Congratulations Tim Outhit!!!!

 

From Under My Desk…….. May 7/08

On Saturday (May 3/0 Tim Outhit was successful in his campaign to become the newest member of the Halifax Regional Municipality Council. I’ve known Tim since he and my little brother Jim were in elementary school together in Rockingham. After an absence from Halifax Tim returned as C.E.O. of novaknowledge, a local think tank who’s motto is ‘behind forward thinking’.

Tim will bring a breath of fresh air to city council and a new vision of how council SHOULD engage the citizens of Halifax.  Below is the premise of his platform:

Lately, there has been a lot of bickering over regionalism and governance. But I believe what the residents of Bedford really want is action, fueled by a strong voice at City Hall.

The issues our community faces and the opportunities available are well understood. They have been studied by committee after committee and documented in report after report. This has been going on for many years. Progress has been obstructed by a lack of consensus on priorities and the lack of focused passion, drive and energy necessary to follow through.

Focusing on Bedford alone will not bring the action we need. I have the experience and the passion to work with Councilors and leaders from other districts for the “betterment of HRM”. Together we are stronger.

We must act now, with forward thinking, to support the organizations that are striving to attract and retain new businesses and new residents.

I envision Bedford as a strong and vibrant community; within a larger strong and vibrant community.

We can achieve this vision through tax reform, assessment reform, creativity, and collaborative leadership between the private and public sectors.

Tim has already proven to be a man who puts his money where his mouth is … if you review the novaknowledge New Years message

SPARK A NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION FOR NOVA SCOTIA

I commit to novaknowledge’s Top 8 for ‘08 - New Year’s Resolutions for Nova Scotia.

I will …

1. Get Active
Change image, attitudes and policies. Take actions that ensure health and wellness promotion  and injury prevention become paramount in my organization, promote my province as a progressive and innovative place to learn, work and raise a family.

2. Think Big
Reduce the impact of regionalism on Nova Scotia’s economic and social development. We will become strong and prosperous by collaborating with all communities and regions for the betterment of the entire province.

3. Do Away with “CFA”
Become more welcoming to new Canadians and new Nova Scotians by encouraging my organization, friends, and colleagues to employ new Nova Scotians and support the campaign to eliminate the term “come from away” and “CFA”.

4. Learn Something New
Challenge my organization to increase investment in workforce training to 2% of revenue and encourage others to do the same!

5. Spend Wisely
Call on government and business leaders to find additional ways to increase wages and to help reduce student debt. This will reduce the out-migration of young workers. I will encourage my organization to hire recent graduates and international students.

6. Help Others
Improve literacy and numeracy in my province by calling on all levels of government to increase funding and implement additional incentives.

7. “Come to Life”
Strive to highlight successes and recognize progress in Nova Scotia.

8. Lead by Example
Support the creation of a Nova Scotia Leaders’ Council to help lead the charge on productivity, innovation, the adoption of technology, foster forward-thinking attitudes, and recommend leading-edge public policy.

Tim is a professional facilitator, creative problem solver, at ease with developing concepts and taking those ideas through to implementation and he is experienced at effective meeting co ordination. 

Now comes the challenge for Tim and to council. Can that room full of self centered egos actually get behind some positive forward thinking and start the change that will take Halifax to its next step in becoming the myHalifax of the future?

Will things change? Your guess is as good as mine but the next six months should be interesting…. including the upcoming Municipal Election this October.

Technorati Tags: Bedford Election,Tim Outhit,Les Muise,Halifax,novaknowlege,behind forward thinking

Waste ban worries Atlantic mayors

New federal guidelines hot topic at Atlantic congress
By SHERRI BORDEN COLLEY Staff Reporter
Sat. Apr 12 - 5:00 AM

Small-town mayors like Woodrow French worry they won’t be able to cough up their share of the cost to meet federal guidelines that will ban communities from dumping raw or partially treated sewage into the ocean.

Mr. French, mayor of Conception Bay South, near St. John’s, N.L., says part of the town of 24,000 has no water and no sewer system — residents are on individual wells and septic systems — and the other part has a treatment facility that’s on its last legs.

“I now have a sewage treatment plant that is worn out,” Mr. French told the Atlantic Mayors Congress in Halifax on Friday.

“I have no business base in my community and all the moneys that are raised are basically on provincial and federal funding and on taxation as well.

“I’ve got crumbling infrastructure. I’ve got no money and part of the problem, I am dumping all sewage into a pristine bay, Conception Bay, and I feel bad about doing this.”

Environment Minister John Baird said Tuesday the federal government is prepared to make an $8-billion investment in cleaner water and hopes Canada’s provinces and municipalities will also chip in $8 billion each.

Halifax Regional Municipality’s $330-million primary sewage treatment system, which is just now being finished, was designed so it could be modified to provide secondary processing. That upgrade is expected to cost about $100 million.

Carl Yates, general manager of Halifax Water, says his heart goes out to small towns that may be starting from scratch to get proper infrastructure in place to handle their sewage.

“It is a bit overwhelming for them,” Mr. Yates said. “It is a very difficult challenge, in particular recognizing this is coming just after what we call in the industry, the Walkerton way. There’s been a tremendous push for new regulations for drinking water, which we believe in. We think that’s appropriate.”

More stringent regulations for drinking water were introduced in the wake of the Walkerton tragedy, in which seven people died in 2000 in Ontario after drinking water contam-inated with E. coli bacteria.

