The Gazette is jumping the gun on Evenko and announcing that there will be no Osheaga festival this summer.
Updates from April, 2021 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
City council agreed to strengthen the police hate crimes unit, which currently has five people in it.
Ephraim
The five are likely completely over-run with just trying to investigate the hate crimes within the force.
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Kate
Ensemble punted Hadrien Parizeau out in 2018 when he agreed to collaborate with Projet on some matters, but Denis Coderre has gathered the independent Ahuntsic-Cartierville councillor back into the fold. Coderre also presented a candidate to the mayoralty of Hochelaga-Maisonneuve on Wednesday.
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Kate
The mayor of Anjou borough isn’t going to be happy with the city’s decision to maintain the Golf Métropolitain Anjou as a green space. Luis Miranda had wanted the area for an industrial installation.
qatzelok
While Luis Miranda might be able to get a few humans to agree with him, NO OTHER SPECIES wants another parking lot with a metal shed on it.
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Kate
A new history festival will launch next month.
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Kate
People 45 and up have been lining up to get the AstraZeneca vaccination, and snow is falling.
Kevin
I made an appointment. A bit confusing since the first page on clic sante had a bunch of postings for 45+, but when you clicked through, some still had minimum age requirements of 55 or 60, or listed minimum ages of 45 and 55.
Meezly
I made an appointment too, but I think I’m severely limited with what’s available in my area because the earliest booking I could find was August 1!!! Aren’t we all supposed to be vaxxed by July? So this date does not make any sense. So I may have to go line up at Palais de Congres at some point.
Joey
@Meezly make sure that you choose a location that has the 45+ badge on it. The Clic Sante UI is atrocious. I know of at least five people who had the exact same problem – they clicked on the first Palais des Congres button not knowing that was for Pfizer/Moderna, unavailable to 45+, and that they were supposed to scroll down (past tons of “unavailable” sites) to find one with the 45+ badge. Currently there are a couple of slots at the Bill Durnan Arena tomorrow and Monday (three total) and at a handful of pharmacies.
Meezly
Thanks @Joey. I had booked for myself and my partner for August 1. My partner received an email update 15 min. ago that his appointment has been changed to April 22, which is tomorrow! I haven’t received an update yet, but maybe because I’m younger, and the pharmacy is trying to prioritize according to year of birth. So it seems that I will get bumped up to a more reasonable date soon… I hope!
Joey
@Meezly might be worth calling the pharmacy…
GC
That’s interesting, Meezly. Maybe there were cancellations? Or there was a bit of a glitch in the update they did to the website last night?
Meezly
For those interested, my appointment did get changed to April 22 about 15 min later and I was informed both by email and SMS (which I selected as a notification).
Maybe the CliqSante website will make it more transparent later, but for now, if you see a appointment date for August, just make an appointment for whatever date is provided, as that later date seems to be a temporary placeholder. The pharmacy will then revise your appointment to a closer date.
Meezly
A coworker of mine also reported showed up this morning at the Olympic Stadium (free parking on site!) around 10h30 this morning. There was no line at all. It seems the rush from this morning ended just before he arrived.
Bill Binns
I’m going to wait until this can be done in a Pharmaprix in 10 minutes on a Saturday morning.
Veronik
My coworker and I were able to make appointments at the Bill Durnan area this morning – today’s date was the only one available so we scheduled our first shot after work. All told, it took 30 minutes, including 15 minutes after the vaccine in case of side effects.
Kevin
I was a bit longer, but walked out at 7:25 pm from a 6:40 appt
Get the first vaccine you can.
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Kate
Équipe Spectra has announced it’s moving the jazz festival and the Francos to September this year, presumably hoping the pandemic will have subsided enough to hold crowded live shows again.
Josh
The CFL also announced today that it plans a mid-August opening for its season. And they count on gate money to be sustainable, so they don’t plan any games in fully-empty stadiums like most of the other sports leagues have done.
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Kate
In some cases, landlords are bullying tenants out by starting renovations that make the building uninhabitable.
In some cases residential buildings are being left to stand empty while the owner tries to find financing for renovations. Some of these belong to the SHDM.
Ephraim
The first article is based on the episode of La Facture https://ici.radio-canada.ca/tele/la-facture/site/episodes/527447/renoviction-logement-federation-inventeurs-cellulaire-credit-voyage-covid
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Kate
Jonathan Montpetit explains here the relationship between the notwithstanding clause and Bill 21. It isn’t a dry exercise but has consequences for how Quebec will be, especially in the pre‑emptive manner in which it has been used.
Update: Montpetit continues the theme with an examination of the CAQ intention to use the notwithstanding clause to extend French language laws – and basically do what it likes.
GC
“As Blanchard explains, it doesn’t matter what rights are overridden by the clause; all that matters is that proper procedure is followed when invoking it, which Quebec did.”
I’m sure that’s true from a legal perspective, but it’s still a chilling statement. I should matter a great deal when rights are overridden.
Kate
The CAQ is fond of writing complicated laws that do a number on normal rights. Here’s a post from last year where I point to an analysis of an earlier CAQ bill. They like to write meta-stuff in making it difficult or impossible to challenge the law, pretty much daring the court system to draw a line. It’s a nasty way to govern.
Kevin
Every single invocation of the notwithstanding clause is an admission that rights are being violated. That’s why it has a five-year term limit.
GC
I understand that, Kevin, but it’s still disturbing.
Joey
The five-year limit also ensures that cynical, divisive political parties get to benefit from the surfacing of wedge issues designed to motivate xenophobic citizens to get out and vote on a cyclical basis.
Kevin
@GC
It’s telling that of all the laws invoking the clause in the rest of the country, in almost every case, the law was ultimately dropped or courts decided the clause was not needed.Meezly
Blanchard said that Quebec properly invoked the procedure, but later says that it was invoked preemptively to prevent the court from blocking it if it violates human rights. So in effect, he exposed the loopholes of what the notwithstanding clause permits.
Daniel D 10:11 on 2021-04-22 Permalink
I got a what I assume was a “dark advert” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_advertising) the other day browsing a site completely unrelated to anything Montreal.
It stated in bold caps “LA DECISION DE VALERIE PLANTE: OSHEAGA, C’EST FINI”. Above it a photo of festival-goers having fun, below it a photo of Valerie Plante with her arms folded.
I don’t know who’s behind these adverts, but if I’m seeing them I’ll bet lots of other people are, and although based on misinformation I don’t see how some people won’t be swayed by them.
It’s going to be a depressing election cycle…
Kate 10:15 on 2021-04-22 Permalink
It is.
steph 13:33 on 2021-04-22 Permalink
Valerie took away my ice cream, cancelled summer and made it snow. She’s a mean mean meanie.
dhomas 15:35 on 2021-04-22 Permalink
I heard Terry DiMonte declare on the radio that “summer was cancelled” because the Grand Prix won’t be coming to Montreal this year. I turned off the radio because I was driving my kids to school and they asked me “why did that man say summer is cancelled?”, so I couldn’t hear what he said next. But I know that he often points the finger at the mayor for other things (“why are bike paths cleared of snow before sidewalks, Mme mayor?” kind of stuff). He is one of the reasons I now avoid listening to CHOM in the morning. It’s just tiring to listen to.
qatzelok 20:20 on 2021-04-22 Permalink
By cancelling Osheaga, Valerie Plante has basically thrown away the drunk-teens-from-Ottawa vote.