This comes after a high-profile drone shark study out of California — finding that juvenile white sharks were close to people on 97% of the days surveyed, and no one was bitten during the 2-year drone study.

Along the Cape, scientists last summer started to use drones in a pilot study.

“When water conditions are clear and nice, this is an incredible tool to study sharks and their activities off of our beaches,” Atlantic White Shark Conservancy staff scientist Megan Winton said during the conservancy’s media day on Tuesday.

“One thing we want to do is get an idea of how they’re using the nearshore waters right off our beaches with these direct observations,” Winton added of the great whites.

This summer, the researchers will be trying to figure out how effective drones are at spotting sharks along the Cape.

Many people have proposed using drones as a shark surveillance technology at local beaches, but the concern is that sharks could disappear from sight when the Cape waters turn murky.

“Sometimes the water is clear, and it looks like the Caribbean… and sometimes it looks like chocolate milk,” Winton said. “So nobody knows how that technology would perform in our waters.”

Australian officials have used drones for spotting sharks off public beaches.

“Under ideal conditions, it would be great for that, but we don’t know how well it will perform here,” Winton added.

In the California 2-year drone study, the juvenile sharks came very close to people, but simply moved around them or ignored them completely.

The juvenile sharks were often spotted within 50 yards of where the waves break, putting surfers and stand-up paddle boarders in the closest proximity to sharks. Some sharks were seen as close as 2 yards from the wave break.

Winton noted that the juvenile sharks from that study are much smaller than the average great white along the Cape. The juveniles along California feed on fish, and are not targeting seals like the Cape sharks.

“It’s a similar situation in that there are a lot of white sharks close to the beach there, but it’s a different life stage, so it’s also very different,” Winton said.

“Here in the summer and fall, there is likely a white shark somewhere around in the area when densities are highest,” she said.

Cape sharks hunt for seals in shallow water close to shore, and that has led to some shark bites on humans in the last decade. In 2018, a 26-year-old man was killed by a shark at a Wellfleet beach.

There have been no reported Cape shark bites on humans since that fatal incident.

“From what we see, people appear to have changed their behavior in a lot of ways,” Winton said. “People tend to stay closer to the shoreline it seems.”

Local researchers have tagged more than 300 sharks, and they have identified more than 600 individual sharks that have visited the Cape. During the summer, lifeguards are notified when tagged sharks get close to the beach, and the lifeguards get people out of the water.

Four killer whales were recently spotted south of Nantucket, a rare pod sighting in southern New England waters, while an orca was also seen swimming near dolphins off of Provincetown.

New England Aquarium scientists spotted the four killer whales swimming together as the research team flew aerial surveys 40 miles south of Nantucket on Sunday.

Meanwhile, fishermen saw the orca swimming next to the dolphins off the northern tip of Cape Cod.

It’s “always unusual to see killer whales in New England waters,” said Orla O’Brien, an associate research scientist who leads the aerial survey team for the New England Aquarium’s Anderson Cabot Center for Ocean Life.

Katherine McKenna, an assistant research scientist, first spotted the four killer whales.

“Initially I could just see two splashes ahead of the plane,” McKenna said. “As we circled the area, two whales surfaced too quickly to tell what they were. On the third surfacing, we got a nice look and could see the tell-tale coloration before the large dorsal fins broke the surface.”

The four killer whales were among nearly 150 whales and dolphins that the team spotted during the seven-hour flight — including 23 fin whales, five minke whales, 62 bottlenose dolphins, and 20 humpback whales bubble feeding.

“Seeing them swim in formation was just unreal,” O’Brien said of the orca pod. “We believe the sighting to be two males and two females, but that hasn’t been confirmed.

“I think seeing killer whales is particularly special for us because it unlocks that childhood part of you that wanted to be a marine biologist,” O’Brien added.

The species’ population is very small in western North Atlantic waters. The only killer whale seen regularly in North Atlantic waters is “Old Thom,” a large male orca who is known to swim alone, sometimes alongside dolphins, in the Gulf of Maine and the Bay of Fundy. He was last spotted in Massachusetts waters in May 2022 off of Cape Cod.

A large orca that was swimming next to dolphins was recently captured on video by Simon Sez Sportfishing.

“Special day today seeing an Orca Whale in our waters off P-town,” Simon Sez posted on Instagram. “Never know what you’ll see, this made up for a tuna-less day today.”

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Supporters of the new study commissioned by the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation say it helps reveal the broader consequences of health inequities and provides motivation for public and private sector leaders to help rectify the disparities. The research also looks to the future of the state’s population, where communities of color are driving growth but are also the ones who are the most heavily impacted by health inequities.

As the next generation rises, the report said, these groups will represent nearly half of the state’s population compared to the less than one-third share they represent today.

“Massachusetts faces a choice to ‘pay now or pay greater later,’ as demonstrated by this report, which highlights the unacceptable cost being paid by communities of color and ultimately borne by businesses and the commonwealth,” the advocacy organization Health Equity Compact said in a statement included with the report.

The authors of the report said it is a “first of its kind” to quantify in economic terms the cost of health inequities for individuals and families, health care providers, employers, public and private sector payers, and the overall Massachusetts economy.

The economic burden associated with health inequities experienced by communities of color in Massachusetts totals nearly $6 billion but could grow to $11.2 billion by 2050 if no action is taken, the report said.

The time to shift from “awareness of the problem to action on solutions” is now after analysis made clear the “staggering economic toll” of health disparities, said Audrey Shelto, president and CEO of the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation.

“Our commonwealth led the way in expanding health insurance coverage and improving access, and we have a shared responsibility to act similarly to achieve health equity and eliminate health disparities,” Shelto said in a statement.

Populations of color in the state are disproportionately affected by housing instability, food insecurity, environmental toxins and stressors, and higher rates of poverty as a result of longstanding systemic racism in social and economic structures, policies, and practices, the report said.

That has led to less access to health coverage and care and differences in the quality of care received, researchers wrote in the study.

Differences in delivery of care also stem back to “mistrust in the health care system due to historical and systemic racism and experiences of continued lack of respect and breaches of trust reported by many,” the report said.

Researchers found Black and Hispanic/Latino residents report poorer health and mental health statuses than White residents; pregnancy-associated mortality and severe maternal morbidity are higher for Black residents; and higher rates of diabetes and asthma are reported among Black and Hispanic/Latino residents.

Higher rates of disease and disability in a population require more healthcare services to treat those conditions, which means higher healthcare spending, researchers said.

“By computing the gap between health care spending under the current health status for Massachusetts adults and health care spending if populations of color achieved the health equity target health status, we estimated that avoidable health care spending due to health inequities is $1.5 billion each year, or about 2 percent of total Massachusetts annual health spending,” the report said.

Working-age adults who are less healthy tend to work fewer hours, take more sick days, and be less productive on the job, the report said. The analysis compared the productivity of working-age populations of color with their current health status to the same group if they were fully healthy.

“We estimated that health inequities experienced by populations of color today cost Massachusetts $1.4 billion each year in lost labor productivity across industries,” the report said.

The analysis also compared the current mortality rates by race and ethnicity at each with the “health equity targets” for mortality at each age.

“We found that health inequities are estimated to lead to premature death for Massachusetts residents of all ages,” the report said.

After leaving the second “leadership meeting” held with Gov. Maura Healey and House Speaker Ron Mariano in as many weeks, Senate President Karen Spilka told reporters during a brief press conference outside her Beacon Hill office that lawmakers had settled on the date of the holiday, though any suspension will still need to be made official by actual legislation.

“We will be doing a sales tax holiday August 12th, 13th, that weekend,” Spilka said. Mariano did not voice any opposition to the dates.

When asked if she and her colleagues would consider expanding the two-day pause on the state’s 6.25% sales tax, she said that “no, we’re not there yet.”

“But we will be doing the weekend,” the Democrat from Ashland said.

First tried for just one day in 2004 but made into an annual full weekend holiday in 2018, the law aims to boost consumer spending for one weekend a year at the expense of millions in sales tax revenue.

