California state scientists authorize first-ever strike. Will workers walk off the job?

Lindsey Holden
Sat, September 2, 2023 

Kevin Neri/kneri@sacbee.com

California state scientists could potentially walk off the job for the first time in their union’s four-decade history.

The California Association of Professional Scientists on Friday announced members voted to authorize a strike after a three-year contract fight. The union represents about 5,300 managerial-level scientists in state government who monitor food safety, prevent air and water pollution and manage natural resources, among other public duties.

CAPS leaders announced the strike authorization vote on Tuesday, and members were able to cast ballots until 8 a.m. on Friday. About 93.5% of members voted in favor of calling a strike, according to a news release.

“I’m extremely proud of the members who stood together and voted,” said Jacqueline Tkac, CAPS bargaining committee chair, in a statement. “State scientists are united and are willing to fight for what they deserve, if necessary. This vote is a clear message to our bargaining partners in the Newsom administration that their last, late-hour offer was sadly inadequate.”

The union has been fighting for pay raises of 30% to 40% to fix wage disparities between scientists and their engineering counterparts. Members say engineers receive significantly more money for similar work.

The strike authorization does not mean CAPS members will walk off the job. However, it will allow leaders to call for a strike if the union cannot reach a contract agreement with the state and declares an impasse.

The strike authorization announcement describes negotiations as having reached a “critical juncture” ahead of the final two weeks of the legislative calendar. The Senate and Assembly conclude their business on Sept. 14.

“We continue to bargain, of course,” Tkac said in her statement. “But time is short to reach an agreement and state scientists are tired of the state’s foot-dragging and lowball offers. The bargaining team remains steadfastly committed to our efforts to ensure the state of California becomes a just and equitable employer for state scientists.”

Tremors are shaking Washington’s volcanoes, including Mount Baker. What’s causing it?

Robert Mittendorf
Thu, August 31, 2023 

Several Washington state volcanoes are showing what appear to be swarms of minor earthquakes, a phenomenon that’s lasted for the past month or more.

But a Western Washington University seismologist known for explaining the recent “Swift quake” says they might not be earthquakes at all.

Seismographs on Mount Baker, Mount Rainier and Mount St. Helens each registered a dozen or more apparent temblors in July and August, according to data posted at the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network website.

All were less than magnitude 2, and many were less than magnitude 1 — too small to be felt by people.

Even so, increased seismic activity can indicate that an eruption is imminent, as happened in 1980 with Mount St. Helens.


But what looks like seismic shaking on these volcanoes isn’t even an earthquake, a Western Washington University seismology professor said.

Turns out, the tremors are actually vibrations from the folding and cracking of glaciers, Jackie Caplan-Auerbach told The Bellingham Herald.

“A lot of the earthquakes that you are seeing right now are those little tiny glacier quakes,” Caplan-Auerbach said in an interview.

Western Washington University geology professor Jackie Caplan-Auerbach is shown doing field work off the coast of Hawaii in July 2018.

“These are associated in some way with the glaciers. It often looks alarming. (But) none of these look out of the ordinary,” she said.

Caplan-Auerbach, who is a professor in WWU’s Geology Department and associate dean of the College of Science and Engineering, made international news in August when she shared that Taylor Swift’s recent Seattle concerts registered more forcefully on seismographs than the Seattle Seahawks’ 2013 “Beast Quake.”

Glaciers are giant rivers of ice, and as they creep along and melt and freeze they create cracks and crevasses, Caplan-Auerbach said.

“Those cracks shake the ground like an earthquake,” she said.

Glaciers on Mount Baker are seen from the Heliotrope Ridge Trail in August 2020, The 10,781-foot volcano is about 50 miles east of Bellingham.

How billion-dollar hurricanes, other disasters are starting to reshape your insurance bill

Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY
Updated Sat, September 2, 2023 

As coastal residents pick up the pieces in Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas, the final price tag from Idalia is far from clear. But one thing is already known – the storm is yet another reminder that protecting homes with insurance is getting harder, riskier and more expensive as temperatures warm and weather events grow more erratic and intense.

While nowhere near as harmful as it might have been, Hurricane Idalia is still predicted to have caused somewhere between $12 and $20 billion in damage and lost output, according to Moody's Analytics. In Florida alone, Idalia may result in insured losses of almost $10 billion, according to USB Bank.

