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Partnership expands access to kids' mental health services
First 5 Plumas announces it is working with Lost Sierra Family Integration Center to provide easier access to infant and early childhood mental health and
Fall Preview with Entertainment Correspondent Mike Marra
Airdate: October 5th, 2026 Leoni Township Update with Administrator Mike JesterOctober 5, 2026City Treasurer Hosting Town Hall Meeting SeriesOctober 5, 2026Tecumseh Appleumpkin Festival This WeekendOctober 5, 2026Fall Preview with Entertainment Correspondent Mike MarraOctober 5, 2026Disney’s Frozen Premieres Thursday at The SaukOctober 5, 2026Alison McGlynn & Lilly Hayworth, The Annex Collective SalonOctober 5, 2026John Spink, Nite…
Part of Capitol complex in downtown Sacramento evacuated due to threat
California lawmakers are not currently in session, but construction crews and legislative employees were at the site.
EU science policy wonks debate prospect of stronger ties with Canada
Europe’s research and innovation sector has started asking questions on how European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s offer to make Canada “the first associate member of the EU” would actually work in practice, and who will get to shape priorities in a transatlantic relationship that is getting stronger. The Commission says it wants “a new model of association” under which the EU and Canada will aim to develop “a shared space” to face ongoing challenges. “Working in close coordination with our member states and the European Parliament, we will aim to create a new form of partnership that has not existed until now, building the closest imaginable form of association with a partner outside Europe,” a spokesperson told Science|Business.Locked in an escalating trade war with US President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly talked of annexing Canada, Prime Minister Mark Carney has been looking east, but full EU membership was never in play. Taking the floor a day after von der Leyen’s proposal, he agreed to strengthen ties under “an alliance of the future” but reined in enthusiasm on the new label. He also suggested expanding Canada’s involvement in the Erasmus+ student mobility scheme, to which it currently has limited access, and the next iteration of Horizon Europe. Canada joined the present Horizon Europe in 2024, but only contributes to collaborative projects.Neither side has detailed the next practical steps in developing this new relationship. “I think nobody at the moment truly knows how this will work,” said Michael Browne, chief executive and founder of Crowdhelix, a global collaborative network that connects players in research and innovation. “It’s more of a statement of intent for closer collaboration, which requires legislative frameworks and approval processes, which have not started.”Kurt Deketelaere, secretary general of the League of European Research Universities, said von der Leyen’s pitch to Canada is “politically significant, but the legal content still has to be negotiated and constructed.”Mattias Björnmalm, secretary general of the Cesaer university group, agreed that she had only opened “a political door” to Canada, as “associate membership does not come with a predefined set of rights in the EU institutions.”Not only does this status not currently exist as a legal category in the two treaties that set up how the EU functions, but the Commission president cannot unilaterally create a new category of EU membership.According to Deketelaere, Article 217 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU, which allows the bloc to make association deals with non-EU countries involving reciprocal rights and duties, is “the most obvious existing legal basis for building a much deeper EU-Canada relationship.”Getting universities involvedNo matter how this new cooperation takes shape, Liviu Matei, who heads the School of Education, Communication and Society at King’s College London, hopes to see universities involved in discussions from an early stage.“Its primary motivations, entirely justifiably, are political and geopolitical,” he said. “In the area of higher education, however, restricting the initiative to political and geopolitical considerations would limit the scope of cooperation and lead to distorted frameworks and counterproductive implementation.”It is all the more important since academic interests on the two sides of the Atlantic are “neither identical nor fully aligned,” Matei added. “This is not insurmountable; it simply requires work to articulate the details of this privileged cooperation, including its governance and funding frameworks, as well as its substantive content in education and research.”Related articlesCanada looks to deepen research and education links with the EUZaharieva hopes for a Horizon Europe deal in 2026Canada might participate in European Research Council schemes, for example, which was not on offer in the present Horizon Europe association agreement. But “there would have to be something in it for the EU,” Browne said. “They don’t want to be funding projects outside of the EU where intellectual property is going to sit outside of the EU. There has to be some kind of transfer of knowledge.”But access to funding will not by itself resolve all the practical difficulties of working together, said Björnmalm. “For researchers and students, these include visas and residence arrangements, recognition of qualifications and study periods, and the conditions for pursuing a research career across borders,” he said. “For universities, there is scope for more predictable access to shared laboratories, computing and research data, and stronger support for joint doctoral training and long-term institutional partnerships.”Linda Doyle, provost and president of Trinity College Dublin, said Europe should strive for the “closest possible expression” of this new political alliance. “If Europe is serious about recovering its voice and its place in the world, it needs to be strongly allied with countries who share its values and its vision for a stable, rules-based, peaceful world.”
Cheyenne Audubon says proposed business park addition threatens important bird area
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The Cheyenne City Council's Public Services Committee advanced a handful of ordinances to annex and zone Laramie County land for
Local Business Owners Start New Chapter with Opening of New PostalAnnex Location in Bastrop, Texas
Annex Brands, Inc., one of the leading franchisors in the packing, shipping and office services industries, is excited to announce the opening of its newest PostalAnnex location in Bastrop, Texas to new owners Chetan Modi and Karan Desai. This new PostalAnnex is set to offer a wide range of essential shipping and office services to the local community, making it easier to provide more service to more people in more places.
Russia holds parliamentary vote in areas it seized from Ukraine in the war
Russia's parliamentary election for the first time is being held in Ukraine's regions that Moscow illegally annexed after the start of its full-scale invasion more than 4 1/2 years ago.
Trump announces agreement with Denmark to secure ‘permanent’ control over Greenland’s security
The agreement comes after President Donald Trump previously suggested annexing Greenland through military force before saying he wouldn’t.
Lane County, PeaceHealth continue push for new mental health facilities as Springfield weighs land annexation
Lane County and PeaceHealth want to open a new behavioral health campus in Springfield. But before the project can move forward, the City of Springfield has to agree to annex the land.