There are some exclusions to the holiday, which only applies to purchases less than $2,500.

Purchases of cars, boats, meals, utilities, marijuana, tobacco and alcohol are still taxed. Gasoline is not subject to the sales tax and so is not affected by the holiday. Business purchases are still taxable.

Residents who want to do their shopping online may do so as well, provided their purchase is made during the sales tax holiday weekend.

A single item that costs $2,500 would see a tax savings of $156.25. An item costing even one dollar more would be subject to that tax amount, plus the 7 cents for the extra dollar.

Clothing under $175 is generally not taxed, but during the holiday more expensive duds up to $2,500 will be untaxed.

Rentals of up to 30 days that are normally subject to sales tax are tax-free if paid for during the holiday. This does not include car and boat rentals.

Massachusetts retailers must, by law, participate in the holiday if they are open for business during the scheduled weekend. Any purchase made during that weekend that is charged a sales tax must see the tax refunded by the retailer, according to the Department of Revenue.

Researchers at Mass Eye and Ear looked at the loss of olfactory and gustatory senses and estimated that about 25% of Americans who had COVID-19 reported only partial or no recovery of taste or smell.

“We wanted to quantify the national impact of smell disorders resulting from COVID,” said Neil Bhattacharyya, professor of Otolaryngology at Mass Eye and Ear.

“With this data we can understand, in big numbers, how many people lost their sense of smell or taste due to COVID infection and how many people never fully recovered those senses,” Bhattacharyya added.

The researchers examined data from the 2021 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), a CDC branch, which includes survey data from 29,696 adults.

In the NHIS data, COVID patients were asked about the severity of their symptoms, any loss of taste or smell, and their recovery of those senses.

The research team reported that about 60% of surveyed participants infected with COVID experienced loss of smell and about 58% experienced loss of taste.

The study found that around 72% of patients fully recovered their sense of smell, but 24% only had a partial recovery, and more than 3% had no recovery.

Similarly, of those who experienced a loss of taste due to COVID, about 76% fully recovered the sense, while 20% only partially recovered, and more than 2% did not recover at all.

The researchers estimated that almost 28 million Americans had been potentially left with a decreased sense of smell after a COVID infection.

Bhattacharyya said one of the motivations for the study was his patient who lost 50 pounds due to COVID-related smell loss.

“The patient wasn’t eating and became very sick and very depressed because of the loss of smell,” Bhattacharyya said. “When you hear about COVID-related smell loss, you think most people get it back and are fine. But there is a substantial number of people who don’t recover it.”

“The value of this study is that we are highlighting a group of people who have been a bit neglected,” Bhattacharyya added. “Losing your sense of smell or taste isn’t as benign as you may think. It can lead to decreased eating for pleasure and, in more extreme cases, it can lead to depression and weight loss.”

The study also found that there’s a correlation between COVID symptom severity and loss of smell or taste. As symptom severity increased, the percentage of patients with smell or taste loss also went up.

Moreover, the likelihood of smell and taste sensory recovery dropped with more severe COVID symptoms.

The smoke from the wildfires dissipated across Massachusetts by the weekend, and it doesn’t appear that the poor air quality will return this week.

“It’s not looking like it will be similar to last week,” Bill Leatham, meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Boston office, told the Herald on Sunday.

He noted the major change in the wind pattern, which is why the smoke won’t come back to the Bay State, at least for the week ahead.

Meanwhile, temps for much of the week should be seasonable in the upper 70s and around 80 degrees, and the weather pattern is expected to turn unsettled again with the risk of showers each day.

“It should feel like summer this week,” Leatham said. “While it will be warmer, there will be an increased risk for thunderstorms through the week.”

Temps on Monday should approach 80 degrees, and a good portion of the day could be dry. Then, some moderate to heavy rainfall is expected to arrive Monday night. Rainfall amounts of 0.75 to 1.5 inches across southern New England are predicted.

“The best shot for widespread rain this week will be later Monday into Tuesday morning,” Leatham said.

After the rain overnight, it should be drier Tuesday afternoon with temps in the 70s, followed by another round of rain and potentially severe thunderstorms on Wednesday.

“There is still plenty of time for the forecast to change, but Wednesday will be a day to watch closely as we head into the new week,” the National Weather Service’s forecast discussion reads. “Hazards would be limited to damaging wind gusts and small hail as low-level wind shear would not be strong enough to support a substantial tornado threat.”

As this system exits, Thursday should be similar to Tuesday with clearing skies and seasonable temps in the upper 70s.

The wet to dry pattern looks to continue late in the week into the weekend, with possible rainfall on Friday followed by a drier day on Saturday.

The Barnstable Police Department patrol officer at around 1:41 p.m. tried to pull over the motorcyclist for a traffic violation on Route 28, near Garden Lane in Hyannis.

The motorcyclist didn’t stop for the officer and fled north onto Bearses Way, police said. Moments later, the motorcyclist crashed into a vehicle on Bearses Way near Enterprise Road.

The motorcyclist was transported to Cape Cod Hospital by a Hyannis Fire Department ambulance, where he was pronounced dead.

The operator of the vehicle struck by the fleeing motorcycle sustained minor injuries in the accident.

The crash is being investigated by the Cape Cod Regional Law Enforcement Council Crash Reconstruction Team.

During its regular meeting last week, Commissioners learned that, though the state is home to hundreds of thousands of veterans, many of whom would qualify for medical marijuana as a result of service connected disabilities, veterans are not entering the medical marijuana program at nearly the same rates as other adults.

Part of the problem is the law.

“Access to medical marijuana in the regulated industry for veterans in Massachusetts continue to face significant barriers primarily due to the existing federal illegality of cannabis,” commissioners were shown during a presentation by Commissioner Bruce Stebbins.

For the 71,000 Massachusetts veterans using a Veterans Administration facility for healthcare or the 11,000 who are 100% disabled as a result of their service, marijuana remains illegal at the federal level, making it inaccessible through the VA. That means veterans cannot get a recommendation from their doctors to get a medical marijuana card or even ask their doctors for advice about use of marijuana.

“I believe that federal prohibition of cannabis has had a chilling effect on our veterans ability to seek treatment here in Massachusetts and perhaps even to pursue employment in the cannabis industry,” Stebbins said. “This is really a question of access and equity for our veterans.”

Another part of the problem is the cost of certification. Medical marijuana cards are issued on a yearly basis with an annual cost for both licensing and processing. That additional expense, on top of the cost of the cannabis itself, can be too much for a veteran on a fixed disability income to add to their already steep health costs.

Commissioners indicated, as a possible statement of policy, that they will support expanding the definition of “qualifying patient” to include veterans using the VA for healthcare who can furnish documentation demonstrating the federal department has diagnosed the veteran with a condition which would normally qualify them for the program.

The commission could also support changing their list of qualifying “debilitating conditions” to include PTSD, or Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and opioid addiction. Too many veterans, commissioners learned, are turning to more dangerous or addictive drugs because they simply have no alternative.

“Veterans are more susceptible to opioid addiction as they are more likely to suffer from chronic pain. In addition, many veterans suffer from mental health problems like Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, making them more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol in an attempt to self medicate,” Commissioner Kimberly Roy said.

Mortality rates from drug overdoses among the veteran population have increased by more than 50% in the last decade, Roy told her colleagues, but it’s a problem that the commission is in a unique position to help solve, she said.

“Addressing drug overdose in the veteran population requires accessible and non-judgmental, low threshold, wraparound, and holistic solutions that recognize the complex etiology of overdose risk for veterans,” she said.

While marijuana is legal for adult use in Massachusetts — with or without a medical recommendation — it remains a Schedule 1 Controlled Substance under federal law alongside drugs like heroin or LSD. According to the Drug Enforcement Agency, Schedule 1 drugs “are defined as drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

Every year from June 1 to Aug. 31, wild turkey reports from the public help MassWildlife biologists determine the population’s reproductive success.