Halifax’s inland treatment plants that discharge into fresh water already provide secondary treatment or better, and so does the Mill Cove plant on Bedford Basin. The three new Harbour Solutions plants offer advanced primary treatment and would have to be upgraded to meet the new rules.

Though the cost-sharing between the three levels of government to implement the standards is not yet finalized, Atlantic mayors agreed Friday the usual one-third equal share for each no longer cuts it for the municipalities.

“We cannot continue to operate on this concept,” Charlottetown Mayor Clifford Lee said.

While the mayors support the new guidelines and recognize the importance of protecting the environment, one thing not being looked at is the funding side, he said.

“We need, as a nation, to sit down and say who are we paying our taxes to and what are we getting for it?” Mr. Lee said.

“We know what the roles of municipal governments are in this country. This is the level that provides the services that everybody in this country depends on, on a day-to-day basis.”

“Who is the taxpayer paying the least amount of money to? It’s to this level of government.”

A recent expansion to Charlottetown’s waste-water treatment plant has meant the cost of operating it “is a lot higher this year than it was last year,” Mr. Lee said in an interview.

“We just brought down our budget for 2008 a few weeks ago and we had to increase the water and sewer rates in the city of Charlottetown (by four per cent) to provide what we provided last year,” he said. “And, actually, we had to cut some of the level of services of maintenance in our system to get the budget passed.”

Corner Brook Mayor Charles Pender said the Newfoundland town was caught off guard by this week’s announcement.

“Up to this point, absolutely, we had no consultation from the federal or provincial governments that this was coming,” Mr. Pender told his counterparts. “For us, it was an awful shock.”

“We had originally looked at about $24 million for sewage treatment for Corner Brook, using a combination of primary and some secondary,” he said.

“Now, we’ve had to go to secondary, which now means we would have to go from $24 million to $32 million. . . . By the time we get there then, we might be looking at $40 million to $50 million to deal with this one issue.”

Port Hawkesbury is ahead of the game with its $11-million regional sewage treatment plant, the second phase of which will open in two weeks.

“Basically, in Port Hawkesbury, we were very fortunate in the sense that five years ago we decided to do an assessment study environmentally to see just what we should put in place,” Mayor Billy Joe MacLean said in an interview.

“The laws we’re talking about today, five years ago, we thought that’s what the law should be and will be. So therefore we jumped on board and went ahead and did it.”

If the guidelines proceed, the mayors congress will work with municipal associations, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and provinces to ensure that federal funding to municipalities to meet the standards is included as part of the implementation strategy to enable all regions to comply.

The mayors are also calling upon the federal and provincial governments, in designing and developing the funding strategy, to address the capital and operating costs.

The congress, formed in 2001, consists of mayors from Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador.

( sborden@herald.ca)

Technorati Tags: Halifax Chronical Herald,S Borden,Political Comment,Wast Cost,Mayors

COMMENTS

POST YOUR COMMENT

Frawin wrote:
As a Nova Scotian now living in a small town in Newfoundland, I am wondering what these small municipal units will do to meet the new guidelines. You become very aware of the outmigration in Newfoundland when you are living here. The jobs aren’t here nor the money. Our property tax and water bill went up 25% from last year - from $600 to $804. Does anyone really think that retired people can continue to come up with additional funds? I support the government’s efforts to keep pollutants out of water ways but how can people who live on retirement income in communities that are hanging on by a thread possibly be expected to cough up even more money?

Wingman wrote:
This going green and the enviornment is going to bankrupt everyone.

Downtown Halifax of the future

Final draft of HRM By Design report to be released todayBy MICHAEL LIGHTSTONE Staff Reporter Mon. Apr 7 - 5:34 AM

(Illustration from HRM By Design) (Illustration from HRM By Design) (Illustration from HRM By Design) HRM By Design consultants envision a greener, more people-friendy downtown Halifax. (Illustration from HRM By Design)

THIS IS A CITY in which residents still refer to one of two spans across Halifax Harbour, a structure that opened 38 years ago, as “the new bridge.”

It’s a place some folks have said, perhaps facetiously, should adopt the following motto: Halifax — Progress Without Change.

Old habits die hard here, but the first decade of the 21st century is going to bring a shift in the way urban planners and developers do things downtown.

As a result, if all goes well, Halifax’s central core will evolve into a lively, people-friendly place with downtown residents, workers, business owners and tourists living in harmony.

Heritage properties and new highrise buildings will coexist in the Halifax Regional Municipality of the future. Affordable housing will be available, and public transit upgraded.

The cost? So far, that’s unknown.

But many costs associated with the renewal effort are to be handled by the private sector, developers who’ll likely be improving existing properties and paying to build more esthetically pleasing new ones.

Plans for downtown’s refurbishment come from the city’s HRM by Design study, an urban revitalization plan in the works for about 20 months. A 17-member task force assigned to the $405,400 project envisions a downtown that’s livable, distinct and vibrant.

Planners want 16,000 people to move downtown within the next 15 years, Halifax regional council heard at a city hall meeting in February. They’d also like to see a million square feet of new office space downtown in the next decade or so.

On Monday, the municipality’s final draft of the downtown plan is to be released. Public review of the proposal is to continue until April 23. Copies of the plan will be available electronically and in print.

City hall is encouraging people to review the draft and submit comments to the HRM by Design gurus. An open house will be held April 16 at the World Trade and Convention Centre in Halifax.

The proposed downtown vision, guided by consultants from Toronto, would manage growth and development in the central core over the next 25 years.

