Construction is set to begin on a long-anticipated joint-use elementary school in Regina’s Harbour Landing neighbourhood.

The new facility will be built on an 11-acre plot of land near the corner of Gordon Road and Campbell Street in the city’s southwest.

The new facility will house 500 students from Regina Public Schools and 350 Regina Catholic students in addition to 90 new childcare spaces.

The provincial government originally announced the project in September of 2020, and the school was targeted to open in the fall of 2026. However, the project was delayed while the City of Regina searched for the necessary 11 acres of land required to build the facility.

The Government of Saskatchewan told CTV News that another reason for the delay was ongoing discussion with the Regina Public and Catholic School Boards, concerning the rapid growth of the Harbour Landing neighbourhood.

“I think that was one of the main reasons for the initial delays, taking some time to make sure that with all of our partners, we were able to get the site right as best as possible, and the size of the school here in terms of trying to be able to accommodate as many families as we can,” said Saskatchewan Minister of Education Everett Hindley.

The Harbour Landing neighbourhood has been host to school overcrowding concerns in recent years. In 2023, hundreds of students were forced to move from their Harbour Landing school to Ethel Milliken school due to the facility nearly exceeding legal capacity limits.

The Chair of Regina Public School Board Adam Hicks said the new facility will relieve some pressure off schools like Milliken, Perry, and Argyle that took in children from Harbour Landing.

He also said parents would benefit from the new school.

“A lot of kids near this location right now are hopping on a bus, moving across the Lewvan and going to another school,” he said. “ So, we know that parents will appreciate being able to walk their kids to this community school again.”

The Government of Saskatchewan put the total cost of the project at $65.9 million, which is a necessary investment in their eyes, but just one step in improving Saskatchewan’s education.

“This one investment won’t be enough, and I think it’s all the more reason for us to focus on the economic aspects of the province because it’s only through the growth of that economy that we’re able to make investments like this,” said Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe.

The project is now slated to be completed by the fall of 2027.

The Government of Saskatchewan has also announced plans for two more joint-use schools in The Towns neighbourhood in Regina’s east end.

No construction dates have been announced in relation to the projects.

An inquest into the death of a 14-year-old Saskatchewan boy in the custody of the social services ministry is revealing troubling gaps in the care provided to vulnerable youth.

Brandon Schafer Kovacs died of severe septic shock in Saskatoon’s Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital on Nov. 28, 2022. Now, a coroner’s inquest is detailing how he died, and what the people charged with his safe keeping observed in the days leading up to his hospitalization in the pediatric intensive care unit.

According to the director of programs for Saskatoon’s Eagle’s Nest facilities, Schafer Kovacs was pretty typical for the type of kids under their care.

But a number of factors were working against the teen that week, as a deadly coinfection of strep. pneumonia and influenza A took hold.

The jury heard about unclear policies, a complicated hierarchy of decision making and communication breakdowns at Eagle’s Nest Youth Ranch.

The house manager at his residence had only been in the position for two weeks, Eagle’s Nest was facing staff shortages due to illness and was pulling in workers from other residences, and the teen’s case worker – responsible for scheduling his appointments and immunizations and the primary contact with family – was an inexperienced undergraduate social work student.

Marie Digby, the case worker assigned to work with the 14-year-old at Eagle’s Nest, testified he had a pattern of embellishing illnesses to get out of school, implying staff were not inclined to take his medical complaints at face value.

On Monday, a staff member testified there was no functioning thermometer in the home the week before Schafer Kovacs’ death, and ultimately no staff member has testified to checking his temperature over the four days he complained of flu-like symptoms – and they were all asked.

Digby testified she knew that Schafer Kovacs’ illness was serious when she arrived at work on Nov. 25, five days after the teen initially asked to see a doctor.

“I put my bag in my office and went to check on Brandon,” she said, pausing to press a tissue to her cheeks, now reddened as tears began to flow.