Wildlife officials are looking for wild turkey reports from all regions of Massachusetts — from the most rural communities to more densely-populated areas like Boston and Brookline, where turkeys are now spotted on a regular basis.

“As we’ve seen over the past couple of decades, turkeys are becoming more and more common in suburban areas and now in urban settings,” MassWildlife Turkey Project Leader Dave Scarpitti told the Herald, noting that the turkeys are finding food in these areas.

People can report sightings of hens (female turkeys), poults (newly-hatched turkeys), jakes (juvenile males), and toms (adult males). The state’s survey asks for the sighting date, location and number of turkeys.

“It goes a long way to helping us keep our finger on the pulse of the population and the success of their reproduction,” Scarpitti said.

“We want to get a better idea of what that reproduction looks like for the fall season,” he added. “If there are significant declines in the population, we would want to adjust our harvest regulations.”

The state’s wild turkey population has jumped exponentially since the 1970s when MassWildlife biologists trapped 37 turkeys in New York and released them in the Berkshires. The new flock grew, and by the fall of 1978, the estimated population was about 1,000 birds.

As more birds moved in from neighboring states, turkeys soon ranged throughout most parts of western Massachusetts. Then the wild turkeys continued to expand their range into central, northeastern and southeastern areas of the state — and today, the wild turkey population is estimated at between 30,000 and 35,000 birds.

MassWildlife officials warn people to never deliberately feed wild turkeys, which will attract them to their property and keep them around. Turkeys can survive very well on natural foods, and do not need handouts from people.

Also, if people come across aggressive turkeys, they should not hesitate to scare or threaten a bold turkey with loud noises, spraying water from a hose or swatting with a broom. A dog on a leash is also an effective deterrent.

For more information on the state’s annual wild turkey survey and to report sightings, visit www.mass.gov/info-details/summer-wild-turkey-survey.

With the black bear population’s range expanding east toward the most densely populated Bay State communities, bear sightings are increasing — especially during these peak months for bear activity.

Newton joined the bear sighting list on Sunday at around 8:26 a.m., when Massachusetts Environmental Police were alerted to the black bear. The city received reports of the bear running through Newton Highlands near Cold Spring Park.

“Our officers are watching its location,” Newton Police wrote on social media. “The Environmental Police have been notified.

“Please do not approach any wildlife and keep a safe distance,” police added.

The City of Newton Mayor’s Office shared a photo of the bear.

“Newton Police are watching its location,” Mayor Ruthanne Fuller’s office added. “Please do not approach the bear.”

Environmental Police responded to the area, and monitored the bear’s movements until the animal entered the woods at around 10:45 a.m.

“No aggression has been reported or observed,” the state agency reported.

May, June, and July are peak months for bear activity and reported conflicts with bears in Massachusetts. This is because 1-year-old cubs are leaving their mothers for the first time, and are finding new territories. June is also the peak of the bear mating season, leading to lots of activity and movement tied to mating.

Also, bears are searching for food at a time of year when natural foods like berries are still not available for them.

“If a bear is seen in town, leave the animal alone and keep pets leashed,” a spokesperson for Massachusetts Environmental Police said in a statement. “A gathering of people not only stresses the animal, but adds the risk of having a bear chased out into traffic or into a group of bystanders. In most situations, if left alone, bears will return to forested areas on their own.”

In the mid-1970s, the Massachusetts black bear population was estimated at under 100 individuals.

Today, there are at least 4,500 black bears in the Bay State, and their range is expanding eastward, according to state wildlife officials.

MassWildlife has been receiving an increasing number of public inquiries about what to do if they see a bear. The state wildlife officials urge residents to take a few precautionary measures to avoid negative encounters with bears, including: removing bird feeders, securing trash, and protecting chickens with electric fencing.

On Sunday, Newton Police told residents that if they saw the bear, people could contact the non-emergency line at 617-796-2123.

If a bear is in a very populated area, the state told people to contact the Environmental Police Radio Room at 1-800-632-8075 or the nearest MassWildlife District Office to report the sighting and get advice.

They may come in handy this summer, as seen in cities along the East Coast this week with people again putting on masks to deal with the hazardous smoke from the raging Canadian wildfires.

The smoke and haze conditions have drastically improved in Massachusetts since Tuesday, but meteorologists warn that the wildfire smoke could return in waves over the next several weeks.

When those high concentrations of smoke come back, masks will help reduce peoples’ exposure to the PM2.5 air pollution from wildfires, according to John Rogan, professor of geography at Clark University in Worcester.

“If people are outside, wearing masks during those hazardous air quality days will be important,” Rogan, whose recent research projects have involved mapping wildfire burn severity in southern California and southeastern Arizona, told the Herald on Thursday.

He noted that N95 respirator masks offer far greater protection than cloth masks.

Nova Scotia and Quebec have already seen record fires this season, leading to the massive plumes of smoke from up north impacting the U.S. East Coast.

This wildfire anomaly was sparked by a prolonged drought and lightning strikes from storms. More wildfire burning is expected this summer.

“It’s unprecedented what’s going on in Quebec,” Rogan said. “And cities are getting pummeled by these large smoke plumes that are dense on the ground.”

He noted that tall buildings in cities are acting as canyons for that smoke.

“It’s a very serious threat,” he added, emphasizing the impact on those with respiratory conditions.

Many have wondered about the smoke’s impact on dogs and cats. When the poor air quality returns, owners should limit how much time their pets spend outside, said Meg Whelan, chief medical officer of Angell Animal Medical Center.

Owners could also wipe down their pet with a warm washcloth, she added.

Some cats have asthma, and these conditions can be “a trigger for pets that are sensitive,” Whelan said.

As far as the near-term weather forecast, wildfire smoke from Canada will continue to influence fine particle levels in parts of Massachusetts on Friday.

“Fine particle levels will likely average in the Moderate range over much of the State with Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups levels likely in southeast areas of the State,” the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection wrote in an air quality alert.

President Biden spoke with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to “offer additional help putting out these fires, particularly those in Quebec that have severe impacts on American communities,” the president tweeted.

Biden also tweeted, “Folks, head to AirNow.gov to stay up-to-date with the air quality in your area and take the right precautions to help keep you and your family safe.”

Mateo Ventura, 18, who told the undercover agent that he wanted to fight with ISIS, also reportedly tried to get $10 million from the FBI in exchange for information about an ISIS terror attack.

The FBI on Thursday arrested Ventura, and he was charged with knowingly concealing the source of material support or resources that he intended to go to a foreign terrorist organization.

While Ventura was still a juvenile, he gave 26 gift cards to the undercover agent — donating $965 that was intended to support ISIS. Then after Ventura turned 18 years old, he gave 16 gift cards to the agent earlier this year — donating $705 to help ISIS.

“This seems really untraceable,” Ventura wrote to the agent about using the gift cards to help the terrorist organization.

Ventura, who lives at home with his father in Wakefield, used an online encrypted messaging application to communicate with the agent. The application, EMA, has become one of ISIS’s primary communication tools, and the app is used by its supporters to plan attacks.

As a juvenile in 2021, Ventura started talking with the agent about his desire to “make hijrah,” which refers to traveling overseas to join and fight with ISIS.

Then the agent asked Ventura if he wanted to give “sadaqah,” a term used to describe donations to ISIS.

Later that day, Ventura sent the undercover agent a redemption code for a Google gift card worth $25.

The agent asked Ventura if he wanted the redemption code sold on the dark web for money, and for that money to be sent “straight to mujahideen (Islamic fighters) for help in fight against kuffar (disbelievers).”

“Okay sell on darkweb,” Ventura wrote to the agent.

FBI special agent Paul Lagno wrote in the criminal complaint, “Ventura understood that providing material support to ISIS in the form of gift cards would be untraceable and would conceal that he was the source of the donations.”

Ventura is accused of purchasing a total of $1,670 in gift cards, with the intention of the money supporting the terror group.

Then in April, the 18-year-old allegedly called the FBI Boston Operations Center multiple times — asking to speak with an agent, saying he had information about upcoming terror attacks.