Coun. Dawn Sloane (Halifax Downtown), a task force member, said recently that a renaissance for the downtown, parts of which have been neglected for years, is long overdue. She urged residents, workers, employers, visitors and property owners to contribute to the planning process by commenting on the consultants’ final draft.

“We’re hoping that by June, we’ll be bringing the full contents of the (final) report to regional council forward,” Ms. Sloane said.

A public hearing on the study will probably be held before July.

According to the city’s consultants, a new-and-improved downtown should include:

•”Defined and distinct . . . precincts.”

•A protected and “vibrant historic heart.”

•Various open spaces and “streets that support . . . walking.”

•A downtown that’s transit-oriented.

•A central core that reinforces civic pride.

Project manager Andy Fill-more, a city hall staffer, said the precinct idea is relatively simple. Planners are proposing nine downtown neighbourhoods be designated.

Mr. Fillmore said “a clear mission statement” for each district — areas that share a common geography but have distinct elements — would be established.

“The policy for each precinct is developed around acknowledging, protecting and perpetuating those . . . characteristics.” Not everyone agrees with the HRM by Design concept, of course, and the consultants have received candid criticism from opponents.

Haligonian Janet Morris is worried the city’s historic structures will suffer under the proposed revitalization scheme. Tall buildings near heritage properties, she feels, should be verboten.

“Halifax is known as the City of Trees,” she said last year in comments posted on a local website. “This is a clue — the height of our buildings in the historic core should not exceed the tree canopy. Let there be light and air for everyone.”

A summary of feedback provided to the municipality’s design team at a public forum in November shows the perennially contentious issue of height is not in danger of being knocked down soon.

“Height is fine,” an observer wrote, “in the right spot.”

Another warned about tall buildings affecting such heritage sites as Halifax city hall, Province House and Government House.

One person noted there are unattractive low-rise buildings downtown and was concerned they could be joined by taller mistakes. “Ugly short buildings may be bad,” the commenter wrote, “but ugly, tall, overpowering buildings are even worse.”

Said a tall-building supporter: “I would like to see more height in the Cogswell area. I am also concerned about the height restriction in a lot of the downtown area.”

Planners are recommending a height limit of about six storeys for part of downtown, the “vibrant historic heart,” Mr. Fillmore said. He said that district would include Historic Properties and parts of Barrington Street.

Outside of that zone, “a balance” will have to be struck between heritage preservation and allowing for modern architecture, Mr. Fillmore said.

When it comes to reviewing, approving and appealing future developments, downtown planners want municipal politicians to have the final say, on appeal, instead of the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board. Mr. Fillmore said proposals would be considered and authorized by a “site plan review” group of municipal staff and a design-review committee made up of citizens.

Progress without change?

Not in the scenario shaped by the HRM by Design team.

Mr. Fillmore said changes are definitely in the offing, such as the approval and appeal processes for development proposals. But he acknowledged several are subject to amendments to provincial legislation. He said the city is making progress on that front.

On Monday, to obtain a free copy of the final draft of the downtown plan, a five-volume report, go to www.hrmbydesign.ca or go to the planners’ office at the Halifax ferry terminal on George Street.

( mlightstone@herald.ca)

COMMENTS

POST YOUR COMMENT

Quiet Comment wrote:
It would be great to have a plan that allows the old to co-exist with new. If you look at Europe and some of the wonderful cities there they have learned to allow tall buildings to be constructed among beautiful old buildings. The heritage buildings in Halifax and Dartmouth are great but if they are falling down and not worth saving let them go. We need to make our city a place where business and residents can live together. Buildings like the “Twisted Sisters” will bring people to the small shops and restaurants downtown. It will allow people to live work and shop in their own neighborhood. It will give a sense of community within a City. The sky line of Halifax is ready for some buildings that will show we are willing to be a modern place. Canadians seem to think the only time we can look at fondly is the past. The present and future are great too.

voiceofreality wrote:
I don’t really care what direction they take, so long as them make some more bloody parking.

Chuck wrote:
unhuh…16000 people moving to the downtown core within 15 years…ic. Well I can’t seriously predict the future…but let’s put it this way…I’ll believe it when I see it. Right now..they’ll be lucky if there are that many people left in the whole city, the way this place is being run. I notice they have a little “side note” in there about upgrading transit. They’re going to need to move that front and center if they want to even begin to succeed here…and never mind too much about “affordable housing” in the midst of all this development because the only 16000 people who would be able to afford to live down there are the people with the $$$. Anyway, we’ll see what happens. Based on council’s track record (any council of late), I have serious doubts this is going to go through.

black pearl wrote:
The new vision for an exciting, vibrant city sounds inviting…but at the snail’s pace of change by which it happens here, it will take a generation or two to see results. I crave an exciting but livable city in which to live. Halifax has ground to a standstill in terms of anything remotely inspiring or exciting being built. It has become a tired, dreary place with the same old, same old look. This city desperately needs a facelift of something bold and exciting. Maybe a concert hall or a futuristic development that will be a trademark.

Ont.1 wrote:No municipality can stay “the same”.For many reasons a city has to embrace change but do so very carefully,especially a city like Halifax which has such a blend of historic and modern.As an occasional visitor to your city I say,”so far so good”,but tread lightly.Good luck!

Will they ever learn? I doubt it!

