Friday - Jan. 12, 2024 - The wellness hustle

🌤️ High -8C

Good morning!

It’s finally starting to look—and feel—a little more like winter this week. It’s colder in Langley. But I still feel this satisfaction that verges on the mildly rude (imagine a metaphysical but good-natured pointing-and-laughing) when I hear about how cold it is in my hometown: with the windchill, minus-49 C. And that’s measured at the airport—out of town it gets even colder. Sunny and minus-8 in Langley is practically a crisp spring morning in comparison.

– Grace

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Traffic & Weather

🌤 Local forecast: Langley | Chilliwack | Abbotsford | Hope

🚘 Driving today? Check the current traffic situation via Google, and find DriveBC’s latest updates.

🛣 Click here for links to road cameras across the Fraser Valley, including those for the Coquihalla, Highway 7, Hope-Princeton, Fraser Canyon, and Highway 1 in Langley and Abbotsford.

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NEWS

The wellness hustle

Every year, thousands of Canadians are reeled into multi-level-marketing (MLM) schemes on promises of wealth and healing.

But for most fortune—or even a simple profit—will forever remain far out of reach, while the wellness companies that rely on desperate sellers make millions.

• Today, we’re sharing a story by Christopher Curtis at The Rover, a great Montreal-based independent news outlet.

Related

Need to Know

🥶 Arctic air is freezing large swaths of Western Canada [CTV]

❄️ Blizzard conditions closed schools in Hope on Thursday [Hope Standard]

🏘️ Metro Vancouver mayors are warning of a ‘misalignment’ between new provincial housing density roles and regional planning [Vancouver Sun]

⛴️ BC’s fast ferries, relics of a decades-old political scandal, are up for sale on Facebook Marketplace [CBC]

🤒 Fraser Health is investigating an outbreak of Legionnaire’s disease in downtown Langley [Langley Advance Times]

🗳️ A Langley Township city councillor will run for BC United in the upcoming provincial election [BC United]

👉️ Stolen items were returned with an apology after a break-in in Mission [Mission Record]

➡️ Three racoons were illegally trapped in Mission: two died [Mission Record]

🚲️ Langley RCMP used a helicopter to chase an injured suspect on a bicycle [Langley Advance Times]

🥗 Chilliwack increased funding for Chilliwack Restorative Justice by $10k after food at a volunteer appreciation dinner disappointed [Chilliwack Progress]

👉️ The man who killed an off-duty Abbotsford police officer with a skateboard in Nelson was sentenced to five years in prison [Abbotsford News]

🚓 Police broke down a door to end a standoff in Langley [Langley Advance Times]

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The Agenda

Opening date set for regional aquatic centre in Agassiz

Agassiz’s long-awaited indoor aquatic centre is set to open to the public by the end of 2025.

The Lets’emot Regional Aquatic Centre, a long-fundraised-for project in the District of Kent, has been in the works for years. Funding for the $21 million project is just $3.5 million short of its target construction funding needs. The target opening date of the end of next year is based on the District’s plans to ramp up fundraising. So far, it has secured about $16.5 million for the pool, including a recent $50,000 donation from pipeline company Enbridge and several million in grants from local, federal, and provincial governments.

The indoor pool, complete with lap lanes, a whirlpool, and a leisure pool, will replace the district’s 46-year-old outdoor pool. At the moment, the closest indoor facility is in Chilliwack, 26km away.

Detailed information about the 30,000-square-foot facility is expected to be available for bidding shortly.

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💾 Flashback Friday

A large crowd of men gathered on the street in front of the Abbotsford Hotel. It’s October 4, 1934. A chalkboard at the front of the building is being updated periodically with the linescores of a baseball game—St. Louis vs. Detroit in the second game of the World Series. The hotel has a radio tuned to the broadcast. The Detroit Tigers would take this game 3-2 in extra innings, but the St. Louis Cardinals would eventually win the series with a 11-0 blowout in game seven.

🗓 Things to do

🎸 Punk rock: Four local punk rock bands will play a concert in Abbotsford on Saturday, Jan. 13 at a venue on George Ferguson Way. Details online.

🎙️ Radio play: A staged reading of the radio play, The Gallows Does Well, based on the life of a Victorian career criminal, will be presented at the Chilliwack Cultural Centre on Saturday, Jan. 13. Details and tickets online.

🦐 Local food: Dine Chilliwack, a campaign spotlighting Chilliwack’s food and drink scene, features different dishes and specials at local restaurants until Feb. 8. Details online.

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Catch up

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