He told the FBI that the alleged attacks were scheduled to take place around the time of Eid al-Fitr in Egypt.

Then he wrote an electronic tip to the FBI’s National Threat Operations Center, requesting $10 million and immunity “in exchange for information he believed would stop an ISIS attack,” the criminal complaint reads.

The FBI told him that the information was not specific, and therefore not actionable. In a follow-up electronic tip, Ventura told the FBI that he was “okay with the FBI’s decision, and requesting for the FBI to never speak to him again.”

The charge of knowingly concealing the source of material support or resources to a foreign terrorist organization can lead to a sentence of up to 10 years in prison, up to a lifetime of supervised release, and a fine of up to $250,000.

Campbell said those citations have amounted to $1.3 million in penalties, covered roughly 2,000 minors, and affected 127 employers. And children, especially those of migrant families, who are stuck in illegal labor situations often feel afraid or that they have no other options to make money, the attorney general said.

“They’re afraid that their employers will retaliate against them or their families. They’re afraid that coming forward might expose them to immigration enforcement. Too often, they feel they don’t have a choice,” Campbell said at a press conference in Boston. “I, along with the team, want to be crystal clear that they do have a choice.”

Campbell urged more education on child labor laws after her office announced it had reached a settlement with Dave & Busters over child labor violations.

The arcade chain agreed to pay a $275,000 fine for not providing meal breaks of at least 30 minutes to employees who worked shifts longer than six hours, not obtaining work permits for minors before they began employment, and employing 16- or 17-year-old children for later hours than permitted under state law, according to a Thursday statement.

Campbell’s office said they began to investigate the Texas-based arcade chain — which operates locations in Braintree, Natick, and Woburn — after a parent accused the company of making their child work past midnight on a weekend. Dave & Busters, according to Campbell, employed “several minors” without work permits.

Children under 16 and 17 years old are barred from working later than 10 p.m. on school nights, Campbell’s office said.

“We want young workers and their families to know about their rights and, of course, these laws,” Campbell said. “And we want them to know about these laws because these are the laws designed to protect them. And we want employers to know of their legal obligations too.”

A spokesperson for Dave & Busters did not immediately return a request for comment.

The state has experienced a surge over the past year of migrant arrivals, many who have left their home countries because of violence, political persecution, or economic hardships. The Massachusetts Housing Stabilization Division reported 1,051 homeless families were living in motels as of Wednesday.

Many children who accompany migrant families often find themselves in unsafe workplaces, working long hours, because parents “don’t know any different,” said La Colaborativa Executive Director Gladys Vega.

“Sometimes parents are worried about paying that coyote. They need to pay whatever they left behind in their country, whoever they borrowed the money to come here. So everyone in that family has to work,” Gladys said.

La Colaborativa runs a summer youth employment program, which employs approximately 230 to 250 young people in Chelsea. Gladys said when young people are being paid, parents are often waiting for their paycheck.

Addressing unsafe or illegal child labor is “not an easy task, because at times, parents are behind it,” Gladys said.

“We need to educate our families. We need to educate our community to make sure that they’re aware that if their kid is working 30 hours and is 14 years old, absolutely not. Education goes first,” she said.

Campbell said her office created an internal child labor working group to identify investigation targets and “novel approaches to overcoming enforcement challenges.” The office, Campbell said, will continue to meet with immigrant worker centers, “which is really important.”

“We’re also, of course, giving this information out through pamphlets and flyers to community groups and partners,” she said.

School officials often pick up on when a young person is working in an unhealthy or unsafe environment, said Ruben Carmona of the Salem Public Schools.

“They are working too late and their homework is not done,” he said. “Their grades are slipping or they are late for school. Poor working conditions out of school and out of the home impact their lives in our school and the home as well.”

Next year’s budget comes in at about 7%, or $174 million higher than this fiscal year and the spending plan calls for growing the T’s workforce from 6,679 employees to 7,743, an addition of 964 employees not included in this year’s costs.

Most of those new hires and the mass of that new spending is safety driven, according to MBTA Chief Financial Officer Mary Ann O’Hara

“This budget is very different than the budgets we’ve done in the last three years. It’s unique from prior years just due to the historical investment of state resources into safety and training initiatives,” O’Hara told the Board of Directors ahead of their vote. “The FY2024 budget includes a major investment for safety and training which quadruples prior year efforts.”

More than half of every dollar spent over fiscal 2023’s budget is related to safety, O’Hara said, with a full $68 million worth spent in response to a Federal Transit Administration’s Safety and Management Inspection report.

“This budget reflects a series of investments that sharpen our focus on enhancing safety for our customers, workforce, contractors, and vendors,” MBTA General Manager Phil Eng said in a statement. “The T plays a vital role in connecting people to work, school, family, and friends, and I thank the Board of Directors for approving the FY24 budget. The priorities outlined here provide the means to make progress toward delivering the service our customers deserve and the level of safety – across the entire system – they expect.”

About $181 million will be spent on bridge rehabilitation, station and accessibility upgrades, and the design of the Red-Blue Connector project.

The budget also calls for $5 million to study “means tested” fares, or income driven pricing, with the goal of expanding access to public transit to low income riders.

“This budget strikes a balance between building critical staffing capacity around safety while maintaining our commitment to operating new and future services like the Green Line Extension and South Coast Rail,” Chief Administrative Officer David Panagore, said after the board’s vote.

While 7% may seem like a substantial spending jump, according to the Jim Rooney, the president of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, it is money that needs to be spent.

“I think we all have to recognize that to fix the T is going to require some amount of additional resources both in operating and capital funds,” he told the Herald. “So, no surprises. There is a significant amount of money in the training area and we applaud that focus. At least there is the money for new hires that they need. They need bodies. Now they need to develop the hiring process and pipeline to get them hired. Good to know the money is there.”

After smoke from the Canadian wildfires caused the air quality to plummet across Massachusetts in recent days and some people put back on their N95 masks, meteorologists are warning that smoke from up north could impact the region at times over the next several weeks.

“We might be experiencing this off and on throughout the summer, depending on how the weather pattern shapes up,” AccuWeather senior meteorologist John Gresiak told the Herald on Wednesday — which was a better day for air quality in the Bay State, while New York City and other spots on the East Coast dealt with hazardous conditions.

The haze and smoke could continue to affect the region because the Canadian wildfires are out of control, and it doesn’t appear they’ll be put out soon.

The wildfires are in remote areas of northern Quebec where very few people live, Gresiak said.

“It may be awhile before the fires get extinguished,” he added.

When the air quality drastically plummets, AccuWeather estimates that breathing the polluted air for several hours can be compared to smoking five to 10 cigarettes.

“There are a lot of particulates in this wildfire smoke, and that stuff can cause all kinds of problems when it gets into your lungs, especially if you have asthma or other conditions,” Gresiak said. “Even healthy people don’t want to inhale too much of this.”

Secondhand smoke is a respiratory irritant, and this is a respiratory irritant “in much the same way,” according to Scott Goldberg, director of emergency medical services for Mass General Brigham.

The particulate matter can cause shortness of breath, especially for those in sensitive groups, which includes children, senior citizens, those with pre-existing respiratory and cardiac conditions, and pregnant people.

“If you’re feeling any respiratory symptoms, go inside to a cool place and rest,” said Goldberg, who’s also an emergency medicine physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

People especially in sensitive groups should try to limit their time outdoors until the levels of particulate matter decrease, he said, adding that they should have their rescue medications on hand.

While much of the focus has been on outside pollution, the tiny particles from the wildfire smoke can get into homes and cause health risks, said Shichao Liu, a Worcester Polytechnic Institute assistant professor of architectural engineering and fire protection engineering.

“Even though people are staying in buildings, they’re not 100% prevented from the exposure of the outdoor smoke conditions,” he said.

Liu said people can attach an air filter to the back of a box fan to help clean out their home’s inside air. He also advised people to make sure their vehicle’s A/C is on recirculation mode to avoid bringing the outside air inside the vehicle.