As insurance companies try to quantify risk from climate change, the unglamorous industry is proving to be a key part of how Americans experience the effects of climate change. Virtually anyone buying a house with a mortgage must have homeowner's insurance, and insurance companies in disaster-prone areas have been significantly raising rates or withdrawing altogether from certain areas.

There's a lot at stake: If you don't have insurance, you can't get a mortgage.

An aerial view shows a vehicle driving along a flooded street in New Port Richey, Florida, on August 30, 2023.
How will insurance be affected by Idalia?

Climate change is leading to more intense and frequent natural catastrophes. What changes are likely to be coming as insurers try to balance customer needs with rising costs? James Eck, a senior credit officer with Moody's Investors Service who produced two in-depth reports looking at the issues this week, says insurance companies may make changes in the future:

Individual homeowners might be expected to take on more of the initial risk. "Instead of a $1,000 or $5,000 deductible, maybe it's $20,000 or $25,000," he said.


Insurance companies might reduce the concentration of risk in a given area. So in a given ZIP code they might cap the number of homes they insure, so their exposure to risk is lowered and their customer base is diversified.

Blueprint: Best homeowners insurance in Florida of September 2023

To lower premiums, homeowners might be encouraged to install relatively low-cost flood protection measures that lower the chance of catastrophic damage. Examples include:

Moving utilities above the base flood elevation, often out of basements or first floors, so furnaces, water heaters, electrical systems and other utilities are at least 12 inches above possible water levels.

Replace carpeting on lower levels with tile, which is flood-resistant.

Flood-proof basements by sealing walls with waterproofing compounds. Possibly installing a sump pump.

Install flood vents, which allow water to flow through and then drain out of a home, lowering the risk of structural damage.

Use flood-resistant insulation and drywall, which can minimize water damage and be easily cleaned and sanitized.
In a warming world, how do you make it affordable?

At its core, insurance rests on a simple proposition: If you spread the risk of disaster over a large population, in any given year most people will be fine and their premiums will pay for those who are hit with catastrophe.

Over hundreds of years, insurance companies have gotten very good at calculating the threat of those catastrophes so they can accurately guess just how much risk to take on and still make money.

That calculation has become more difficult as climate change increases the number of disasters, from wildfires in the West to droughts in the Midwest to destructive storms along the East Coast.

Insurance generally presumes that events hit random people, not entire blocks or subdivisions or ZIP codes, said Robin Dillon-Merrill, a professor of operations and management at Georgetown University.

"It starts to break down when the disasters keep getting bigger and bigger," she said.

In response, some insurance companies have simply stopped writing new policies in areas they consider too risky. In Florida, several insurers have curtailed offerings or left the market entirely due to frivolous lawsuits, fraudulent insurance claims and overall hurricane risk. In California, the rising number and ferocity of wildfires, coupled with thousands of residents who want to live in the beautiful but dangerous Wildland Urban Interface have caused some insurers to stop writing new policies.

Nationally, insurance is also more expensive because rebuilding costs have risen due to higher construction prices, inflation and supply chain issues.

Contributing: Trevor Hughes

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Idalia kicks off huge insurance costs in hurricane season 2023

'Long overdue': China's new Foreign State Immunity Law will align it with Western practices

South China Morning Post
Fri, September 1, 2023 

Beijing has made the unprecedented decision to allow some cases against foreign states in Chinese courts, a move that will align its take on "foreign state immunity" with mainstream Western practices.

China has long taken the stance that states and their property are immune from the jurisdiction of the courts of other states. Previously, it has never allowed a case where a foreign state or government was sued, nor has it allowed any claim involving a foreign state or their property.

But the Foreign State Immunity Law, adopted by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress on Friday, will remove such immunity from next year.

Legal experts said the "long overdue" law could provide better legal protection for private businesses involved in international trade as China works to restore business confidence.

From January 1, 2024, sovereign states or entities authorised to act on their behalf that are involved in certain territorial infringements or commercial activities will no longer be immune from prosecution in China.

Commercial activity was defined in the draft law as "any transaction or investment involving goods or services or other act of a commercial nature that does not constitute an exercise of sovereign authority".

"Loans" were added to the list of activities after the deliberation, according to the state-run newspaper Legal Daily.

The law aims to "improve China's foreign state immunity system" and "clarify the jurisdiction of the courts of the People's Republic of China over civil cases involving foreign states and their property".

