Good morning, Greater Sudbury! Here are a few stories to start your day on this Wednesday morning.
OPP: Missing snowmobiler's body recovered from Elbow Lake
After bringing in the Underwater Search and Rescue Unit, the Nipissing West OPP reported recovering a body from Elbow Lake near Estaire yesterday afternoon, which they confirmed to be that of missing snowmobiler Ronald Nantais, who has been missing since the early evening of Jan. 14. Nantais was last seen Jan. 14 departing on his snowmachine for the Elbow Lake area. On Tuesday, OPP said they located an area of open water on the lake and evidence of a snowmachine. "The OPP North East Emergency Response Team (ERT) along with OPP Aviation had been able to locate an area of open water on Elbow Lake with evidence of a snowmobile that had gone through the ice," OPP said this afternoon. The OPP Underwater Search and Rescue Unit was brought in Jan. 17 to search the area of the lake for Nantais.
Do more police mean lower crime rates? The connection is murky
Although Greater Sudburians want more police patrolling streets to improve community safety, evidence connecting these two ideas is actually murky. The number of sworn Greater Sudbury Police Service members grew by 33 during the past 20 years. GSPS counted 241 sworn members among their ranks in 2002, and they now total 274. But during that same period and despite the hiring of additional officers, the city’s overall crime rate did fluctuate somewhat, of course, but in essence has remained generally unchanged. The number of criminal violations reported annually in Greater Sudbury averaged 10,175 between 2001-21 (Statistics Canada data does not yet include 2022). Although there has been a range of violations totals, from 7,751 in 2015 to 10,960 in 2001, the annual tally has fluctuated around the average and does not reveal a clearly defined trend in either direction. In 2021, there were 9,718 violations reported in Greater Sudbury.
Warning issued over spike in drug overdoses in Sudbury
Another warning has been issued about the possibility of unexpected dangerous substances in the street drugs in Sudbury. The Community Drug Strategy which is made up of several local agencies including Public Health Sudbury and District (PHSD), has issued a warning that there has been an increase in the number of overdoses among users of street drugs. This has happened several times previously in the past few years. "While we cannot confirm the substance(s) causing the overdoses, this situation serves as an important reminder to the community that street drugs may be cut or mixed with substances such as benzos (benzodiazepines), fentanyl, or carfentanil. Front-line workers warn that more toxic substances may be circulating locally," said a statement from the drug strategy group. The warning continued that an overdose can occur when a person uses a substance and their body is unable to handle the effects.
Not everyone is in favour of private surgery clinics in Ontario
Ontario's new plan to reduce the hospital surgery backlog by allowing surgeries to take place in private clinics is not the best solution to the problem according to some agencies involved in health care. Ford's announcement on Monday is that Ontario will permit private clinics to perform routine procedures such as cataract surgeries and hip and knee replacements in a bid to take pressure off the hospitals where more urgent and complex surgeries can be done. Both he and Health Minister Sylvia Jones pledged this will not mean “credit card” health care. Ford and Jones said all procedures will be covered by OHIP. The Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario (RNAO) called the plan short-sighted. The RNAO, which represents more than 50,000 nurses, nurse practitioners and nursing students in Ontario, questions the ability of private clinics to deal with the provincial nursing shortage. "How can increasing capacity in other centres not impact on the already stretched health human resources and not deplete hospital, long-term care, and community services of their nurses? Staff have to come from somewhere," said a news release from RNAO political action executive network officer Maria Casas of Sudbury.
Closing the gap the focus of minister’s tour of local reserves
Crown-Indigenous relations minister, Marc Miller, has been touring First Nation communities in Northern Ontario this week. He told Sudbury.com on Jan. 17 the tour was a chance to hear first hand the challenges and achievements of each community he visited, including making stops in Wahnapitae First Nation and M’Chigeeng First Nation on Manitoulin Island to meet United Chiefs and Council of Mnidoo Mnising. Miller said that while there are always unique issues in Northern Ontario, the challenges aren’t dissimilar to threats facing all the First Nations and communities in Canada, such as cost of living inflation, mental health and addictions crises as well as the housing and infrastructure gaps that exist across Canada. “If you compare a non-Indigenous community to an Indigenous community, the gaps are clear,” he said. “Chief and council community members often want to talk about housing, infrastructure, and work that needs to be done by the federal government.” Miller added that while work to this end has been completed, it will take time.
Pursuit: Sudbury’s Carley Olivier laces up for Team Canada
Thank goodness for social media. While I understand that there are two sides to the discussion of the benefits that come from the ultra-rapid distribution of information that is provided courtesy of Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and other avenues, there are clearly times where it is extremely helpful, given my role. There is an obvious and clear-cut challenge to scrolling through each and every roster of Canadian teams competing at the 2023 FISU Winter Games in Lake Placid, hoping to stumble across the random Sudburians in action. With that in mind, I was thankful to be tipped off that Sudbury Lady Wolves’ product Carley Olivier had been named to the women’s hockey team. “I had heard about the games at the end of last year and about being put on the long list, of course,” said Olivier, the Waterloo Warriors' blueliner who was reached in Potsdam, New York, last week, site of the Team Canada round robin games. “The process then sees the list get narrower and narrower until the final roster is made. That was announced in December and that was obviously super exciting.”
Snow, freezing drizzlef, flurries in today’s forecast
Expect a high of -2 today under cloudy skies. Periods of snow will end in the morning, but a 30-per-cent chance of flurries will continue. There is risk of freezing drizzle early in the morning. The wind will be northerly at 20 km/h gusting to 40, so a wind chill of -10 is expected for much of the day. Tonight, expect cloudy periods and a low of -9.