Property owners withdraw 601-acre annexation petition for Amazon's $5B data center
Property owners withdraw Amazon data center annexation petition ahead of Trenton's November referendum on banning such facilities.
Lane County, Springfield ‘making progress’ on behavioral health campus
Lane County officials need Springfield councilors to bless their request for an annexation before a stabilization center can move forward.
Local Business Owner Starts New Chapter with Opening of New Postal Connections Location in Hillsboro, Oregon
Annex Brands, Inc., one of the leading franchisors in the packing, shipping and office services industries, is excited to announce the opening of its newest Postal Connections location in Hillsboro, Oregon to new owner Jason Rautenkranz. This new Postal Connections is set to offer a wide range of essential shipping and office services to the local community, making it easier to provide more service to more people in more places.
Freya Industries raises SEK 6M to expand drone detection business
Swedish drone detection company Freya Industries has closed a SEK 6 million (approx. EUR 500k) round that will fund orders and expansion through Europe. Foundry ventures, Longswan Ventures, Propel Capital, Saminvest AB (via Annexstruktur), Schyssta Änglar, Sting and a small group of private investors contributed to the round. Freya’s sensors are designed to detect drones
These small Seattle theater spaces are making big moves
How new energy at Theatre Off Jackson, Annex Theatre and Seattle Open Arts Place is reinvigorating Seattle’s fringe theater scene, and why that matters.
Local Business Owners Start New Chapter with Opening of New PostalAnnex Location in Concord, California
Annex Brands, Inc., one of the leading franchisors in the packing, shipping and office services industries, is excited to announce the opening of its newest PostalAnnex location in Concord, CA to new owners, Rebeccah and Konstantin Rybalsky. This new PostalAnnex is set to offer a wide range of essential shipping and office services to the local community, making it easier to provide more service to more people in more places.
Council leans toward denying Springfield behavioral health campus annexation
Councillors did not vote on the annexation at the meeting but considered whether the planned crisis stabilization center and behavioral health hospital are consistent with the city’s plans for the area, which is designated for light industrial uses.
Nvidia PAIR Speeds Up AI Agents by Annexing PCs on Your Network
It's the home LAN reimagined.
Wherever Jared Kushner’s Disastrous Business Plans Wander, Indictments and Protests Seem to Follow
Maybe the president’s son-in-law shouldn’t try to annex a protected wildlife habitat in Albania, just saying.
North Range Business Park addition proposal advances to second committee look
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The Cheyenne City Council advanced an ordinance, which would annex a 34-acre lot into the city and eventually fold it into the North
Cheyenne Public Services Committee mulls planned business park addition, new Sweetgrass developments Monday
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The City of Cheyenne's Public Services Committee will meet Monday to discuss the proposed annexation and zoning of a 34-acre lot to be
Annex Health Sector Bulletin June 2026
in English on Syrian Arab Republic; published on 1 Jul 2026 by Health Cluster
Latvia pilots citizen engagement in research grant evaluations
Latvia has introduced an element of citizen engagement to the evaluation of nationally funded research grants. The aim is to both create more connections between science and society, and to improve the quality of its evaluations. The move comes as research funders across Europe are experimenting with ways to improve evaluation processes in the face of a sharpened focus on science’s impact on society. Evaluators of grant applications submitted to Latvia’s Fundamental and Applied Research Programme (FLPP), the country’s main research funder, will this year have the option of consulting citizen feedback on challenges the public thinks science should focus on to inform their decisions. “In recent years, both public discussions and policy-level debates in Latvia have highlighted the importance of demonstrating how publicly funded research contributes to society, the economy and the resolution of real-world challenges,” said a source at the Latvian Council of Science (LCS), which manages the FLPP. “At the same time, research institutions themselves expressed interest in improving the project evaluation framework while continuing to ensure that funding is awarded to the highest-quality projects,” the source added. The citizen input comes from a survey that was conducted between 25 February and 16 March 2025, to which 1,737 people responded. It gathered information on what the public views as problem areas for Latvia, and the role of science and technology in providing solutions to these problems. A summary of these responses has been included as an annex to the FLPP 2026 call for proposals that evaluators can refer to, purely in an advisory manner, when judging proposals. Results from the survey show that the main problem areas identified by the public were in healthcare and public health, followed by the development of new treatment methods and medicines, and then digital technology, data security and cyber security. At the bottom of the list was research aimed at acquiring new knowledge about the universe, matter and the laws of nature. Further analysis looked at the public view of the possible role of science in solving these problems. The survey charted 4,167 individual responses based on open-ended questions that were derived from the participants’ answers. The analysis again found that medical and health sciences topped the scoring, with 788 responses referring to the field. Humanities and the arts were bottom of the list, with 625. Digging further into the details, the survey suggests citizens are aware of and concerned about a number of research areas. This includes technologies and innovation to improve the environment or reduce pollution, the development of modern military technologies and cybersecurity tools, and the development and application of artificial intelligence, among others. “We hope this initiative will help strengthen public trust in science and create a more meaningful dialogue between researchers and society,” the LCS source said, adding that it offers benefits to researchers, evaluators and to the general public. More space for citizen engagement in evaluationsThere is a gradual but increasing use of citizen engagement in research evaluation processes around Europe, especially in healthcare, but it remains relatively rare, said Henry Sauermann, a professor at the European School of Management and Technology in Berlin and an expert in citizen science.