By Les Muise, March 26/08 posted to www.myhalifaxca.wordpress.com & www.lesmuise.wordpress.com

Recently MLA Diana Whalen posed an interesting question in her Letter to the Editor of the Halifax Chronicle Herald that pointed at the shoddy handling of the ‘ Mainland Common Recreation Center by the staff and elected officials of the Halifax Regional Municipality. I’m in full agreement with Mrs Whalen’s position and the comments offered by Bette El-Hawary, P.A. Kidd, Rhonda Beers, Francis MacDonald, and Doug Boudreau each in their own Letters to the Editor, all of whom speak from their personal frustration with the whole process and lack of involvement by our elected leaders.

I have a few comments of my own but first some personal history.

Where to start?

This issue has been part of my world for as long as I can remember.

• I’ve lived between Meadowlark Crest.,Chadwick Place and Westridge Drive for 30 of the past 35 years.
• I attended Halifax West High School when it was on Dutch Village Road and was considered a New School with 1,500 students from the area now serviced by Halifax West, J.L. Ilsley & Sir John A MacDonald. All bussed in each day by a fleet of 50 buses and requiring 6 portable classrooms and split shifts in my grade 10 year.
• I remember when Lacewood Dr. stopped at Bayview, when the YMCA opened the Northcliff Pool with its inflatable roof, and when there was no Dunbrack Dr or Bayers Lake or Parkland Drive.
• I remember when the old city of Halifax took over the Northcliff Pool from the YMCA (they could not afford the upkeep of the roof) to serve a population of   20,0000 in its catchment area.
• I’ve witnessed the phenomenal growth of the community referred to as Clayton Park & Clayton Park West from a sleepy bedroom community, where new homes sold for $  28,000 to $35,000 as it grew into a dynamic, thriving, multicultural center with new homes in the $  250,000 to $ 500,000 range and a population in the service catchment area that is pushing past the  200,0000 mark. Most of that growth exploded into the area in the last 10 – 14 years.
• I have watched the change in what ‘we the people‘ want in our community. There is a much greater demand for municipal services that would not have been considered in the past.
• I have campaigned door to door with the candidate in the past two Provincial Elections and was campaign coordinator for a candidate in the past Municipal Election   & was at his side at every door, every day of that champagne and I have a pretty good idea of what this community was asking for at that time.
• I have attended Chebucto Community Council meetings on this issue when I was one of a dozen people in attendance & when the room was over filled with angry residence objecting to a proposed Recreation Center that resembled a resort with out the floating bar.
• I have attended ‘Town Hall’ meetings at the New Halifax West with a couple of hundred other concerned citizens where we were treated as unwanted interference and at one session managed and controlled as to what we were allowed to ask.
  • I have spoken out at every one of these sessions of my concern that the      City was not building a facility for the future of our community but was doing the minimal that it could get away with and ducking the responsibility.
• I have been involved with the Build It Right group from its inception as a public participant, a petition signature gatherer and I’ve attended meetings as a member with the Managers of both the Department of Planning        & Development and Recreation and Sport. where our concerns were treated with a rather condescending attitude.
• I have talked personally with those same Department managers where they have commented that ‘anything is possible if there is the political will’. And there is the biggest part of this problem, that lack of political will starts right at the top.
  • Every project with in the Recreation and Sport domain had been waiting with baited breath for a successful Commonwealth Games Bid. It was absolutely mind boggling the number of times that the Management of those departments commented that ‘everything depends on getting the Commonwealth Games and being able to tap into the ‘extra’ funding that would be available from the Federal Government because we were hosting an international event of this stature.
  • This logic came to a grinding halt the day that his highness Peter Kelley unceremoniously pulled the City’s support of that Bid. Not only was that decision an insult to the hundreds of bid participants in business community but it ended every one of those projects that had been using the strategy of waiting for the Holy Grail…. there was no plan B, so back to the drawing board we go…. effectively pushing each of those projects a year or two further down the road or in some cases off the road all together.

The Current Reality

After ten (10) years of public involvement it angers me that here we are seven     (7) months before the next Municipal Election and the City & Province are still stonewalling the public as to their plans for this facility.

• How can anyone be expected to believe that the huge amount of heavy earth moving that is currently being done on the proposed site is in preparation….without a plan!!! Talk about throwing money away! I f you believe that I’ve got some swamp land in Florida that you can buy for $1,000.00

From my perspective in this situation the ‘City’ lacks leadership and any firm vision & direction that would come as part of a strong Mayor & Council. There has been a deliberate effort to pacify the community by using the       HRM’s version of Public Consultation and much like what has been happening with the    School Review Process and lets be clear …. this attempt has failed.

By ignoring the the input of community based organizations like    Build It Right and the hundreds of voices heard at the many public meetings the ‘City‘ is setting its self up for ridicule, criticism and controversy.

The attitude of ‘Concerned Citizens’ has changed over the years. The hundreds of people from this community who have taken the time out of their busy lives to be involved in the process, to make their concerns known, ultimately   need to know that their voice was heard and taken into consideration.

Short of that, the process is flawed, the project will become a lightning rod for all the complaints that will be rightly aired.

The Missing Link

In all of the years that this situation has dragged through the painfully slow process, the missing component has been the political will of our elected representatives. The counselors for this area have resisted any objective input from the public and for the most part have avoided any involvement, despite repeated invitations. Not once have I seen, heard or read of Mayor Kelley having attended a meeting on this matter, nor has his opinion ever been expressed publicly although comments from staff as to the lack of Political Will starting at the top have made it clear what position        Mr Kelly has taken.

If Halifax wants to continue to grow and keep its youth, to keep some of the new graduates from our universities and have the young geniuses of the (RIM) technology world make this their home its time to face reality.