The standing committee also amended the Civil Procedure Law in the same meeting, allowing embassies to collect evidence in foreign countries if a plaintiff before a Chinese court needs to seek evidence abroad and the court finds it necessary.

The amendment will also take effect on January 1 and will be exercised according to domestic laws. The amendment is conducive to "better safeguarding China's sovereignty, security and development interests", Xinhua said.

"The Foreign State Immunity Law generally brings China in line with the approach of most other states," said James D Fry, an associate professor of law at the University of Hong Kong.

"For example, international law generally does not recognise immunity for torts or delicts [infringements or violations of the law] committed in the host state, and Article 9 of the draft law makes that express," he said.

While the bill did not specify, he expected the law would also apply to Hong Kong, following the 2011 Congo judgment that the city would follow the China approach on state immunity issues.

"This change will make it easier to enforce arbitration awards in Hong Kong, among other things, which should help strengthen Hong Kong's reputation as a hub for dispute resolution."

The immunity of states from the jurisdiction of foreign domestic courts has been a long-standing and widely accepted principle of international law.

After World War II, most sovereign countries, including the United States and Britain, enacted their own laws to allow some exceptions for better legal protection to businesses engaging in international transactions - changing their approach from "absolute immunity" to "restrictive immunity".

China and Russia were the two main holdouts from the shift - which has meant suing a foreign state in domestic courts has been impossible.

"For many years, China has been reluctant to abandon the traditional absolute theory for fear that it may expose China to many lawsuits in foreign courts," said Bing Ling, a Chinese law professor at the University of Sydney.

But the concern was "misconceived" because whatever theory China upholds, foreign courts could always apply their own laws of restrictive immunity in lawsuits against China, he said.

China signed the United Nations Convention on Jurisdictional Immunities of States and Their Property in 2005 - which set out the circumstances under which a foreign state should not be immune from the jurisdiction of another state - but has yet to ratify it.

The Standing Committee of the National People's Congress passed the Foreign State Immunity Law which will bring China more in line with Western legal practices. 

After a US state filed a suit in federal court against China in 2020 for its alleged responsibility for the human and economic losses caused by Covid-19, more than 35 Chinese lawmakers proposed looking into a law on state immunity as they thought the absence of such legislation put China at a disadvantage when dealing with foreign litigation.

The foreign ministry then drafted the bill which was first deliberated by the standing committee in December.

"With China's engagement in international commerce, especially under the Belt and Road Initiative, Chinese companies have long required the same protection afforded by the restrictive immunity doctrine," Ling said.

He added that the final passage of the Foreign State Immunity Law "sends a somewhat different message" as it will see Chinese law conform "with the mainstream practice of Western countries".

China has recently expanded its legal tools to protect its national interest and security, notably the enactment of the Foreign Relations Law and amendments to the Counter-espionage Law.

Ryan Mitchell, an associate professor of law at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said while the new law is not entirely motivated by competition betweeen China and the US, it could create room for "sanctions-like techniques against foreign states or their officials".

"For instance, denying immunity for damage to property in the PRC could be interpreted broadly to justify some types of lawsuits or fines," he said.

Copyright (c) 2023. South China Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

OOPS

Italian ex-premier says French missile downed an airliner in 1980 by accident in bid to kill Gadhafi

FRANCES D'EMILIO
Sat, September 2, 2023 



- An Italian Carabinieri police officer patrols a hangar, in Pratica di Mare, near Rome, Monday Dec. 15, 2003, the reconstructed wreckage of the Itavia DC-9 passenger jetliner which crashed near the tiny Mediterranean island of Ustica in June 27, 1980. A former Italian premier is contending that a French air force missile brought down a passenger jet over the Mediterranean Sea in 1980 and is appealing to France's president to respond. The crash of the Italian domestic airliner killed all 81 persons aboard. What caused the crash is an enduring mystery. 

(AP Photo/Emiliano Grillotti, File)

ROME (AP) — A former Italian premier, in an interview published on Saturday, contended that a French air force missile accidentally brought down a passenger jet over the Mediterranean Sea in 1980 in a failed bid to assassinate Libya's then leader Moammar Gadhafi.

Former two-time Premier Giuliano Amato appealed to French President Emmanuel Macron to either refute or confirm his assertion about the cause of the crash on June 27, 1980, which killed all 81 persons aboard the Italian domestic flight.

In an interview with Rome daily La Repubblica, Amato said he is convinced that France hit the plane while targeting a Libyan military jet.

