Latest news with #HEAL
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Climate
- Yahoo
Austin's HEAL Initiative focused on high risk homeless camps during severe weather season
AUSTIN (KXAN) — This week's forecast has included the risk of tornadoes, hail, flash flooding, and damaging winds. For people living outside and without easy shelter options, that type of weather presents unique challenges. 'Last night's storm was another reminder of why the preparation is important. Especially when you have severe wind, rain, hail and tornado warnings happening in the middle of the night,' Austin's Homeless Strategy Officer David Gray said. How does the city of Austin decide which homeless encampments to clear? That's why Gray said the city is tailoring its HEAL Initiative efforts toward areas that may be most impacted by severe weather right now. 'We've been looking at sites in wooded areas both to prevent wildfires but also to make sure that people are not injured from lightning strikes, falling trees, wind, tornados and floods,' Gray said. The HEAL Initiative is Austin's program that moves people from high-risk homeless encampments to a bridge shelter, where people get a temporary place to stay until something more permanent opens up. HEAL stands for Housing-Focused Encampment Assistance Link. 'A lot of our recent HEAL initiatives have focused on creek beds for this specific reason. We know that we're entering severe weather season and it's really important that we get people out of those creek beds and out of those low lying areas, so if we do have a flash flood, heaven forbid, we've minimized the chance for people to get injured in those weather events,' Gray said. Austin-led HEAL initiative closes four encampments If it's left you wondering — well, there's an encampment near my house. Why hasn't the city cleared that one? The city can only move people to shelter if one is available. When that space opens up, the city has a ranking system for which camp it targets next. 'Priority rankings are based off of things like the people who are at the sites, so if there is evidence of children or pregnant women or seniors. We also look at factors like, have there been fires at sites recently, what's its proximity to residential areas,' Gray said. Read more about that process here. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Scroll.in
20-05-2025
- Scroll.in
How a wide net of efforts to end ritualistic hunting in India is seeing results
In 2016, a day before World Environment Day on June 5, Kolkata-based conservationist Meghna Banerjee received a distressing phone call about a huge gathering of hunters at the Panskura railway station in East Medinipur district, a bustling stop along the Howrah-Kharagpur railway line in West Bengal. Banerjee, a birdwatcher, was involved in rescuing animals and also engaged in anti-poaching activities. 'Initially, I did not take the call seriously, but my friend, Suvrajyoti Chatterjee, insisted that we go and investigate,' Banerjee said. 'We were shocked to find at least 5,000 hunters at the railway station with multiple sacks, each containing over 50 carcasses of monitor lizards. We saw around 2,000 live animals and carcasses lying on the platform. Some people were skinning the animals and were preparing to cook them on the open platform, in full view of the railway staff and the Railway Protection Force.' This particular hunt was part of the Phalaharini Kali Pujo festival, a Hindu festival primarily celebrated among Bengali communities. This event was the trigger for Banerjee and Chatterjee to start Human and Environment Alliance League – HEAL – in 2017, a non-profit that aims to curb rampant exploitation of wildlife and empower locals to protect their environments. The cluster of hunting festivals known as 'Shikar Utsav' start from January and continue till June. The hunting mainly coincides with the full moon. 'While tribes such as Santhal, Lodha, Sabar, Oraons etc. would mainly engage in these hunts as per their rituals, many non-tribal people would also join just for 'furti' or fun,' Banerjee told Mongabay India. 'There would be around 50 big and small hunting festivals in the year and some of the bigger ones would see gatherings of 10,000 to 15,000 hunters.' In 2018, Banerjee, a lawyer, filed a public interest litigation seeking a ban on the hunting that takes place during the Phalaharini Kali Pujo festival. In May 2018, the Calcutta High Court passed an interim order directing the forest department, the police and the railway authorities to work together to stop the hunting during this festival. Howrah-based animal rescuer Chitrak Pramanik said that till 2017, around 5,000 animals used to be slaughtered during the Phalaharini Kali Pujo in Howrah ranging from civets, fishing cats, monitor lizards, mongoose, squirrels, birds etc. 'After the court order, there has been a drastic reduction in hunting,' Pramanik added. 