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Healey activates National Guard to help with influx of migrants to Massachusetts

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

Facing a steady influx of migrants from other countries, Gov. Maura Healey on Thursday activated up to 250 National Guard members to provide basic services at emergency shelter hotels.Healey’s office announced the move Thursday afternoon, saying that her new executive order applies to locations that do not have a contracted service provider. Guard members next week will be assigned to hotels to ensure basic needs of families are met.The administration also said it is also launching regional rapid response teams to assist with overseeing shelter sites and serve as a direct contact to the administration to address any concerns.There are 6,000 families in emergency shelters and Healey has declared a state of emergency due to “rapidly rising numbers of migrant families arriving in Massachusetts, requiring the state’s emergency shelter system to expand in an unsustainable manner.”“We need all hands-on deck to meet this moment and ensure families have access ...

Community leaders call for more resources to deal with violence in Boston

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

With violence in Boston top of mind, community leaders came together on Thursday to demand change and accountability as they push for more resources to help deal with the violence.Members of the New Democracy Coalition and Prophetic Resistance Boston spoke in the South End as they released findings from community meetings they held last fall.In comments, organization members said people who attended the public meetings were concerned about violent incidents in Dorchester, Mattapan and Roxbury. “We live in fear,” said Rev. Kevin Peterson of the New Democracy Coalition, later adding “I’m afraid, sometimes, to go out at night in certain areas.”This week’s meeting came after Dorchester was hit by more violence over the weekend when police said at least eight people were hurt in a shooting near the annual Caribbean Festival on Saturday. “This problem isn’t going to go away overnight,” Peterson said. “This is a systemic problem. The trauma is embedded.” Community leaders, including P...

Students, city leaders hope for a smooth move as ‘Allston Christmas’ arrives

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

The day known as “Allston Christmas” is set to arrive on Friday, bringing with it parked cars, moving vans, students and much of their unwanted belongings for people to claim off the curb as leases expire and an onslaught of students move into the area.With many already in the process of moving ahead of Sept. 1, city leaders gave an update on Thursday on their plans to make sure everything goes smoothly this year. Among measures, Boston Deputy Director of Neighborhood Services Connor Newman said liaisons would be out in city neighborhoods on Thursday and Friday to conduct walkthroughs “to ensure our streets are clear and prepared for our students to move in safely.”City officials this week reminded tenants about what cannot be picked up by trash services, including beds, box springs and mattresses. Despite Allston Christmas traditions, officials are also asking students not to bring in furniture they find on the curb due to the potential of infestations or pests.As city officia...

Bodycam footage shows Boston police quickly helped city councilor robbed on the Mile [+video]

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

Body camera footage released to the Herald shows Boston City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson was confronted by a denizen of Methadone Mile, who shouted that her phone was snatched because she was trying to take a photo.https://www.bostonherald.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Southampton-larceny.mp4The footage, released by the Boston Police Department following a public records request, captures the moments that immediately followed the councilor’s mugging on Atkinson Street last Saturday night — an encounter that occurred a day after the city’s new plan to address escalating violence in the troubled area was announced.It begins with Fernandes Anderson leaving a crowd of people and walking up to a cruiser with the officer wearing the body camera, knocking on his window, and alerting him in a sharp tone that a “guy in a red T-shirt stole my phone.”When asked by the officer where her phone was when this occurred, Fernandes Anderson ignores the question, and states, “I need my phone. ...

San Diego gas prices climb to highest ever for Labor Day weekend: AAA

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

SAN DIEGO -- San Diego drivers, get ready for the highest gas prices ever for the Labor Day weekend, according to the American Automobile Association (AAA).The average price of self-serve regular gasoline in San Diego is the same as the Los Angeles-Long Beach area at $5.37, per AAA. San Diego's gas prices are two cents higher than last week, 31 cents higher than last month and 14 cents higher than last year, officials said.This week, California's average price of gasoline is seven cents less than San Diego's average and $1.47 more than the average national price, per AAA. Over 30 arrested in bust involving $3.3M in car theft Auto Club of California spokesperson Doug Shupe claims Los Angeles wholesale gas prices, which are still at their highest levels since November 2022, will have to drop significantly to provide enough room for pump prices to drop below $5 a gallon.“However, the Auto Club still expects an increase in Labor Day travel over last year because of a fo...