“I went into his room and he was really disoriented and couldn’t speak. I ran downstairs and told Ryan [the house manager] we had to get him to the hospital. So, I got him into the truck and I drove as fast as I could to RUH.”

Once he was admitted, Digby said she first called Chantelle Schafer, the teen’s mom, then the ministry of social services to get a hold of his social worker – the person ultimately responsible for his care.

The jury heard Digby didn’t reach Schafer in a call, so she texted that he was in the PICU – the pediatric intensive care unit – and said he was warm and relaxed now.

It wasn’t clear Schafer knew what the PICU was at that time, and Digby did not specify her son was intubated, with a breathing tube working to push air into his weakened lungs.

On Monday, the jury heard Schafer Kovacs had a history of pneumonia prior to moving to the Eagle’s Nest, and had contracted it once before while living in the group home, although the illness was not disclosed to his mother.

The inquest heard Schafer Kovacs was brought into the care of the Ministry of Social Services under Section 9 of the Child and Family Services Act, where parents willingly give up some custodial responsibility to the state under a temporary agreement.

Given the shared duties at play, the lack of clarity in terms of each caregivers’ roles, and the precarious staffing situation at the care home at the time, the odds were not in Schafer Kovacs’ favour.

The inquest concludes on Wednesday with further testimony expected from Ministry of Social Services staff. Then, the jury of six civilians will be charged with making recommendations to prevent similar deaths in the future.

A Regina man is facing charges after his alleged erratic driving led to a police pursuit in central Saskatchewan last week.

On Aug. 20, at around 4:50 p.m., Saskatoon RCMP received several reports of an erratic driver travelling southbound on Highway 11.

Members of the service’s Craik detachment found the suspect driving at a high rate of speed near Kenaston.

Officers attempted to pull the vehicle over but the driver continued on – fleeing police while travelling southbound.

Officers deployed a tire deflation device ahead of the chase. The suspect drove over the device – which deflated all four of the vehicles’ tires.

The vehicle continued on at a reduced speed before coming to a stop north of Davidson. The driver was arrested.

The 38-year-old from Regina faces one count of dangerous operation of a motor vehicle and one count of flight from a peace officer. He received a traffic-related ticket and his vehicle was impounded.

The accused is scheduled to appear in Moose Jaw provincial court on Oct. 1.

The Regina Police Service (RPS) shared some reassuring statistics Tuesday, reporting that the number of pursuits and stolen vehicles in the city have been steadily decreasing.

From 2023 to 2024, RPS saw a 79 per cent decrease in the number of pursuits officers were involved in – falling from 14 to just three.

2024 saw 101 incidents of suspects attempting to evade police. This marked a decrease of 32 per cent from the 148 reported in 2023.

The number of similar incidents keep decreasing thanks to several factors – most visibly the addition of the service’s aerial support unit. Other factors include increased training and emphasis on de-escalation.

Over the course of the year, officers deployed tire deflation devices a total of 19 times.

Similarly, the number of vehicles stolen in the city has been steadily decreasing over the past several years. In 2021, 914 thefts were reported – while the total fell to just 565 in 2024.

Mid-year report

As part of its mid-year reporting schedule, RPS reviewed crime statistics over the past decade.

So far in 2025, RPS have recorded 8,432 crimes – representing a 15 per cent decline from last year and a 17 per cent decrease compared to 2016.

Not all offences have fallen in number. Violent crimes within the city have decreased 15 per cent from 2024 – but have increased 18 per cent compared to a decade ago.

The number of homicide victims has varied over the past 10 years – peaking midway through 2020 with eight victims before falling to three victims in both 2023 and 2024.

The first half of 2025 saw five people die as a result of homicide.

Sexual assaults are also trending upwards for the city with 120 reported so far in 2025 – an increase from the average of 95 from 2016-2024.

In terms of arsons, the number of purposely lit fires in the first half of 2025 more than doubled the 10-year average of 129 incidents. Increases across all categories of arson were noted, with bin fires accounting for 54 per cent.

