NarrativeBear

The letter targets my wife's background. We both feel uneasy about this, and feel like our privacy was invaded.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/27838901

Indore in Madhya Pradesh, India, was once dotted with fetid waste dumps but after a huge campaign is now virtually spotless

This is what happens usually in India: a politician wakes up and launches a cleanliness “drive” with fanfare. They ostentatiously start sweeping a street and speak solemnly about civic duty while the media take photos. The next day it’s over and things go back to how they were before.

But not in Indore in Madhya Pradesh. From 2017, when it won the prize for being the cleanest city in the country, it kept winning for eight straight years, until last year.

Before 2017, Indore had been ranked 25th of 471 towns and cities in the government’s cleanliness rankings.

In many cities, families will keep their home scrupulously clean, but a few feet from their front door rubbish is left lying around.

“That other area is seen as someone else’s responsibility and no one sees any contradiction in walking past a stinking pile of rubbish to their clean home,” said Arjun Sehgal, a local chemistry tutor.

Residents have taken up cleanliness as their own personal responsibility, according to Prabhnit Sawhney, a petrol pump owner. “I’ve seen people stopping someone who littered. I’ve seen drivers stop their car when they see rubbish on the street to remove it. It’s become a kind of mission that inspires everyone,” he said.

Indore in Madhya Pradesh, India, was once dotted with fetid waste dumps but after a huge campaign is now virtually spotless

This is what happens usually in India: a politician wakes up and launches a cleanliness “drive” with fanfare. They ostentatiously start sweeping a street and speak solemnly about civic duty while the media take photos. The next day it’s over and things go back to how they were before.

But not in Indore in Madhya Pradesh. From 2017, when it won the prize for being the cleanest city in the country, it kept winning for eight straight years, until last year.

Before 2017, Indore had been ranked 25th of 471 towns and cities in the government’s cleanliness rankings.

In many cities, families will keep their home scrupulously clean, but a few feet from their front door rubbish is left lying around.

“That other area is seen as someone else’s responsibility and no one sees any contradiction in walking past a stinking pile of rubbish to their clean home,” said Arjun Sehgal, a local chemistry tutor.

Residents have taken up cleanliness as their own personal responsibility, according to Prabhnit Sawhney, a petrol pump owner. “I’ve seen people stopping someone who littered. I’ve seen drivers stop their car when they see rubbish on the street to remove it. It’s become a kind of mission that inspires everyone,” he said.

Gladys and Nelson Gonzalez have called the United States home since 1989. Their three daughters, now grown, were all born and raised in California.

“For nearly four decades, they have built a life here — raising three daughters, giving back to their community, and recently welcoming their first grandchild,” their daughter Stephanie Gonzalez wrote on a GoFundMe page for the family. “Now, they are being treated as criminals.”

Last month, the parents checked in at an immigration court in Santa Ana, just “like they have been doing since 2000,” Stephanie wrote in an email to CNN.

But this check-in ended with a much different outcome.

The couple was arrested and handcuffed during their February 21 appointment and put in federal custody, where they spent three weeks before being deported to Colombia.

“We didn’t expect that they would be apprehended and held in custody. And again, it’s not really unique to them anymore. It’s happening across the country,” Crooms told CNN, pointing to recent immigration policy changes in the US two months into the current administration.

The Gonzalezes spent many years searching for a viable path to citizenship, paid their taxes and never had any trouble with the law, according to Crooms and their daughters.

Ideally, the couple would have been given time to get their affairs in order and say goodbye to their daughters and grandchild, according to Crooms. But that didn’t happen.

“We had to go and pick up their car from the parking lot and didn’t get to say goodbye,” Stephanie said.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/26834396

Family and friends of a Vancouver entrepreneur are demanding answers after she was unexpectedly detained by U.S. immigration officials while attempting to cross the border with a job offer and visa paperwork in hand.

Jasmine Mooney, a 35-year-old business consultant and co-founder of a drink brand, has been detained for 11 days under what her supporters describe as “inhumane conditions,” with no clear explanation of why she was arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Eagles, who said she found out about Mooney’s detention through a family friend, noted that her daughter had been working in the U.S. but was detained at the San Ysidro U.S.-Mexico border crossing near San Diego, Calif., on March 3.

Eagles said an immigration lawyer was finally able to reach Mooney late Thursday, but despite having no criminal record and facing no charges, Mooney remains in custody with no clear timeline for release.

