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A 16-year-old girl from Northbridge, Massachusetts, who went missing earlier this month could be with a 23-year-old man in Rhode Island, according to authorities.

Aubrey Pollinger left her home on Feb. 6 with no cell phone or credit card or debt card, Northbridge police said.

Pollinger is believed to be with the 23-year-old man in the Woonsocket area, according to police, who said she was in a relationship with him.

The 16-year-old was last seen wearing a white sweatshirt and black Nike sweatpants, police said. She has a nose ring and septum piercing.

Pollinger was described as 5 feet 3 inches tall with brown hair and blue eyes.

Anyone with information about the Pollinger’s whereabouts should call the Northbridge Police Department at 508-234-6211.

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Amid the nationwide cellphone outage affecting AT&T’s network on Thursday, people have “flooded” 911 centers in Massachusetts with calls, looking to see if those calls will work.

“Please do not do this,” state police said on social media, adding that anyone who can place a phone call will be able to call 911 as well.

The agency also urged people who need to call 911 but can’t to use a landline, if they have access to one.

Some people have been reporting that their phones are in “SOS mode” during the outage.

“At my house, my phone was working, and then I stepped outside and all of a sudden got the SOS message,” AT&T customer Emma Smart said, calling the issue frustrating.

It forced her to rush to the AT&T Store on Boylston Street in Boston before it even opened — on her birthday — to find out what was going on.

“I just hope it gets sorted out soon enough, cause,” she said. “I want to call my mom and stuff.”

There have been no requests for help from the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, a representative told NBC10 Boston, though it was “aware of and actively monitoring reports of service outages impacting some commercial cellular carriers” and in tough with its partners.

AT&T has said it is “working urgently to restore service.” It wasn’t immediately clear what caused the outage.

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The Emerald Necklace Conservancy and some Boston residents are suing the city over the proposed privatization of the White Stadium in Franklin Park — which could become the home for a new professional women’s soccer team.

In the lawsuit, filed Tuesday, the conservancy and 15 residents expressed concerns about the project, including the “unconstitutional privatization of public land,” “absence of a realistic transportation plan for 20 annual game days” and “lack of adequate community input throughout an incredibly fast-moving redevelopment process.”

One of the plaintiffs, Jean McGuire, of Roxbury, said Franklin Park is “for the people who live here. It’s not for any private group to profit from, it’s for the public’s free use.”

“All of us in Boston and the suburbs who use the park want it left pristine. We want it left the way we designed it — for the people,” she wrote in a release Wednesday.

The conservancy said it “strongly” supports the renovation of the stadium but doesn’t support the “involvement of a professional sports team that would displace the local community for the next 30 years, while privatizing and profiting from a treasured public resource.”

The lawsuit aims to stop the city and the Trustees of the White Fund Trust from continuing with the project because it “violates the purpose of the White Fund Trust, which requires White Stadium to be reserved for public use.”

White Stadium renovation proposal

The project, as proposed, will consist of a renovated and accessible stadium with restrooms, water fountains, covered seating and a well-maintained field that will benefit current and future stadium and park programming beyond Boston Public School uses, such as cultural festivals, the Half Marathon finish, and Special Olympics, in conformance with the goals of further activating Franklin Park, as CaughtinDot previously reported.

The revitalized stadium will serve as an improved facility for Boston Public School students, community events, and gatherings, and as the home pitch and venue for Boston’s new National Women’s Soccer League team.

The proponent is excited to commit to the city’s vision of restoring White Stadium as a central hub for BPS athletics and enhancing and complementing the city’s athletic offerings with new resources that will create a world-class facility for Boston’s new National Women’s Soccer League team.

These resources will improve BPS’ ability to use the stadium for sports across the spring, summer, and fall seasons, school day games, and graduation ceremonies, and provide a vastly improved first-rate venue for all participants.

The West Grandstand Renovation & Additions – The West Grandstand component includes retaining the curving concrete wall (the ‘clamshell’ wall) while demolishing the existing bleacher seats and stadium foundation, as well as the existing floors and columns. The Project will replace the current 5,000 bleacher seats with approximately 5,000 bucket seats within the West Grandstand, with additional team and fan programs. A roof canopy will provide weather protection to the West Grandstand seating.

The Grove – Intended buildings in The Grove include food and beverage stations, as well as restrooms, water fountains, and storage. Site work within The Grove includes a multi-purpose green space and paving to accommodate food and beverage trucks and temporary tents for security, merchandising, and other game-day activities.

Site Improvements – Lawn areas, forested areas, vehicular drives, and pedestrian pathways within the project’s limit of work will be sensitively preserved or improved in a manner that fits into the existing park settings. Furnishings, light fixtures and materiality will be similar to Franklin Park and will be coordinated with Boston Parks and the Boston Facilities Department.