As far as the near future forecast in Massachusetts, Thursday’s smoke will be mainly situated south of the Mass Pike corridor, according to the National Weather Service’s Boston office.

The Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection has again issued an air quality advisory for Thursday.

“AIR QUALITY: Wildfire smoke from Canada will continue to influence fine particle levels in parts of our region on Thursday,” the advisory reads. “Fine particle levels will likely average in the Good range in northeast sections of the State and Moderate range in the remainder of eastern and central parts of the State. Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups levels are once again likely in western sections of the State and an Air Quality Alert remains posted for particle pollution in western sections.”

In early May, Sidney Mae Olson died after a large truck hit and killed her in an Elm Street downtown crosswalk. The 5-year-old girl was on her way to art class with her family.

Sidney’s father Eric Olson and a group of concerned parents called “Sidney’s Rainbows” are now pushing for safer streets in Elm Square and across town.

“In an instant, we had an impossible void in our lives,” Olson said in a statement, which he plans to read at a community forum about pedestrian safety on Thursday. “My wife and I lost a daughter. My son lost his big sister. Her classmates lost a dear friend.

“No one should die in a crosswalk,” he added. “Yet, there have been three similar incidents in the last 18 months on Elm Street alone. Andover is thriving, but the slow pace of progress on pedestrian and bicycle safety means we risk our community members dying.”

The town’s population has jumped by almost 50% in the last two decades. In 2005, the population was 25,000 people when the downtown roads were designed. Now, the town’s population is about 37,000 people.

Meanwhile, crashes in Andover are up 30% over the past 10 years, according to data from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation. Statewide, pedestrian fatalities exceeded 100 last year, up 35% from 2021.

“Despite global advances in protecting vulnerable road users, we’re going backwards,” Olson said.

He’s pushing the town to make three immediate pedestrian safety improvements.

“Make common sense changes to Elm Square crosswalks, starting with moving vehicle stop lines back farther from crosswalks, adding flex posts to slow speeds, and eliminating turns through intersections when pedestrians have a walk sign,” the father said.

The other two changes are: post police details at Elm Square and other busy intersections at peak traffic times; and improve awareness and enforcement of speed limits on Elm, High, and Central streets with portable speed bumps, signage and radar signs.

“There is no action that will bring back our daughter, but we hope this terrible incident can bring us together to create safer streets,” Olson said.

The town should commit to zero fatalities and serious injuries with a standard like Vision Zero as part of Andover’s 5-year Complete Streets Policy, he said, adding that the town should conduct a thorough pedestrian and bicyclist road safety audit for downtown.

The community forum on Thursday is at 7 p.m., at Doherty Middle School in Andover.

Because we’re not all there.

Someone told me that joke recently, and it seemed appropriate for what’s going on. I mean, everything has been spiraling out of control here for quite some time. But it seems to be getting worse, crazier, not making any sense whatsoever.

Just to take one example – nip bottles of alcohol. There’s a movement to outlaw the little mini-containers, and I get it.

Winos chug them – the smaller the bottle, the larger the problem. They increase litter. And perhaps worst of all, they’re easy to hide and drink while you’re driving.

Remember what they found in Rep. David “Sleepy” LeBouef’s wrecked car when he was lugged for driving legless last year — multiple containers of Dr. McGillicuddy’s non-prescription Wild Grape elixirs.

So you can understand why it might be good public policy to get rid of nips. Yet at the same moment, some legislators on Beacon Hill are pushing to allow barrooms to sell mixed drinks to go.

How does that make sense? You want to outlaw mini-bottles, but simultaneously allow drivers to grab cold highballs that go down easier than straight booze, and will likely contain more booze than the standard 1.7-ounce “airplane” bottle.

Also, don’t most states, including Massachusetts, have a law on the books against “open containers” in cars?

How about gambling? First the state legalized casinos, and now sports betting. Guess what’s happened – state lottery sales have taken a big hit, especially from sports betting. Who could have ever seen that one coming?

We all understand that gambling, like booze or drugs, can get out of control. What used to be called a “vice” is now a “disease.”

Once you had to know a bookie to make a bet on a sporting event. Now you just need an app on your cell phone. How do you think business is doing?

What the Lottery did to bingo games at your local parish church a half-century ago, online sports betting is now doing to the Lottery. Once again, it’s Schumpeter’s creative destruction of capitalism, even if the Lottery is a state-run enterprise.

But the Lottery has a solution to its declining revenues. It’s peddling a new scratch ticket – a $50 scratch ticket! What could possibly go wrong?

I was only a kid at the time, but I can still remember the arguments made in the Legislature against the Lottery back in the early 70’s. Oh sure, the Catholic church said, Beacon Hill will start off with just a once-a-week drawing. But then it’ll be twice a week. Then they’ll go to daily numbers, like the Mob. Then it’ll be Keno, and punch cards, and big multi-state games….

Guess where the $50 scratch tickets are selling fastest? (Hint: it’s not Weston.)

Next we have drugs. By a narrow margin, Massachusetts legalized weed a few years back. (I voted against it.) It just didn’t seem like this society needed yet another drug, gateway or otherwise.

As the Commonwealth made it easier to get a good buzz on, we also decided to outlaw menthol cigarettes, because they’re so addictive. Now, does anyone seriously believe that if you have a severe tobacco jones, you’re just going to quit because you can’t get Newports?

No, you’re just going to switch to Marlboros or something else. Or if you live close enough to the border you’re just going to drive to New Hampshire or Rhode Island.

But cigarettes are so dangerous, right? Of course they are. On the other hand, has anyone working in a cigarette factory or distribution center ever died after inhaling tobacco dust that caused a fatal asthma attack?

But that’s just what happened to a young woman in Holyoke who worked for one of the new weed companies. She died last year after breathing in cannabis dust. The company that owned the facility just announced that it is closing down all of its operations in Massachusetts.

Newports take decades to kill you. Weed can apparently get the job done in a matter of months.

Have you heard about the plummeting tax revenues in the Commonwealth? Working people, Americans, are fleeing the state at the rate of 1,100 a week.

Non-working people, illegal immigrants, are flooding into the Commonwealth. Unlike the people who were leaving, they must be supported. In Taunton, among other places, they’ve taken over an entire hotel, 160 rooms.

According to the city, the state is paying the hotel chain more than $150 a night for each room. Plus all the illegals get three hot meals a day, delivered, which costs an additional $37 per day, per person.

No wonder the state’s taxpayers are clearing out. In terms of flight per 1,000 residents, Massachusetts ranks now fourth in the nation, trailing only New York, California and Illinois.

Just like with the death and unemployment rates during the recent Panic, Massachusetts is punching way above its weight class.

The median rent in Boston is the second-highest in the nation, behind only New York City — $3,839 a month here vs. $4,032 in New York, according to the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation.

The proposed solution? A new “transfer” tax on real estate transactions. That’s what the “advocates” are lobbying for on Beacon Hill for this week – maybe up to 2% on transactions of over a million bucks.

Someone would have to pay that extra $20,000 or so to the hackerama. Who do you think would end up footing the bill – the tenant or the landlord?

But that’s okay, because the money from this latest new tax would be used for… affordable housing. Wink wink nudge nudge.

Then there’s mass transit. There’s not enough money for the MBTA. Hey, let’s make everything free! That should solve the funding problem!

Did any of these people ever hear of the old saw, that if you want to get more of something, you just have the government subsidize it. (Think illegals on welfare.)

If you want to get less of something, you just tax it more. (Think American citizens who aren’t on welfare.)

Taxachusetts – it’s back. As for all of us who’ve been in Massachusetts most of our lives, we’re here, as the old country song goes, for better or for worse.

But not for long.

After the region’s air quality plummeted on Tuesday due to the wildfire smoke, Bay State environmental officials are yet again warning that the smoke will impact the area on Wednesday.

And local meteorologists expect the smoke to linger through at least Saturday.

