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What drove these people to clown school? A need for joy in face of layoffs, cancer and anger.

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

In First Presbyterian Church of Englewood’s basement Sunday afternoon, five Coloradans dressed in wacky regalia and big, honkin’ shoes marched before their loved ones — and past a painting of the Last Supper — belting “Pomp and Circumstance” on kazoos.An audience of family, friends and plainclothes clowns squinting to recognize each other without white-painted faces cheered on as the five men, women and teens each leveled up from layperson to professional goofball.It was graduation day for the 2023 cohort of Colorado Clown Alley’s 10-week clown school. The newly-inducted jesters are now not only card-carrying members of a different variety of postsecondary institution, but rising masters of belly laughs, balloon animals and spreading joy in uncertain times.The clown class of 2023 tickled Clown Alley president Isabel Nuanez as there were multiple young members, she said, inspiring hope for a rebound in the clown industry.Whether people were compensating for the bleakness of the pande...

‘A special type of validation’: grassroots grant supports South Asian women creatives

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

Three local grassroots organizations have come together to support South Asian women and gender-diverse artists in their creative endeavours, with an eye toward creating a nurturing and encouraging ecosystem for them to thrive in.The Didihood Creative Fund was launched last year in collaboration with Tamil Women Rising and the South Asian and Tamil Women’s Collective.“We felt this fund was necessary because there aren’t too many funds available specifically for South Asian women in creative industries. So we really wanted to focus in on that niche,” says Didihood co-founder Nikki Gill.Manjula Selvarajah, co-founder of Tamil Women Rising, says they wanted to fill what they feel is a gap in support that needs to be addressed in the South Asian community.“If I can just even speak to the Tamil community as an example — most of the people in the community have been here, I would say about maybe three to four decades, fleeing war. We have a generation that cr...

14-year-old boy arrested in Mexico for murder of 8

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexican authorities have arrested a 14-year-old boy nicknamed “El Chapito” for the drug-related killing of eight people near Mexico City, the federal Public Safety Department said Thursday.The boy allegedly rode up on a motorcycle and opened fire on a family in the low-income Mexico City suburb of Chimalhuacan. Another man was also arrested in the Jan. 22 killings, and seven other members of the gang were arrested on drug charges. The victims were holding a party at their house at the time of the attack, which also left five adults and two children wounded. It was reportedly a birthday party.The boy’s name was not released, but his nickname — “Little Chapo” — is an apparent reference to imprisoned drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. The motive in the killings has not been made public, but drug gangs in Mexico frequently dabble in kidnapping and contract killing. They also kill rivals selling drugs on their territory, or people who who them money.Mexico is no stra...

NFL wants judge to send discrimination claims to arbitrator

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — NFL lawyers are urging a New York judge to change her mind and agree to let racial discrimination claims against the league and its teams go to arbitration rather than trial.In written arguments late Wednesday, the lawyers said Judge Valerie E. Caproni in Manhattan should reverse her recent decision finding that some claims by NFL Coach Brian Flores can go to trial.Flores, the new defense coordinator for the Minnesota Vikings, sued the league and three teams last year, saying the NFL was “rife with racism,” particularly in its hiring and promotion of Black coaches.Caproni ruled on March 1 that discrimination claims by two other Black coaches, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton, must go to arbitration. She let claims Flores made against the Miami Dolphins go to arbitration. Flores made some of his most sensational claims against the team that fired him early last year after he led the Dolphins to a 24-25 record over three years.Earlier this week, lawyers for the coaches asked...

Government finds discrimination at Canadian Human Rights Commission, union says

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

OTTAWA — A union representing public service lawyers says the government has found there was discrimination and systemic racism in an institution specifically designed to root it out.The Association of Justice Counsel said Thursday that the Canadian Human Rights Commission, whose mandate is to protect the core principle of equal opportunity, discriminated against Black and racialized employees.It said the Treasury Board Secretariat found the commission breached the “no discrimination” clause in its collective agreement, and has invited parties to engage in a mediation process to seek a meaningful resolution. The union is calling the March 6 decision an important win, and one that will have consequences across the federal public service.“Racism has absolutely no place in our institutions,” Justice Minister David Lametti said in a statement, adding that the information arising out of the grievance is “both concerning and disappointing, not least because o...

