On Oct. 28, Manitobans will once again elect the people who serve on our local school boards. School trustee races rarely attract the attention given to other elections. Yet school boards are among our most immediate forms of representative democracy.

Before asking who should be a school trustee, perhaps we should ask a more basic question:

What, exactly, are we electing a school trustee to do?

Trustees are elected to govern a school division. They are not elected to run it.

There’s an old saying that even a stopped clock is right twice a day. It’s a good way to describe Premier Wab Kinew’s recent announcement that his government is ending seasonal time changes in Manitoba. From this point on, Manitoba will remain on Central Daylight Time all year long.

Let’s give credit where it is due. The premier got it right when he announced that Manitobans will no longer turn their clocks back an hour this November. In fact, it should have been an easy decision.

Opinion polls show that the vast majority of Manitobans were ready to end the practice of switching their clocks twice a year. This issue was brought to the fore when British Columbia and Alberta recently announced that their residents would no longer have to switch their clocks. Saskatchewan, of course, had never participated in the time change.

With all our western neighbours ditching the twice-annual time change, it made little sense for Manitoba to continue with this antiquated practice. Plus, there’s plenty of evidence that switching our clocks was stressful and led to a loss of sleep. Now we will just keep the same time all year round.

Building permits are hitting new levels in Steinbach.

Coun. Susan Penner made the motion to approve the August building permits during the Tuesday council meeting.

While the month had a total permit value of $27.9 million, it was the number of residential units that stood out.

Residential permits exceeded $25 million, including 145 multi-family units and 3 single- or two-family units for a total of 148.

Re: Choose carefully in local elections, Think Again, Michael Zwaagstra, Sept. 10, The Carillon.

Mr. Zwaagstra shares methods for gathering information on candidates in the upcoming Hanover School Division board of trustees election in an effort to ascertain whether they are ‘right-leaning’ or ‘left-leaning.’ Presumably, he does this because he knows that any candidate tagged ‘conservative’ is essentially guaranteed to win any election in Steinbach and the RM of Hanover.

It’s no secret that the current HSD board of trustees has had more than its fair share of controversy. They have made quite a name for themselves; not only locally, but also provincially, and even nationally.

It’s also no secret that our district has consistently been voting conservative ever since the days American Christian radio programs first began airing on Southern Manitoba’s local radio stations. (Prior to that we generally voted liberal.)

Re: Choose carefully in local elections, Think Again, Michael Zwaagstra, Sept. 10, The Carillon.

How little does Mr. Zwaagstra think of the electorate, I wonder, to suggest that candidates running in the municipal election must fall on one side of the political spectrum or the other, and that this should be the deciding factor in how we vote?

In the view expressed in his column, traditional values and low taxes are right-leaning, so anyone supporting them must be on the right, while inclusion and big spending are left-leaning talking points used by those who are left-leaning. There is no room for nuance; all candidates must be sorted into either team left or team right so you can safely vote for whoever falls on your side of the line.

The word for this is tribalism.

As September rolls in, schools in the Lac du Bonnet constituency are buzzing with the excitement of a new school year. In rural areas, back-to-school time is not just another date on the calendar; it’s a perfect time for students to set their sights high, try out new activities, and build the relationships that make our schools the backbone of the community.

Congratulations to the Town of the Year! Thank you to the 100 years of Pine Falls committee and all their volunteers for an excellent weekend.

It was a great weekend, but a couple things were disappointing. The reconstruction of Highway 11 in the town revealed that the current government has reduced funding for basic infrastructure like sidewalks. Additionally, there has been a delay in the permitting process for the cleanup of the Pine Falls school following the recent fire, which has also been affected by government inaction.

As many of you know, the current NDP government has a history of pausing, delaying, or canceling various projects throughout Manitoba, including in the Lac du Bonnet constituency. Recently, the Park Avenue project in Beausejour and two childcare centers in Lac du Bonnet within the Sunrise School Division, as well as in Pinawa within the Whiteshell School District, have also experienced delays. We can only hope these projects are just postponed rather that fully cancelled, as we’ve seen with other initiatives.

The Steinbach Arts Council is offering a free parent and tot art workshop series for families with children aged 1–4. Led by qualified instructors, these interactive sessions focus on arts-based learning and wellness, spanning dance, music, visual arts, theatre, and culinary arts. Each workshop includes a healthy snack to support active lifestyles.

Parent and tot art workshop series schedule

• Dance workshop: Oct. 30, 2026

• Music and sensory exploration workshop: Nov. 6, 2026

Imagine what you could do with an extra $3,000 every year.

That’s how much extra money an average couple earning $30,000 each will have in their bank accounts if the Progressive Conservatives win the next provincial election. The PC Party is promising to raise the personal basic exemption from $15,780 to $30,000. This would be the highest basic exemption in the country.

Cutting income taxes is the simplest and best way to get more money into people’s pockets. Instead of mailing out cheques or creating yet another government program that requires a whole new set of bureaucrats to administer, the PC proposal means more money on your paycheque every month.

This is the kind of tax relief that Manitoba families urgently need. Sadly, the Manitoba NDP government is more focused on gimmicks than on providing meaningful help. For example, the much-trumpeted removal of the PST from pop and junk food sold in grocery stores reduces each grocery bill by mere pennies. By the end of the year, the average person has saved about $100—barely enough to make a dent on their bills.