“It’s going to stick with us for the next few days, based on the trajectory of the plume,” Bill Simpson, meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Boston office, told the Herald on Tuesday. “Probably through at least Saturday.”

“Smoke is not healthy, so if you can avoid being outside and avoid strenuous activity, that’s a good idea,” he added.

The wildfire smoke from Canada will continue to influence fine particle levels across the region on Wednesday, according to the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection.

“Fine particle levels will likely average in the Moderate range with some Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups readings possible at times,” reads MassDEP’s air quality advisory.

Sensitive groups include people with heart or lung disease, such as asthma, older adults, children, teenagers, and people who are active outdoors.

MassDEP on Tuesday had been advising people in sensitive groups to reduce prolonged or heavy outdoor exertion, take more breaks, do less intense activities, follow asthma action plans, and keep quick relief medicine handy.

Even though some rain showers arrived on Tuesday, it didn’t affect the smoke levels very much.

“They’re mostly scattered showers, so they have a very localized effect,” Simpson said. “They’re not these widespread showers that can clean out the atmosphere.”

With the air quality advisory in effect, residents should close their windows, according to Eric Schiff, a physics professor at Syracuse University and an indoor air quality expert.

“When local authorities warn about poor air quality, windows should be closed,” he said.

Air purifiers can help improve indoor air quality, Schiff added, saying they’re useful in reducing the buildup of small particles and unhealthy gases.

Canada is dealing with a series of intense wildfires that have spread from the western provinces to Quebec, with hundreds of forest fires burning.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a poor air quality alert for New England, a day after parts of Illinois, Wisconsin and Minnesota received a similar advisory. Last week, U.S. officials as far south as Maryland, Baltimore, Virginia and Pennsylvania reported being impacted by the wildfires.

Herald wire services were used in this report.

Kim West, a partner at Ashcroft Law Firm in Boston, was recently selected as the Specialist Prosecutor at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers and Specialist Prosecutor’s Office in The Hague, Netherlands.

West was one of the high-profile local lawyers who were being looked at as the replacement for Andrew Lelling to lead the Bay State U.S. Attorney’s Office. Rollins, the Suffolk County district attorney at the time, was later picked as U.S. Attorney — and she recently resigned following bombshell investigative reports from two federal watchdog agencies.

Instead of the experienced and accomplished West running the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney’s Office, she’s now heading to the European Union-backed court.

“I am extremely grateful to the European Union for selecting me for this position,” West said in a statement. “My colleagues at Ashcroft Law Firm know that my passion has long been centered around international investigations. They recognized that this is an opportunity of a lifetime, and have all been very supportive.

“This new role allows me to continue working with victims, witnesses, and the international community to ensure that perpetrators of war crimes are brought to justice,” West added.

She began her legal career as assistant district attorney in Plymouth County. Then after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, she joined the Anti-Terrorism and National Security Unit at the Massachusetts U.S. Attorney’s Office.

Later, she served for five years as a trial attorney at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, where she prosecuted Radovan Karadzic — who was found guilty of directing the genocide of more than 7,000 Bosnian Muslims in the worst massacre on European soil since the Holocaust.

Then as chief of the Criminal Bureau for the Attorney General’s Office in Massachusetts, West supervised a team of more than 120 professionals responsible for investigating and prosecuting a range of financial, fraud, public corruption, narcotics, gaming, human trafficking, and other offenses.

West at Ashcroft Law Firm has focused on white-collar cases, primarily representing international clients.

“We are immensely proud of her achievements and grateful for the contributions she has made to our firm,” said Michael Sullivan, managing partner of Ashcroft Law Firm’s Boston office. “People from around the world have sought her help because of her empathy and commitment to international justice and accountability. Those same characteristics will guide her in her new position.”

Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft, the firm’s founder and chairman, said of West, “Her appointment to the European Union-backed court is not at all surprising because her career has been defined by a dedication to justice on a global scale. We are sad to be losing Kim as our colleague, but by selecting her for this key position, the international community has chosen the ideal steward to oversee the important responsibilities of investigating war crimes in Kosovo.”

The study along southern California beaches looked at how close juvenile white sharks get to humans, such as waders, swimmers, surfers, and stand-up paddle boarders.

The researchers from Cal State Long Beach Shark Lab revealed that at juvenile white shark aggregation sites, people were near sharks on 97% of the days surveyed. And during the two-year drone study, there were no reported shark bites in any of the surveyed locations.

“Frankly, we were shocked,” Christopher Lowe, professor of marine biology and director of CSULB Shark Lab, told the Herald on Monday. “Sharks would interact with people every single day, multiple times a day, and they would just swim by.

“It was shocking that these occurrences were happening so often,” Lowe added. “And the fact that no one was being bitten smacks in the face of the misconception that if there’s a white shark nearby, you’ll be attacked. This shows that’s not the case.”

More than 1,500 drone surveys were conducted from 2019 through 2021 across 26 different southern California beaches to measure human-juvenile white shark habitat overlap.

The juvenile white sharks were often spotted within 50 yards of where the waves break, putting surfers and stand-up paddle boarders in the closest proximity to sharks. Some sharks were seen as close as 2 yards from the wave break.

“There were a number of times when white sharks would swim by people, and the people just didn’t know it,” Lowe said. “The surfers and swimmers could not see them, and it happens far more than people imagine.”

Lowe grew up on Martha’s Vineyard, when it was very rare to see a great white shark and when the gray seal population had not exploded along the Cape.

He compared the California shark situation to the Cape shark situation, noting that researchers have been starting to see more and more sharks popping up along southern California beaches in the last 20 years.

One major difference is Cape seals have claimed territory at beaches, bringing adult white sharks closer to people.

“That makes that a very different situation, but there’s still people going in the water and white sharks are still swimming by people on the Cape, and they aren’t being bitten,” Lowe said.

“There are a lot of opportunities to use drones along the Cape, and I think people would be surprised with what they see,” he added.

This method of surveillance using drone videography can also be used for future approaches for research, education, or overall beach safety purposes.

These findings are applicable on a global scale, providing confirmation of sharks and humans peacefully coinciding in the same location.

“I hope the state (of Massachusetts) does what California does and invests more in research,” Lowe said. “I think that will really help.”

The third oldest chartered military organization in the world, this year’s change of command was the Artillery Company’s 385th.

Founded in 1638, the Company has left its headquarters at Faneuil Hall and marched to Common on the first Monday of every June since.

Once there, the organization forms rank on the Carty Parade Ground and awaits inspection by the governor — this time Gov. Maura Healey who was greeted with the booming report of three howitzers operated by the Massachusetts National Guard’s 101st Field Artillery Group.

Captain Commanding Thomas Goodfellow resigned his commission as commander of the Artillery Monday, handing the command staff to Captain Timothy Haraden, who was elected to his position by members of the Company.

Large whales can be a safety hazard for recreational boaters and fishermen because they can surface unexpectedly, and are hard to detect in certain weather conditions.

“As whales feed at the surface and close to shore, the chances of encountering one increases,” NOAA wrote on its website. “Accidental collisions with these large animals can be dangerous for everyone involved and can result in costly repairs to your boat.”

Officials are emphasizing the “See a Spout? Watch Out!” boater education program to keep safe when operating a vessel in waters shared by whales.

“Did you see a spout, a tail, or a breaching whale? Slow down and post a lookout,” NOAA wrote. “Some whales dive 20 minutes or more. Seeing one whale at the surface means more could be nearby. Proceed cautiously!”

Some whales, such as humpback whales, create bubble clouds and bubble nets to corral schools of small fish. Never approach or drive through bubbles, NOAA warns. A feeding whale is likely to surface in that space.

Also, if a whale moves away from your boat, don’t chase it. Respect the whale’s behavior and keep your distance.

“Whales are protected under federal law, so interrupting their natural behaviors is illegal,” NOAA wrote. “Stay parallel to the whale’s course and direction while staying at least 100 feet away to avoid cutting off its path or getting too close. Give North Atlantic right whales more space — it is illegal to approach within 1,500 feet/500 yards (five football field lengths) in U.S. waters.”