'In the last three years, there have been zero hunts in Howrah and East Medinipur. Now, all agencies including the forest department, police, railways and NGOs remain vigilant, and the hunters are mostly stopped and sent back from the Kolaghat bridge itself.' Things however were different in the tribal dense Jungle Mahal districts such as Purulia, Bankura, Jhargram and West Medinipur. In 2018, when an adult male tiger strayed into Lalgarh in the Jhargram district during the Pakhibandh hunting festival, it was allegedly killed by a spear after it mauled two members from a hunting party. This led to widespread outrage and HEAL filed another PIL, which led the Calcutta High Court to pass an embargo in 2019 on all hunting festivals in the state. A traditional community is granted rights over wildlife and forest resources under Schedule 3 (1) of the Scheduled Tribes and other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 also known as the Forest Rights Act (FRA). The Forest Rights Act, however, specifically restricts hunting, trapping or extracting a part of the body of wild animals. 'With tribal communities having a long-standing relationship with the forest ecosystem and wildlife, often the forest department has to take a multi-pronged approach of awareness and enforcement to tackle these issues,' said Singaram Kulandaivel, Chief Conservator of Forest, Central Circle, an area where ritualistic hunts used to be common. 'If one travels 70-80 kilometres from Kolkata, an entirely different culture will be seen,' he added. 'The Jungle Mahal area is a tribal-dominated area. They used to hunt for cultural reasons, which today is not a very sustainable thing to do. We are requesting people to stop hunting or else these animals will not be found in the wild in the future.' Hunting practices In November 2024, a study titled ' Ritualistic hunts: exploring the motivations and conservation implications in West Bengal ' was published in Nature Conservation. It was a socioeconomic study that aimed to understand the hunting practices in Jhargram and West Medinipur districts. Speaking to Mongabay India, Vasudha Mishra, one of the authors and also a part of HEAL, said that they interviewed 112 individuals in these two districts (59 in Jhargram and 53 in West Medinipur). 'Out of them, 99 identified themselves as hunters and the rest as non-hunters.' The study revealed that it was mostly a traditional hunt with only two respondents admitting using guns. The hunting parties mostly comprised of 20-40 people who used traditional weapons such as spears (ballams), bows and arrows (teer dhonukh), catapults (batul, gulti), hand axes (tangi), wooden stick (lathi), snares (faand) among others. Wild boars were the most desirable kill for the respondents followed by the Indian hare, greater coucal, quail, collared dove, yellow-footed green pigeon, jungle cat and Bengal monitor lizards. Reduction in hunting Following a surge in incidents of illegal hunting during traditional festivals and rising concerns from wildlife activists, the Calcutta High Court in a landmark judgement in 2023, said that killing of animals in the wild for pleasure, and the purported show of false prowess, is as heinous and culpable a crime as murder. In the same judgement, the court ordered the formation of 'humane committees' in five districts of West Bengal – West Medinipur, Bankura, Purulia, Jhargram and Mursidabad. This was later expanded to two more districts – East Bardhaman and Birbhum. The committee was headed by the District Judge and brought together all important stakeholders under one umbrella, including the Superintendent of Police, Divisional Forest Officer, Chief Conservator of Forest, Member Secretary, District Legal Service Authority, Public Prosecutor, Wildlife Warden, a member from the tribal community, Divisional Security Commissioner, Head Quarters, Railway Protection Force of the concerned zone and Tiasa Adhya, Joint Secretary of HEAL. Adhya, a wildlife biologist, represents the civil society and is the only person who is present in the committees of all seven districts. The court said that the committees would take steps for protection and preservation of animals in the forest and see that the animals were not killed indiscriminately, whether during hunting festivals or otherwise. In conversation with Mongabay India, Adhya said, 'Even if not unprecedented, the formation of these committees is certainly unique in the global scenario of wildlife conservation. It brings a member from those tribal communities engaging in ritualistic hunting thus involving them in conservation, while inclusion of a member from the civil society brings transparency.' She added that some of the committees like the one in Murshidabad are doing really well, while there are also districts like East Bardhaman which are yet to form a functional committee. 'Jhargram has done well by arranging a meeting with political representatives from the communities engaged in hunting,' she added. 'We did not agree on everything with them but at least a conversation has been initiated. The court had directed the committees to take a strategic action plan to mitigate hunting prior to the hunting season and also a plan of action to change the attitude of these communities about hunting by engaging with them throughout the year. However, more than meetings, I would like to see the focus on engagements with communities, which is currently lacking especially in the Jungle Mahal districts.' She added that even though the court had asked the committees to have bi-monthly meetings, barring Murshidabad, others do not have regular meetings. In 2025, only the committees in Birbhum, Purulia and West Medinipur have met so far. However, according to a post published on Facebook by HEAL in 2024, major hunting festivals of South Bengal such as Pakhibandh, Gopegarh, Arabari, Joypur and Ajodhya Hills saw a drastic reduction in the gathering of hunters, while 10 smaller hunting festivals were called off. Raju Sarkar, Divisional Forest Officer, Panchet said, 'Apart from killing of a wild boar in Joypur there has been no reported killing of any wild animals in the last two years in my division. I'd give more credit to enforcement for the reduction in hunting. We are now getting help from other agencies, including the police and railways and trying to intercept the hunters before they enter the district.' Meanwhile, Anjan Guha, Divisional Forest Officer of Purulia, credited the awareness campaigns by the forest department behind the reduced killing during the hunting festivals. 