The McNeil Show As I write this morning, I’ve been watching Premier Stephen McNeil set a land-speed record for opening and closing a session of the Nova Scotia legislature. In addition to worrying about the Lieutenant Governor (who sounds like he ranks among those at highest risk from COVID), I’veRead More

Briefing Both Premier Stephen McNeil and Dr. Robert Strang began today’s briefing by expressing condolences to the families of the fishermen on a scallop vessel that went missing in the Bay of Fundy off the coast of southwestern Nova Scotia Tuesday. The body of one crew member of the ChiefRead More

During this month’s meeting of the CBRM council,  49 minutes’ worth of discussion was devoted to a motion by District 6 Councilor Glenn Paruch that staff be directed to draft an Issue Paper on commissioning a study into the possibility of building a facility, somewhere in the CBRM, with twoRead More

On 3 December 2014, almost exactly six years ago, CBRM awarded a $128,805 tender to TRACE Planning & Design of Moncton to create a Recreation Master Plan for the municipality. I did not think of this plan a week ago Tuesday, while listening to council discuss the need for aRead More

Christmas is nigh and the good and the generous have been hard at work throughout our communities, making sure that each and every family awakens to everything it takes to make the day a joyful one. They’ll have food and toys and clothing and all will be fine — forRead More

As you may recall, I asked the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner (OIPC) for clarification on the use of outside legal counsel to handle municipal access to information requests (I was inspired to ask for this clarification by the discovery that my 2015 FOIPOP to the CBRM regardingRead More

Editor’s Note: Sydney’s casino turns 25 this summer and to mark its quarter-century, Rob Csernyik has been taking an in-depth look at the promises — and realities — of casino gambling in Cape Breton. In Part III, he focuses on the question of addiction. (Read Part I here and Part IIRead More

Editor’s Note: I didn’t have time to cover council properly this week, so today’s short takes will focus on random things from the most recent meeting of the Cape8 Breton Regional Council.   Dress Code District 5 Councilor Eldon MacDonald had himself gift-wrapped for Tuesday night’s meeting: This works inRead More

I learned a few things from the discussion of my 2015 FOIPOP application during last night’s CBRM council meeting. I learned that Jim Gogan of Breton Law Group handled my initial request in 2015 and is now handling the review. Regional solicitor Demetri Kachafanas revealed this in response to aRead More

Back in April, CNN reported that the governor of the Kenyan capital city, Nairobi, was including small bottles of Hennessy cognac in COVID-19 care packages being distributed to citizens. He erroneously claimed the cognac would act as a “throat sanitizer” and help combat the coronavirus. Both the World Health OrganizationRead More