“Overall, total crime continues to trend downward, although patterns vary by category,” acting RPS Chief Lorilee Davies said during the meeting.

“While there are positive developments, our data indicates that there are still areas requiring ongoing attention.”

A California woman is facing up to 10 years in prison after she was caught trying to smuggle her husband into the United States through southeastern British Columbia.

The U.S. district attorney for Montana says 53-year-old Tracy Routh Lautenslager pleaded guilty to conspiracy to smuggle an alien into the country at a location other than a designated port of entry.

A statement from the attorney’s office says Lautenslager’s husband is a British citizen with “no lawful status” in the U.S.

Prosecutors allege Lautenslager drove her vehicle south through the Roosville, B.C., border crossing on April 1 and then headed to nearby Swisher Lake, Mont.

Later that morning, U.S. border guards were alerted to a lone man seen walking across the border from Canada. The border agents searched the area but could not find the man, believing he had had returned to Canada.

Mounties on the Canadian side responded to the area, locating the man and bringing him to the crossing at Roosville, where he was identified by U.S. border agents, prosecutors said.

Around the time her husband was apprehended, Lautenslager was attempting to re-enter Canada to look for him but was denied entry on suspicion of smuggling.

She was subsequently interviewed by U.S. authorities and “admitted she and her husband planned to have him circumvent the immigration process,” the district attorney’s office said.

“She indicated the plan was to drop her husband off at a location on the Canadian side of the border, drive into the United States, and then pick him up,” according to the statement Tuesday.

“She admitted that what she attempted to do was wrong.”

Authorities searched Lautenslager’s cellphone during their investigation and “discovered text messages between her and her husband as the conspiracy was unfolding and discussing logistics,” the attorney’s office said.

The smuggling charge carries a potential 10-year prison sentence, followed by three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine, according to the statement.

Trans Mountain CEO Mark Maki says the federal government’s focus should be on maximizing TMX’s existing capacity first, before greenlighting any new pipeline projects.

“My personal belief is that you look at the optimization of your existing pipelines, it’s the first thing you do, because it’s the easiest thing to do,” Maki said in an interview with CTV News Chief Political Correspondent Vassy Kapelos in Burnaby, B.C., on Tuesday.

“It’s much harder to build another TMX somewhere,” he added. “And for that reason, optimize the kit that you have, which you can do in steps over time, and then add capacity as it’s needed, and then you have time to evaluate the bigger issue, which is, do you need another pipeline somewhere?”

Maki’s comments come as Prime Minister Mark Carney makes his push to strengthen energy and economic ties with Europe, revealing Tuesday that the federal government will imminently unveil major new investments in port infrastructure.

The prime minister has pledged to make Canada an “energy superpower,” and said in an exclusive interview with Kapelos in May that he would support building a new pipeline if the consensus exists for one.

Maki said there are “very doable, very cost-effective” ways to increase the government-owned Trans Mountain pipeline’s capacity. Namely, he said, adding more horsepower to the existing infrastructure could boost oil shipments from about 890,000 barrels a day to nearly 1.2 million barrels a day.

“That involves pumps, motors in existing locations, maybe some new locations, and then power infrastructure to supply that, and maybe a little bit of pipe, TBD,” he said. “So, we’re working through that now.”

The Trans Mountain pipeline has been shipping oil from Alberta to the B.C. coast for more than 70 years. In 2018, the federal government made the controversial decision to buy it for $4.5 billion, before funding an expansion project to twin the existing 1,180-kilometre pipeline, at a cost that ballooned to $34 billion.

The project nearly tripled the pipeline’s capacity, with expanded operations beginning last May.

According to an analysis by Alberta Central chief economist Charles St-Arnaud, TMX has contributed to narrowing the discount at which Alberta oil is sold, leading to an extra $2 billion in revenue for the federal government.

