- The city's extreme weather response will be activated from June 8 to June 13 due to extreme heat and may be extended if conditions persist. Extreme heat response measures include water bottle filling stations across the city, which will be open until Sept. 30. Those needing a break from the heat can find relief in any open city facility or library, and peace officers will carry water bottles to distribute to Edmontonians in need.
- Const. Yi Yang of the Edmonton Police Service as well as former community peace officers Mathieu Labrie and Jeffrey Mullenix have been charged with failing to provide the necessaries of life following an internal investigation into a March 2020 incident in which a man was found dead of fentanyl toxicity inside a holding cell at a police detainee management unit. At the time, all three men were working as community peace officers in the unit. An earlier Alberta Serious Incident Response Team (ASIRT) report found officers noticed something was wrong with the detainee nearly five hours after he stopped moving and thus failed to comply with police service policy that officers conduct "arousal checks" every hour. EPS would not comment further as the matter is before the courts.
- Edmonton Public Schools has released data from its first-ever survey of student demographics. The data reflects responses from 55,800 students across 213 schools, who answered questions about their race, religion, ethnicity, gender, and Indigenous identity. In total, 33% identified as white, 16% as East Asian, 16% as South Asian, 11% as Black, 10% as First Nations, Métis, or Inuit, 8% as Middle Eastern, and 7% as Southeast Asian. About 22% of students in Grades 7 to 12 identified as Christian, 18% as Muslim, and 22% as having no religious affiliation. Among students in Grades 4 to 12, most identified as female or male, while about 3% identified as non-binary and 3% as a gender not listed on the survey. Students in Grades 7 to 12 also answered questions about sexual orientation, with 67% identifying as heterosexual, 8% as bisexual, 2% as lesbian, 1.4% as gay, and 7% preferring not to answer. In 2020, Edmonton Public Schools was the first Alberta school division to commit to collecting demographic information, although some Ontario school divisions have been doing similar surveys for years.
- Officials marked the start of construction on the new $38.6-million Edmonton-Strathcona County Footbridge on June 7. When finished, the footbridge will cross the North Saskatchewan River, connecting 167 Avenue in Edmonton to Township Road 540 in Strathcona County. Construction is expected to be complete in 2025. Half of the funding for the project came from the River Valley Alliance, while the City of Edmonton and Strathcona County are sharing the remaining costs evenly.
- The Archdiocese of Edmonton announced on June 7 it will donate $3.2 million to the national Indigenous Reconciliation Fund, a charity created in 2022 that accepts contributions from 73 Catholic entities across Canada and aims to fulfill a $30-million financial commitment made in 2021. The donation comes after the Pope's "penitential pilgrimage" to Canada last summer, during which he visited Maskwacis and Edmonton, and participated in an annual pilgrimage to Lac Ste. Anne.
- Alphonso Davies hosted a soccer camp for kids on June 7 at the Victoria Soccer Club, where Davies himself played many matches as a child. The camp drew 44 kids aged eight to 12, and tickets were sold out within five hours of going on sale. It is the first of many grassroots soccer programs planned to encourage the next generation of Canadian soccer players.
- Premier Danielle Smith is expected to announce her new government cabinet on June 9. The UCP will begin its mandate with 14 fewer seats than in 2019, after former cabinet ministers Kaycee Madu, Tyler Shandro, Jason Copping, Jeremy Nixon, Nicholas Milliken, and Jason Luan all lost their seats in the recent election. Former cabinet ministers Travis Toews and Sonya Savage decided not to run again.
Headlines: June 8, 2023
By Kevin Holowack