• Its time to invest in our youth by giving them a chance to grow to their potential with a ‘Center of Excellence’ .
• Its time to invest in a positive and healthy community by providing a community / recreation canter that promotes an active and involved lifestyle for all ages.
• Its time to invest in our communities by putting the services where they are convenient and stop using the logic that oh well you can do that over there … on the other side of the city …    45 minutes each way [by car  & 2 hrs by bus ... during peak hours]
• Its time for strong, aggressive leadership that chases all potential stakeholders and doesn’t stop till they get the best for Halifax. If Port Hawksbury can raise the funds…. you know the rest of that comment!
• Its time to make the changes in all of the processes to effective allow public participation    &   to speed up those processes thereby allowing Halifax to grow into the great city that it could be.

In Closing

Halifax is a great city & Clayton Park is a fabulous area in which to live.

To me the fix for this situation comes down to a change in attitude and a new approach. The key objective of any project undertaken by the Halifax Regional Municipal  should be;

• by using effective community consultation the project meets the needs of the community,
• all the participants can be proud of their involvement, proud of the facility      and proud of Halifax.

In reality it is a team approach with bottom up concept development combined with conciliation and facilitation, add some creative problem solving along with a consistently positive attitude by all involved. And that’s an approach will make the difference. I’ve been known to say on more than one occasion “give me the right attitude and anything is possible”.

Couple that approach & attitude with a strong leadership team that is willing to be involved in the community, to be transparent in its methods, accountable to the voters, and willing to promote Halifax as a great place to live at every opportunity and through every method and most importantly be ready & willing to fight for every ounce of funding that we are due.

No matter what Moncton says Halifax is the regional center and should start acting accordingly, on all levels. Invest in the infrastructure, the facilities and the people …. the rest will be here or come here.

Unfortunately it appears that the Mayor and Counselors have decided to go into the upcoming election with a [potentially] flawed proposed facility hoping to gain community support for their version of what is needed.

I wouldn’t want to be knocking on doors this fall with any of them…. its not going to be nice.

Are NIMBYs really taking over?

 

 

 

 

By JIM MEEK
Sat. Mar 8 - 6:44 AM

I COULD WRITE a column about our “genius for getting to no” in my sleep. (Not a good sign, I admit.)

My somnambulistic – or sleepwalking – view is that we’re beating ourselves to death when it comes to economic activity.

A quarry on Digby Neck?

Oppose it, sure, but don’t take five years to run the sponsoring company out of town.

Clean, green, necessary windmills near Anne Murray’s cottage on the Northumberland Strait?

C’mon Anne – spread your tiny wings and fly away.

And do we really have to mount and man the barricades because some hapless promoter wants to bring Celine Dion to the Halifax Commons?

The Chronicle Herald takes a look at these issues (starting today) in a three-day series called Citizens Against Virtually Everything?

I first heard the acronym CAVE while interviewing a trio of people from the mining industry.

They were clearly upset with the decision rejecting the Digby Neck quarry, and worried about the “chill” they say this sends through the investment community.

I know, I know. To some people, this sounds like sabre-rattling or fear-mongering.

But in my past life as a consultant, I watched companies leave town in a rush after taking a close, hard look at the political and public opinion environment here.

In one case, this meant taking a billion-dollar investment out of Nova Scotia and parking it in a safer place.

This is the kind of economic loss that’s invisible to the public eye.

Still, a part of me says good riddance and Godspeed to these dearly departed companies.

If they don’t want to work in a way that respects our values, why let ‘em stay here and work against us?

That seemed to be one fundamental idea underlying the decision rejecting the Digby Neck quarry proposal.

Bob Fournier, the Dalhousie professor who chaired the review panel, says “core community values” are at the heart of government policy in Nova Scotia.

This idea, that you promote “sustainable” development based on core values, sounds good.

But who gets to wave the flag and mount the podium on behalf of those values?

In the case of the Digby Neck quarry, the local residents who wanted the project to go ahead – and to create some jobs – say their voices went unheard.

That is, they were drowned out by people with more money, more education, more time and second homes in some other part of the globe.

Well, you can see how quickly this CAVE? debate can get ugly.

In each of the three main stories we did for this series, the Come From Away (CFA) question reared its head.

An opponent of a real estate development had moved to Mahone Bay from Ontario.

Cottage people or year-round newcomers often lead the fight against wind power developments.

And more than one mining guy told me CFA landowners are more reluctant to let prospectors on their properties.

Sorry, guys, this is just too xenophobic for me.

Yes, non-native Nova Scotians do change the province and often import fresh ideas. (Thank God.)

In many cases, they’ve bought into the dream this province promotes – of a peaceable kingdom by the sea, where life is supposed to be slower, neighbours are said to be friendlier, and beauty is not a postcard but the view from the front porch.

That brings us to the tough underlying questions.

What kind of Nova Scotia do we want to build, anyway?

And how does rural Nova Scotia survive – pay its taxes, pave its roads, educate its young – in the face of outmigration and economic decline?

Frankly, this series poses these questions more than it answers them.

The trouble is, the more you know about the issues, the more elusive solutions seem to be.

From the tone and tenor of the public debate, for instance, it would seem that the NIMBYs are winning.

But government statistics – or estimates, more accurately – show most projects in rural Nova Scotia still gain regulatory seals of approval, especially if they work hard upfront to meet community and environmental standards.

So there you have it. These are complex issues, and I can’t round out this column with some ringing declaration of incontestable truth.

But at least I’m wide awake while writing this.