'In the last two years, we don't have any report of animals killed during Sendra (a tribal festival celebrated by the Santhal community),' he told Mongabay India. 'We are trying to disseminate an anti-hunting message through announcements, street plays and distributing pamphlets in Ol Chiki, a language spoken by the Santhal tribe. We do door-to-door campaigns and try to create awareness among women and children. We have organised certain sports like archery competitions instead during Sendra.' The Sendra Parab festival which takes place in Ajodhya Pahar in Purulia district during Buddha Purnima is one of the biggest festivals of the Santhal tribe. Traditionally it coincides with one of the biggest hunting festivals of the entire Central India landscape, the Shikar Parab. The same festival is celebrated as Visu Sendra or Disom Sendra in the Dalma region of Jharkhand and as Akhand Shikar in the Simlipal hills of Mayurbhanj district of Odisha. Rajen Tudu, spokesperson of the Bharat Jakat Majhi Pargana Mahal, one of the biggest organisations of the Santhal tribe spoke to Mongabay India about how the festival is wrongly seen as a hunting festival. ' Sendra actually means search,' he said. 'In the ancient times, when we used to live in the forests, we had to search for ideal habitat, food, water, medicinal plants etc. So, there used to be an annual event during which we used to search for places from where we could derive our required items.' Tudu added that as wild animals were more in numbers back in the days, they used to hunt both as a safety measure, and as a means to derive food. 'Now, Santhals don't need to hunt because the number of wild animals have dwindled and we have got alternative sources of animal protein. Even still, our tribe gets the tag of a 'hunters' and the state tries to use it as an excuse to snatch our right to enter the forests.' Explaining the connection tribals have with forests, Jagdeep Oraon, Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Tribal Studies at Sidhu-Kanho-Birsha University in Purulia told Mongabay India, that in India, one will always find tribals in forest areas. 'Everything, including religion, economy and society, revolves around the forest. They eat in sal tree leaves; when they get married, their mandap is also made from a tree. In addition, their house materials are collected from forests,' he added. 'The supreme deity for the Santhal community is Marang Buru, which means the God of Forests. The tribal community has a very symbiotic relation with forests. If forests are still surviving in India, it is only because of the tribals.' Way ahead Banerjee said that while the reduction in hunting is an encouraging development, they are yet to achieve the target of zero hunts in Jungle Mahal. 'Now, HEAL has a dedicated team of around 150 volunteers who monitor and report these hunts,' she said. 'HEAL members have faced physical threats on ground while trying to stop the hunters because many of them are in an inebriated state and become quite aggressive.' Banerjee also shared that this year, they have reports of 10,000 to 15,000 people assembling in a big hunt in the Bankura district. They received reports of wild boars, jungle cats and rabbits being killed in these hunts. Pradeep Vyas, former Principal Chief Conservator of Forest, Wildlife, West Bengal, said that according to the Wildlife Protection Act 1972, hunting is illegal and there is no concession for any community in this regard. 'However, some tribal communities believed in their right to hunt and if the forest department tried to stop them, they were seen as anti-tribal. Gradually awareness was raised among these communities and the authorities now have socio-legal rights to stop these hunts,' he added. 'They always had the legal rights, but as long as they do not get support from the society, implementation of any law becomes difficult.' Speaking to Mongabay India, Raza Kazmi, wildlife historian and conservationist expressed fear that unregulated hunting might lead to decimation of wildlife and empty forests with no animals. Giving the example of the Bison Maria tribe in Bastar, Chhattisgarh, he said, 'Bison Marias have this culture of wearing bison horns as headgear during their traditional dance. In this process, they wiped off the entire bison population in Bastar… now they are using plastic or wooden horns.' Kazmi also added that there is still a huge gap in awareness regarding wildlife conservation in the Central India region encompassing Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Odisha and parts of West Bengal.
