St. Albert news

• December holiday blitz nabs dozens of drunk drivers in Edmonton

  04-01-2018 23:22 via edmontonjournal.com
  Forty-two drivers took an unplanned holiday jaunt to police cells in December when officers caught them apparently impaired behind the wheel.
  Another 72 tipsy drivers temporarily lost their licences during the month of December, according to numbers released Thursday by the Edmonton Police Service.
  In December, the police increased roadway checkstops and roving patrols near clubs and restaurants. One 49-year-old man blew a breath sample of 0.19 grams per 100 millilitres, which is more than doubl
  
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• Flooding at Minchau School displaces students for weeks

  04-01-2018 22:41 via edmontonjournal.com
  More than 300 students at Minchau School won’t be able to return for weeks after extreme cold temperatures ruptured a pipe and caused extensive flooding.
  Minchau School, a kindergarten to Grade 6 school at 3615 Mill Woods Rd. East, won’t be able to reopen in time for classes to resume on Jan. 8. Repairs are expected to take between 10 to 12 weeks to complete.
  “This is an unfortunate, unpredictable challenge for our Minchau students and staff,” said Lorne Parker, assi
  
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• Five charged with pre-Christmas killing of 16-year-old girl appear in court

  04-01-2018 21:19 via edmontonjournal.com
  The boyfriend of a 16-year-old girl fatally shot in Grande Prairie — along with four other young men — have had new court dates set in connection with her killing. 
  RCMP called to a home in the northern city found Hannah Sutton dead around 10:30 a.m. Dec. 16.
  Justice Watt-Blais, 19, charged with second-degree murder, appeared in Grande Prairie court on Wednesday via closed circuit television from the Peace River Correctional Centre. Watt-Blais’ counsel, Chris Millsap, aske
  
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• Ryan Nugent-Hopkins for Max Pacioretty? TSN's Ray Ferraro speculates

  04-01-2018 20:27 via edmontonjournal.com
  This in from TSN’s Ray Ferraro, his speculation — and I want to make it clear Ferraro was speculating — about a possible deal between the Edmonton Oilers and the Montreal Canadiens, with Edmonton moving Ryan Nugent-Hopkins for Montreal’s Max Pacioretty as the main part of the deal.
  “What if there’s a deal to be made between Edmonton and Montreal that involves Nugent-Hopkins, and Pacioretty is in it? And there are some other pieces to equal the way that works.
  
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• Edmonton Oilers GM Peter Chiarelli was willing to move Taylor Hall for Cody Ceci, TSN's Dreger reports. Hmmmm

  04-01-2018 20:21 via edmontonjournal.com
  This in from TSN’s Darren Dreger talked to TSN1260’s Dustin Nielson: “These two clubs came real close to making a pretty big trade not that long ago and just couldn’t get it done, and that trade was Taylor Hall for, I think they finally got to a place where Ottawa was willing to consider Cody Ceci, so it would have been Hall for Ceci, but it had to be cleared in Ottawa through ownership and before they could get clearance Hall got traded to New Jersey for Larsson.”
  
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• City police take on youth in friendly McCauley Cup hockey game

  04-01-2018 19:30 via edmontonjournal.com
  Downtown division police officers will lace up their skates for a friendly game of hockey at the McCauley Cup ice rink facing off youth from the neighbourhood.
  Thursday’s game is the ninth time that officers will get down on the ice at the McCauley outdoor skating rink, at 96 Street and 108 Avenue.
  The puck drops at 1 p.m.  
  Usually held in December the Cup, was postponed because of frigid temperatures. 
  But temperatures Thursday are expected to be a balmy 2 C wit
  
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• Wildlife: Edmonton art's scene in 2017 was captivatingly anthropological

  04-01-2018 18:47 via edmontonjournal.com
  Before we poke too deeply into 2018, a few nods to the contemporary art scene are in order.
  Last year had a bounty of standout exhibitions, and witnessed the local art ecosystem moving forward particularly with indigenous contemporary art. Latitude 53’s touring Big’Uns show by Dayna Danger (which tangentially graced the cover of Canadian Art) and dc3’s alluring and compelling show Disclosures, also hanging Danger’s portraits, come to mind as the city broke ground on its u
  
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• 10 things to do in Edmonton this week: The Disaster Artist, Twelfth Night, and Big Boi

  04-01-2018 18:30 via edmontonjournal.com
  The Disaster Artist
  Widely considered to be one of the worst films ever made, Tommy Wiseau’s The Room has also become one of the biggest cult movies of the last 20 years, with audiences returning time and time again to mock the dialogue and dress as their favourite characters. It should come as no surprise, then, that Hollywood would eventually pick up the option on The Disaster Artist, a well-received book by Room actor/producer Greg Sesteros about the making of the film, and turn it into
  