Meanwhile on Tuesday, a New England Aquarium scientist will testify before a congressional subcommittee on enhanced federal regulations to protect North Atlantic right whales.

Jessica Redfern will be testifying in favor of proposed changes that would slow vessels to protect the critically endangered species, which has an estimated population of less than 350 individuals.

Proposed changes to the vessel speed rule include expanding the size of and time period for areas with seasonal speed restrictions, extending restrictions to most vessels measuring 35 to 65 feet in length, and implementing mandatory speed restrictions in dynamic speed zones.

Vessel strikes are a leading cause of the North Atlantic right whale’s decline, and scientific evidence has shown that slowing down vessels is essential to reducing deaths and serious injuries.

Beacon Hill was abuzz last week, after a routine audit revealed that the Baker Administration, in the middle of his second term, apparently spent $2.5 billion in federal funds on unemployment insurance payouts that were supposed to be covered by Massachusetts tax dollars.

Gov. Maura Healey was the attorney general when that money was spent, so it would be incorrect to imply there is blame to lay at her feet for the error, nevertheless, the state’s current chief executive was immediately asked to answer for the apparent misplacement of billions in COVID funds after she left an afternoon meeting with the House Speaker and Senate President.

“This is something that we became aware of very, very recently,” Healey said alongside Speaker Ron Mariano and Sen. President Karen Spilka.

According to Healey, while it is clear that during the pandemic there were federal funds coming into the state from various pots following the passage of several different pandemic response bills, it is not clear how money was drawn from the wrong account or when it will need to be returned.

“What happened is that there were multiple funds set up, as you know during this COVID pandemic time, and for whatever reason money was drawn from a federal pot instead of a state pot,” she said. “Our plan has been to continue discussion with the U.S. Department of Labor on this and to hopefully be able to resolve things in a way that minimizes any impact to the Commonwealth.”

“We’re sort of in a fact-finding stage right now,” Spilka chimed in. “I think it’s too early to speculate what action we would be taking.”

“We don’t even know how much we owe,” Mariano added.

The audit showed that in 2020 and through the pandemic, the state labor department withdrew federal relief funds for unemployment claims that should have been covered by the state’s Unemployment Trust Fund, which Massachusetts employers pay into, according to labor officials.

“In broad strokes, it was money that was really set aside as a federal account, a federal bucket and we had a state bucket. At some point these two got merged and money was unfortunately drawn down from this federal account,” Healey said.

A U.S. Department of Labor spokesperson confirmed they have been in discussion with state officials about the oversight and are “working with the state on options to rectify the situation.”

The governor said she is confident that steps have already been taken to make sure this sort of mistake does not occur again.

State Senate President Karen Spilka, speaking to reporters after meeting with both Gov. Maura Healey and House Speaker Ron Mariano for one of the trio’s somewhat regular “leadership meetings,” said last summer’s sudden shelving of a unanimously accepted economic development bill, brought about after lawmakers learned they had taken too much from taxpayers and would need to send billions back under a rarely invoked 1986 law, will not serve as a precedent for a second slow-walk on tax relief.

“We are proceeding with a tax relief package — as I’ve said for many months — we will do a tax relief package,” she said.

On Friday, a yearly audit revealed Baker Administration officials apparently used $2.5 billion in federal pandemic-era relief funds to cover the cost of state-provided unemployment benefits, a tab which is supposed to be picked up by the commonwealth, not the feds.

It is unclear when the federal government will be paid back or how the error was made. On Monday lawmakers said they were still in a “fact-finding” phase.

The state’s Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development said the discrepancy occurred in 2020 and was “only recently identified” by the Healey administration.

According to the senate president, despite that unexpected unemployment bill arriving — which she contends isn’t even necessarily reflective of what the state may owe back — the upper chamber will proceed with the sort of progressive tax cuts she has been championing all session.

The Senate’s about $56 billion fiscal 2024 budget, unanimously passed at the end of May, already includes a carveout for $575 million in tax relief. That’s about what was approved last year but abandoned and yet still hundreds of millions less than the economic reform plans offered by the state House and governor.

What will be in the plan is still up in the air. Senate Ways and Means Chair Michael Rodrigues said a bill would be released in “the next two weeks.”

“We are in regular communication with our colleagues, putting together a package as we speak,” he told the State House News Service.

According to Spilka, residents will learn the specifics of the Senate’s tax cut plan “soon.”

“So, stay tuned,” she said.

Attorney Michael Bachrach, who is based in Manhattan, has been appointed as a lawyer for the 21-year-old federally detained Dighton man.

“Mr. Bachrach’s notable cases include: winning 284 counts of acquittal for Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani, the first and thus far only Guantanamo Bay detainee to be transferred to civilian custody for trial,” reads the attorney’s website.

“Ghailani was found guilty of only one count of a 308-count indictment charging him with the bombings of the United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania,” the website states. “Along the way, Mr. Bachrach and his co-counsel won major victories requiring preclusion of evidence obtained as a result of the torture of their client, as well as requiring the United States government to disclose evidence well beyond what had ever been provided before.”

Teixeira, while he was assigned to the 102nd Intelligence Wing of the Massachusetts Air National Guard at Otis Air National Guard Base on Cape Cod, is accused of leaking national defense classified information.

The Massachusetts U.S. Attorney’s Office alleges in a criminal complaint that Teixeira used his top secret security clearance as an Air National Guardsman to access and publish information about the Russia-Ukraine conflict and other sensitive matters. He’s being charged under the Espionage Act.

Recently, a U.S. magistrate judge ruled that Teixeira should remain detained.

“I find that the United States has proved by a preponderance of the evidence that no condition or combination of conditions will reasonably address the serious risk of flight and obstruction of justice posed by Defendant’s release on conditions,” wrote Judge David Hennessy.

Following that ruling, Teixeira tried to boost his court-appointed representation with a private attorney under the Criminal Justice Act (CJA).

“In order to ‘provide high-quality representation consistent with the best practices of the legal profession and commensurate with those services rendered when counsel is privately retained,’ additional appointment of CJA counsel is necessary here because of the complexity and nature of this prosecution and the nature of the evidence and procedures involved,” Teixeira’s federal public defender wrote.

Bachrach serves on the CJA panel for the Southern District of New York and is a member of the CJA Capital Panel for the Southern District of New York, the CJA Capital Panel for the Eastern District of New York, and the CJA Terrorism Panel for the Eastern District of New York.

Bachrach did not immediately respond to comment on Monday.

The air may have the smell of smoke at times on Tuesday, as Massachusetts environmental officials have issued an “Air Quality Alert” until midnight on Tuesday.

“AIR QUALITY: Smoke from Canadian wildfires over our region will likely elevate fine particle levels into the Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups range over much of the State,” the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection’s forecast reads.

“An Air Quality Alert will be posted for these elevated PM2.5 levels for the midnight to midnight period Tuesday,” MassDEP added.

The significant smoke from the Canadian wildfires might lead to a hazy sun during the day.

Other states have also issued alerts due to the smoke from the Canadian wildfires, including the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services.

“Sensitive individuals include children and older adults; anyone with lung disease such as asthma, emphysema, and bronchitis; and people who are active outdoors,” the Granite State alert reads. “Even healthy individuals may experience mild health effects and should consider limiting strenuous or prolonged outdoor activities.”

The other weather development on Tuesday will be scattered showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon.

Small hail and gusty winds will be possible with the strongest storms.

The storms are expected to be hit or miss, according to the National Weather Service.

“Greatest risk for this activity seems to be southeast of an Orange…to Fitchburg…to Boston line,” the National Weather Service’s forecast discussion reads. “Again though this activity will be hit or miss…so not everyone will get wet and the vast majority of the day will be rain free in a given location.”

A wildfire that forced thousands of residents from their homes in Nova Scotia is now contained, while a second wildfire remains out of control.

Nova Scotia’s natural resources department said the Tantallon fire northwest of Halifax is now under control, meaning it is not expected to grow but is not yet out.

