Latest news with #Caledonia
CTV News
2 days ago
- General
- CTV News
Police still trying to identify human remains found in Caledonia fire
Human remains found during a house fire in Caledonia almost a month ago still haven't been identified. Emergency services were originally called to Kinross Street on May 11 at around 3:32 a.m. When firefighters arrived, the home was already fully enveloped in flames. After crews put out the fire they found human remains inside. Investigators have not yet been able to determine who they belong to. The Haldimand County detachment of Ontario Provincial Police, the Office of the Fire Marshal, Office of the Chief Coroner and the Ontario Forensic Pathology Service continue to investigate. The fire is not considered suspicious and no foul play is suspected.
The Courier
2 days ago
- The Courier
Forfar Gables sale on the cards as council snubs vandalism bill FOI query
The possible sale of the vandal-hit Gables centre in Forfar is back on the agenda. The centre for adults with learning disabilities has lain empty since its residents were moved to Forfar's former Beech Hill House care home in 2023. Since then, the Arbroath Road property has become a magnet for vandals. A fire there in February was the latest in a series of incidents. Next week, a confidential report on possible disposal of The Gables will go before councillors. It could see affordable housing plans for the site rejuvenated. The move comes as Angus Council has snubbed questions around how much has been spent there since the shutters went up. Plans for an affordable housing transformation were first drawn up in 2018. And in 2020, councillors approved the transfer of the land to Caledonia Housing Association. But the £3.5 million project didn't materialise due to soaring costs. It was scrapped in 2022. The council recently confirmed the land transfer never went ahead. In April, the housing association said it remained in talks with Angus Council. A spokesperson for Caledonia said: 'We are aware that a report relating to The Gables site in Forfar is due to be considered by Angus Council's policy committee next week. 'We are not yet privy to the detail of the report or its recommendations.' Despite the empty centre being directly next door to Forfar fire station, brazen youths have repeatedly broken in. Images following the fire in February revealed the shocking state inside the building. It included widespread damage to the main lounge and kitchen, graffiti, and burnt furniture. Through Freedom of Information (FOI), The Courier sought answers to several questions relating to the building. These included the number of incidents of unauthorised entry or vandalism, and how often Police Scotland and Scottish Fire and Rescue had been involved. The amount spent on repairs and security measures was also requested. A response – due within 20 working days of the April 8 request – is yet to be received. The council has also failed to respond to follow-up emails seeking an update on the FOI request's progress.
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
New York State invests $120M to modernize fish hatcheries
ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) — A big investment is reeling in major improvements for New York State's fish hatcheries. The Department of Environmental Conservation is announcing a $120 million investment to modernize freshwater fish hatcheries across the state. The announcement took place at the historic Caledonia Fish Hatchery, the oldest in the Western hemisphere, just in time to kick off the annual Caledonia Trout Festival this weekend. The funding marks the start of a three-phase project to upgrade 12 hatcheries statewide, ensuring the continued success of fish stocking and conservation programs. And as it happens, Friday, the New York State Senate confirmed the first openly gay DEC commissioner Amanda Lefton. We heard from her today on the investment. 'So our hatcheries systems in NYS really stock over 1,000 water bodies all across New York,' Lefton said. 'So, we have anglers that go out and catch fish. And they might not even know that we helped raise those fish and these stocking efforts are really so helpful to help with restoration efforts but for the angling communities. And what's so neat about Caledonia is the history, a lot of people grew up going to this hatchery.' These hatcheries support a recreational fishing industry that already contributes $5 billion annually to New York's economy. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
12-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Contact 6 helps consumers save $62,000 in April 2025
The Brief Contact 6 helped a Caledonia man get a refund for a snowblower after he says it stopped working after the first winter. A Grafton man credits Contact 6 with helping him get five fraudulent overseas charges dropped from his credit card. A Menomonee Falls man says Contact 6 helped him get a medical bill waived after a billing mistake. It was his second resolution through Contact 6. CALEDONIA, Wis. - Frustrated with customer service, three men decided they'd had enough. Their problems were different, but they all found relief with Contact 6's help. What we know After more than two years and dozens of bad batteries, Michael Hickman gave up on this snowblower. He says the snowblower stopped working after one season. The company responded by sending him new batteries repeatedly. "When those batteries came. none of them worked," said Hickman. FREE DOWNLOAD: Get breaking news alerts in the FOX LOCAL Mobile app for iOS or Android The Caledonia man says the company sent him a total of 32 batteries. The snowblower uses four. He was also sent new charging stations and two replacement snowblowers. "Destroy the snowblower," Hickman recalled the company telling him. Hickman sent the company a video of him destroying its products with a sledgehammer. Hickman says the third time he was asked to dismantle the snowblower, his fiancé had a suggestion. "Why don't you actually Contact 6?" recalled Hickman. "I said, 'You're right. I am.'" Hickman says the company went from offering in-store credit only to sending him a full refund. "You guys are worth getting in contact with," said Hickman. "You guys get this job done." By the numbers Hickman's refund of $1,048 is among the 15 cases that consumer say Contact 6 helped to resolve in April. Working behind the scenes, Contact 6's associate producer, Annette, helped FOX6 viewers save $62,006.15. What we know Among those resolutions was Ken Spitz's case. The Grafton man wrote to Contact 6 after discovering four fraudulent overseas charges to his credit card. "I was being transferred to different departments and I wasn't getting the answers that I wanted," recalled Spitz. SIGN UP TODAY: Get daily headlines, breaking news emails from FOX6 News Contact 6 wrote to Spitz's bank and the charges amounting to $3,997.46 were dropped. "It gave me some relief," said Spitz. "I was very pleased by the outcome." What we know Bruce Buenning of Menomonee Falls also found relief through Contact 6 after getting a $907 renal ultrasound bill. Buenning says his insurance had no record of the procedure. Buenning says he called customer service repeatedly, but the bill was resent. "It was getting really frustrating especially when they said they were going to collections on me," said Buenning. Contact 6 reached out to the hospital system on his behalf. The bill was written off. "They called me and said they had processed the claim incorrectly," said Buenning. "This was a great relief off my mind." It was Buenning's second resolution with the assistance of Contact 6. What you can do To find out if Contact 6 can help you with a consumer problem, simply file a complaint. The Source Information for this report comes from interviews and documentation provided by Michael Hickman, Ken Spitz and Bruce Buenning. Additional information was submitted by consumers and businesses to the Contact 6 case files.