Mom who gave parenting advice on ‘8 Passengers’ YouTube channel arrested on suspicion of child abuse

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

A Utah woman who gave online parenting advice via a once popular YouTube channel has been arrested on suspicion of aggravated child abuse after her malnourished son escaped out a window and ran to a nearby house for help, authorities said.Ruby Franke, whose now defunct channel “8 Passengers” followed her family, was arrested Wednesday night in the southern Utah city of Ivins. She was taken into custody at the home of Jodi Hildebrandt, who owns a counseling business that she says teaches people to improve their lives by being honest, responsible and humble. Franke has recently appeared in YouTube videos with Hildebrandt that were posted online by Hildebrandt’s counseling business, ConneXions Classroom.Franke’s 12-year-old son climbed out of a window in Hildebrandt’s residence in Ivins and ran to a neighbor’s house Wednesday morning and asked for food and water, according to an affidavit filed by an officer with the Santa Clara-Ivins Public Safety Department.Th...

Mexico City’s old airport told to cut flights by 17%, leading airlines to warn of mass cancellations

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The Mexican government ordered Mexico City’s old airport to cut flights by 17% Thursday, sparking warnings by airlines of possible mass flight cancellations. The new rules scheduled to take effect by Oct. 29 would require the terminal to reduce the number of flights per hour at the airport from 52 to 43. The airport has a design capacity of around 61 flights per hour, but that has already been cut to 52 previously. The airport has maintenance problems, including flooding or sewage smells in some areas. But the country’s airline industry chamber says that’s because the government took away the terminal’s revenues to pay for an airport project elsewhere that was later cancelled. The National Air Transport Chamber said the new rules for the Mexico City International Airport, or AICM, would hurt passengers, airlines and industry workers. “This unexpected reduction planned to start on Oct. 29 will imply the need to massively cancel flights, including for passenge...

‘Persistent’ bears force 160 firefighters to pull out of B.C. Interior camp

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

GOLD BRIDGE, B.C. — About 160 firefighters battling a blaze in British Columbia’s Interior have pulled out of their camp after they were subjected to what the BC Wildfire Service calls “persistent bear activity.”The service says the bears threatened the safety of personnel “within and around” the camp near Gold Bridge, about 100 kilometres west of Lillooet, B.C., prompting the decision to move everyone Wednesday evening.Nic Kokolski, an information officer with the service, says the animals had been moving around tents and other camp infrastructure.Kokolski says no one has been injured and no animals have been harmed, but conservation authorities felt it would be safest if the firefighters left the area.A social media post by the wildfire service says its personnel are being hosted at T’it’q’et First Nation and Lillooet municipal facilities for the time being.It says conservation officers have been “assessing and advising” ...

Hong Kong and parts of southern China grind to near standstill as Super Typhoon Saola edges closer

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

HONG KONG (AP) — Most of Hong Kong and some other areas in southern China ground to a near standstill Friday with classes and flights canceled as Super Typhoon Saola edged closer to the region. The typhoon could make a landfall in parts of southern China and many workers were forced to stay at home. Pupils in various cities had the start of their school year postponed to next week. Hong Kong’s stock market trading was suspended and nearly 200 outbound flights for Friday were canceled in the key center for regional business and travel.China Railway Guangzhou Group said nearly 4,000 trains were suspended between Thursday and Sunday, state media CCTV earlier reported. The Hong Kong Observatory raised a No. 8 typhoon signal, the third-highest warning under the city’s weather system, early Friday. Its forecast said Saola — with maximum sustained winds of 205 kilometers (127 miles) per hour — would be “rather close” to the financial hub on Friday and Saturday morning, skirting withi...

Belarus journalist jailed for ‘facilitating extremism’ after collecting data for human rights group

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 18:11:06 GMT

TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — A court in Belarus has sentenced a high-profile journalist to 3 1/2 years for “facilitating extremist activities” and “discrediting Belarus” after she provided data for a renowned human rights group, the Belarusian Association of Journalists (BAJ) said Thursday.Larysa Shchyrakova — sentenced during a closed trial in the city of Gomel — will serve her sentence in a high-security penal colony and must pay a fine of 3,500 Belarusian rubles (about $1,100).Belarusian authorities detained Shchyrakova in December 2022. Officials initially placed her son in a state orphanage before transferring custody to her ex-husband.Shchyrakova, 50, is the latest in a string of journalists jailed in Belarus after covering the large-scale political repression that has rocked the country since its last presidential elections three years ago.Large-scale protests erupted in Belarus in August 2020, when President Alexander Lukashenko was re-elected in a vote that both the opposition a...