For the Record: RCMP searching for driver in hit-and-run

By Medicine Hat News on June 16, 2021.

RCMP in Gleichen are looking for the driver in a hit-and-run accident that injured a teenager on the weekend. Mounties say the teen is in hospital with non-life-threatening injuries after they were struck near a house on the Siksika First Nation in the early morning of June 13.

The vehicle fled before police and ambulance arrived. Authorities are asking anyone with information to contact the detachment at 403-734-3923.

Input sought on property rights bill

A special committee of the Legislature is studying a proposed property rights bill and is now asking for public submissions until Aug. 15.

Bill 206 asks for amendments to the property rights statues, and the committee is considering whether legal remedies are adequate when land is expropriated and whether the standing of personal property rights should be expanded.

The bill was originally introduced by Cypress-Medicine Hat MLA Drew Barnes, but he shortly stepped back to avoid the inference of conflict of interest. Sponsorship of the bill was then taken up by Brooks-Medicine Hat MLA Michaela Glasgo.

Select Special Committee on Real Property Rights will make its report available in December.

Hat hot

The worst of a heatwave that blanketed southern Alberta on Monday was particularly focused on the Highway 3 corridor.

With temperatures touching or climbing above 36C throughout much of the wider region, three stations were noted as hotspots in Canada through the afternoon.

That included Medicine Hat (37.3C at the airport at 4 p.m.), Barnwell (36.9C at 5 p.m.), and Grassy Lake (37.7C at 6 p.m.). Medicine Hat was again the hotspot in the nation Tuesday morning, with the mercury reaching 33.1C at 10 a.m., while the cold spot at the time was Pingualuit National Park in northern Quebec as minus-1.3C.

Generally cooler temperatures in Alberta are forecast for the remainder of the week.

Union drive at Wellington

Workers at the Wellington Retirement Residence have voted “overwhelmingly to join the United Steelworkers following a unionization drive at the Medicine Hat seniors’ facility first reported by the News this spring.

The facility includes 100 independent and 93 supportive living suites, and the new bargaining unit comprises 80 employees.

“The pandemic has certainly put a focus on the difficult working conditions that health-care workers face every day on the job,” said Stephen Hunt, USW western Canadian director.

“These workers know their work does not stop being essential when the pandemic ends and we will fight hard for them because we believe they are essential every day.”

Specific tallies of the secret ballot vote were not provided. The USW represents 50,000 health-care workers in the prairie provinces and British Columbia, according to a release.