“We have no issue with her being denied entry, we have no issue with her initially being detained. But we have a huge issue with the inhumane treatment she is receiving and that she knows nothing, has not been charged and has not been able to speak with us directly,” her mother said.

Eagles said the family has received an update from a third-party that Mooney may have a tentative release date of March 24, which — if true — remains “still too far away.”

“By then, she’ll have been in custody for three weeks,” Eagles said. “That’s twice as long as she’s been there already. And so we want to get her home as soon as possible.”

Mooney was detained by border officials while trying to enter the U.S., as she had previously done successfully when applying for a Trade NAFTA, or TN, work visa.

After spending three nights in detention at the world’s busiest land border, Eagles said her daughter was transferred to a facility in San Diego then to the San Luis Regional Detention Center south of Yuma, Arizona, where she has since been sleeping on the floor of a cell alongside nearly 30 other women.

Eagles said that each time her daughter was transferred, she was handcuffed and in chains.

“I was put in a cell, and I had to sleep on a mat with no blanket, no pillow, with an aluminum foil wrapped over my body like a dead body for 2½ days,” she told a reporter.

As her detention continues, Mooney remains confined to a concrete cell with no natural light, no mats, no blankets, and minimal bathroom facilities.

“Every single guard that sees me is like ‘What are you doing here? I don’t understand — you’re Canadian. How are you here?’” she told ABC News.

“One or two months ago, if CBP officers found an issue with a Canadian’s work visa, the typical route taken is revoking the visa and ordering that person to leave the country,” said Neitor. “To detain someone like this would have been considered extreme not long ago, but’s it happening much more frequently nowadays.”

Neitor noted that while there is no limit on how long U.S. immigration authorities can detain a non-U.S. citizen, individuals have the legal right to talk to a lawyer while in detention.

Family and friends of a Vancouver entrepreneur are demanding answers after she was unexpectedly detained by U.S. immigration officials while attempting to cross the border with a job offer and visa paperwork in hand.

Jasmine Mooney, a 35-year-old business consultant and co-founder of a drink brand, has been detained for 11 days under what her supporters describe as “inhumane conditions,” with no clear explanation of why she was arrested by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Eagles, who said she found out about Mooney’s detention through a family friend, noted that her daughter had been working in the U.S. but was detained at the San Ysidro U.S.-Mexico border crossing near San Diego, Calif., on March 3.

Eagles said an immigration lawyer was finally able to reach Mooney late Thursday, but despite having no criminal record and facing no charges, Mooney remains in custody with no clear timeline for release.

“We have no issue with her being denied entry, we have no issue with her initially being detained. But we have a huge issue with the inhumane treatment she is receiving and that she knows nothing, has not been charged and has not been able to speak with us directly,” her mother said.

Eagles said the family has received an update from a third-party that Mooney may have a tentative release date of March 24, which — if true — remains “still too far away.”

“By then, she’ll have been in custody for three weeks,” Eagles said. “That’s twice as long as she’s been there already. And so we want to get her home as soon as possible.”

Mooney was detained by border officials while trying to enter the U.S., as she had previously done successfully when applying for a Trade NAFTA, or TN, work visa.

After spending three nights in detention at the world’s busiest land border, Eagles said her daughter was transferred to a facility in San Diego then to the San Luis Regional Detention Center south of Yuma, Arizona, where she has since been sleeping on the floor of a cell alongside nearly 30 other women.

Eagles said that each time her daughter was transferred, she was handcuffed and in chains.

“I was put in a cell, and I had to sleep on a mat with no blanket, no pillow, with an aluminum foil wrapped over my body like a dead body for 2½ days,” she told a reporter.

As her detention continues, Mooney remains confined to a concrete cell with no natural light, no mats, no blankets, and minimal bathroom facilities.

“Every single guard that sees me is like ‘What are you doing here? I don’t understand — you’re Canadian. How are you here?’” she told ABC News.

“One or two months ago, if CBP officers found an issue with a Canadian’s work visa, the typical route taken is revoking the visa and ordering that person to leave the country,” said Neitor. “To detain someone like this would have been considered extreme not long ago, but’s it happening much more frequently nowadays.”

Neitor noted that while there is no limit on how long U.S. immigration authorities can detain a non-U.S. citizen, individuals have the legal right to talk to a lawyer while in detention.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/26376257

“Canada doesn’t allow American Banks to do business in Canada, but their banks flood the American Market. Oh, that seems fair to me, doesn’t it?” Trump wrote in a social media post

CNN and others debunked Trump’s claim a month ago.

