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Ontario cities seek ways to fight increasingly visible rats

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Efforts are underway to combat growing rat populations in two of Ontario’s largest cities, as the rodents that typically lurk underground become more visible thanks to a combination of construction and climate change.

In Toronto, the municipality’s infrastructure committee recently adopted a motion asking city council to direct staff to craft an “action plan” to reduce rats in the city.

The motion, put forward by Coun. Alejandra Bravo and Deputy Mayor Amber Morley, is a response to residents’ concerns about a rise in visible rats in local neighbourhoods, Bravo said.

“People were talking about this in 2022 as sort of a growing problem. And then last year, last year and a half … it’s been something that’s bubbling and growing,” said Bravo, noting that residents of her ward have found themselves “overrun” by the rodents.

“It’s a really critical quality-of-life problem when people have all of a sudden been confronted with rats coming into their home or into their business or their place of work … a bunch of factors (have) come together to create this kind of perfect rat storm.”

A sharp increase in construction in the city, due to transit projects and housing development, has disrupted rat habitats deep underground, driving them into open spaces where people can see them, Bravo said.

Longer stretches of warmer weather due to climate change have also enabled the rodent population to flourish by extending their mating periods, she said.

“Cold winters helped us because that interrupted the breeding of rats,” Bravo said. “But with winters not being cold enough, that means that every two months (the rats) can breed.”

The motion put forward by Bravo and Morley – which will go to city council for a vote later this month – also seeks to have council ask the city manager to consult other communities in North America on their approach to rat reduction.

In Ottawa, the city is exploring a form of rat birth control that is not yet legal in Canada.

Local council recently supported a motion brought by Coun. Laine Johnson that asks Health Canada to expedite the review of a product called ContraPest, which is already being deployed in Seattle.

ContraPest works by inducing early menopause in female rats while reducing sperm production in males.

Johnson called it a better solution than rat poison because rats have the ability to “learn” which food sources are bad for them and adjust their behaviour.

A trial of the oral contraceptive was conducted in Washington D.C. in 2019, but the Department of Health said“the results proved inconclusive” and stopped using the product.

Meanwhile, the province of Alberta says it has been a rat-free zone for about 70 years, adhering to a zero-tolerance policy that even prohibits residents from keeping the rodents as pets.

The province says it does not allow rat populations to establish themselves and while small infestations might occasionally occur, those rats are isolated and eradicated when found. Public vigilance, prevention of rat infestations by efforts like rat-proofing structures and removing food sources, are key, the province says.

Karen Wickerson, the province’s rat and pest specialist, doubts whether the humane birth control strategy suggested by Ottawa would be enough to fight the problem plaguing North American cities by itself.

“They have to continuously eat (the birth control) for (population reduction) to continue, so I think there’s a lot kind of missing from that strategy,” she said.

Wickerson has been at the helm of the province’s rat control program for four years, and says that a multi-pronged approach is necessary, but ultimately the province prescribes to a strategy of elimination based on vigilant citizen reportage.

The project that began in the 1950s has been so successful that many Albertans don’t even know what a rat looks like anymore, Wickerson said, sometimes sending pictures of tree squirrels to the official government reporting email.

“If you’ve never lived outside of Alberta, you may never have seen a rat before and so they’re often misidentified,” she said, adding that muskrats make up about 50 per cent of the 400-500 yearly reports of alleged rat sightings.

Along with public education and participation, Alberta has established a veritable rat exclusion zone. The Rocky Mountains to the west and co-ordination with neighbouring Saskatchewan to the east have fortified the rat-free borders, something that might be difficult to establish in Ontario’s urban centres.

“For the province of Ontario, that rat is out of the gate,” said Johnson, the Ottawa councillor. “So we unfortunately have to work reactively instead of proactively as Alberta was able to back 70 years ago.”

Ontario isn’t alone in its struggle.

New York City’s mayor will be hosting the Urban Rat Summit in September, with expected participation of experts from cities like Boston, New Orleans, and Seattle.

The inaugural conference aims to bring together experts in pest control, academic researchers, and politicians in order to share best practices for rat population control in North American cities.

Bravo, the Toronto councillor, said knowledge sharing and co-ordination across regions is key to the fight.

“We’re part of a huge, continuous megalopolis here, and collaboration is always important,” she said. “If there’s good things being done in Peel or in Ottawa or in Chicago, we want to know about that.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 10, 2024.