“Given that we are at a point where citizen involvement is extremely limited, there is presumably space for more, but it's not that we should do it just because we want to do it,” he told Science|Business. He said some research lends itself better to having citizen input, and this usually tends to be on the applied end of the science spectrum where the public can offer useful feedback based on their experiences. He added that advising scientists on certain topics to study is also a useful approach, in the way that Latvia is doing. “The public does fund a lot of science, there's a lot of tax money going into this. We of course do want to preserve academic freedom, but it's also not unreasonable to incorporate more feedback or input from citizens where possible,” he said. Related articlesCitizen science: where, when, and how to let the public contribute to researchHow can Europe cope with a flood of AI-assisted research grant proposals?Data Corner: Horizon Europe’s AI, digital and data call success rate is 5.2%There are several ways of involving citizens in science funding. The most minimal way is having a few representatives on a panel, such as members of a patient group or union. The most direct way is crowdsourcing funding for specific projects. There is an increasing number of online platforms that allow the public to chip in to support scientific proposals.Sauermann studied this in a recent paper and found that it can have its uses, but it still is not clear if there are benefits to it. There are various assumptions linked to citizen engagement, for example that it increases public trust in science, or that it provides a representative view of what the public thinks about science. These are not necessarily true, Sauermann found. People who participate in engagement activities tend to already be very trusting of science, and, on the whole, it is generally the well-off and well educated who contribute, giving a narrow view of public opinion. On whether citizen input can help manage the increasing number of proposals that are being submitted due to assistance from AI, Sauermann is more sceptical. “The obvious answer to the flood of AI-written proposals is AI-driven evaluation,” he said, adding that it doesn’t mean citizen engagement shouldn’t be a part of evaluations in a well thought-out manner. Southern Denmark’s successful approachOne successful example of citizen engagement in science evaluations was implemented in southern Denmark. Between 2019 and 2025, citizens in the region were invited to vote to fund one of five pre-selected projects in the field of healthcare. The project, called A Healthier Southern Denmark, was a collaboration between regional authorities, the University of Southern Denmark, and two media partners. Over the seven years, there were 75,000 votes and significant public engagement online and on social media. “It was a bit of a wild project, we’d never done something like that before and we were a bit nervous about what would be said in the media about it. But actually, people were very positive,” said Anne Kathrine Overgaard, one of the main organisers of the project from the University of Southern Denmark. The university and its researchers have learned a lot from the experience, particularly about engaging with society and shaping their research to match real-world needs. This is important with Europe’s increasing focus on competitiveness and bringing innovations to market faster, Overgaard said. She hopes to see more citizen engagement in evaluation processes and in science more broadly. “For many years, citizen engagement has been a bit of an add-on to proposals, just to check a box. But I think things are changing,” she said. It’s less about citizens just gathering data and more “about the dialogue between the public and the scientists,” she said. The initiative ended last year as the team wanted to regroup to find fresh momentum. The development of AI and AI-written proposals has made Overgaard reflect on how the project could be reworked to help evaluators. She hopes to bring it back in the future. “It could be a good idea to try this initiative again in a slightly re-worked format,” she said.
Exhibit at Griffin Museum of Science and Industry re-creates Anne Frank's hidden annex
A historical exhibit at Chicago's Griffin Museum of Science and Industry is giving visitors a chance to walk through a re-creation of Anne Frank's hidden annex.
Member States Support Extended Deadline For Talks On Pandemic Agreement Annex
All World Health Organization (WHO) member states supported the extension of talks on the last outstanding piece of the Pandemic Agreement, the Pathogen
Are lawmakers or unelected staff making decisions on the Capitol Annex Project?
Since the Capitol Annex Project began in 2018, there has not been a single lawmaker consistently overseeing the construction.
As Springfield weighs annexation request, regional behavioral health needs hang in the balance
Springfield councilors will ponder an annexation request that would set the stage for Oregon’s first behavioral health campus that has both a psychiatric hospital and stabilization center on site.
Now What? With Carbon Pricing Eroded and Pipeline Politics Advancing, Here Are the Pathways for Climate Success
At the end of a whirlwind week of news on carbon pricing and electricity strategy, capping a madcap year of pretty much non-stop, dramatic change, the word across much of Canada’s climate and energy transition community is that climate policy in this country has been shredded. Eviscerated. Hit with a sledgehammer by policy rollbacks that have pushed the country’s 2050 net zero target “well out of reach”. That means it’s never been more important to look for the rays of hope and glimmers of possibility. To glimpse the seeds of the next set of strategies to get Canada’s climate pollution under control and the country into the accelerating global dash away from fossil fuels. And then, once we’ve spotted those possibilities, get on with the hard, day-to-day slog of trying to make them a reality. Nothing takes away from the frustration and the deep disappointment so many climate and energy hawks are expressing, the sense of betrayal by the author of Value(s) and the former UN special envoy for climate action and finance. But we knew two things as the week drew to a close. We’re looking at the world as it most definitely is. And we don’t get to give up finding the pathways to confront climate change and deliver faster, deeper carbon cuts that leave no one else behind. So really, the first question we all have to ask ourselves is: What’s next? Subscribe All the Oxygen in the Room The outpouring of anger and grief over the carbon pricing deal between Prime Minister Mark Carney and Alberta Premier Danielle Smith has been absolutely understandable. So much of the climate community poured years, more than a decade, into dragging the current federal pricing regime across the finish line, then defending it from a deluge of three-syllable rhymes after the Trudeau government proved utterly incapable of delivering its own message. The policy foisted on us by neo-classical economists took up all the oxygen in the room, burned through years of climate response time that we won’t get back, while cornering climate hawks into the position that the best response to the crisis of our lifetimes is a new tax…in an era of historic anti-tax sentiment. I mean, really—what could possibly have gone wrong? Against that history, let’s appreciate columnist Max Fawcett’s point that even a modest carbon pricing agreement with a government as off-the-wall libertarian/conspiracist as Danielle Smith’s—those adjectives are