The Carney government, meanwhile, has signalled it will start announcing approved so-called nation-building projects in the coming weeks.

“There’s a huge range of immediate opportunities with respect to critical metals and minerals, and there are medium-term opportunities with respect to all forms of energy, including LNG and hydrogen,” Carney told reporters, speaking alongside German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Berlin on Tuesday.

In June, Parliament passed Bill C-5 — dubbed the Building Canada Act by the Liberals — aimed at giving government sweeping new powers to approve major projects of national interest.

When asked whether he believes an entirely new pipeline is feasible, Maki told Kapelos he does, but that the supply must exist to underpin it, adding “a lot of things have to line up for that to happen.”

“Like policy changes, there has to be a desire on the part of the private sector to actually invest in more production, and so the environment has to be right for that,” he said. “That’s really kind of the starting point in my mind, is there’s a will, and capital wants to be deployed to Canada.”

“And then you can start talking about ‘I need another pipeline,’” he also said, adding investors and capital are the necessary first step.

Boosting the current pipeline’s capacity, Maki said, would however be in the national interest, in his view.

“People are saying, ‘well, it’s not going to be economic, it’s not going to be utilized,’” he said. “We’re highly utilized today. We’ll be highly utilized tomorrow. We’ll be highly utilized 20 years from now. That’s not going to change.”

Saskatchewan’s go-kart community is slowly increasing in size with a small, but dedicated, group of female drivers embracing the sport.

“There’s been a huge uptick in women in the sport, which is fantastic. There’s never enough,” expressed Alexis Budel, who has been go-kart racing for 20 years.

Travelling from outside of Winnipeg to Regina, Budel is one of seven women representing the South Sask. Kart Club out of its 60 members.

She said it’s the community of motorists that brings her back every year.

“We always tell people that it’s the best part to this sport. I have a family we met two years ago, and I absolutely walk in their house like it’s mine,” she shared. “That’s a second family and everybody here. Everybody looks out for each other.”

The number of female drivers has increased little by little over the years, with women partaking in the sport for various reasons.

“I had to sell my horses. I was moving off a farm and into the city, and that was the comment to ‘trade horsepower for horsepower,’” said go-kart motorist Melissa Nicholauson who commutes from Melville to attend the weekly races.

“I had loads of questions and I came to watch five years or six years ago, and my daughter and I started that next year.”

“When my dad got diagnosed with hemochromatosis, he wanted to find a hobby that me and him could both partake in,” shared Abigail Frost, who has been racing for a decade.

“We sold one of our cars, bought our first go kart, got the suit, got everything. It was just pull the cord and race at that point.”

Haley Gulash, who also joined the racing community because of her family, said she enjoys the high-speed action karting brings.

“I really just enjoy being on the track. I enjoy racing, I enjoy the competitive nature of it,” Gulash expressed.

“There’s no other feeling than being behind a wheel going 120 kilometres an hour. There’s no feeling that matches up.”

Gulash has been racing on the track for 16 years and has noticed how supportive the community is anytime a new member joins.

“We’re all cheering for each other. We’re all trying to make each other better,” she said. “We all want to see each other on the top step or on the podium. It’s a good feeling. It’s a proud feeling. Anything we can do to support each other is fantastic.”

The non-profit club hopes to see the next generation of girls and boys keep the sport alive.

“We really want to keep growing the sport. It’s the quickest, the best way, the most affordable way into motor sport by all means,” Gulash said.

“For the little guys, it’s the best way for them to get into it. It’s the safest way to get into motorsport. For us to keep the club alive, it gives everybody an opportunity to get into motorsport at one time or another.”

Come the September 6 weekend, racers from across Saskatchewan and Manitoba will be participating in the club’s Sask. Series tournament.

The provincial government says three beaches across Saskatchewan remain under E coli. advisories.

According to the Healthy Beaches Public Map, E. coli has been detected at Melville Beach, Alice Beach and the main beach area at Rowan’s Ravine Provincial Park.