While acknowledging he has no hard proof, Amato also contended that Italy tipped off Gadhafi, and so the Libyan, who was heading back to Tripoli from a meeting in Yugoslavia, didn't board the Libyan military jet.

What caused the crash is one of modern Italy’s most enduring mysteries. Some say a bomb exploded aboard the Itavia jetliner on a flight from Bologna to Sicily, while others say examination of the wreckage, pulled up from the seafloor years later, indicate it was hit by a missile.

Radar traces indicated a flurry of aircraft activity in that part of the skies when the plane went down.

“The most credible version is that of responsibility of the French air force, in complicity with the Americans and who participated in a war in the skies that evening of June 27," Amato was quoted as saying.

NATO planned to “simulate an exercise, with many planes in action, during which a missile was supposed to be fired” with Gadhafi as the target, Amato said.

In the aftermath of the crash, French, U.S. and NATO officials denied any military activity in the skies that night.

According to Amato, a missile was allegedly fired by a French fighter jet that had taken off from an aircraft carrier, possibly off Corsica's southern coast.

Macron, 45, was a toddler when the Italian passenger jet went down in the sea near the tiny Italian island of Ustica.

"I ask myself why a young president like Macron, while age-wise extraneous to the Ustica tragedy, wouldn't want to remove the shame that weighs on France," Amato told La Repubblica. ”And he can remove it in only two ways — either demonstrating that the this thesis is unfounded or, once the (thesis') foundation is verified, by offering the deepest apologies to Italy and to the families of the victims in the name of his government."

Amato, who is 85, said that in 2000, when he was premier, he wrote to the then presidents of the United States and France, Bill Clinton and Jacques Chirac, respectively, to press them to shed light on what happened. But ultimately, those entreaties yielded “total silence,” Amato said.

When queried by The Associated Press, Macron’s office said Saturday it wouldn't immediately comment on Amato’s remarks.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni called on Amato to say if he has concrete elements to back his assertions so that her government could pursue any further investigation.

Amato's words "merit attention,'' Meloni said in a statement issued by her office, while noting that the former premier had specified that his assertions are “fruit of personal deductions.”

Assertions of French involvement aren't new. In a 2008 television interview, former Italian President Francesco Cossiga, who was serving as premier when the crash occurred, blamed it on a French missile whose target had been a Libyan military jet and said he learned that Italy's secret services military branch had tipped off Gadhafi.

Gadhafi was killed in Libya's civil war in 2011.

A few weeks after the crash, the wreckage of a Libyan MiG, with the badly decomposed body of its pilot, was discovered in the remote mountains of southern Calabria.

___

Sylvie Corbet contributed to this report from Paris.

OK EVERYBODY STAY HOME

Russia to block G20 declaration if its views are ignored - Lavrov

Reuters
Fri, September 1, 2023 



MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia will block the final declaration of this month's G20 summit unless it reflects Moscow's position on Ukraine and other crises, leaving participants to issue a non-binding or partial communique, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday.

Lavrov, who has served as President Vladimir Putin's foreign minister since 2004, is due to represent Russia at the Sept. 9-10 meeting of the Group of 20 leading industrialised and developing countries in New Delhi.

Putin is not known to have travelled abroad since the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him in March on suspicion of war crimes in Ukraine.

"There will be no general declaration on behalf of all members if our position is not reflected," Lavrov told students at the prestigious Moscow State Institute of International Relations.

The Kremlin casts the Ukraine war, which began when Russia invaded in February 2022, as an existential battle with an arrogant West that Putin says wants to dismantle Russia and take control of its vast natural resources.

The West denies any such intentions but says it wants Ukraine to defeat Russia on the battlefield and has imposed several rounds of sweeping economic sanctions in response to the invasion, which Russia calls a "special military operation".

Other leading powers such as China, India and Brazil have called for peace but also reserved the right to determine their own relationship with Moscow. China has accused the West of fanning the war by supplying Ukraine with weapons.

Lavrov said the West had raised Ukraine in meetings preparing for the summit, to which Russia had replied that "the issue is closed for us".

He accused the West of undermining international institutions by pushing its own agenda and suggested that, if consensus could not be reached at the G20 meeting, a non-binding communique could be issued by the G20 presidency.

"Another option is to adopt a document that focuses on specific decisions in the sphere of G20 competences, and let everyone say the rest on their own behalf," Lavrov said.