mine, not Max’s—is a win worth savouring (as long as Smith keeps her promises for a change). But part of living in the world as it is (no, I’m not letting that go) is to be clear-headed about what we can and can’t control. And one thing we get to decide, after seeing this week’s carbon price festivities take up all the oxygen yet again, is whether we want to keep letting that happen. Particularly when success down that road depends on a factor that no one with a climate agenda can control or influence—a provincial carbon pricing mechanism that has been manipulated and eroded beyond its lowest possible denominator. Thankfully, that’s not the way it has to go. Not when we have so many other powerful, practical tools at our disposal, including the ones still available to us through this abominable Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Canada and Alberta. Tools In Our Toolbox When I started roughing out this list, I didn’t expect it to grow to nearly a dozen bullet points. It’s probably still incomplete. Some of the greatest hits in today’s climate solutions toolbox include: • No Carbon Capture, No Pipeline: On Friday, Prime Minister Mark Carney explicitly stated that there’s been no change to the MOU provision that there will be no West Coast pipeline without an industry commitment to build its massive, $16.5-billion carbon capture and storage (CCUS) hub in Northern Alberta, and vice versa. The two megaprojects were joined at the hip when the MOU was signed Nov. 27, and the implementation agreement this week affirmed that they still are. A parade of independent analysts have spent years pointing to the economic and technical flaws in CCUS, while the industry kept postponing its investment decision until it could arm-twist the government for more “clarity” (by which it meant even more lavish taxpayer subsidies) on the project. Now the industry itself is running away from the CCUS hub and insisting the pipeline should proceed without it, but Carney doesn’t seem to be budging from a central tenet of the MOU to which Smith has signed on. • No Subsidies, No Investors: Climate analysts and advocates have quite rightly been hammering away at Carney and his team, insisting that any new capacity the industry wants to build must proceed without new subsidies. The government has responded with a growing collection of funding and financing mechanisms for the very wide menu of industrial development and nation-building projects they say they want to take on, and that menu always includes fossil fuel infrastructure. But it’s hard to see how even the combined fiscal clout of the federal and supportive provincial governments will deliver the financial backing private investors would need when the business case for new fossil fuel development is evaporating before their eyes. Particularly when… • No Market, No Demand, No Investors: As our friend Markham Hislop at Energi Media (our apparently sleepless friend, given the massive volume of great material he’s been churning out) points out this morning, the biggest vulnerability in any pipeline deal is the assumption that Asian buyers will want the oil or liquefied natural ga that our fossil industry is so keen to send them. Hislop writes in part: Ottawa and Alberta are effectively betting that countries like China and India will continue increasing oil imports for decades as their economies grow and energy consumption rises. That assumption underpins the entire economic rationale for expanding oil sands production and building billions of dollars in new export infrastructure. But Asian energy systems are changing rapidly… China, India, South Korea, and other major hydrocarbon importers are now investing hundreds of billions of dollars into electricity systems built around wind, solar, batteries, nuclear, hydro, and expanded transmission infrastructure. Domestic “energy sovereignty” is increasingly replacing the old energy-security model based on stable oil and gas imports. Those investments are expected to sharply slow oil demand growth and eventually reverse it, even as overall energy consumption continues rising. There are also refining constraints. Many Asian refineries and petrochemical complexes are already optimized to process discounted heavy crude from the Middle East and Latin America. That raises serious questions about how much additional Canadian bitumen Asian markets can absorb at profitable prices. Small wonder that there’s still no private sector investor for the project, despite Smith’s government desperately beating the bushes to put together a deal. For now, Alberta is acting as proponent and covering early start-up costs for a pitch to the federal Major Projects Office, which could actually turn into the next tough hurdle for Smith and her pipeline to jump. • Canada Day Looms: How ironic that Canada’s birthday this year could become a major chokepoint for the provincial premier who’s been working so diligently to tear the country apart! The July 1 target date for Alberta’s pipeline proposal is baked into the MOU, was reaffirmed by the implementation plan, but it hadn’t dawned on me that it cuts both ways. As one very smart colleague wrote in an email yesterday, “they’ve thrown the ball into Alberta’s court to get the project proposal on the table really quickly and to have to do a whole pile of work to put together a massive, complicated project that would typically take years to assemble, and they’ve given them weeks to do it.” That makes July 1 a looming deadline that Smith won’t be able to run away from politically, especially with the separatists in her party and her caucus breathing down her neck. (See previous ref to off-the-wall.) But if Alberta comes in with a sloppy, incomplete submission, even after Carney bent over backwards to simplify the application process and the rules that govern it, it may be harder for the province or the industry to blame Ottawa and insist on the faster process they claim their investors are demanding. (Oh, wait—which investors would those be??) • We’ll See You In Court (Then We’ll See You Again): If Carney did cave, that would be just one more reason for Indigenous and other affected communities to take the government and the process to court—Just as Alberta First Nations did, successfully, in response to Smith’s half-baked separation referendum. Veterans of the Harper era have been warning that a shoddy process around fossil fuel infrastructure or other major projects will be a recipe for the very delays that process seeks to avoid. And now more than ever, with renewable energy and energy storage eating fossil fuels’ lunch in import markets around the world, a delayed pipeline or LNG terminal may be as good as a cancelled one. • Charged Up, Ready to Go: With its goal of doubling Canada’s electricity supply to meet a doubling of demand by 2050, the national electricity strategy that Carney unveiled Thursday has a lot to like. With its explicit language about speeding the shift from fuels to more efficient and affordable electricity, global investment and deployment patterns that already favour that shift, an emerging bidirectional power grid, the role of front-line options like rooftop solar and heat pumps, the emergence of electric vehicles as behind-the-meter energy storage, and the domestic jobs