( jmeek@herald.ca)

Technorati Tags: Come From Aways,Meek,Development Aproval Process

On cats, councils, common sense and Twain

 

 

 

By PAUL SCHNEIDEREIT
Tue. Mar 4 - 4:46 AM

HALIFAX regional council, in its great, uh, wisdom, has pronounced itself interested in holding a meeting to hear public views on its new cat bylaw.

I kid you not.

My question is: Wasn’t council listening the first time?

With less than a month to go before the new bylaw is to take effect, municipal politicians are having second thoughts about the whole matter. Why? Well, in a closed meeting last month, councillors were formally introduced to estimates of the cost they’d be asked to swallow for sheltering all the roaming cats expected to be picked up under the new regulations. My guess is that the numbers, whatever they were, went over like a future hairball with quite a few councillors.

Which, frankly, is sort of odd. Last fall, when council debated the issue before passing the cat bylaw in a 11-9 vote, the estimated cost of a facility big enough to handle all incoming felines sent to the, let’s face it, mass euthanizing centre, was tossed around as roughly $3 million. That didn’t seem to faze the majority of councillors who passed the measure, but then again, that was in future dollars, not ones that had to be spent at the moment.

Imagine their surprise when, behind closed doors, they recently learned at least some of those future dollars were going to have to be converted to real ones, and included in this year’s budget. Quick as you can say fall municipal election, I reckon, some mighty serious second-thinking commenced.

Now, I don’t claim to know what actually happened in that meeting. Maybe a majority of councillors thought a new shelter could be built for free. Maybe they thought that the cat bylaw fairy would appear and get them out of their own self-created mess. But it’s clear the price tag attached to the bylaw caused, anticipated or not, sticker shock.

Mayor Peter Kelly, sticking to the party line of a “contractual matter,” wasn’t going to hiss and tell. “We can’t get into details right now,” the mayor said, though he allowed the issue was over “dollars” and finding enough of them. “Due to financial implications,” Kelly monotoned, the city would go back to the public for input and “to see whether or not they wish to remove cats from Bylaw A-300.”

The rub is, of course, that a majority of the public who voiced opinions last fall had already made it exceedingly clear that they didn’t want a cat bylaw, at least not the one proposed. Most speakers at a public hearing were against the bylaw. This newspaper also published many letters, the vast majority opposed to licensing cats.

Perhaps regional council could have pondered Mark Twain’s advice about cats. “Never try to teach a cat to sing,” the humourist once cautioned. “It wastes your time, and it annoys the cat.” In other words, perhaps council, in its, uh, wisdom, might have realized that the reason so many people have been against the various incarnations of the cat bylaw is that it’s not a good idea.

Sadly, however, council seems to have learned nothing over the years. A proposed cat bylaw was before a new council in the summer of 1996, months after amalgamation. The issue had been discussed repeatedly by the old Halifax city council as well. In 2004, this paper noted that council had debated a cat bylaw 22 times since amalgamation – and that was before the many sessions that brought us the unenforceable legislation passed last fall.

Some councillors have protested that they’ve got a bad rap over the cat bylaw fiasco, that criticisms that council wastes time on cats while there are more important matters ignores the fact that council does plenty of other things, too. Fair enough. Let the record reflect that council does not only spend its time debating inane rules regarding felines that most cat owners will ignore and that, as a result, bring council into disrepute. But here we are, looking back at a dozen years of debates on cats at city hall, and ahead at proposals for a public hearing and, gasp, plebiscite, and I know I’m not alone in saying: Enough already.

Stray cats, I would speculate, have been with us throughout human history. Rather than penalizing responsible cat owners – the only ones who’d pay licence fees – and creating financial disincentives around stray cat adoptions, or building industrial-scale cat-killing centres, perhaps council could focus on programs that have been shown to work, like catch, neuter and release schemes to stabilize feral cat populations. If particular roaming cats are a problem in specific situations, deal with them. Don’t turn neighbour against neighbour throughout HRM and let stand a law most people view with derision.

“The man who carries a cat by the tail,” goes yet another Twain witticism, “learns something that can be learned in no other way.” Will council finally conclude it’s time to let go?

pauls

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EricS wrote:
I would like to help Council with some vision on this issue. I see Steve Murphy on Live-at-Five interviewing an aging war veteran about the disappearance of his sole companion, his cat. Of course the veteran will be in obviously ill-health and will be holding a faded picture of his only companion sitting on his knee. And the cat will be called Mountbatten or Churchhill or the like………….are you getting my drift yet??? It will make for great Supper Hour TV…….probably become an issue in the upcoming elections. A web site will go up www.councillorsagaintscats.com….pictures of other “disappered” cats will start being posted….etc etc As my ancient Irish Mother says “Common Sense Isn’t!!!!”

David fm CH wrote:
The unfortunate thing about this is that the irresponsible cat owners will once again have free reign to allow their animals to breed, roam, howl, fight, destroy and spread disease. In the long run, it will be the cats themselves that suffer as it has been in the past.

Fsmith wrote:
What happens when you get rid of all the cats, you will be over-run with mice and rats. I remember when I was in school inthe early 60’s they tried the samething in I thing it was London Eng. and they had to bring the cats back. I would sooner have cats than rats and mice running around. FSmith

Frank wrote:
Right on Mr. S., catch, neuter and release any stray cat that draws complaints, and let that be the end of the matter.

City wants to save McNabs fort from demolition ball

By AMY PUGSLEY FRASER City Hall Reporter
Wed. Feb 20 - 5:27 AM

Halifax city hall wants to put an immediate stop to the demolition of a historic fort on McNabs Island.