“There’s nothing prohibiting American banks from operating here, including having retail branches,” Cristie Ford, a professor at the University of British Columbia’s law school, said in an email in February.

Canada tightly regulates the banking industry, and it requires various government approvals before a foreign-owned bank can open in the country. But U.S. banks have been operating in Canada for well over a century; the Canadian Bankers Association, an industry group, said in a February statement that “there are 16 U.S.-based bank subsidiaries and branches with around C$113 billion in assets currently operating in Canada” and that “U.S. banks now make up approximately half of all foreign bank assets in Canada.”

Tyler Meredith, former head of economic and fiscal policy for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, noted on social media in February that Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, U.S. Bank, JPMorgan, and Northern Trust are among the U.S. banks with current Canadian operations. You can see the others here and here.

Meredith said in an interview that “we take a very careful look at people who want to come into our banking sector, because we consider financial services to be a core asset to Canada and to the Canadian economy” and try hard to avoid the “cascading consequences” the world has seen with bank failures in the U.S

“Canada doesn’t allow American Banks to do business in Canada, but their banks flood the American Market. Oh, that seems fair to me, doesn’t it?” Trump wrote in a social media post

CNN and others debunked Trump’s claim a month ago.

“There’s nothing prohibiting American banks from operating here, including having retail branches,” Cristie Ford, a professor at the University of British Columbia’s law school, said in an email in February.

Canada tightly regulates the banking industry, and it requires various government approvals before a foreign-owned bank can open in the country. But U.S. banks have been operating in Canada for well over a century; the Canadian Bankers Association, an industry group, said in a February statement that “there are 16 U.S.-based bank subsidiaries and branches with around C$113 billion in assets currently operating in Canada” and that “U.S. banks now make up approximately half of all foreign bank assets in Canada.”

Tyler Meredith, former head of economic and fiscal policy for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, noted on social media in February that Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, U.S. Bank, JPMorgan, and Northern Trust are among the U.S. banks with current Canadian operations. You can see the others here and here.

Meredith said in an interview that “we take a very careful look at people who want to come into our banking sector, because we consider financial services to be a core asset to Canada and to the Canadian economy” and try hard to avoid the “cascading consequences” the world has seen with bank failures in the U.S

Posted speed limits in nearly 200 Mississauga school zones will soon increase to 40 km/h

With the new amendments on local roads, City of Mississauga officials said the speed limit will remain 30 km/h from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday to Friday, and outside that period will be increased to 40 km/h. The move was prompted by complaints from drivers that the 30 km/h limit was too low during times when there were no students and other people around.

The Greenbelt scandal is the elephant in the room of Ontario’s 2025 election, even as Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives try to leave it in the rearview.

It’s been more than a year since the RCMP opened an investigation into the boondoggle, which saw the Ford government open sections of environmentally protected land outside Toronto for housing construction in fall 2022. That move came at the request of a select group of well-connected developers who stood to make more than $8 billion from the deal. 

In early February, The Trillium reported that two former Ford government staffers — one a central figure in the Greenbelt changes who resigned amid the fallout, the other an employee of Ford’s re-election campaign — are being sued by a developer alleging they accepted money in exchange for promises to use “backchannel contacts” to rezone land, but did not deliver.

It also prompted attention from journalists, who soon revealed developers stood to be the main beneficiaries. Ontario’s auditor general and integrity commissioner released twin reports in August 2023 that were chock-full of bombshell revelations. The public was furious, while Ford remained defiant, even as Amato and Clark resigned from their roles. (Clark has remained an MPP in the Progressive Conservative caucus, and was named government house leader last June.)

But there were also spinoff scandals. One revolved around a pre-wedding stag-and-doe party for one of Ford’s daughters in the months before the Greenbelt changes — developers were invited, and attendees were encouraged to give cash gifts to the happy couple in addition to the $150 ticket price. Another involved a Las Vegas trip involving key Tory figures and a would-be Greenbelt developer that happened in 2020. There were also allegations about an alleged unregistered lobbyist dubbed Mr. X who had close ties to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

Finally, in September 2023 — as new salacious details mounted about a Tory MPP getting a massage at the same time as a would-be Greenbelt developer during that Las Vegas trip, prompting more resignations in the Progressive Conservative government

A growing body of research suggests that road salt contributes to metal corrosion and can have a negative impact on ecosystems. Despite the introduction of some successful alternatives, many Canadian cities are still using salt because it's cheaper.