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Netflix’s subscriber growth slows as gains from password-sharing crackdown subside

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Netflix on Thursday reported that its subscriber growth slowed dramatically during the summer, a sign the huge gains from the video-streaming service’s crackdown on freeloading viewers is tapering off.

The 5.1 million subscribers that Netflix added during the July-September period represented a 42% decline from the total gained during the same time last year. Even so, the company’s revenue and profit rose at a faster pace than analysts had projected, according to FactSet Research.

Netflix ended September with 282.7 million worldwide subscribers — far more than any other streaming service.

The Los Gatos, California, company earned $2.36 billion, or $5.40 per share, a 41% increase from the same time last year. Revenue climbed 15% from a year ago to $9.82 billion. Netflix management predicted the company’s revenue will rise at the same 15% year-over-year pace during the October-December period, slightly than better than analysts have been expecting.

The strong financial performance in the past quarter coupled with the upbeat forecast eclipsed any worries about slowing subscriber growth. Netflix’s stock price surged nearly 4% in extended trading after the numbers came out, building upon a more than 40% increase in the company’s shares so far this year.

The past quarter’s subscriber gains were the lowest posted in any three-month period since the beginning of last year. That drop-off indicates Netflix is shifting to a new phase after reaping the benefits from a ban on the once-rampant practice of sharing account passwords that enabled an estimated 100 million people watch its popular service without paying for it.

The crackdown, triggered by a rare loss of subscribers coming out of the pandemic in 2022, helped Netflix add 57 million subscribers from June 2022 through this June — an average of more than 7 million per quarter, while many of its industry rivals have been struggling as households curbed their discretionary spending.

Netflix’s gains also were propelled by a low-priced version of its service that included commercials for the first time in its history. The company still is only getting a small fraction of its revenue from the 2-year-old advertising push, but Netflix is intensifying its focus on that segment of its business to help boost its profits.

In a letter to shareholder, Netflix reiterated previous cautionary notes about its expansion into advertising, though the low-priced option including commercials has become its fastest growing segment.

“We have much more work to do improving our offering for advertisers, which will be a priority over the next few years,” Netflix management wrote in the letter.

As part of its evolution, Netflix has been increasingly supplementing its lineup of scripted TV series and movies with live programming, such as a Labor Day spectacle featuring renowned glutton Joey Chestnut setting a world record for gorging on hot dogs in a showdown with his longtime nemesis Takeru Kobayashi.

Netflix will be trying to attract more viewer during the current quarter with a Nov. 15 fight pitting former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson against Jake Paul, a YouTube sensation turned boxer, and two National Football League games on Christmas Day.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



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Promise tracker: What the Saskatchewan Party and NDP pledge to do if they win Oct. 28

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REGINA – Saskatchewan’s provincial election is on Oct. 28. Here’s a look at some of the campaign promises made by the two major parties:

Saskatchewan Party

— Continue withholding federal carbon levy payments to Ottawa on natural gas until the end of 2025.

— Reduce personal income tax rates over four years; a family of four would save $3,400.

— Double the Active Families Benefit to $300 per child per year and the benefit for children with disabilities to $400 a year.

— Direct all school divisions to ban “biological boys” from girls’ change rooms in schools.

— Increase the First-Time Homebuyers Tax Credit to $15,000 from $10,000.

— Reintroduce the Home Renovation Tax Credit, allowing homeowners to claim up to $4,000 in renovation costs on their income taxes; seniors could claim up to $5,000.

— Extend coverage for insulin pumps and diabetes supplies to seniors and young adults

— Provide a 50 per cent refundable tax credit — up to $10,000 — to help cover the cost of a first fertility treatment.

— Hire 100 new municipal officers and 70 more officers with the Saskatchewan Marshals Service.

— Amend legislation to provide police with more authority to address intoxication, vandalism and disturbances on public property.

— Platform cost of $1.2 billion, with deficits in the first three years and a small surplus in 2027.

NDP

— Pause the 15-cent-a-litre gas tax for six months, saving an average family about $350.

— Remove the provincial sales tax from children’s clothes and ready-to-eat grocery items like rotisserie chickens and granola bars.

— Pass legislation to limit how often and how much landlords can raise rent.

— Repeal the law that requires parental consent when children under 16 want to change their names or pronouns at school.

— Launch a provincewide school nutrition program.

— Build more schools and reduce classroom sizes.

— Hire 800 front-line health-care workers in areas most in need.

— Launch an accountability commission to investigate cost overruns for government projects.

— Scrap the marshals service.