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Kansas towns get $1.5M for downtown revitalization projects
TOPEKA, Kan. (KSNW) — More than $1.5 million in state funding is heading to 19 Kansas communities to support revitalization projects aimed at breathing new life into historic downtown buildings, the Kansas Department of Commerce announced Thursday. The funding from the state's Historic Economic Asset Lifeline (HEAL) program, matched by over $6.4 million in local contributions, totals about $7.9 million. Closures, reduced services at some Kansas lakes 'By revitalizing our historic buildings, we can create spaces that drive community growth and bring in new economic opportunities for the entire state,' Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of Commerce David Toland said in a news release. 'Our rural communities are some of the best places to be in Kansas — and it's because we are intentional with how we invest in them.' The HEAL program offers matching grants to small towns for projects that convert vacant or underused buildings into active spaces for businesses, housing, child care, arts, and community uses. Since its 2021 launch, it has funded improvements to nearly 100 buildings statewide. 'This group of projects will save buildings in some of the smallest communities in Kansas,' Trisha Purdon, director of the Office of Rural Prosperity, said. 'It's about more than preserving buildings — it's about generating opportunity and restoring vitality to our downtowns.' Highlights from the latest round of funding include: Admire: A $35,000 grant will help transform a 120-year-old senior center into the 'Last Chance Arcade,' a retro gaming space with more than 60 classic arcade machines. The venue aims to be the largest arcade between Wichita and Kansas City, serving as a family-friendly attraction. Garnett: The city received $100,000 to renovate one of its largest historic buildings into a modern, 24/7 fitness center with a designated kid zone. The project is expected to increase foot traffic and downtown activity. Sharon Springs: A $100,000 grant will support redeveloping the long-vacant upper levels of two historic buildings into new housing. The effort aligns with local housing needs identified through a recent community assessment. Wilson: The Weber & Peirano Building, a 1904 structure serving as a tourism hub, mercantile, and art space, will receive $40,000 for façade restoration. The updates aim to preserve the building's architectural integrity while supporting entrepreneurship and tourism. The state says the HEAL program is part of its broader strategy to support economic development and livability in rural Kansas through targeted investments and partnerships. For a complete list of grant recipients and projects, visit the Kansas Department of Commerce website. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Techday NZ
24-04-2025
- Business
- Techday NZ
Lattica secures $3.25 million to boost private AI with FHE
Lattica has announced its emergence from stealth mode and raised $3.25 million in pre-seed funding to bring Fully Homomorphic Encryption (FHE) to cloud-based artificial intelligence applications. The funding round was led by Cyber Fund, the investment firm of Managing Partner Konstantin Lomashuk, with additional participation from angel investor Sandeep Nailwal, who is a co-founder of both Polygon Network and Sentient: The Open AGI Foundation. Lattica's technology aims to address persistent privacy and security challenges in sectors such as healthcare, finance, and government, where organisations are hesitant to adopt AI over concerns about sensitive data exposure. Referencing the Cisco 2025 AI Briefing: CEO Edition, the company highlighted that 70% of surveyed CEOs are worried about their network security due to increasing AI use, and 34% see security as a major obstacle to AI adoption. FHE, which allows encrypted data to be queried by AI models without decryption, has long been considered a desired goal in cryptography, but has until now suffered from computational inefficiencies. Lattica claims it has managed to operationalise FHE by leveraging the latest advancements in the AI acceleration stack, making use of acceleration techniques that improve FHE's commercial viability. Dr. Rotem Tsabary, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Lattica, holds a PhD in lattice-based cryptography from the Weizmann Institute of Science and leads a team focused on the mathematical similarities between FHE and machine learning to build a cloud-based, hardware-agnostic platform for private AI computation. Central to Lattica's solution is the Homomorphic Encryption Abstraction Layer (HEAL), a cloud-based service designed to enhance FHE's performance and streamline