Backroom deals During Tuesday’s CBRM council meeting, CAO Marie Walsh revealed — very matter-of-factly — that she and regional solicitor Demetri Kachafanas had met with developer Martin Chernin after the expiration of Chernin’s waterfront pre-development contract to discuss a new proposal. She even admitted that she and Kachafanas had presented…Read...

Last night’s council discussion regarding Harbour Royale Development Limited’s new Sydney waterfront proposal was fascinating in many ways but the most interesting aspect to me (besides the outcome, which was council refusing to entertain it and voting instead to issue a new request for proposals for CBRM-owned land on the…Read...

Editor’s Note: I’m trying something new this week to see how it pans out: I’m writing the first part of this article based on the information attached to the CBRM council agenda for Tuesday’s meeting. I will then write the second part based on what actually unfolds during the meeting….Read...

CBRM councilors last night approved an easement to enable the construction of a pedway across the Esplanade connecting an NSCC Marconi building to be located on Charlotte Street to the rest of the new waterfront campus. The pedway will be 33 feet above the street and planner Karen Neville says…Read...

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

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

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

Board blessings A reader sent along an interesting piece of correspondence received from the Sydney Downtown Development Association (SDDA) just prior to the provincial election. Signed by board chair Jennifer Griffin, it concerns the executive director of the association, Michelle Wilson, and her foray into provincial politics. Griffin writes: Due…Read...

There was a wonderfully wonky — yet important — item on the agenda of last night’s CBRM council meeting, and I am not talking about the CBRM declaring Paul’s Pizza Burgers the official food of the municipality for 2021. I am talking about an item that pleased me personally first,Read More

Last week, I wrote CBRM Communications & Information Officer Christina Lamey asking to see details of the CBRM’s bid for the 2023 Brier. As you may recall, council discussed the bid in camera during its regular monthly meeting on August 24, but Mayor Amanda McDougall, as she kicked all media,Read More