Fort Hugonin, on the northwest edge of the island in the mouth of Halifax Harbour, is in bad shape. But that doesn’t mean that all or part of it can’t be saved, a regional councillor says.

Coun. Jackie Barkhouse (Woodside-Eastern Passage) received unanimous support from her council colleagues Tuesday night when she asked that a letter be sent to the Defence Department requesting that demolition be halted until other options are explored.

“I feel that it would be timely and appropriate,” she said at council’s regular weekly meeting at city hall.

Last week, Defence Construction Canada issued a tender for the demolition of the fort. The work, which would include dealing with any asbestos, lead or PCBs contaminating the property, is expected to cost $224,250.

Ms. Barkhouse would like the federal government to look into remediating the fort or, if necessary, removing just the second storey.

She plans to get a closer look during a visit to the island this afternoon.

Ms. Barkhouse’s motion to send a letter to Ottawa reflects recent requests by the Friends of McNabs Island Society to save the fort, built in 1899.

“McNabs offers such an amazing glimpse into the history of Nova Scotia,” Cathy McCarthy, president of the Friends of McNabs Island Society, said in a recent interview.

“And it does have the added feature of having a significant military history related to the founding of Halifax. It was always seen by the British military as being the key spot in Halifax to guard the entrance to the harbour. It’s of tremendous historical significance.”

With such historical importance, another councillor wants to know why his federal counterparts haven’t been speaking out against the demolition tender.

“I’d like to know what federal MPs, on both sides of the harbour, are doing about it,” Coun. Patrick Murphy (Halifax North End) said.

“Nothing.”

The councillor, who worked extensively in Nova Scotia’s tourism industry before becoming a councillor in 2004, said McNabs Island should be seen as an asset.

“I think it’s an absolute disgrace that the federal government and (the Defence Department) would be touching those great forts that could be making a lot of money for tourism in this harbour,” Mr. Murphy said.

McNabs Island was named a provincial park in 2002 but some areas are still privately owned and others belong to Ottawa.

( apugsley@herald.ca)

’I think it’s an absolute disgrace that the federal government . . . would be touching those great forts that could be making a lot of money for tourism in this harbour.’

PATRICK MURPHY Councillor

 

Technorati Tags: McNabs Island,Save the Fort,Budget,Halifax

Kelly wants URB to speed it up

  By AMY PUGSLEY FRASER City Hall Reporter
Fri. Feb 15 - 5:49 AM

The Utility and Review Board should deliver its decisions quicker to bring the development appeal process to a speedier conclusion, Mayor Peter Kelly says.

“Anyone is entitled to due process, and to me, a 30-day rendering is reasonable,” he said in an interview.

The review board is the quasi-judicial tribunal that hears appeals of city hall’s decisions on downtown development.

Recent appeals involved the Midtown Tower Hotel, which was to go on the current Midtown Tavern site on Grafton Street, and the so-called Twisted Sisters, a 27-storey twin-tower development United Gulf proposed for the old Tex-Park site on Hollis Street.

In both cases, regional council approved the developments but heritage groups and other interested parties appealed the decisions within weeks.

The Twisted Sisters project will go ahead, the Midtown Tower Hotel will not.

Although the length of the hearing process is hard to control, Mr. Kelly said the 90-day decision-making process should be shortened.

“I know that it is sometimes challenging, but to be fair to the appellants and the development community, there needs to be some definition of time frames in order to clearly see from start to finish,” the mayor said.

“There is nothing that complicated in development issues or appeals in development.

“It should be a 30-day rendering and that should be made law.”

The city is already working on changes to its own processes to streamline things for developers, Mr. Kelly said. There are plans to cut wait times for applications by 30 per cent, he said.

“This would reduce the average number of months required for a plan amendment to approximately nine months, for a rezoning to approximately six months, and for a development agreement to eight months.”

As well, the city is drafting a new set of guidelines for downtown development in its HRM by Design initiative. Essentially, it will determine “what goes where” downtown, the mayor said.

“That will set the tone for the downtown so there will be less room for interpretation and more definition of what you can and can’t do,” he said. “That should reduce the number of appeals.”

A report is expected to come before council in about April, he said, with final public participation sessions occurring after that.

“We need to do our piece, which we are doing,” the mayor said.

“But they (the province) need to do their piece, which is refining the Utility and Review Board process.”

Premier Rodney MacDonald made his own promise this week to curb delays in downtown Halifax’s development process.

At last weekend’s provincial Conservative convention, he said the province hopes to “fix the issue.”

“We’re not going to sit back and wait for things to happen,” the premier told reporters.

“That means working with the city to make sure the process is clearly defined and is not going to stop development from taking place.”

This week, the premier’s spokesman said the province is already pondering changes.

“Basically we’re looking at how we can streamline the process to make sure the appeals process is more efficient and consistent,” Joe Gillis said.

“One of the problems developers and businesses face is that the appeals process can be unwieldy and uncertain, and that leaves uncertainty in their business case and bottom line.”

If they know upfront what the rules of engagement are and what the timelines are, they are better able to make decisions, Mr. Gillis said.

“Beyond the ‘Whose role is it?’ though, one of (the province’s) roles is to attract business and help business grow, and Halifax being Halifax, we know what businesses want, so it’s our job to work with the city to get beyond or reduce barriers.

“It just makes sense.”