Telegraph
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Telegraph
Reform is about to smash the myth of a ‘progressive' Scotland
As is the fashion these days, journalists, politicians and commentators are getting their tartan troos in a twist over the most recent polling for next year's Holyrood elections. Given Reform's narrative-changing performance at last week's local elections in England, it probably shouldn't be much of a surprise that Nigel Farage's party has enjoyed a post-poll bounce even in Scotland, where, we are regularly informed, your average voter is so progressive that he is permanently on the cusp of canonisation. Yet being more virtuous than our English neighbours has not prevented a Caledonian surge for Reform here too. A Survation poll has produced a snapshot of party support north of the border that suggests Reform could form the official opposition to the SNP government from next May. The usual caveats apply: not a prediction, things could change, margin of error, etc. This will annoy a lot of people and frighten many more. Not so much because they see in Reform's advance a repeat of German history in the 1930s – Scottish education has suffered under the SNP but it hasn't quite deteriorated that much yet – but because it looks likely that Scotland is about to endure another political earthquake that will reconfigure the political landscape. Again. Ten years ago today, Scotland woke up to the new political reality that Scottish Labour's reliable fiefdom was no more: all but one of its MPs had been removed from office in a crushing defeat by the nationalists at the UK general election. In the years that followed, the party made heroic efforts to recover, helped by the SNP's own unforced errors. Last year, most of those seats were recaptured by a new generation of Labour MPs. But discontent with Keir Starmer's administration has been widespread and Scotland has not reverted to the way it was in the '70s through to the noughties, when voters would reliably vote Labour whatever the national UK mood. A friendly and sensible Labour MP pointed out to me recently that the threat to UK Labour from Reform is similar to the threat the SNP poses to Scottish Labour: voters in large parts of the country would be unlikely to countenance voting Tory, however unhappy they might be at Labour. But when an electorally viable alternative arrives on the scene… well, all bets are off. And it is Scottish Labour and its leader at Holyrood, Anas Sarwar, who will feel most worried by the latest poll. When Humza Yousaf, the SNP's Liz Truss tribute act, was first minister, Sarwar enjoyed the unusual experience of being the most likely person to succeed him in Bute House, the official residence of the head of government in Scotland. But Yousaf's replacement by the dull, reliable and 'nice' John Swinney has steadied the SNP ship and the party has been leading in every poll since then. The prospect of being replaced by Reform as the main opposition in even a single poll is exactly the kind of blow to personal and party morale that Sarwar could do without. Starmer repeatedly insisted, before last year's general election, that his path to Downing Street ran through Scotland. He was right. But if he's still right, that could mean the path to Downing Street is being paved for the benefit of a rather different political leader. Does this poll mean that Scots are suddenly dangerously Right wing – or even 'far Right' as Swinney has often warned – and are emulating their southern compatriots' alleged intolerance of high levels of immigration? Put it this way: the only time I had a voter tell me that 'Enoch was right' was not in a housing estate in London, Birmingham or Leicester; it was in Glasgow. From a Labour voter. The fact that for, decades, Scots generally voted for parties perceived as Left-wing, progressive and tolerant, effectively hid the frustration felt across many areas of Scotland, particularly in the sprawling housing estates where Labour used to trawl for support. The resentment against the influx of asylum seekers, sent northwards by the Home Office to Labour-run Glasgow, the only Scottish local authority that had agreed to be part of the asylum dispersal scheme, was real and it was loud. And political parties ignored it. It has been pointed out often but it's worth reiterating: it is the poorest communities, the ones with the fewest employment opportunities, the lowest quality of housing and schools, the fewest community facilities, that are more likely to resent new arrivals, especially if they arrive in large numbers. This is true across the whole of the UK, and Scotland is not exempt. But our politicians chose not to acknowledge this, at least publicly. The myth of the welcoming, progressive Scot who is only too happy to hold placards declaring 'refugees welcome here' was propagated and repeated, however little attention was paid to the fact that a lot of those placard wavers headed home afterwards to their comfortable, middle class homes and their comfortable middle class jobs, separated from the affected communities by a comfortable middle class distance. And suddenly in Scotland it's no longer socially unacceptable – or at least, not as socially unacceptable – to admit to being a Reform voter, especially if the central aim of placing that cross on the ballot paper is not to object to immigration, but to protest at the complacency of the establishment. I know at least two members of my former local Labour Party who intend to exercise their frustration at their party by doing exactly that. Scottish Labour thought the nightmare of 2015 was over. It may be about to be repeated.