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• rising song star heads into another busy year

  04-01-2018 18:29 via edmontonjournal.com
  The holiday season is a quiet time for many unless you’re a musician. In that case you might feel as if entertaining other people never stops.
  Catching up with rising star Rebecca Lappa on the last day of 2017 found the local folk-pop singer-songwriter just back from a gig at the airport where she was playing solo with her guitar.
  “I’ve done a lot of stuff this year,” she admits.
  Much of her busy year was spent performing with her band The Revelry. They’re playing B
  
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• Woman arrested after police vehicle loaded with prisoner rammed

  04-01-2018 17:21 via edmontonjournal.com
  A 28-year-old woman is facing a pile of charges after a police vehicle transporting a prisoner was rammed before the driver led Mounties on a brief pursuit. 
  A Mountie in the fully marked police truck was transporting the prisoner from the Paul Band First Nation to Stony Plain RCMP detachment around 2:45 a.m. on Jan. 1 when a driver rammed into the police vehicle near Highway 16 at Range Road 35, said RCMP Cpl. Laurel Scott on Thursday.
  The driver then made repeated attempts to ram the poli
  
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• $10K Tokyo buffet tops expense list as NDP slashes millions from hospitality bills

  04-01-2018 14:17 via edmontonjournal.com
  A $10,000 buffet lunch for 200 people in Japan topped last year’s expense list for Alberta’s political staffers, ministers and senior bureaucrats. 
  In total, the top echelons of the government and public service spent $3.8 million on travel and hospitality in 2017, according to provincial expense disclosures.
  It’s a huge drop from just two years ago, when the same list topped $18.4 million. 
  In 2013, travel and hospitality expenses totalled $27.6 million. That year, t
  
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• Thursday's letters: Congratulations on making science fun

  04-01-2018 14:00 via edmontonjournal.com
  Re. “Mill Woods school puts focus on math, science, environment,” Dec. 27
  Congratulations to the teaching staff at St. Richard Catholic Elementary School in Mill Woods for implementing the modern learning design system for teaching science popularly known as STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics). It is amazing that the creative teachers have been able to bring the system to the early childhood level.
  STEM is now a growing technique for imparting knowledge in biology, c
  
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• Opinion: Fruit trees on Edmonton streets could help feed the hungry

  04-01-2018 14:00 via edmontonjournal.com
  In 2018, even in a prosperous city like Edmonton, many people are trying to stretch their food budgets (among other things). The demand for food banks remains high in Edmonton, and across Canada. Hungercount 2015 states that food bank use was up 23 per cent from 2014. True, it is now 2018 and the economy has (somewhat) recovered. But ups and downs are inevitable.
  One response is to harvest fruit trees. Different approaches have been tried in this regard. In Toronto, an organization called Not Fa
  
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• Alberta oil prices face further hit from transportation bottlenecks in 2018: report

  04-01-2018 13:00 via edmontonjournal.com
  Transportation bottlenecks are helping increase the spread between what Alberta oil producers receive and the benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) price, according to a report by Deloitte.
  A forecast released by the consulting firm Thursday predicts WTI will rise to an average $55 US a barrel this year, while Western Canada Select crude will drop almost 10 per cent to $46.40 Cdn, or about $36 US.
  Increased oilsands output is creating concerns about how to get it to markets even as Canadian co
  
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• Patrick Maroon's suspension and its negligible consequences for him and Edmonton Oilers

  04-01-2018 03:07 via edmontonjournal.com
  Patrick Maroon got a two game suspension for hitting Drew Doughty in the head, when Doughty didn’t have the puck and was turned away from him. 
  What does this mean for the Oilers and for him? 
  Until the team can actually kill off a penalty or have its top power play unit generate a goal, it means very little. Edmonton’s not-so-special teams have killed its playoff hopes. 
  As for Maroon, he’s battling for a new contract with the Oilers — and if it weren&rsqu
  
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• Things are looking up: Housing numbers show real estate stable in 2017

  04-01-2018 02:46 via edmontonjournal.com
  The real estate market in Edmonton held steady throughout 2017, according to new data shared by the Realtors Association of Edmonton on Wednesday.
  “2017 was a steady year for real estate in Edmonton and many of the surrounding municipalities, where sales and prices were quite stable for the majority of the year,” said Darcy Torhjelm, chairman of the Realtors Association of Edmonton. “For most of the year, we continued to see home buyers take advantage of low mortgage rates and
  
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• Edmonton officer suspended 30 hours for discreditable conduct under Police Act