( apugsley@herald.ca)

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Urban Coyote wrote:
Geez, is this the same Peter Kelly who drags his feet and creates committees and focus groups, and panels to study different situations endlessly? Is this the same Peter Kelly who can’t create any forward momentum, or make decisions on anything? Now he wants to speed up a decision process? Why the sudden change? Ahhhh yes, must be an election coming up. Trying to make himself look good after years of sitting on his rear end.

Technorati Tags: Peter Kelly,Development,PUB

Special interest groups cropping up to get a voice at city hall

 

Special interest committees crop up to represent Bedford, labour interests, creation of separate rural municipality

By AMY PUGSLEY FRASER City Hall Reporter
Thu. Feb 7 - 5:34 AM

STRENGTH IN NUMBERS:

Three groups currently mobilizing in advance of October’s municipal election in Halifax:

•Bedford Community Council Association: Currently has about 50 members, with seven committee members. The inaugural meeting will be held at 7 p.m. tonight at the Bedford legion. Its website is www.futureofbedford.com

•Citizens for Halifax: Currently selling memberships and its Facebook group has 493 members. An introductory breakfast meeting in November brought 150 to the World Trade and Convention Centre. The inaugural members meeting will be held 6-8:30 p.m., Feb. 12, at the Nova Scotia Sports Hall of Fame. Its website is www.citizensforhalifax.ca.

•Municipalities Matter: A group dedicated to community and labour priorities for the Halifax Regional Municipality. Led by the Halifax-Dartmouth and district labour council of the Canadian Labour Congress, it organized an all-day forum last month and drew about 50 people to a local high school.

( apugsley@herald.ca)

New special interest groups are mobilizing forces well in advance of municipal election day on Oct. 18, when they hope to force change at Halifax City Hall. (ERIC WYNNE / Staff)

With eight months to go until October’s municipal election, Halifax city hall and its politicians are facing attack from a few different angles.

Groups like Citizens for Halifax, Municipalities Matter and the newest, Bedford Community Council Association, are mobilizing forces, and well in advance of election day on Oct. 18.

Uniting together under the banners of special interest groups is a new tack in municipal politics.

And it’s not resonating well with most councillors.

“Obviously, there are people who are really frustrated and they’ve banded together with common interests,” Coun. Steve Streatch (Eastern Shore-Musquodoboit Valley) said Wednesday.

“But when you start going off in individual corners, what’s that going to accomplish?”

He guesses there may be some political posturing at work, with a leader in each group waiting to announce that they want to run themselves.

They’re using “rhetoric to get people to jump onto their cause.”

Another councillor, who took out a membership in Citizens for Halifax so she could attend the inaugural meeting late last year, says she’s not surprised that the special interest groups are rallying so hard this time around.

“It’s the silent majority who is now coming forth to say, ‘We sat here quietly and now we want something done,’ ” Coun. Sue Uteck (Northwest Arm-South End) said Wednesday.

“And, traditionally, governments react to those who scream the loudest.”

Deputy Mayor Stephen Adams (Spryfield-Herring Cove) said he prefers the grassroots approach to municipal governing, where no one particular agenda is pushed to the forefront through sheer volume, influence or affluence.

“I prefer to look at citizens for citizens,” he said Wednesday.

“I’m not going to get involved with any group, and then be beholden to anybody except the people I represent.”

Mayor Peter Kelly, who served five years as Bedford mayor before representing the district on Halifax’s first regional municipal council, says he’s not personally offended by the creation of the newest group supporting Bedford.

“I don’t see this as being a change of support or non-support,” he said Wednesday.

In fact, he plans to attend their meeting tonight in the Bedford legion.

He sees it as “an opportunity to explore challenges faced by the community,” like the on-again, off-again privately-driven triplex rink.

“There’s frustration that this (arena) has been discussed and discussed and discussed and promised and promised and promised and people are getting peeved,” he says.

“And I’m one of those people getting peeved as well. I see no reason why we can’t say, ‘Either do it or move out of the way so someone else can do it.’ ”

If communities like Bedford want to have more power through taxation or levying area rates through their community councils, then city hall will thoroughly look into that, he says.

“Who are we to stand in the way of change that can make our representation that much better?”

However, the group behind Citizens for Halifax feels that certain municipal representatives are doing exactly that.

According to their recently-drafted memorandum of association, they would like to field a roster of candidates in the fall election “that promote the governance of the Halifax Regional Municipality by promoting the creation of two municipal units, one for urban residents and one for rural residents.”

The citizens for Bedford group differs in their outlook, says committee member Donna Lugar, because they’re not interested in lopping off pieces of the municipality.

They want to work with what they’ve got and make it better.

“Bedford went into amalgamation kicking and screaming . . . and lately people are getting a little concerned that things weren’t undertaken,” Ms. Lugar said Wednesday.

She said it is not a reflection of the area’s representation through councillors Len Goucher (now an MLA) and Gary Martin, who was excused from his council duties just one month ago due to his long battle with pancreatic cancer.

Despite that assurance, Coun. Debbie Hum (Rockingham-Wentworth) says she’s “disturbed” that the group is holding their very first public meeting this week.

“To go public like that, at this point, is somewhat disrespectful of the position that the current councillor finds himself in,” she said of Mr. Martin’s stay in hospital.

“They’re not recognizing and appreciating the fact that Coun. Martin is really quite sick and not able to conduct his normal responsibilities.”

A few other councillors say that Mr. Christie is positioning his son for a run at the Bedford seat in the October election.

“That’s always the rumour,” Coun. Sue Uteck (Northwest Arm-South End) said Wednesday.

However, Mr. Christie says the group doesn’t currently support any candidates. He also says that about 200 are expected to turn out to today’s meeti