The proposed site work will blend seamlessly with work outside of the Proponents limit of work lines and will facilitate the park’s overall goals for wayfinding, transportation, and mobility access.

It is understood that as part of the overall plan, the city of Boston will renovate the East Grandstand and other areas of the existing stadium. The parties design teams are already engaged in coordination of their respective efforts.

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A man was arrested after he broke into three businesses on Beacon Hill Wednesday night, according to authorities.

The break-ins occurred at 15 Charles St., 53 Charles St. and 103 Charles St., Boston police said.

While at 15 Charles St., police …

Massachusetts drivers racked up nearly 40% more traffic violations last year than they did in 2020, driven in large part by a substantial increase in warnings issued by law enforcement, new data shows.

Altogether, motorists across the state received nearly 1.08 million violations in 2023, up from just fewer than 776,000 in 2020, according to figures presented Tuesday by the state board in charge of maintaining driving violation records.

Merit Rating Board Director Sonja Singleton told fellow members of the group, which is part of the state Registry of Motor Vehicles, that more than six in 10 of the violations counted last year were, in fact, warnings. About one-quarter were civil violations, and the remainder were criminal violations.

In addition to making up a majority of the violations counted, warnings also grew at a much faster rate than civil or criminal offenses, the data show.

The Merit Rating Board counted about 429,000 warnings in 2020 and 683,000 in 2023 — a nearly 60% increase. Civil violations increased about 14 percent over the same span, while criminal violations grew about 12% in that period.

But state officials did not offer much explanation or insight into why warnings have grown so much more than other kinds of violations. Asked to detail any possible reasons behind the trends, a Department of Transportation official deferred comment to law enforcement.

One potential factor behind the overall growth in violations is traffic. Far more drivers were on the road in 2023 than in 2020, when many businesses, schools and other facets of public life were closed for extended periods due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Higher volumes could translate into more violations.

Another contributor to the increase — but not the cause of all of it — is a change in state law.

The state in 2020 began implementing a new distracted driving ban that permits motorists to make only a single tap or swipe on a device to activate its hands-free mode while behind the wheel. 

That year, which was affected by the pandemic, police issued more than 29,600 citations for violations of the new distracted driving law, according to data Singleton presented Tuesday. The number of citations continued to increase in each subsequent year to more than 44,000 in 2021, 51,000 in 2022 and nearly 54,000 in 2023.

“They’re really trying to do a lot of awareness around distracted driving, but we still continually see those numbers increase,” Singleton said during the board meeting. 

As is the case with all violations more broadly, the majority of distracted driving citations are recorded as warnings. About 40,000, or roughly 75 percent, of the distracted driving citations in 2023 consisted of warnings.

While enforcement continues to ramp up, distracted driving did not crack the top three most commonly issued violations in 2023, according to Singleton’s presentation. That list was topped by speeding, with about 275,000 total violations; inspection sticker issues, with about 105,000 violations; and failure to stop or yield, with nearly 98,000 violations.

A single citation can cover multiple violations.

The state in recent years has also more fully embraced electronic citations over paper-only versions. In 2020, paper citations outnumbered their electronic counterparts 323,328 to 265,501, but the trend flipped in 2021 and the gap has continued to widen.

Last year, more than three-quarters of the 808,000 total citations issued were electronic rather than paper. Singleton said the Massachusetts State Police are now fully operating with e-citations, as are 290 out of 351 municipal police departments.

“We are still getting a lot of paper [citations], but you can see that the decrease — it’s exactly what we want to see,” Singleton said.

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Steward Health Care is now in the crosshairs of the Boston City Council.

The embattled health care system has already been given an ultimatum from Gov. Maura Healey.

Steward — which owns nine health care facilities in the state, including Carney Hospital in Dorchester — is being pressured by elected officials to turn over financial records by Friday or leave the state.

The company is reportedly $50 million behind on its rent, and employees say the financial woes are showing even in the little things such as the shortage of supplies due to not paying their vendors. They also say the company can’t resume construction on the Norwood Hospital that flooded in 2020 because it’s not paying contractors.

U.S. Rep. Stephen Lynch on Wednesday visited that hospital and Signature Healthcare Brockton Hospital that caught fire last year, which is set to reopen in late spring. He’s now threatening company executives with a subpoena.

“We need to get complete transparency from steward health care about their finances, about their plans,” said Lynch.

“I’m not a financial expert, but I’m certainly making sure that the requests from the congressmen, the letter that the delegation has sent has been forwarded on to Dallas for their review and hopefully for their response,” said Dr. Joseph Weinstein, chief physician executive at Steward Health Care

Weinstein also said that he believes patient care is adequate.

The Boston City Council will discuss how to deal with Steward in a virtual meeting at 10 a.m. Thursday.

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