(Writing by Guy Faulconbridge and Felix Light; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

TRUMP'S FIFTH COLUMN
Trump's Supporters Want To Help Him Crush Democracy. This Is What It Means For Black Folks

Candace McDuffie
Fri, September 1, 2023

Photo: Martin H. Simon (Getty Images)

Donald Trump may be drowning in a sea of legal problems that could land him in jail for the rest of his life, his staunchest supporters are keeping their eyes on the ball. The ball, in this case, is a second presidency in which Trump is the key to realizing some conservatives’ fever dream of dismantling what they call the ‘administrative state’ of the federal government.

In simple terms, the right is no longer cosplaying as a movement for limited government with less spending; it openly wants to erase much of the federal government itself, with a specific focus on departments that protect civil and voting rights and the environment or check abuses out of control police departments. It also sees no need for an Education Department or even the Justice Department. In other words, they want to do away with all the ways the government functions to help everyday people, especially Black and brown folks, and the conservative orgs who want this see Trump as the prophet who’s come to part the political waters that lead to their promised land.

This initiative is being led by Heritage Foundation, as well as former Trump administration officials, who plan on forming a makeshift government in the event that Trump returns to office. However, they will back any conservative who beats Biden.

Armed with their 1,000-page “Project 2025” handbook, numerous conservative groups are preparing to have the infrastructure ready to get rid of a “deep state” bureaucracy if the GOP takes over the White House. The first step to achieving this, according to the document, is by firing up to 50,000 federal employees.

Historically, Republicans have always wanted to limit the federal government by cutting federal taxes as well as federal spending. Now, Trump has inspired conservatives to get rid of federal employees who oppose their policies and beliefs altogether. Those workers would be replaced by yes-men, eager to fulfill the President’s wishes which would render the position a dictatorship.

This agenda has been endorsed by Trump’s GOP competitors Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy. Despite how demented it is, it could happen if Schedule F—a Trump executive order that makes thousands of federal employees at-will workers disposable—is reinstated.

Biden repealed the executive order when he took office in 2021, but GOP candidates are hoping to reverse it. The handbook also calls for an overhaul of the Department of Justice, getting rid of diversity and inclusion initiatives in the Pentagon and bolstering law enforcement officials.

Heritage released a similar book 50 years ago, as a precursor to the Ronald Reagan administration. That only illustrates how conservatives’ goal of an authoritarian society has always been their bottom line.

The Root

UCP DEREGULATION

Paramedics, tow truck drivers criticize Alberta's diluted safety legislation for roadside workers

NDP Transportation critic tells UCP  to put Friday's roll-out on hold and go back to the original set of rules, which are the norm in most Canadian provinces

CBC
Fri, September 1, 2023

Don Getschel, president of the Towing and Recovery Association of Alberta, stands next to one of his company's trucks on Friday. (Travis McEwan/CBC - image credit)

Tow truck drivers and paramedics are joining the voices criticizing the provincial government for walking back some of new traffic safety provisions intended to protect roadside workers.

The original version of the 2022 legislation, which amended the Traffic Safety Act, required drivers in every lane going in the same direction to reduce their speed to 60 kilometres per hour when passing a roadside worker's vehicle with its flashing lights on. Drivers on two-lane highways were required to slow to 60 in both directions.

Earlier this month, Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen announced the speed limit change would come into effect on Sept. 1, but would only apply to drivers in the lane closest to the roadside worker.

Mike Parker, the president of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta, and Don Getschel, president of the Towing and Recovery Association of Alberta said Friday he thinks the new rules are dangerous for everyone on the road.

They said people driving 60 could be rear-ended by other drivers going nearly twice the speed when they change lanes.

"This creates unnecessary risk for the motoring public and for us as workers on the roadside," Getschel said at an NDP news conference in Edmonton, the same day the new rules come into effect.

Getschel, who owns a towing company with an office in Leduc, said his operators have seen 14 major collisions over 12 years. Two were so serious that the operators were taken to hospital in an ambulance, he said.

"We were hoping that this change would be a positive thing for our industry, but unfortunately that didn't happen," he said.

Jesse Furber, press secretary for Dreeshen, said in an email to CBC News that it was safer for vehicles in the outside lanes to keep a consistent highway speed.

"Some Alberta roads have up to five lanes, and having five lanes slow down to 60km/h will create a sudden bottleneck increasing the risk of sudden or improper braking leading to a higher risk of rear-end collisions," he wrote. "It is also the case that drivers in the far lane often cannot see that a vehicle is stopped on the shoulder multiple lanes across from them.