its adoption. HEAL operates as an interface connecting FHE-equipped applications with a variety of computing hardware, including GPUs, TPUs, CPUs, and purpose-built accelerators such as ASICs and FPGAs. "By combining the advancements of hardware acceleration with software-based optimisation, we realised that not only could we improve FHE efficiency to the point of commercial viability, but use it to solve critical data dilemmas holding back AI's adoption in sensitive industries," said Dr. Rotem Tsabary, founder and CEO of Lattica. "We're enabling practical FHE by developing a solution that is tailor made for neural networks." In conjunction with its debut, Lattica has posted demonstration versions of its platform and shared the results of an in-depth survey conducted within the FHE community. According to these findings, 71% of participants believe FHE adoption will likely depend on a hybrid approach consisting of both hardware and software innovations. Konstantin Lomashuk, Managing Partner at Cyber Fund, commented, "Lattica is pushing the boundaries of Fully Homomorphic Encryption, solving one of the most critical challenges in AI security. Cyber Fund is proud to have led Lattica's pre-seed round. This is the kind of deep-tech innovation that defines the future, and we're excited to see Lattica leading the way." The healthcare and finance industries are specific targets for Lattica, given the demand for secure, cloud-based AI applications that can process medical and financial data without exposing such information to providers or third-party platforms. The company sees use cases in encrypted financial transactions and secure data analysis for medical research. Sandeep Nailwal, co-founder of Polygon Network and investor in Lattica, said, "Lattica's product-first approach fundamentally transforms sensitive data processing in the AI ecosystem. Lattica has made FHE a reality that is both practical and scalable, as Tsabary and her research team is proving that advances in the machine learning stack can significantly boost the performance of FHE and have an immediate impact on the market."
Yahoo
02-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
What's going on with the hotels Austin bought to house the homeless?
AUSTIN (KXAN) — Several years ago, the city of Austin purchased several hotels and motels to serve people experiencing homelessness. They spent tens of millions of dollars on the properties and renovations, collectively. Two of the hotels the city of Austin previously purchased are being used as bridge shelters, which provide a temporary unit for people to get on their feet before being moved to permanent supportive housing or other more permanent housing. The Northbridge and Southbridge shelters are being used to get people off the street through the city's Housing-focused Encampment Assistance Link (HEAL) Initiative. Since 2021, the city has moved more than 1,000 people to the bridge shelter through HEAL, the city said in its most recent HEAL release. Two additional hotels purchased by the city of Austin are now operating as permanent supportive housing. Permanent supportive housing typically targets people exiting homelessness with the greatest need. It provides people with wrap-around services like mental health treatment, case management and peer support. Price tag goes up for north Austin hotel meant to house people who are homeless The Candlewood Suites hotel in north Austin (Williamson County) is now called Pecan Gardens and is open to residents as of last fall. It's housing more than 70 previously homeless, elderly and disabled people under the eye of Family Eldercare. The city voted to spend $9.5 million on the property in 2021. At least $2.6 million was added to the budget for unexpected renovations after Family Eldercare 'discovered significant issues with the structure of the building, including mold, drainage, and fireproofing issues', we previously reported. Similarly, the former Texas Bungalows Hotel and Suites, which is now Bungalows at Century Park, is now providing 60 units for people who have a 'disabling condition' and have experienced homelessness most of their lives (chronic homelessness). That one also opened last fall. Austin City Council votes to purchase motel to house homeless The city bought the motel back in 2021 for $6.7 million, we reported in 2021. Over the last three years, the city spent $4 million renovating it, close to double the original budget, KXAN previously reported. It's being operated by Integral Care, which cares for 'adults and children living with mental illness, substance use disorder and intellectual and developmental disabilities in Travis County,' according to their website. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
