Articles by: Mary Campbell

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

October 8, 2021 at 1:00 pm

Just say no The local CBC is running a multi-part series on “street drugs” and if I didn’t know better, I’d suspect it was being sponsored by the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, because the stance it takes on drugs — they’re bad and people who do them die — seemsRead More

Quietly Shrinking CBRM

Quietly Shrinking CBRM

October 6, 2021 at 12:54 pm

Maxwell Hartt’s book, Quietly Shrinking Cities: Canadian Urban Population Loss in an Age of Growth really made me think. Hartt, an assistant professor in the department of geography and planning at Queen’s University, makes the case for cities accepting rather than fighting population decline and uses the Cape Breton Regional MunicipalityRead More

From the Mailbag: FOIPOPs & Single Malt

From the Mailbag: FOIPOPs & Single Malt

October 6, 2021 at 12:50 pm

Editor’s Note: I had to read the book, conduct and transcribe an interview and write the story about Maxwell Hartt’s Quietly Shrinking Cities this week, which left me very little time for other reporting but I would like to note a couple of interesting items that popped up in myRead More

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

October 1, 2021 at 10:30 am

Housing for the People? I want to write about the recent referendum on expropriating major landlords in Berlin, but before I do, I have to take you back in time, so you’ll better understand the context in which this referendum — which passed by a vote of 56.4% to 39%Read More

In Other Innovacorp News…

In Other Innovacorp News…

September 29, 2021 at 1:10 pm

Tim Bousquet of the Halifax Examiner has been making the point that the $104 million Innovacorp made on its META exit could be used to fund affordable housing in Nova Scotia. He even did the math: For the record, $104 million would pay for 80 apartments at $1,000/month rent forRead More

Revisiting the Unicorn

Revisiting the Unicorn

September 29, 2021 at 1:07 pm

This week, I’m going to continue my examination of Innovacorp’s “unicorn” investment, spurred, in part, by the Cape Breton Post’s take, which appeared in Monday’s print edition wrapped in a piece of puffery about Bob Pelley, Innovacorp’s regional manager in Cape Breton. The Post — like the CBC before itRead More

Procrastination is Killing Us

Procrastination is Killing Us

September 29, 2021 at 1:06 pm

Great ideas to address climate change already exist — there are thousands of them — but they need to be categorized by the degree of impact they would have on climate change mitigation. Luckily, some authors have attempted this categorization. Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse GlobalRead More

Tracking a COVID Vax Rumor

Tracking a COVID Vax Rumor

September 29, 2021 at 1:04 pm

I heard a strange rumor this weekend about anti-vaxxers in Halifax paying a guy — the same guy, in the story I heard — to get vaccinated for them and provide them with proof of vaccination. My first thought was that this had “urban myth” written all over it (theRead More

What Will $9M Buy CBRM?

What Will $9M Buy CBRM?

September 29, 2021 at 1:02 pm

Credit where credit is due: Tim Houston’s Tory government has followed through on an election promise and doubled funding to Nova Scotia’s municipalities, an increase of $32 million. The increase is for one year only but Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister John Lohr, who made the announcement last Friday, saysRead More

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

Fast & Curious: Short Takes on Random Things

September 24, 2021 at 11:24 am

Owl’s Head Thank you Michael Gorman of CBC Halifax for this story about Owl’s Head, the provincial park whose pending protected status was removed by the former Liberal government to open the way for its sale to a golf course developer. Gorman FOIPOPed documents that show that in late 2019Read More