and manufacturing to make it all happen, the document doubles down on the essential cornerstone of a faster shift off fossil fuels. The strategy envisions a more prominent role for gas and nuclear power. But some of those provisions were already in the Clean Electricity Regulations that climate hawks are now fighting so hard to defend, inserted as a compromise in a futile attempt to mollify the industry and its political representatives in Alberta and Saskatchewan. But once again, gas will be a tougher sell when it’s more expensive and now so much more unpredictable than the clean alternatives. The new nuclear technologies are still speculative and deeply vulnerable to cost overruns. Increasingly, utilities, developers, and investors know it. Carney declared Thursday that “it doesn’t do us good to be sitting in court all the time with provinces. It doesn’t do us good to be talking past each other. What does do us good is to come together with specific projects.” There are no guarantees, but so much of the language and narrative-building in the electricity strategy suggests the lion’s share of those projects will be renewable. • The Party Has Already Started: The electricity strategy only rarely digs down to specific projects, but provinces representing three-quarters of Canada’s population are already embracing a faster transition. Hydro-Québec is working on a 10-year, $185-billion renewable energy and grid buildout by 2035. Ontario recently brought 10 provinces and territories together in a National Energy Corridor Agreement to boost interprovincial and -territorial transmission infrastructure. And the MOU implementation agreement commits Alberta to facilitate investment in renewable energy projects, a big step back from its continuing, punitive restrictions on renewables development. The electricity strategy envisions much of the financing and infrastructure that will be needed to pull those advances together into an integrated whole. • Delivering on Affordability: The MOU implementation plan has little or nothing to say about affordability (are you surprised?), but the electricity strategy does, with a top-line pledge to reduce home energy costs for seven out of 10 Canadian households by 2050, a total saving of $15 billion across the board. It’s just a start, but it puts affordability on the government’s narrative map. If they’re serious and deliberate about patching together a least-cost energy strategy, it’ll have little if any room for oil, gas, or nuclear—not with powerful evidence, for example, that electricity prices are higher when those prices are set by gas. • Smith Proves that Canada Works: By signing a deal that makes it harder to claim the federal government is blocking a new pipeline, Smith has helped prove Carney’s constant anti-separatist refrain that “Canada works”—incurring the rage, no doubt, of her own political base. Canada also needs to work for anyone who depends on a clean environment, healthy and thriving ecosystems, and safe, stable climate. But with Smith and her separatist constituents setting up as a fifth column for annexation by Donald Trump’s United States, let’s set aside any notion that 51st state status for Canada is a recipe for anything other than climate disaster (and so much else). Resisting and withstanding Trump (just 170 more sleeps until mid-term elections, which is a damn sight better than the 730 we started with) doesn’t mean a free pass for a pipeline, but we can still appreciate it that keeping Canada whole and sovereign is still Carney’s Job One. • The Words Not Spoken: Apart from a commitment to export a million barrels of “low-emission” Alberta bitumen per day (memo to Smith and Carney: You realize that that’s less than the industry is already exporting??), the MOU implementation plan says nothing about the international trade and economic sovereignty deals that Carney has been travelling the world to negotiate. It didn’t have to. Carney doesn’t need permission from Danielle Smith, her American enablers, or her separatist allies to continue building the alliances that will ratchet down our economic dependency on our unstable, unreliable neighbour to the south. But every connection he builds with countries outside North America helps align our economy and our future with a faster shift off fossil fuels. Little if any of this was on our bingo cards a year or two ago. But it’s the pathway that has opened up to us. And if it gives Canada any climate or energy gains at all in an era still dominated by Trump and his increasingly ridiculous tariffs, his loutish trade negotiations and his continuing annexation threats, we have to take the wins. Not least because they’ll be the point of departure for what we can achieve in 2027, 2029, and beyond, as Trump’s grip and this era begin to loosen and then fade. What is Carney Doing? If this line of thought is right—and it’s a possibility, not a prediction—it means that Carney’s actions and decisions are largely about buying time. Time for Trump’s power to wane. Time for Alberta’s separatist/conspiracist virus to spread, mutate, die out, or at least die back, with help from a vaccine of federal steadiness and calm (appropriate enough, for a movement populated largely by vaccine deniers) that no conspiracy theory can dismiss. And time for the government’s trade and investment agenda to deliver results—even knowing that some of those results will bring impacts that front-line communities will not and should not accept. In the immediate moment, none of this changes the way the wider climate community has to respond, from campaigners to investors to front-line practitioners. All of our voices are still essential. But those voices will be stronger and more confident if we have a clearer sense of the brutal game we’ve been pulled into, and a plausible path (or two it three) for playing it to the win we need. This conversation also underscores our biggest task for the remaining years of what was supposed to be the “decisive” decade for climate response: if we can shift the energy narrative in Canada, make it a mainstream view that the country’s preoccupation with oil and gas has us falling farther behind a changing world, we’ll see far better results in the 2030s and beyond. For many veteran climate advocates, taking on that part of the fight will begin with recognizing that most of our friends and family, neighbours and colleagues already understand that climate change is real and right in front of us: they’re looking away and staying silent because they don’t have what climate communicator Katharine Hayhoe calls “efficacy”. As Hayhoe recently pointed out in a feature interview with The Energy Mix, it amounts to science denial to keep hammering away at the dire news about global warming without also helping audiences understand what they can do about it, with multiple studies telling us why that won’t work. Far better to open those conversations with the dominant crises like energy security, food security, emergency preparedness and business continuity, affordability, and financial security that have knocked climate change far lower on the list of public priorities, and will likely keep it there. We Knew This Would Happen Climate hawks have always known this day would come. For decades, we warned that everyone had to pay attention to climate change right now, because it would be much tougher to respond once the crisis itself started affecting our daily lives. We were right, and here we are. But now, thanks to decades of hard work, communities and countries have an alternative to doubling down on fossil fuels. “In 10 years everyone will have ‘always known’ that solar and batteries were going to win,” Morgan Solar Executive Chair Mike Andrade writes on LinkedIn. With the disruption in the Strait of Hormuz roiling energy priorities around the world, Canada and the United States are among the shrinking number of countries that are still very keen on fossil fuel development. Understanding that gap is a first, essential step in spotting the opportunities ahead, and averting the deep economic as well as environmental and social risk we face if we don’t seize them. Thanks for reading The Energy Mix Weekender! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support our work. Subscribe Mitchell Beer traces his background in renewable energy and energy efficiency back to 1977, in climate change to 1997. Now he and the rest of the Energy Mix team scan 1,200 news headlines a week to pull together The Energy Mix and The Energy Mix Weekender. Chart of the Week BYD Eyes 20 Dealership Locations After Canada Greenlights Chinese EV Imports ‘Sledgehammer’ Carbon Price Deal Boosts Emissions by 230Mt, Aims for Fall 2027 Pipeline Approval ‘Worse Than Harper’: Regulatory Rollback Would Stop Canada from Assessing Project Impacts, Critics Warn Electricity Strategy Aims for Doubling by 2050, Allows ‘Flexibility’ for Gas Power Plants Opposition Mounts as O’Leary’s Data Centre Approved in Drought-Stricken Utah Diluted Carbon Price Misses ‘Reality of the World We’re In’, Could Impede Diversified Trade: Climate Institute $200B in Clean Energy Investment Will Need On-Time Delivery, Reliable Policies, Trade Association Says ‘Sovereign Pipeline’: CEO Pitches to Keep Trans Mountain in Government Hands What a Supercharged El Niño Could Mean for Canada Canada’s future is electric, and here’s how a power grid superhighway would get us there (Toronto Star) The Perilous Waters of Hecate Strait (Globe and Mail) Saudi Aramco profits jump despite conflict in Middle East (The Guardian) Farmers confront rising cost of fertilizer and fuel as spring seeding under way (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) Clarkson forecasts 24% decline in offshore oil, gas capital expenditures (Oil & Gas Journal) Pipe Dreams: How Oil and Gas Fail to Deliver Economic Development in Africa (Oil Change International) Developing countries must hold the pen to script the fossil fuel transition (Climate Home News) Iran war threatens the dream of a post-oil economy in the Gulf (Washington Post) U.S. Oil, Gas Work Force Hits Lowest Level Since 2022 (Rigzone) Why Polestar Is Doubling Down on Net Zero as Rivals Pull Back on EVs (Bloomberg) Why this Michigan utility plans to sell its hydro dams for $13 (E&E News/Politico) Levees can no longer save New Orleans (Vox)
ISU trustees approve $84 million for new science complex facilities
With a combination of state funding and repayment from student fees, the ISU Board of Trustees approved $84 million in funds for three new STEM facilities. These include a new teaching building, an annex and a greenhouse.
Anne Frank exhibit at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry opens the door to her secret annex
The full-scale recreation of the Frank family’s hideout during World War II in Amsterdam is the stunning centerpiece of a new exhibition opening Friday.
Developed Countries Propose ‘Hybrid’ Model Ahead Of Pandemic Agreement Talks
Yet another negotiating session on the outstanding annex of the Pandemic Agreement begins at the World Health Organization’s (WHO) headquarters on Monday (27
Public Services Committee to review 1,260-acre Cox Ranch business park annexation
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — City Council members will consider supporting a resolution to overrule the Cheyenne Planning Commission today as they weigh a proposed
Neighbors raise concern over proposed 1,260-acre business park annexation
CHEYENNE – The city of Cheyenne is eyeing the opportunity to annex approximately 1,260 acres west of town and zone it as a business park.
Cheyenne residents protest proposed business park near Roundtop Road
CHEYENNE, Wyo. — The Cheyenne City Council faced pushback from local residents Monday evening during a public hearing regarding the proposed annexation
Political divisions fuel push to have Texas annex part of New Mexico
The Texas House speaker directed a committee to study the constitutional and economic impact of adding a couple of New Mexico counties to Texas.
Trump's respect for King Charles possibly quashed desire to annex Canada, says royal commentator
An upcoming book authored by a prominent royal commentator says U.S. President Donald Trump was primarily interested in annexing Canadian territory just above the U.S. border — and his respect for King Charles may have quashed his interest.
Assemblyman Josh Hoover says Capitol Annex project leaders are hiding information from lawmakers
California Republican Assemblyman Josh Hoover says some state lawmakers like him are getting little to no information on the Capitol Annex Project and how much it could cost taxpayers.
Student researchers bring Kentucky State University science to Posters-at-the-Capitol
With lawmakers just steps away, three Kentucky State University undergraduates presented research on cattle health, soil amendments and food safety at the Capitol Annex on March 5, bringing student-led agricultural […]
New Albany looks to annex, rezone 106 acres for business park expansion
A developer seeks to annex and rezone more than 100 acres in Licking County into New Albany, expanding the business park near Intel.
SPORTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND OLYMPIC STARS HEADLINE 2026 ANNEXUS PRO-AM
If Wednesday at the WM Phoenix Open feels a little bigger, louder, and more electric than most Pro-Am days, there’s a reason. The 2026 Annexus Pro-Am brings together an all-star mix of professional athletes, entertainers, musicians and Olympians for one of the most anticipated days of tournament week, turning TPC Scottsdale’s Stadium Course into a showcase of star power and personality before competition officially ramps up.
SPORTS, ENTERTAINMENT AND OLYMPIC STARS HEADLINE 2026 ANNEXUS PRO-AM
If Wednesday at the WM Phoenix Open feels a little bigger, louder, and more electric than most Pro-Am days, there’s a reason. The 2026 Annexus Pro-Am brings together an all-star mix of professional athletes, entertainers, musicians and Olympians for one of the most anticipated days of tournament week, turning TPC Scottsdale’s Stadium Course into a showcase of star power and personality before competition officially ramps up.
MLB ALL-STARS AND ENTERTAINMENT ICONS TO PLAY IN 2026 ANNEXUS PRO-AM
Tournament Chairman Jason Eisenberg announced today that Major League Baseball standouts Cal Raleigh, Alex Bregman and Mookie Betts, along with entertainers Colin Jost and Brian Baumgartner, have committed to compete in the 2026 WM Phoenix Open Annexus Pro-Am, set to take place Wednesday, Feb. 4, on the Stadium Course at TPC Scottsdale.