— Hire 100 Mounties and expand detox services.

— Platform cost of $3.5 billion, with small deficits in the first three years and a small surplus in the fourth year.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct .17, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.



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Bad weather forecast for B.C. election day as record numbers vote in advance polls

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VANCOUVER – More than a million British Columbians have already cast their provincial election ballots, smashing the advance voting record ahead of what weather forecasters say will be a rain-drenched election day in much of B.C., with snow also predicted for the north.

Elections BC said Thursday that 1,001,331 people had cast ballots in six days of advance voting, easily breaking a record set during the pandemic election four years ago.

More than 28 per cent of all registered electors have voted, potentially putting the province on track for a big final turnout on Saturday.

“It reflects what I believe, which is this election is critically important for the future of our province,” New Democrat Leader David Eby said Thursday at a news conference in Vancouver. “I understand why British Columbians are out in numbers. We haven’t seen questions like this on the ballot in a generation.”

He said voters are faced with the choice of supporting his party’s plans to improve affordability, public health care and education, while the B.C. Conservatives, led by John Rustad, are proposing to cut services and are fielding candidates who support conspiracy theories about the COVID-19 pandemic and espouse racist views.

Rustad held no public availabilities on Thursday.

Elections BC said the record advance vote tally includes about 223,000 people who voted on the final day of advance voting Wednesday, the last day of advance polls, shattering the one-day record set on Tuesday by more than 40,000 votes.

The previous record for advance voting in a B.C. election was set in 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic, when about 670,000 people voted early, representing about 19 per cent of registered voters.

Some ridings have now seen turnout of more than 35 per cent, including in NDP Leader David Eby’s Vancouver-Point Grey riding where 36.5 per cent of all electors have voted.

There has also been big turnout in some Vancouver Island ridings, including Oak Bay-Gordon Head, where 39 per cent of electors have voted, and Victoria-Beacon Hill, where Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau is running, with 37.2 per cent.

Advance voter turnout in Rustad’s riding of Nechako Lakes was 30.5 per cent.

Total turnout in 2020 was 54 per cent, down from about 61 per cent in 2017.

Stewart Prest, a political science lecturer at the University of British Columbia, said many factors are at play in the advance voter turnout.

“If you have an early option, if you have an option where there are fewer crowds, fewer lineups that you have to deal with, then that’s going to be a much more desirable option,” said Prest.

“So, having the possibility of voting across multiple advanced voting days is something that more people are looking to as a way to avoid last-minute lineups or heavy weather.”

Voters along the south coast of British Columbia who have not cast their ballots yet will have to contend with heavy rain and high winds from an incoming atmospheric river weather system on election day.

Environment Canada said the weather system will bring prolonged heavy rain to Metro Vancouver, the Sunshine Coast, Fraser Valley, Howe Sound, Whistler and Vancouver Island starting Friday.

Eby said the forecast of an atmospheric weather storm on election day will become a “ballot question” for some voters who are concerned about the approaches the parties have towards addressing climate change.

But he said he is confident people will not let the storm deter them from voting.

“I know British Columbians are tough and they’re not going to let even an atmospheric river stop them from voting,” said Eby.

In northern B.C., heavy snow is in the forecast starting Friday and through to Saturday for areas along the Yukon boundary.

Elections BC said it will focus on ensuring it is prepared for bad weather, said Andrew Watson, senior director of communications.

“We’ve also been working with BC Hydro to make sure that they’re aware of all of our voting place locations so that they can respond quickly if there are any power outages,” he said.

Elections BC also has paper backups for all of its systems in case there is a power outage, forcing them to go through manual procedures, Watson said.

Prest said the dramatic downfall of the Official Opposition BC United Party just before the start of the campaign and voter frustration could also be contributing to the record size of the advance vote.

It’s too early to say if the province is experiencing a “renewed enthusiasm for voting,” he said.

“As a political scientist, I think it would be a good thing to see, but I’m not ready to conclude that’s what we are seeing just yet,” he said, adding, “this is one of the storylines to watch come Saturday.”

Overall turnout in B.C. elections has generally been dwindling compared with the 71.5 per cent turnout for the 1996 vote.

Adam Olsen, Green Party campaign chair, said the advance voting turnout indicates people are much more engaged in the campaign than they were in the weeks leading up to the start of the campaign in September.

“All we know so far is that people are excited to go out and vote early,” he said. “The real question will be does that voter turnout stay up throughout election night?”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version said more than 180,000 voters cast their votes on Wednesday.



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