Happy Canada Day, Greater Sudbury! Here are a few stories to start your day on this July 1 morning.
Plan your Canada Day here
The Sudbury Multicultural and Folk Arts Association and Science North are partnering on this year’s Canada Day festivities. Event to be held on the grounds of Science North 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. July 1.
Variety show featuring local talents on the main stage, vendors, activities and fireworks. Multicultural association says its Canada Day food fair will be held on the grounds of Science North this year instead of at the Sudbury Arena. Check out the full list of activities here.
Also, folks in the Blezard Valley area can head to their local celebration at the Sen. Rheal Belisle Cultural Centre from 2 - 10:30 p.m. July 1.
Enjoy vendors, inflatables, games such as horseshoe and beanbag toss, free hotdogs and cupcakes, a family movie on the big screen and fireworks. Event will be held the next day in case of rain. In Capreol, Canada Day celebrations take place at the Northern Ontario Railroad Museum.
Admission is free and the day will begin with the museum’s opening at 10 a.m., with the official Canada Day program starting at 11:30 a.m. Live entertainment from 12 to 4 p.m. will feature Rodéo (Rodney Meilleur/ Leo Duquette) and with Scott Mitchell hitting the stage from 5 to 9 p.m.
The day will include a photo booth by Fun Cube, snacks by Cotton Candy Man, family activities as well as a barbecue, beer garden and fireworks display at the Capreol Waterfront on Lakeshore St. You can find more information about the event on the Railroad Museum’s Facebook page, found here.
Possible sanctions against Coun. Vagnini deferred to August
A report calling for sanctions against Ward 2 Coun. Michael Vagnini has been deferred until Aug. 9 due to new information coming forward to city integrity commissioner Robert Swayze. City council was originally poised to vote on Swayze’s recommendation during Tuesday night’s city council meeting, which might have seen Vagnini penalized 40 days’ pay for what was described in the report as “vulgar and disrespectful” behaviour. This included three complaints, of which one was dismissed. The dismissed complaint centred around Ward 11 Coun. Bill Leduc’s claim Vagnini threatened his life, which Vagnini denied and which North Bay Police Service determined there were “insufficient grounds” to proceed with charges on.
YES Theatre’s $2.7M Refettorio ‘dream’ coming true
Thanks to $2.7 million in funding from a number of different sources, a dream is coming true for YES Theatre. Shovels are expected to go in the ground next month for the Refettorio, an 180-seat theatre being built in the vacant lot next to the former Roy’s Furniture store on Durham Street. The space will be used as a key venue for the YES Theatre Summer Festival. YES Theatre founder Alessandro Costantini said the construction phase of the project is scheduled to finish by October, and there will be a soft opening of the space in the fall, with a major opening planned next spring. “I am very, very thrilled to be standing here,” he said. “It's quite an emotional day after this little dream became a reality.”
Maple Leaf legend and Sudburian Jim Pappin dies at 82
Jim Pappin, the former NHL forward credited with the Toronto Maple Leafs’ last Stanley Cup-winning goal, has died. He was 82. Pappin was born in Copper Cliff on Sept. 10, 1939. After spending two seasons (1958-1960) with the Toronto Marlboros in the Ontario Hockey League, he joined the Sudbury Wolves, lacing up with the team for the 1959–1960 season, although he joined the club in the middle of the season. He turned pro in 1960 when he was signed by the Rochester Americans of the American Hockey League. The Maple Leafs and Chicago Blackhawks announced the death Wednesday on social media. “We are deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Jim Pappin," the Maple Leafs said. "Jim played five seasons in Toronto, winning the Stanley Cup in 1964 & ’67. Named one of the 100 Greatest Leafs, he scored the Cup-winning goal and led the team in scoring in ’67. Our thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Canada and Italy square off at Top Glove on July 7
Head to Top Glove Boxing Academy on July 7 to see some of Sudbury's best young fighters square off against fighters who have travelled all the way from Italy to see who will come out on top. “We have a select team from Italy coming here and they're going to be boxing against the select team from Canada,” Gord Apolloni, owner of Top Glove Boxing Academy and head organizer for the event, told Sudbury.com in an interview. There are a total of five boxers who are provincially ranked in Ontario that will represent Canada for the occasion – including two national champions Hunter Lee from Windsor and Top Glove’s very own Owen Paquette. They’ll be pitted against five select boxers from Riccione, Italy. Apolloni is expecting the fights to be challenging for both sides, but this isn’t the first challenging international fight. “This is not the first event that we've had,” Apolloni said. “They (Italian boxing athletes) were here in 2018 and they were very challenging.”
Read the full story on the Sudbury.com homepage.
Sexual assaults jumped 25.1% last year, while overall crime down
Offering a mixed bag of a report, Greater Sudbury Police Service reported this week that overall criminal offences were down 3.4 per cent last year, but violent crime jumped by 12.6 per cent. Sexual assaults, however, jumped by more than 25 per cent. Chief Paul Pedersen walked the police board through these latest statistics during Wednesday’s meeting, which highlighted changes between 2020 and 2021 crime statistic totals. Total calls for service were down slightly year over year, from 58,815 to 57,874, of which approximately 17 per cent were criminal in nature. The 9,675 criminal offences reported last year marks Greater Sudbury’s lowest figure since 9,410 cases were reported in 2017. There’s no cut and dried explanation for these numbers, Pedersen told the board, offering a number of possible explanations for the the spike in sexual assaults and offences.
Muggy, cloudy Canada Day in store
Expect a high of 25 under mainly cloudy skies for your Canada Day holiday. There is a 40-per-cent chance of showers in the morning. The wind will be out of the southwest at 20 km/h, gusting to 40 early in the afternoon. The humidex today is 27, while the UV index is six, or high. Tonight, the skies will clear and the temperature will drop to 12.
