Winnipeg’s Exchange Technology Services, which provides cybersecurity management services, warned against making premature assumptions about any cyberat- tack or placing blame until an official investigation has been completed. “Regardless of the company size, budget or staff, breaches can occur and, at the end of the day, the ability to respond to and mitigate an incident is the key factor in minimizing the impact of a cyber event,” he said. The Commission on Kinder- garten to Grade 12 Education deemed a modernized data collection system a priority in its final report, for unrelated reasons. Recommendation No. 71 of 75 called for an overhaul and the related adoption of lifelong student identification numbers to increase capacity for data col- lection, analysis and evaluation across the education sector. The report, made public in 2021 after a year-long delay prompted by the COVID-19 pan- demic, described the initiative as an important step to allow partners to better collaborate on improving student achievement. Its contents were overshad- owed by debate on the commis- sion’s call to amalgamate elected school boards into mega-regional boards made up of government appointees. maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca ;