Happy holidays from all of us at the Duluth Police Department! I hope you are having opportunities to spend time with family, friends, and loved ones during this holiday season. As we look forward to a new year, it is time to reflect on 2024 and look ahead to 2025. ADVERTISEMENT Recruiting new officers continues to challenge our department and the profession. Our Professional Standards Unit attended numerous job fairs and took advantage of other outreach opportunities to engage with individuals interested in a career in law enforcement. The Minnesota Peace Officer Standards and Training Board is also exploring a new academy approach. This path may make it easier for people to transition to the profession. Minnesota currently offers the Intensive Comprehensive Peace Officer Education and Training Program, an option we are interested in. The program takes people with existing college degrees and offers them extensive training so they can become police officers. Currently, this program is only offered at Hennepin Technical College and Alexandria Technical College. We are hopeful this program will soon be available at Fond Du Lac Tribal and Community College. This would be a tremendous opportunity for us to recruit local professionals into policing. We consistently look at ways to improve our community's and officers' safety. During the past year, we made significant improvements to our capabilities in critical incident response. We partnered with the Duluth Fire Department to integrate tactical emergency medical operators. These firefighters are specifically trained to respond with our Tactical Response Team on operations. This provides a heightened level of emergency medical response for community members and officers during these events. Our drone and crisis-response teams also train with our Tactical Response Team, a cross-training that ensures proficient staff and resources are available when a critical incident arises. An area of concern for all of us is downtown safety. Many of the issues we respond to in downtown Duluth are quality-of-life issues. Most often, these are not criminal offenses; when they are, they are most likely misdemeanors. While these are not the most serious crimes, these crimes do have a negative impact on our perception of safety. This past year, we changed our approach to downtown safety. These changes include the community policing unit, parking ramp infrastructure, and engagement with the downtown community. Traditionally, our community policing unit was tied to geographical boundaries and largely worked on issues within its own area. This year, we removed those boundaries and had them work as a team to address problem areas and people. This unit consists of our Community Engagement Problem Orientated Policing Unit, Behavioral Health Unit, and school resource officers. These units work together to identify strategies to address quality-of-life issues, unlike our patrol division, whose primary responsibility is responding to 911 calls and utilizing its unallocated time to be proactive; this unit’s job is to be proactive. The HART parking ramp, medical district parking ramp, and Tech Village parking ramp, all in downtown, underwent renovations and security enhancements this year. The enhancements were first made at the HART Ramp. Since then we have seen a significant decrease in crime and problems and a significant increase in cleanliness there. We expect to see the same result at the other two ramps once new security features are fully operational. ADVERTISEMENT We are launching an online crime map dashboard on our website as a commitment to building trust through transparency with our community. This dashboard will serve as another communication tool for people concerned about the activities that have been reported in their neighborhood. In 2025, we will continue to find innovative ways to keep our community safe. The use of technology continues to grow in our profession. This growth includes things like camera systems with AI, drones as first responders, and AI-assisted report writing. As a department, we will evaluate emerging technologies that may benefit our community as well as their possible unintended consequences. Our goal is to be innovative in reducing call response times and in increasing our ability to address areas of concern proactively. We appreciate the support of our city administration, City Council, and community as we continue to find ways to improve our public safety response. I wish you all a happy and healthy 2025! Mike Ceynowa is chief of the Duluth Police Department. He wrote this at the invitation of the News Tribune Opinion page.Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, is known for his ambitious ventures in the realms of technology, space exploration, and renewable energy. 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‘The adversity we all went through, it molded us’: What went into Harrisburg’s 4th straight District 3 title

