HighRiver

The Championship Final Heat in the 2025 Battle of the North has been decided.

The top four drivers after four days are Chanse Vigen, Chance Bensmiller, Obrey Motowylo, and Jason Glass, all of whom have won the Battle of the North before.

Glass, of High River, was in the fifth spot in the aggregate heading into Day 4, but managed to bump himself into the fourth spot after finishing with the third-best time of the night.

Chanse Vigen held onto the top spot in the aggregate by landing the fastest time of the night for the third consecutive day.

The union representing front-line RCMP members wants the force to ease requirements for foreign applicants to help attract experienced police officers from agencies like the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation and counterparts in the United Kingdom and Australia.

The RCMP currently requires that applicants be Canadian citizens or have permanent resident status in Canada. Applicants with permanent resident status must have lived in Canada as a permanent resident for three of the last five years.

Farm groups are asking for federal action on regulation and trade amid mounting financial pressures and tariff fears

Keystone Agricultural Producers and the Canadian Federation of Agriculture want governments to consider agriculture more often when setting priorities.

They are ramping up pressure on governments to prioritize agriculture in trade, regulation and disaster response as farmers face worsening drought and mounting financial strain.

Canada's 2025 wildfire season is now the second-worst on record.

The latest figures posted by the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre suggest the fires have torn through 72,000 square kilometres, an area roughly the size of New Brunswick.

That surpasses the next worst season in 1989 and is about half the area burned during the record-setting 2023 season, according to a federal database of wildfire seasons dating back to 1972.

Ottawa is hiking entry-level pay for Canadian Armed Forces privates by 20 per cent for the regular force and 13 per cent for reservists, Prime Minister Mark Carney said at CFB Trenton on Friday.

That means the annual salary for a new recruit will go from $43,368 to $52,044.

Other military members will also receive pay raises, with smaller increases for higher ranks — part of a broader plan to boost recruitment and operational readiness. The new pay hikes will be retroactive to April 1 of this year.

Film crews will be all around in High River today (Aug. 11).

Shooting for the latest season of Heartland is still underway, and a Facebook post from the Town says they'll be filming in various locations throughout the day.

Some traffic disruptions are expected, with flaggers occasionally conducting traffic along Macleod Trail and 5th Ave SW.

The Museum of the Highwood is also closed today due to filming, but it will return to its regular hours on Tuesday.

While housing in Okotoks remains competitive, July brought a bit of a breather.

According to the Calgary Real Estate Board's (CREB) July statistics, the town's sales-to-new-listings ratio dropped to 71 per cent; still tighter than in Cochrane and Airdrie, but down from June's 87 per cent.

Inventory also grew, with months of supply rising to nearly 2.2. That's roughly double the average for July over the past few years, when it hovered just above one month.

The Town of Nanton has received grant funding to help preserve the town's history.   

Funding through the Heritage Preservation Partnership Program will be used to support Community Design Strategies to identify heritage buildings that could potentially receive official heritage designation.  

The Town of Diamond Valley is getting a new golf course this summer.

It was announced in the spring that the Town would be getting a new 18-hole disc golf course this year.

The course is in the town-owned greenspace that runs beside the Sheep River, just south of the Field of Dreams baseball diamond along Highway 22, between the old Turner Valley and Black Diamond townsites.

Now that the course is open and ready to play, the Town is hosting a grand opening celebration on Sunday, August 17.

Glyphosate, a key product that is used by a number of farmers, could be coming to an end.

Bill Anderson, the CEO of Bayer, noted on Wednesday that the company will be forced to end its US production of glyphosate, unless regulatory or legal changes are made to prevent litigation.