'In the winter, this becomes even more unsafe as it takes up to 10 times longer to stop on snow and ice than it does on dry pavement."

Furber said drivers aren't expected to change lanes away from stopped roadside vehicles if it isn't safe to do so. They are required to go 60 km/hr or the posted speed if it is lower.

The old rules required drivers in the adjacent lane to slow to 60 km/hr when passing an emergency vehicle, tow trucks and construction crews when vehicle lights were flashing.

In addition to requiring drivers in all lanes to slow down, the amendments to the Traffic Safety Act passed by the Alberta legislature in 2022 extended the rule to snowplows and maintenance crews.

The 2022 regulations were supposed to come into effect in March but were put on hold. At the time, the government said it needed to release a two- to three-month campaign to educate drivers.

Don Getschel, president of the Towing and Recovery Association of Alberta (left), Lorne Dach, NDP Transportation critic, and Mike Parker, president of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta, want the province to require drivers in all lanes to slow to 60 km/hr when passing a roadside vehicle with flashing lights.

Don Getschel, president of the Towing and Recovery Association of Alberta (left), Lorne Dach, NDP Transportation critic, and Mike Parker, president of the Health Sciences Association of Alberta, want the province to require drivers in all lanes to slow to 60 km/hr when passing a roadside vehicle with flashing lights. (Travis McEwan/CBC)

In early August, Dreeshen announced the Sept. 1 start date. It was only then that the media and groups like the Alberta Motor Association noticed the regulations were different.

Parker, whose union represents Alberta paramedics, said HSAA was not consulted about the change. He said the government needs to get everyone passing a roadside vehicle to slow to 60 regardless of what lane they're in.

"When there's an incident with the emergency lights on the side of the highway, everybody slows down," he said. "It's that simple .Now you've got multiple lanes doing 110 and 120, one lane trying to do 60. This is the chaos."

NDP Transportation critic Lorne Dach wants Dreeshen to put Friday's roll-out on hold and go back to the original set of rules, which are the norm in most Canadian provinces.

UNB 'condensing' nursing program into three-year degree

GOOD IDEA SAYS NORMAN BETHUNE

Local Journalism Initiative
Fri, September 1, 2023

A new UNB degree program is aimed at getting nursing hopefuls onto the job faster in order to address shortages in New Brunswick.

UNB Saint John will be launching a three-year bachelor of nursing program starting in September 2024, said Arlene Dunn, the province's minister of post-secondary education, training and labour, at an announcement Friday afternoon at UNB Saint John.

Petra Hauf, UNB vice-president, Saint John, told the crowd it was "condensing a well-oiled machine" to offer a more accessible alternative to the school's four-year nursing bachelor program, with a three-terms-per-year model.

"It's extremely important that we build those avenues and pathways ... and expedite those opportunities, make it easier for them to get back out into the field quickly," Dunn told reporters after the announcement. "That helps with the shortage we have right now."

Dunn said the province will provide $412,000 up front for the first class of 21 students, with up to $1.2 million available over three years dependent on evaluation of results, including student graduation rate and continued enrolment and retention throughout the program.

Hauf told reporters some of that money would be used to pick up additional faculty.

"We will need more faculty to support the clinics, and that's why we're so happy to have PETL supporting us with the funds to be able to hire the additional staff that we need," she said.

Catherine Hamilton, chair of the nursing department at UNB Saint John, told the Telegraph-Journal that the program will have the same rigour but has some different scheduling.

While some nursing courses have to be taken in order because they "build off each other," others which can be moved will be done during the summer term, she said.

For years two and three of the program, what that ends up looking like is fewer courses per term, without a summer break.

"Students are going to get the same education, fewer courses per term, the same number of total courses," Hamilton said, noting that students can then recoup the extra pay from starting their career a year earlier.

Hamilton said the department has created a leadership position related to academic success who will monitor the program and whether there are issues with lack of a break or lack of extra time to work.

"When we have a new program like this, we're very interested in just this issue, especially when there are possible stressors," she said. "We're acutely aware of it, and we're just going to monitor them. We're aware of it, it's on our radar, we're supporting them."

For the first year, applicants would study alongside students in the four-year program, which currently has 56 seats, and once the schedules diverged they would look at opportunities to "maximize" having classes at the same time, Hamilton said.

For clinical placements, Hauf said that this enables trainees to go "off-cycle," taking advantage of placement spots that may have been filled during a regular term.

"Offering that off-cycle option allows us to have more access options for students because learning and learners have different needs now than they might have had 20 years ago," she said.

Dunn said that there would be opportunities to review the success of the program in March of 2025 and 2026.

"We would want to see that continuity of student attraction and retention through that entire process, and of course success rates as well," she said, adding that the funding may continue "as long as the partners are committed to doing what they signed up to do."

According to Horizon Health Network's nurse recruitment dashboard, there is a target of 708 new nurses by March 2024, with 376 of those positions filled. In June, the provincial nursing union said there were 1,200 vacancies, the Telegraph-Journal previously reported.

"We are working diligently to make sure that we're focused on what that gap is and filling that gap," Dunn said.

Andrew Bates, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Telegraph-Journal

Ecuador presidential front-runner dons bulletproof vest amid threats

Reuters
Fri, September 1, 2023 a

Presidential election in Ecuador


QUITO (Reuters) - Ecuadorean presidential front-runner Luisa Gonzalez said on Friday she will wear a bulletproof vest while campaigning, following threats against her life and the gunning down of another candidate last month.

She will also accept the government's offer of military protection, her party, Citizen's Revolution, said in a statement.

"I am forced to wear a bulletproof vest and to accept the government's offer to have security provided by the armed forces," Gonzalez said while speaking to voters in Otavalo city, in Imbabura province.

Security conditions in Ecuador have deteriorated in recent years, with soaring murder rates and growing levels of crime. Violence has accelerated during the elections, with candidate Fernando Villavicencio shot to death in Quito on Aug. 10 as he was leaving a campaign event.

The capital was even rocked by two car bombs on Wednesday night in acts of violence that officials said could be linked to disquiet over prisoner transfers between prisons.

Ecuador's attorney general's office has opened an investigation against a citizen who made threats against Gonzalez, the statement said.

"It's unfortunate to have to carry out a political campaign in a situation where a candidate was assassinated and in which today I received threats against my life as I am the candidate with the best chance of becoming president," she said.

Gonzalez, a protege of former President Rafael Correa who has promised to revive his social programs, won 33% support in a first-round election last month.

She will face off against Daniel Noboa, who came second in the first round, in a second vote on Oct. 15.

Outgoing President Guillermo Lasso - who dissolved the legislature and called early elections to avoid an impeachment process - has repeatedly blamed the spiraling violence on drug trafficking gangs operating in the country.

(Reporting by Alexandra Valencia; Writing by Oliver Griffin; Editing by Sandra Maler)

Ecuador vote shows contrasting roles of political parties and social movements

August 31, 2023 

 BY W. T. WHITNEY JR.

An electoral official shows the ballot for a presidential election in Ayora, Ecuador, Sunday, Aug. 20, 2023. The election was called after President Guillermo Lasso dissolved the National Assembly by decree in May to avoid being impeached. | Dolores Ochoa / AP

On Aug. 20 in Ecuador, 45-year-old lawyer Luisa González of the Citizen’s Revolution movement political party (RC) gained 33.6% of the votes in first-round balloting for eight presidential candidates. Second-place candidate Daniel Noboa of the National Democratic Action, a 35-year-old businessman and political neophyte, took 23.4% of the vote. González and Noboa will be competing in second-round voting on Oct. 15.

As for the elections to the National Assembly, the RC accounted for 39.4% of the votes, three other parties for 45% of those votes, and five smaller parties for the remaining ballots.

The voters also considered referendums, one on halting oil extraction from Ecuador’s huge Yasuní National Park and the other on prohibiting mining activities in a biosphere region northeast of Quito. The referendums were approved by 59% and 68% of the voters, respectively.

The circumstances were unusual. Two processes played out on parallel tracks and culminated together. These were political parties taking part in elections and social movements pursuing referendums. Contradictions emerged along with the promise of troubles ahead and signs of commitment and hope.

The new president will serve only the 18 months that remain in the term of Guillermo Lasso, elected in 2021 for a five-year term. When confronted with impeachment proceedings in May 2023 on corruption charges, Lasso dissolved the National Assembly and thereby, as provided by the Constitution, set in motion preparations for a new election and his own departure.

Nationwide Indigenous protests in 2022 accelerated the transition now taking place amidst violence attributed to narco-trafficking that took 4,671 lives during the past year. The election campaign itself provoked killings, those of presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio, a legislator, journalist, and labor leader; the mayor of Manta, Agustín Intriago, and others.

The Citizen’s Revolution movement political party, represented by presidential candidate Luisa González, defends policies of social assistance and national development introduced under the leadership of former President Rafael Correa during his tenure from 2007 to 2017. The CR took shape in reaction to the neoliberal turn taken by the government of Lenin Moreno, Correa’s former vice president and successor.

Its predecessor party, under Correa’s democratic-socialist leadership, managed the national economy so as to preserve funds for social programs through reliance on petroleum exports and foreign credit. The RC led left-leaning forces in opposing the neoliberal government of Guillermo Lasso, in power since 2021.

With his second-place finish in the recent voting, candidate Daniel Noboa surpassed expectations, due in part to a stellar TV debate performance. He represents wealth and power. His father, a five-time presidential candidate, and his uncle preside over an agro-export and real estate conglomerate made up of 200 business entities. They owe the government $1 billion in back taxes.

Now campaigning for the second round of presidential elections, RC candidate González would seem to differ greatly from the prince of such an empire. “We are going to deal with the basic causes of violence and criminality which are hunger, poverty, lack of education, and the absence of opportunity,” she noted as she was accepting her party’s nomination.

But all is not as it appears. The positions taken by the various presidential candidates on the referendums were revealing. Only four of the eight candidates unambiguously supported the Yasuní referendum; three of them represented right-wing parties. Noboa justified leaving oil underground based on his conclusion that the financial yield is low and that over-reliance on oil exports impedes diversification of the economy.

The Correa-inspired RC movement and its candidate Gonzalez rejected the Yasuní referendum. Previous governments, governments headed by Correa in particular, took the position that income from oil exports is crucial to continued funding of social advances.

The contrast between approval at the polls shown for the candidates of political parties and for approval of the referendums was striking─33.6% and 23.4%, respectively, versus 68% and 59%, respectively. One set of the voting results testified to activists’ enthusiasm and commitment.

Approval of the two referendums reflects the advocacy and hard work of environmentalists, Indigenous activists, and supporters of women’s rights. According to NACLA.org: “The vote marks a triumph for the country’s grassroots anti-extractivist, ecological, and Indigenous movements, whose road to victory comes from a decade of social and political conflicts over extractive industry policies.”

Journalist Gabriela Barzallo surveys collective efforts toward restraining oil extraction. Highlighting the persistent participation of social movements, she quotes Ecuadorian sociologist Gregorio Páez:


“This upcoming referendum … serves as an inspiration for all Ecuadorians to have the agency to decide over our natural resources, and to empower people to see that grassroots activism really can have changes in policies.”

Páez sees activism in Ecuador as “inspiring social movements on a global scale.”

Analyst Santiago Kingman explores the impact of social movements on the elections:


“The triumph of the social movements is understood as a positive response from cities and areas far removed from the oil-producing world. At least 59% of Ecuador’s citizens…are alienated from the electoral system and political parties and say they have another way of doing politics. Those who voted for Noboa [who favored the referendum’s approval] are against politics, but they are not anti-capitalists. The social organizations behind the referendums are anti-capitalists and are anti-political parties.”

Social movements have shaped political resistance throughout Latin America, in some countries more than others. They flourish, it seems, in situations of grief at the hands of international capitalism. Resonating there is contention over control of land and sub-soil resources, provision of energy, debt owed to foreign creditors, and prescriptions for domestic economies from abroad.

Capitalist-oriented political parties, often enablers of foreign predators, offer little resistance. Social movements active in Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Colombia, and now Ecuador have partially filled the void. Social movements operating in conjunction with anti-capitalist governments have different job descriptions.

Imaginings lead to speculation about an expanded role for social movements in the capitalist powerhouse nations. One recalls U.S. labor uprisings in the 1930s and the civil rights movement that peaked a few decades later.

CONTRIBUTOR

W. T. Whitney Jr. is a political journalist whose focus is on Latin America, health care, and anti-racism. A Cuba solidarity activist, he formerly worked as a pediatrician, lives in rural Maine. W.T. Whitney Jr. es un periodista político cuyo enfoque está en América Latina, la atención médica y el antirracismo. Activista solidario con Cuba, anteriormente trabajó como pediatra, vive en la zona rural de Maine.