The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr. Wale Edun, has disclosed that the Nigerian government has saved approximately $20 billion, equivalent to 5% of the nation’s GDP, due to the implementation of critical reforms in fuel and exchange rate policies. This achievement resulted from efforts under President Bola Tinubu’s administration to transition to market-based pricing for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) and the exchange rate. Edun made these remarks during the validation of federal civil service policies in Abuja, marking the first 100 days of Mrs. Esther Didi Walso-Jack as Head of Civil Service of the Federation. According to him, the savings stemmed from the removal of fuel and foreign exchange subsidies, which previously drained government coffers. Edun highlighted that maintaining these subsidies had cost the country around $20 billion annually, funds that could have been redirected to critical sectors like infrastructure, health, education, and social services. He emphasized that the policy shift has freed up these resources that are now accessible for meaningful investments in national development. Tekedia Mini-MBA edition 16 (Feb 10 – May 3, 2025 ) opens registrations; register today for early bird discounts. Tekedia AI in Business Masterclass opens registrations here. Join Tekedia Capital Syndicate and i nvest in Africa’s finest startups here . “An amount of five percent of GDP is what those two subsidies were costing when there was a subsidy on PMS; when there was a petroleum product generally for a long time and when there was a subsidy of foreign exchange. Between them, they cost five percent of GDP. “If you say GDP was on average, let’s say $400 billion. We all know what five percent of that is – $20 billion of funds that could be going into infrastructure, health, social services, and education. “And that is what the flow is now coming back into government’s coffers to be able to be deployed in those areas,” he said. Edun criticized past practices where individuals and entities exploited the subsidy regime and central bank policies for personal enrichment. These rent-seeking activities allowed individuals to profit without adding value to the economy. He commended the reforms for eliminating these avenues, fostering an environment where wealth creation depends on genuine enterprise and innovation. “The real change that has happened with the measures of Mr. President is that nobody can wake up and their target for the day or for the week or the month or the year is to get access to cheap funding, cheap funding exchange from the central bank, which they can now flip. “And overnight, they became wealthy from no value added for doing nothing virtually except you know the right people. Similarly, they can no longer try and be part of a new peak, market and very inefficient petrol subsidy regime as a way of making money overnight,” Edun said. The Finance Minister urged Nigerians to embrace new economic opportunities presented by the reforms. He pointed to agriculture and manufactured exports as avenues where individuals can thrive. He said that the relatively weaker naira, while a challenge domestically, enhances competitiveness for exports such as cosmetics and hair extensions to markets like Kenya, Egypt, and South Africa. Edun advocated for increased productivity, suggesting that heightened agricultural output could ease elevated food prices, while export-driven industries could create jobs and reduce poverty. While the savings from the reforms and their long-term benefits are expected, the policy changes have brought immediate economic pain. Higher fuel prices and depreciated naira have increased living costs, raising concerns about the reforms’ social impact. Critics argue that without robust social safety nets, the economic hardship could overshadow the potential gains. However, Edun remains optimistic. He said, “The incentive framework has shifted from one of rent-seeking to one that rewards innovation, hard work, and enterprise. This change will create jobs, help reduce poverty, and build a resilient economy.” The statement by Edun that the government saved $20 billion from the removal of the fuel subsidy has raised significant questions about the country’s financial trajectory, particularly regarding its continued reliance on borrowing. Many are now questioning why, despite such substantial savings, the government still resorts to domestic and external loans to fund its expenditures. The removal of the fuel subsidy hailed as a landmark policy by President Bola Tinubu’s administration, was expected to alleviate fiscal strain. The subsidy had long been criticized for benefiting a select few and contributing to economic distortions. However, despite these proclaimed savings, the government continues to grapple with fiscal deficits that it has relied on borrowing to address. For instance, the Nigerian Senate, on Friday, approved President Bola Tinubu’s request for a fresh N1.77 trillion ($2.2 billion) external loan to partially finance the country’s N9.7 trillion budget deficit for the 2024 fiscal year. This reliance on borrowing has raised doubts about whether the savings from the subsidy removal are being efficiently utilized or if they are sufficient to address the country’s pressing financial needs. It is believed that so far, there is no evidence of the gains from the fuel subsidy removal in Nigeria’s economic and infrastructural development. Many are pointing at the country’s fiscal deficit and growing debt as evidence that the subsidy removal is not yielding the promised result. Tinubu has borrowed $6.45 billion from the World Bank in just 16 months, according to a document on the global lender’s website. The resulting increase in Nigeria’s public debt profile has compounded the burden of debt servicing on the country’s finances. The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) recently reported a staggering $3.58 billion spent on servicing foreign debts in the first nine months of 2024, a 39.77% increase from the $2.56 billion recorded during the same period in 2023.Moreover, New China Insurance must leverage its core strengths, such as its extensive network, diversified product portfolio, and talented workforce, to capitalize on emerging opportunities and navigate potential challenges in the market. By aligning its business strategies with market trends and customer preferences, the company can position itself as a market leader and drive sustainable growth in the long run.