British Columbia

Thousands of people with disabilities could end up stranded in the coming weeks across Metro Vancouver as strike action by ATU Local 1724 ramps up.

The union represents HandyDart drivers, maintenance workers, road supervisors, trainers and office workers in Metro Vancouver and has been on strike since July 3 when an overwhelming majority of members voted in favour of taking action, said union president Joe McCann.

This does not impact HandyDart services outside of Metro Vancouver.

HandyDart offers a “paratransit” service for people who can’t take conventional public transit without assistance due to physical, sensory or cognitive disabilities. Drivers offers passengers door-to-door service and are trained to work with people with a range of disabilities and mobility aides, McCann said. Passengers can book a ride up to a week in advance and pay the same fare as conventional public transit users. They will often ride the bus with several other passengers.

Leo Yu, a HandyDart bus operator and member of Local 1724, says working conditions have been deteriorating over the past decade. More recently, “completely chaotic” workdays have been negatively impacting drivers, dispatchers, passengers and their caregivers, he says.

cross-posted from: https://rss.ponder.cat/post/1089

On the night of July 17, a massive lightning storm rolled across the Kootenay region of B.C.’s southeast Interior, lighting up the darkness and setting dry hillsides ablaze. In my small, end-of-the-road community of Argenta, home to approximately 150 people, we awoke to at least four fires burning on the mountain directly above our homes.

It’s something many of us have been waiting for, recognizing it as an inevitable reality of living so intimately with the forests we love so dearly. It’s also something we prepared for.

With over 200 strikes reported and little rain to accompany them, mountain sides were set on fire near villages and cities that included Nelson, Silverton, Meadow Creek and New Denver.

> Hartmann says beavers lived in the watershed historically, but the population had drastically diminished due to trapping, as is the case in much of the province. As a result, the wetlands have dried up. According to Parks Canada, beavers create wetlands by constructing dams, which store water, and by creating ponds.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/b-c-expands-services-for-women-with-gynecological-cancer-1.7270158

Approximately 2,000 people in the Village of Ashcroft have been told to be ready to leave their homes at a moment's notice, after an evacuation alert was put into place at noon Friday for the entire community, about 100 kilometres west of Kamloops.

The warning comes with officials forecasting smoky skies across much of B.C. as over 300 fires burn across the province, with more expected in the days ahead.

Cliff Chapman with the B.C. Wildfire Service (BCWS) said Thursday the province appeared to be "on the precipice of a very challenging 72 hours" with hot and dry weather, dry lightning and strong winds forecast.

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I'm part of the university community and I don't know a single person who is not happy to see this go.

The thing that makes me angriest I think is I agree with their message but the way they went about this was straight up wrong and made all Palestine supporters look bad.

Camp has been evacuated but they left all their trash for the groundskeepers making above barely minimum wage to clean up.

A global IT outage has caused widespread disruption across multiple industries, including significant issues within the health-care sector in B.C.

The province's Ministry of Health confirmed the disruption is impacting its networks and computers.

In a statement, the ministry said it has implemented "contingency plans" to ensure that health-care services remain operational, and patient care is not disrupted "to the best of our ability."

It is urging people to contact their care providers Friday if they have questions about appointments or services.

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> Dr. Devon Mitchell, a Vancouver-based resident emergency physician and spokesperson for the Canadian Doctors for Medicare, said he has "very little faith" that private, for-profit clinics owned by investors can provide efficient care. > > "Because at the end of the day, if you're delivering the same service but you have to carve off an extra five to eight per cent for your shareholders, there's no way you can deliver that at cost," he said. "Ultimately, you're just getting the same care for a higher cost with less oversight because it's happening in a private facility."

> The City of Prince George has previously experimented with bear-resistant garbage cans but has since abandoned the efforts, due to the cost involved and their lack of compatibility with the existing collection system.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/25152450

British Columbians will no longer get plastic and Styrofoam takeout containers and will be charged fees for new shopping bags, as part of single-use plastic regulations rolling out Monday.

It's the latest part of the province's regulations on plastics, which started rolling out last December to align with federal regulations that are going into effect across the country.

B.C., however, had delayed some aspects of the federal single-use plastics regulations, saying that producers and businesses needed more time to adapt.

The province says the bans will help divert plastic waste from landfills, where an estimated 340,000 tonnes of plastic items and packaging were disposed of in the province in 2019.

> While Belcarra is close to two 'Bear Smart' communities, Port Moody and Coquitlam, Hodgins said RCMP are using this incident as a reminder for everyone sharing spaces with wildlife to do their part to prevent human-bear conflicts by securing attractants, such as garbage, and securing homes and vehicles.

> Eby said Friday at an unrelated news conference that it's "extremely bizarre" that Weaver might favour Rustad, who says climate change isn't a crisis and was turfed from the former B.C. Liberals, now known as B.C. United, for his views on the subject. > > On his party's website, Rustad says the "changing climate is real, and man is impacting our climate," but it "isn't a crisis," and the party will not engage in "over-taxation, hype, scare tactics" on the issue. He has also said he would prohibit teaching climate science in classrooms.

> "These are not 'drug dens,' they are health centres," said Philpott, now the dean of health sciences at Queen's University, in a post on X.

> One wild-born owl left

> According to the prime minister's statement, the updated treaty will cover concerns not addressed in the original document — including ecosystems and Indigenous values — while reducing flood risk and promoting clean energy goals.

> Prior to this legal challenge, Teck Coal had also been fined tens of millions of dollars for contaminating waterways in B.C. over the years.

[...]

> On Thursday, Teck also announced that the company has closed the sale of its B.C. coal mining operations to Glencore. When reached for comment, the spokesperson for Teck referred CBC News to the Swiss commodities giant.

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Seismograph is located in Vancouver, earthquake is part of a swarm going on along the Juan de Fuca Ridge offshore.