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25-year-old William Pelletier made another court appearance In Dauphin today.

Back in December of last year, he was involved in a shooting incident on the Pine Creek First nation Reserve.

He was arrested earlier this year when RCMP executed a search warrant and found a firearm related to the incident.

Pelletier has pleaded not guilty to numerous charges and appears in court on May 22 in Dauphin.

Whirlpool Lake and campground area in Riding Mountain National Park will remain closed for the season due to testing positive for Environmental DNA evidence of zebra mussels.

The east portion of Cowan Lake trail, which links to Whirlpool Lake’s campground area, will be temporarily closed as well.

All watercraft including canoes and kayaks are prohibited on Whirlpool Lake.

Duck Mountain Provincial Park and Provincial Forest has issued a Level 1 Fire and Travel Restriction.

Specific restrictions include cancellation of burning permits; no new burning permits will be issued until conditions improve and motorized back country travel on roads and trails is prohibited between 10:00 in the morning until 8:00 in the evening.

For more information call 622-2106 or to report a wildfire call 1-800-782-0076.

The Grandview Municipality burning ban is still effective for rural and urban areas with some exceptions until further notice.

For further information please contact the office at 204-546-5250.

The City of Dauphin passed the budget for 2018 on Monday.

Brad Collett, City Manager, tells 730 CKDM this year’s mill rates are lower than last year.

“Council set the new mill rate for 2018 at 35.174, which is down slightly from 35.254 for residential properties and down to 44.944 for commercial properties from 45.754 the previous year.”

According to the assessment branch, 75 per cent of properties will see lower taxes this year and 25 per cent will see an increase due to improvements.

This year, council is focusing on capital expenditures of roads, streets and sidewalks. Approximately $80,000 has been set aside to deal with any issues for either Vermillion or Edwards Creek water supplies or replacement of lead piping.

Reserves for the city are sitting at about $8 million dollars, which is about approximately worth one year of taxes.

The largest portion of the budget expenses are policing and recreation services.

Elections for the Manitoba Metis Federation see many positions being filled by acclamation.

David Chartrand returns as President along with Audrey Chartrand as the Northwest Region Vice President.

There will be elections for the Vice President position for the Winnipeg Region along with 2 Regional Directions in the Northwest, South east and Winnipeg regions.

James Bruce, Darlene Genaille  Richard Genailleand John Parenteau are candidates seeking to fill two director spots for the local Northwest Region.

In the end, three people filed nomination papers and didn’t meet the qualifications and weren’t allowed to have their name stand.

All positions will serve a four year term and the next MMF election is required to be held before August 31, 2022.

The RM of Dauphin is planning to put more into reserve funds, begin paying for the rural waterline loan, and paying increased external fees in their 2018 financial plan.

They are anticipating expenditures to increase by about $180,000 and to take over $600,000 from reserves.

Chief Administrative Officer, Robin Wiebe, explains how the council tried to best manage these increased costs.

 “Council really tried to temper the increases imposed upon us, which of course get passed down to council. They really tried to mitigate those effects and addressing that through using our reserves and accumulated surplus to supplement operations.”

In 2018, the Public Works Department has many projects planned including 26 approach installations, eight drainage maintenance projects, five major drain projects and one major bridge repair.

Wiebe warns that some of these projects are in jeopardy if the Provincial Municipal Road Improvement Program is not in effect.

A province wide test of the Ready Alert system is scheduled for today at 1:55 in the afternoon.

All cell phones, tablets, radio and television stations will ring off an alert as a test for emergency warnings.

In the future, the alerts will inform the public of tornadoes, floods, Amber Alerts or terrorist threats.

Provincial alerts will only come from the Manitoba Emergency Measures Organization and Environment and Climate Change Canada.

Rossburn, which is 150 kilometres southwest of Dauphin, is currently under a boil water advisory.

This is a result of a line breaking at the water treatment plant, causing a loss of water pressure at the Rossburn Distribution Centre.

All water used for consumption should be boiled for at least one minute and water used for household purposes doesn’t need to be boiled.

The advisory is to remain in effect until otherwise stated.

Those with any questions can call the Regional Drinking Water Officer at 570-1405.

The trial in Brandon continued yesterday, involving three men killing Garnet Baptiste of Ebb and Flow First Nation.

Jurors were shown surveillance footage from the Carberry Motor Inn of the assault in the parking lot, which led to Baptiste’s death.

Later on a search of Baptiste’s hotel room revealed empty containers of alcohol, drug paraphernalia.

The accused’s hotel room revealed nothing more than a broken lamp, which may have been used to strike Baptiste.

The three accused have pleaded not guilty to manslaughter.

Shoplifters in Dauphin are working in groups and in a more organized fashion as opposed to alone.

Many businesses are looking to deal with the issue rather than ignore it and have been approaching Riehl Securities for solutions and help with loss prevention.

Business owners have taken to social media posts to help identify shoplifters.

Kerri Riehl, owner of Riehl Securities, says it’s the same people who are shoplifting.

“That is also a concern I am hearing from the business community is that it’s the same people. There’s people that are banned from every grocery store and getting prescriptions and if you follow social media you can see that it’s the same people being identified.”

Anyone trying to apprehend or deal with shoplifters should be properly trained to prevent any injuries or liabilities.

Riehl is working on a database of shoplifters in the area as a resource for businesses.