  04-01-2018 02:16 via edmontonjournal.com
  A veteran Edmonton police officer has been suspended for 30 hours without pay under the Police Act after being accused of assaulting his now ex-wife in 2015.
  Const. Binoy Prabhu was charged criminally with assault after police responded to a 911 call Nov. 4, 2015, where it was determined he threatened his now ex-wife with a kitchen chair and scratched her cheek, according to an agreed statement of facts submitted to court when the pair agreed to a June 2016 peace bond and the criminal charge had
  
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• Player grades, Game 31-40: Edmonton Oilers' record keeps improving, but gap to playoff cut line keeps widening

  04-01-2018 01:49 via edmontonjournal.com
  The Edmonton Oilers finally broke out of their win-one-lose-one cycle that had dominated much of their 2017-18 season with a nifty new twist: win-four-lose-four. The Oilers did muster one pity point for an overtime loss to Chicago, but it’s a league-wide trend that one loss in four gets such a bonus. Effectively, then, the Oilers have been running in place over the course of their last ten games:
  Games 1 – 10: 3-6-1, .350 | 22 GF, 33 GA | 377 SF, 310 SA | .952 PDOGames 11-20: 4-5-1,
  
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• Player grades, Game 31-40: Edmonton Oilers' record keeps improving, but the gap to the playoff cut line keeps widening

  04-01-2018 01:40 via edmontonjournal.com
  The Edmonton Oilers finally broke out of their win-one-lose-one cycle that had dominated much of their 2017-18 season with a nifty new twist: win-four-lose-four. The Oilers did muster one pity point for an overtime loss to Chicago, but it’s a league-wide trend that one loss in four gets such a bonus. Effectively, then, the Oilers have been running in place over the course of their last ten games:
  Games 1 – 10: 3-6-1, .350 | 22 GF, 33 GA | 377 SF, 310 SA | .952 PDOGames 11-20: 4-5-1,
  
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• First homicide victim of year survived getting shot two years ago

  04-01-2018 01:34 via edmontonjournal.com
  Edmonton’s first homicide victim of 2018 survived getting shot in the stomach about two years ago, says a woman who has known him since he was a boy.  
  Ruben (Ben) Baker, 21, was found dead near 92 Avenue and 77 Street in Holyrood about 1:20 p.m. Jan 1.
  “He was the sweetest, kindest, nicest kid,” said Denise Anderson Raymond, who said she was Baker’s mother’s best friend and the mother-figure in his life. His mother died before Baker was 10 years old. 
  
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• Hosanna? The 'ascension' of Jason Kenney to provincial politics

  04-01-2018 01:08 via edmontonjournal.com
  In one of his social media videos posted over the holidays, United Conservative Party Leader Jason Kenney offered some sage advice to his supporters: “As long as we work hard, stay humble and earn every vote, we will be in a very strong position to present a credible, common sense, free-enterprise alternative to the NDP in the spring of 2019.”
  Of course, staying humble is proving difficult for more than a few of his supporters on social media, who are gleefully predicting the destruc
  
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• Police lay charges after would-be thief shoots his way out of car

  04-01-2018 01:05 via edmontonjournal.com
  Police have charged a man after a would-be thief was locked in a car and had to shoot his way out.
  Police were called to 96 Avenue and 180 Street in La Perle around 12:15 a.m. Tuesday after a man allegedly broke into a vehicle.
  The owner saw a man inside her car and locked the doors remotely, trapping the thief inside.
  The man escaped by firing a long-barrelled gun through the car’s windows, striking a nearby home, and fleeing on foot.
  A suspect was apprehended by police a block away and t
  
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• Big fines for breaking new indoor tanning bed rules

  04-01-2018 00:55 via edmontonjournal.com
  Businesses that violate new rules banning minors from using artificial tanning beds will face thousands of dollars in fines for each offence, says Alberta Health Services. 
  “There are penalties both for individuals and for corporations,” said Dr. Deena Hinshaw, acting deputy chief medical officer of health. “Our concern is that when young people are exposed to ultraviolet (UV) radiation, it puts them at an unnecessary risk of skin cancer, so our position is that all m
  
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• Aggressive driving on rise in Alberta, says study

  04-01-2018 00:28 via edmontonjournal.com
  The streets of Alberta are only getting meaner, say respondents to a recent study.
  Fifty-seven per cent of Albertans believe aggressive driving has increased in the previous three years, according to a survey of 1,800 Albertans conducted in May 2017 by the Alberta Motor Association Foundation for Traffic Safety. A further 49 per cent believe the frequency of road rage also increased.
  Of the behaviours regularly encountered, 59 per cent named tailgating, 42 per cent cited a driver blocking them f
  
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