The blaze broke out a week ago, forcing 16,000 people from their suburban homes and destroying some 200 structures, including 151 homes.

But in Shelburne County in southwest Nova Scotia, the wildfire continues to burn out of control. The blaze covered 97 square miles as of Sunday morning and has destroyed at least 50 homes and cottages.

Canadian soldiers and firefighters from abroad are now on the ground helping the effort to extinguish the blazes that have been burning in several parts of Nova Scotia for the past week.

Herald wire services were used in this report.

The Associated Industries of Massachusetts, in its monthly Business Confidence Index, says Massachusetts business owners’ faith in the economy plunged half-a-point in May, dropping from 50.1% to 49.6% and continuing a downward trend that first began in November.

And while a half point may not sound like a lot, the move is significant as a reading below 50 indicates a pessimistic outlook.

“Massachusetts employers turned pessimistic about the economy for the first time since December 2020 last month as the state economy slowed to a crawl and the Federal Reserve continued to raise interest rates,” the survey reads, in part.

The index, taken well ahead of Friday’s unexpected report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showing the economy had added a further 339,000 jobs and before President Biden’s negotiated deal to suspend the debt ceiling until 2025 had cleared Congress, reflects an ongoing concern among employers that the nation may be barreling toward economic recession or policy driven calamity.

“Businesses have been stung by both stubbornly high inflation and persistently high interest rates, which have dampened demand and raised costs. It’s unfortunately not surprising that the Future Index indicates that business leaders expect these conditions to worsen further,” Michael Tyler, Chief Investment Officer at Eastern Bank Wealth Management and Vice Chair of AIM’s Board of Economic Advisors said with the survey’s release.

“Thankfully, a possible recession would likely be shallow and short, cushioned by a strong jobs market and healthy consumer spending,” Tyler said.

Though circumstances may have seemed particularly dire to business owners as of last month, according AIM President John Regan, doing away with concerns of a U.S. default and the consequences of what might follow will hopefully put the minds of employers at ease.

“The President and Congress did the right thing in hammering out an agreement that will maintain the stability of the global financial system. Employers need all the predictability they can get as the economy continues to slow down,” Regan said.

Friday’s jobs report also showed a slight uptick in the unemployment rate, which has Fed watchers wondering if the economy has slowed enough that Federal Reserve Chair Jay Powell could consider a pause in the central bank’s on-going crusade against inflation via raises to the key interest rate, an eleventh of which may or may not materialize out of June’s meeting of the Board of Governors.

AIM surveys more than 140 Bay State businesses to produce their monthly index, the first of which was published in July of 1991. According to AIM, business confidence hit historic highs in 1997 and 1998, with two months in either year showing 68.5% confidence, and hit a low in February of 2009, when it was 33.3%.

National Weather Service meteorologists are seeing encouraging signs that warmer temperatures and drier days will arrive in Massachusetts for the second weekend of June.

But ahead of next weekend, the region will have a chance of rain showers each day, including at least one day with a chance for some thunderstorms. Temps should remain cooler than average during the workweek until a warm up toward the weekend.

“While this weekend was obviously a damper, next weekend should look considerably better,” Andrew Loconto, meteorologist at the National Weather Service’s Boston office, told the Herald on Sunday.

The weather on Sunday felt more like mid-April than the first weekend of June, as temps remained stuck in the 50s along with periods of rain.

The workweek should start off with a continuation of the weekend, with a lot of clouds but fewer rain showers. It should be breezy in eastern Massachusetts, along with cool temps in the upper 50s to lower 60s.

Temps should improve on Tuesday into the 70s, which is closer to normal for the beginning of June.

“With that, there will be a risk for some showers and thunderstorms later in the afternoon into the evening,” Loconto said. “It’s not looking like it will be severe at this time.”

Then the cooler weather pattern is expected to return from Wednesday to Friday, with below normal temps in the 60s.

“There will be off and on chances for showers, but nothing that looks like it will be a washout,” Loconto said.

Finally, a break from the cool and wet weather is possible for Saturday and Sunday — with sunny skies and temps around 80 degrees by the end of the weekend.

Trulieve Cannabis Corp. recently announced that the marijuana giant will be winding down its operations in Massachusetts. The company’s dispensaries in Worcester, Framingham, and Northampton will close at the end of June, and Trulieve expects that it will cease all operations in the state by the end of the year.

The cannabis behemoth made headlines last year when a worker who was packaging ground cannabis into pre-rolls at Trulieve’s cannabis processing facility in Holyoke suffered an asthma attack and later died in the hospital. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration investigated, and the company later settled with OSHA.

Trulieve isn’t the first cannabis company to shut down pot shops in the state. Late last year, the Source became the first dispensary to close in Massachusetts. The store was located close to other pot shops in Northampton.

Now Trulieve will be taking another marijuana dispensary off the market in Northampton, along with stores in Worcester and Framingham. The company said it’s looking to “preserve cash and improve financial performance.”

“These difficult but necessary measures are part of ongoing efforts to bolster business resilience and our commitment to cash preservation as we continue to focus on our business strategy of going deep in our core markets and jettisoning non-contributive assets,” CEO Kim Rivers said in a statement. “We remain fully confident in our strategic position and the long term prospects for the industry.”

In December, Trulieve had announced a settlement with OSHA that would lead to more health and safety protections for workers at its cannabis manufacturing facilities following the death of an employee.

As part of the agreement, the original $35,219 fine against Trulieve was reduced to $14,502. Under the agreement, Trulieve would study whether ground cannabis dust is required to be classified as a “hazardous chemical” in the occupational setting, according to OSHA regulations.

“Increased-scale manufacturing in our industry is a relatively new endeavor and we are determined to continually ask questions and seek answers to make our workplace the safest and healthiest it can possibly be,” Rivers said. “We already have many protections in place, and we intend to continue our work with state and federal regulators to make sure workers are treated well.”

A six-alarm fire destroyed First Congregational on Friday, and on Saturday, state fire officials confirmed a lightning strike caused the 160-year-old church in the small central Massachusetts town to go up in flames.

Church members are invited to attend service at First Congregational Church-Leicester at 10 a.m. Sunday, Rev. Bruce MacLeod told the Herald on Saturday.

“The folks from Spencer don’t want to abandon the community of Spencer,” said MacLeod, who also leads the Leicester church. “What we’ll be figuring out over the next months and years will be ‘How do we do that? Do we do some rebuilding?’ I don’t know what it will be.”

MacLeod called the Spencer congregation small, with about 30 active members, but one that is “really busy and active.” The church hosted a volunteer-run thrift shop and food pantry, he said.

First Congregational has taken up the property at 207 Main St., in Spencer, since 1743, with the original church a little bigger than a barn, according to the congregation’s website. In 1862, a fire destroyed a larger church built in 1772.

The church, wiped out by Friday’s fire, had served the town of nearly 12,000 since 1863.

MacLeod received a call, while at home Friday afternoon, from an administrator informing him that “the church was on fire,” and “it was bad.” After a half hour commute, he said he arrived at the church about five minutes after the steeple fell.

The pastor stayed at the site until after midnight when a demolition crew finished razing the rest of the building.

“It is devastating, obviously, for the church members for whom this building has been their repository of their encounters with God,” MacLeod said. “We will spend the time grieving that and seeking the comfort of God. I definitely believe God is in the midst of this to help us pick up the pieces.”

Church leaders from Mary Queen of the Rosary, just a half mile away from First Congregational, and other area parishes have offered MacLeod facilities his congregation could use in the interim.

By Saturday afternoon, MacLeod said he had spoken with colleagues serving churches that had fires. He is considering reaching out to Faith Lutheran Church in Cambridge, destroyed during a six-alarm fire on Easter Sunday.

“It’s just amazing, to me, how people are pulling together, especially in this day and age when there’s so much division going on in the world and people can’t agree with anything,” MacLeod said. “That’s not the issue at the moment. People are just stepping up asking ‘How can we help?’”