This week I checked the Nova Scotia Tender Notices website and discovered the Cape Breton Regional Municipality (CBRM) is in the market for a number of things, including external auditors. The lucky winners will get to audit the CBRM, the CBRM Water Utility and — what fun! — the PortRead More

Nova Scotia Auditor General Michael Pickup released his Fall 2016 report today (November 30), focusing on childcare centers, capital planning for schools, critical infrastructure resiliency and the AMANDA software used to manage licenses and permits. (Interestingly, the day the AG’s report dropped found Premier Stephen McNeil on his way to theRead More

In February of last year, I arrived back in Cape Breton after 10 years away. The first evening home, I picked up a newspaper from my sister’s kitchen table and saw a publicity photo for the Boardmore Theatre’s production of The Pillowman. The play, a celebrated and controversial black comedy,Read More

Those of you who have long wished to get an inside look at how the Catholic Church elects a leader (the short line is to the left, or is that the right?) need wait no longer now that Robert Harris has written Conclave: The Power of God, The Ambition ofRead More

Construction of Sydney businessman Marty Chernin’s mixed-use apartment building on the Sydney waterfront has been postponed again—Chernin told the Post  he now hopes to break ground in Spring of 2017. Chernin’s Harbour Royale Development intends to build on the harbor side of the Esplanade at the foot of Dorchester Street.Read More

Repo Man I took a taxi from the airport recently (did I mention I was in Quebec? Quebec and Ottawa for 10 days in October). I got in late and didn’t like to ask anyone to take that drive out Grand Lake Road at 12:30 a.m. to pick me up.Read More

This is not the best moment to be erecting a wall of any sort but the time has come to put a paywall — neither huge nor beautiful — around new content on The Cape Breton Spectator. My stats show me that there are enough people reading the Spectator eachRead More

The numbers connected to our cruise industry are as slippery as a quarterdeck in a Nor’easter (okay, I promise, no more nautical similes). It starts as the season opens and the Port of Sydney trumpets (in the Cape Breton Post, which has never met an economic impact number it didn’tRead More

Don’t ever say I haven’t done my bit for transparency on the cruise file. I made an access to information (ATIP) request to Parks Canada to find out how much the Fortress of Louisbourg, the Alexander Graham Bell Museum and the Cape Breton Highlands National Park have made from cruiseRead More

My loyal readers (both of you) may be wondering why the Doctor stopped gracing the pages of this most valuable online news endeavor. The fact is, I was so busy planning my mayoralty coronation that I only now discovered that I lost the election. I am still shocked: my PierRead More