Local Small Business Owner Opens Pak Mail Inside of His Existing Accounting Business in Springville, Alabama--Offering Shipping and Office Services
Annex Brands, Inc., one of the leading franchisors in the packing, shipping and office services industries, is excited to announce the opening of its newest Pak Mail location inside of Chapman Accounting Solutions in Springville, AL to new owner, Edward Chapman. This new Pak Mail is set to offer a wide range of essential shipping and office services to the local community, making it easier to provide more service to more people in more places.
Trump’s TACO on Greenland could stave off an economic war
President Donald Trump’s threat to tariff countries opposed to his effort to annex Greenland is gone, and, with it, the prospect of tit-for-tat economic warfare with Europe, one of America’s most important trading partners.
Trump's Greenland threats push U.S. allies to a tipping point
Trump's threats to annex Greenland may prove a breaking point in a global order that has benefited the U.S. for over 75 years.
Even some Trump advisers are wary of a military pursuit of Greenland. Is an off-ramp possible?
Flying home this month from an extended Christmas vacation in Palm Beach, President Donald Trump was momentarily taken aback when a reporter asked him about the ice-covered island he’s openly trying to annex.
Trump uses tariffs to pressure Denmark, EU nations on Greenland deal
President Donald Trump threatens tariffs on Denmark and other European nations over Greenland annexation, citing national security concerns.
The weak business case for Trump acquiring Greenland: a $1 trillion price tag and few returns for two decades
An annexation of Greenland would be the largest geographic acquisition in U.S. history—but financial rewards would be a long time coming.
Trump considering new tariffs on countries that oppose his annexation plans for Greenland
President Donald Trump said Friday he is considering applying new tariffs on countries that oppose his ambition of annexing Greenland.
Big problems in a big world : The NPR Politics Podcast
Between pledging support for protesters in Iran, calling once again for the U.S. annexation of Greenland, and meeting with Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, it's been a busy week for President Trump on the global stage. We look at why the White House wants to be involved in so many geopolitical issues despite the president's campaign pledges to be less invested in global affairs, and what outcomes the Trump administration wants in each location.This episode: voting correspondent Miles Parks, White House correspondent Franco Ordoñez, and national security correspondent Greg Myre.This podcast was produced and edited by Casey Morell & Bria Suggs. Our executive producer is Muthoni Muturi.Listen to every episode of the NPR Politics Podcast sponsor-free, unlock access to bonus episodes with more from the NPR Politics team, and support public media when you sign up for The NPR Politics Podcast+ at plus.npr.org/politics.
Trump's threats of intervention jolt allies and foes alike
Trump threatened military attacks on five countries, allies as well as adversaries. His threats to annex Greenland drew particular concern across Europe.
Trump renews push to annex Greenland after Venezuela strike
President Donald Trump has repeatedly talked about annexing Greenland. He reupped those calls hours after the U.S. captured Venezuela's leader.
California Politics 360 Full Episode | Capitol Annex project, enhanced ACA subsidies expiring
Lawmakers overseeing the construction of California's controversial Capitol Annex project are breaking their years-long silence and promising to be more transparent.
The New WHO Pandemic Treaty and Global Health Governance: Incorporating Common but Differentiated Responsibilities into PABS - Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
On May 20, 2025, the World Health Assembly unanimously adopted the World Health Organization (WHO) Pandemic Agreement, an international treaty designed to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response. The product of three years of arduous negotiations, the treaty marks a new era of global cooperation in public health. However, core aspects of the agreement remain unresolved—notably the Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) System, which is intended to ensure equitable access to pandemic-related materials and benefits. To support the successful implementation of the WHO Pandemic Agreement, the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities” should be formally incorporated into the negotiating agenda of the PABS annex. Introduction For the first time, an international treaty has enshrined the principle of “One Health,” the compelling idea that the health of animals, humans, and the environment all contribute to pandemic risks. SARS (2003), H1N1 (2009–10), Ebola (2014–16), and COVID-19 all emerged through zoonotic spillover from animal hosts—respectively, civets, hogs, and bats. Together, they underscore the need for a coordinated, cross-sectoral approach. The Pandemic Agreement responds to this call, requiring state parties to acknowledge the ecological interplay and commit to a comprehensive “One Health” strategy. Specifically, Article 5 charges governments to address “the drivers of pandemics and the emergence and re-emergence of infectious disease at the human-animal-environment interface,” including wild animal markets, deforestation, and antibiotic overuse. Yet the effectiveness of this “One Health” vision depends equally on the free flow of scientific information and data among countries and institutions. Just as environmental and animal health factors have been neglected in past global frameworks, so too has data sharing been marginalized, despite its centrality to timely detection and response. The Pandemic Agreement takes an important step by requiring governments to enhance data collection and cooperate with the World Health Organization (WHO). However, these provisions will remain aspirational without a robust Pathogen Access and Benefit-Sharing (PABS) annex. The PABS system will determine whether countries and researchers can rapidly exchange pathogen samples and genetic data while ensuring equitable access to resulting research and development, including diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines. Without such mechanisms, the treaty’s promise to operationalize “One Health” and strengthen global preparedness will risk becoming largely symbolic, echoing earlier failures to translate shared principles into coordinated action. Equity Concerns When the 2025 Health Assembly adopted the Pandemic Agreement, it left the difficult question of access to pathogens and the sharing of resulting benefits to be addressed in a separate agreement. Negotiations on this separate agreement, PABS, are now underway in Geneva. Yet governments remain divided over fundamental questions of equity between the countries that primarily contribute to the system and those that primarily draw from it—and consequently benefit. For example, wildlife in countries bordering the equator is likely to produce PABS materials, but companies in Europe are likely to use them to develop lucrative products. The most likely contributor countries are likely to be those biodiverse countries around the equator, such as Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Indonesia, where the number of human-mammalian viral host interactions is large. Conversely, countries most likely to benefit from this material are those with the technology, investors, and infrastructure to capitalize on genomic data, such as the United States, EU member states, and Japan. This imbalance reflects a broader pattern seen in prior international frameworks. Now, as in the past, the wealthiest countries in the world (a useful heuristic is membership of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)) disproportionately benefit from systems in which pathogens and genomic sequencing data are contributed to a common source. Under the International Agreement on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (the “Plant Treaty” or “Seed Treaty”) and the Pandemic Influenza Preparedness (PIP) Framework, companies from Europe and North America disproportionately withdraw biological samples and data for development into lucrative medical products. Their governments and companies have both statutory and contractual claims to the products that those companies correspondingly produce. PABS appears poised to follow the same pattern. The text calls for strong language on access to pathogens and associated data, but the corresponding benefits that should flow to poorer countries are couched in equivocal or non-binding language. Common but Differentiated Responsibilities To address these inequities, the principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities” should be formally incorporated into the negotiating agenda of the PABS annex. Common but differentiated responsibilities are often a feature of climate change negotiations. The basic principle is that, even though all countries should reduce carbon emissions, governments that became rich and powerful through massive carbon emissions (e.g., France, the United Kingdom, the United States) should have a greater obligation to address the resulting crises. Applied to PABS, it would require that governments hosting and supporting companies developing lucrative products carry greater obligations toward the cost of running the PABS system; share benefits or final medical products; and transfer technology to help countries worldwide develop their own capacities to innovate and manufacture vaccines during an emergency. For example, an annex could mandate that any company based in an OECD country that withdraws PABS material would be obligated to donate the resulting diagnostics, therapeutics, or vaccines to the WHO during a public health emergency or pandemic. Questions remain about how robust those donations would be, but the principle is that they should deliver highly significant lifesaving benefits to be equitably shared. Theoretically, this approach mirrors the PIP Framework, in which companies withdrawing influenza samples are required to pay half of the operating costs. In practice, however, the framework has fallen short. The PIP Framework Secretariat has struggled to secure payments from companies, with companies often disagreeing over how much is owed. Additionally, without another pandemic influenza to test the strength of the agreement during a public health emergency, corporate compliance with sharing mechanisms remains unknown. Even if these limitations did not characterize the PIP Framework, partially paying for operating expenses does not address the inequity in access to genetic data and pathogen samples that left less developed countries last in line for COVID-19 vaccines (and, before them, H1N1). Common but differentiated responsibilities would go further, addressing governments’ legitimate grievances regarding information sharing. It would make withdrawals of PABS material and resulting products more transparent, building trust across the board. Enforcement and Enduring Success A key implication of this approach is that the governing mechanism of the PABS must have real enforcement authority. The WHO Pandemic Agreement delegates its core governance responsibilities to a Conference of the Parties (COP)—a governing body composed of one representative from each participating government, similar to those established under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. The proposed WHO Pandemic Agreement COP is charged with oversight functions but ultimately possesses no real authority to compel a government to take any action it does not wish to take. The text does not give the COP the ability to, for example, sanction a party that does not comply with either textual obligations or PABS provisions. In other words, there are no effective mechanisms in place to ensure compliance. Perhaps just as significant, establishing a meaningful enforcement mechanism within the PABS system would strengthen the WHO’s credibility and its ability to ensure compliance across global health governance. By setting a precedent for accountability, such a mechanism could enhance the organization’s authority not only within the Pandemic Agreement but also in enforcing the revised International Health Regulations and other frameworks for public health emergencies. Conclusion The PABS annex can—and should—be different. It should establish clear responsibilities for funding as well as for sharing the diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines that result from contributions to the system. The system, in turn, must include a dedicated body empowered to hold governments and the corporations they sponsor accountable for their responsibilities before, during, and after pandemics. Doing so would restore trust in the broader agreement, which was eroded as commitments were repeatedly diluted while parties scrambled to meet their own self-imposed deadlines during the Pandemic Agreement negotiations. A robust PABS Annex would cement a grand social bargain. Wealthier countries and their corporations would gain unimpeded access to scientific information essential for developing and manufacturing lifesaving medical products. As such, they would stand to gain considerable economic benefit. Yet that privilege must be matched with responsibility. The grand bargain must include not only the right to innovate, but also the duty to ensure that innovation serves all. As medical products are developed and produced through collective contributions, every person must have equal access. All human beings deserve an equitable chance to survive—to save their own life, the lives of their families, and the well-being of their communities. … Sam Halabi, JD, MPhil, is the Bette Jacobs Endowed Professor at Georgetown University’s School of Health and the Director of the Center for Transformational Health Law at Georgetown Law. He serves as the co-lead for the WHO’s Working Group on Regulatory Consideration on AI and Health’s training workstream. He earned his JD from Harvard, his MPhil from Oxford, and undergraduate degrees from Kansas State University. Lawrence Gostin, LLD (Hon.), JD, BA, is University Distinguished Professor and Founding Director and Timothy and Linda O’Neill Professor of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law. He is the author of Global Health Security: A Blueprint for the Future (Harvard University Press, 2021); Global Health Law (Harvard University Press, 2014); Public Health Law: Power, Duty, Restraint (University of California Press, 3rd ed., 2016); Public Health Law and Ethics: A Reader (University of California Press, 3rd ed., 2018); Law and the Health System (Foundation Press, 2014); Principles of Mental Health Law & Practice (Oxford University Press, 2010). He also directs the WHO Collaborating Center at Georgetown University. Image Credit: United States Mission Geneva, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Former Historic State Capitol Commissioner explains why group no longer exists
Drama over the secretive and costly California Capitol Annex project, which is under construction now, resulted in the loss of the advisory group.
California Politics 360 Full Episode | Cost of Capitol Annex, offshore oil drilling proposal & more
Construction is underway on the State Capitol Annex Project. However, project leaders have not updated taxpayers on the cost of the project since 2021.