Report scrutinizes US efforts to rebuild post-quake Haiti

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The U.S. Agency for International Development built only half of eight major projects meant to help Haiti recover from a devastating 2010 earthquake, a federal audit report said Thursday.The U.S. Government Accountability Office also found that most of the agency’s projects were delayed, had to be scaled back or turned out to be more expensive than planned. The report is the newest one to scrutinize how billions of dollars were spent to help Haiti in the aftermath of the magnitude 7.0 earthquake that the Haitian government estimates killed some 300,000 people.USAID projects to rehabilitate rural roads, expand a power plant at an industrial park and build a $4.2 million port in northern Haiti were canceled. In addition, only about 900 out of 4,000 planned homes were built, given unanticipated high costs, the audit found.“Pursuing overly ambitious plans resulted in delays, cost increases, reduced scopes, canceled activities and a costly redesign,” the 93-p...

FACT FOCUS: Claims blame ‘woke’ policies on bank’s demise

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

As Wall Street reels from the swift demise of Silicon Valley Bank — the biggest American bank failure since the 2008 financial meltdown — some social media users are honing in on a single culprit: its socially aware, or “woke,” agenda. But the Santa Clara-based institution’s professed commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, wasn’t a driver of the bank’s collapse, say banking and financial experts. Its poor investment strategies and a customer base prone to make devastating bank runs were.Here’s a closer look at the facts.CLAIM: Silicon Valley Bank failed because it focused on “woke” policies such as diversity, equity and inclusion.THE FACTS: The nation’s 16th largest bank collapsed because of poor investment and risk strategies that left the bank with insufficient cash to weather a mass withdrawal of assets from its largely tech sector customers, who have been particularly hard hit in the current economy, financial and banking experts explain. There’s also no ev...

Hexo reports net loss of $11.1 million in second quarter, lower revenues

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

GATINEAU, Que. — Hexo Corp. reported a net loss of $11.1 million in its latest quarter, up from a year earlier, when it reported a loss of $690.3 million, which included $616 million in one-time impairment charges.The Gatineau, Que.-based cannabis company’s net revenues for the second quarter of the company’s financial year were $24.2 million, down 54 per cent from a year earlier and down 32 per cent from the previous quarter. Hexo attributed the year-over-year lower net revenues to decreased market share and performance in Ontario, Alberta and Quebec. It attributed the decline in net revenues from the previous quarter to a variety of factors including Quebec competitors cutting prices and some products being placed on hold because of pricing reductions in Ontario.President and CEO Charlie Bowman said while cannabis prices have dropped sharply across the market, it’s Hexo’s view that slashing prices isn’t a sustainable strategy. Chief financial officer ...

How a life-altering illness led a teen to wheelchair basketball stardom

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

Ibrahim Odza may only be 13-years-old, but he has left quite the mark on the wheelchair basketball scene. You can find him most days shooting hoops at Variety Village. His passion for basketball started a few years ago. Before that, his choice of sport was soccer. The pivot from soccer to basketball happened at the beginning of the pandemic when Ibrahim was visiting family in Macedonia. A year before that he was diagnosed with a cavernoma on his spine, a benign tumour.“We decided to take a trip to Europe for six months and then our trip got extended for over a year because we were stranded,” says Lindita Odza, Ibrahim’s mother. “Our flights were booked for March 13 to come back and see a follow up appointment, but COVID happened so we were stranded in Macedonia for a couple of extra months.” In September of 2020, while there, Ibrahim started having back pain and lost the ability to walk. An MRI revealed the cavernoma ruptured and Ibrahim underwent surgery in Macedonia...

Guards union says second pigeon with a backpack found in B.C. prison

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 12:00:20 GMT

VANCOUVER — A pigeon wearing a tiny empty backpack has been captured inside a federal prison in British Columbia, in what a union official says was likely another plan by inmates to smuggle drugs. The discovery at the Matsqui prison in the Fraser Valley comes just a few months after another pigeon was captured carrying a bird-size backpack full of crystal methamphetamine at the Pacific Institution right next door. John Randle, the Pacific regional president at the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers, says the latest pigeon’s pack was made of blue jeans and bedsheets, materials easily available to inmates. He says the pigeon was found inside the jail on Feb. 27, while the first bird was caught on the prison grounds. Randle says there’s an elementary school close by and pigeons smuggling drugs are a real concern, especially if it lands at the wrong place.After the backpack was removed, the bird was released, and police in Abbotsford say they’re investigating the ...