Stoney Beach, located south of Humboldt, is also under an advisory for microcystin.

The province says beaches are only safe for swimming and other in-water activities when no individual sample exceeds 235 E. coli per 100 millilitres of water ,or the cyanobacteria or microcystin levels are recorded below 10 µg/L.

The advisories showed all affected areas recorded far more contamination than the threshold allowed. In the case of Melville Beach, seven times the contamination limit was reported Aug. 20.

🎉 Update Completed Successfully! 🎉

We are thrilled to announce that our scheduled network update has been completed without any issues! 🚀 All our broadcast stations, streams, and websites are now fully operational and running better than ever.

What’s New?

Here’s what you can expect from this update:
✅ Improved Audio Player – No more interruptions or cutting off! Enjoy seamless streaming on our websites.
✅ Enhanced Stream Stability – Our radio streams are now more reliable than ever.
✅ Upgraded Security & Quality – Improved protection and enhanced broadcast quality for an unmatched listening experience.

Fully Operational Services:

🎵 Stations:

• Z103.5 – https://z1035.evoradio.ca/
• 979 The Cowboy – https://979thecowboy.evoradio.ca/
• 101 The Rockhound – https://101therockhound.evoradio.ca/
• Classic 88.7 The Goat – https://887thegoat.evoradio.ca/

🌐 Websites:

• EVO Radio Advertiser Access – https://advertiseraccess.evoradio.ca/
• EVO Media Corporation – https://evomcorp.com/
• DJ Spinderella – https://djspinderella.evomcorp.com/

Experiencing Issues?

While everything is running smoothly on our end, we’re here to help if you encounter any issues. If you’re having trouble with our broadcasts or websites, please report the issue to us immediately so we can address it.

📧 Contact Us:

If you have having any issues please reach out to us on our websites!

Thank you for your patience and understanding during this process. We’re committed to providing you with the best listening experience possible and appreciate your support!

🎧 Happy Listening!
The EVO Radio & EVO Media Corporation Team

We’re committed to providing our audience with a listening experience like no other! To maintain this standard, we’re excited to announce a major update to our Broadcast Network.

What’s New?

This update will bring:

• A Better Audio Player: Improved performance on our websites to resolve issues with streams cutting off.
• Enhanced Session Operations: Ensuring error-free radio streams.
• Upgraded Security & Quality: Improved protection and overall broadcast quality.

Downtime Details:

• Expected Downtime: 1 hour (we’ve allocated up to 4 hours for any unforeseen circumstances).
• Impacted Services:
  • Live Broadcasts & Website Access for these stations:
    • Z103.5 – https://z1035.evoradio.ca/
    • 979 The Cowboy – https://979thecowboy.evoradio.ca/
    • 101 The Rockhound – https://101therockhound.evoradio.ca/
    • Classic 88.7 The Goat – https://887thegoat.evoradio.ca/
  • Websites:
    • EVO Radio Advertiser Access – https://advertiseraccess.evoradio.ca/
    • EVO Media Corporation – https://evomcorp.com/
    • DJ Spinderella – https://djspinderella.evomcorp.com/
  • Third-Party Apps: Any apps relying on our live broadcasts will also be affected.

Commitment to Excellence:
During the downtime, our team will work diligently to complete the update and monitor the network to ensure peak performance. We’re committed to enhancing your listening experience to the highest standards.

Stay Updated:
Follow us on Facebook or check our websites for real-time updates:

• EVO Media Corporation: https://www.facebook.com/EVOMediaCorporation/
• Z103.5: https://www.facebook.com/YourPartyStationZ103.5
• 979 The Cowboy: https://www.facebook.com/979thecowboy/
• 101 The Rockhound: https://www.facebook.com/101TheRockhound/
• Classic 88.7 The Goat: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100093402861183

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your understanding as we work to improve our services.

Thank you for your continued support,

The EVO Radio & EVO Media Corporation Team