Nova Scotia’s mania for public-private-partnership (P3) school construction was brief—more of an episode than an illness—but what an expensive episode it was. It started in 1997 and ended in 2000 officially, but the 39 schools built under the P3 banner were the subject of 20-year leases, so the P3 programRead More

There will be a mayoral race in the Cape Breton Regional Municipality this fall and I for one, am glad. That’s partly because acclamations are no fun—who wants to watch incumbent Cecil Clarke debate himself?—but mostly because I don’t think they’re particularly healthy for a functioning democracy. Instead, Rankin MacSween,Read More

I’ve been reading a document from the Tamarack Institute this week. It’s called 10—A Guide for Cities Reducing Poverty and it was presented during the Cities Reducing Poverty: When Mayors Lead conference in Edmonton in February. I borrowed CBRM Mayor Cecil Clarke’s copy. (JUST KIDDING! He didn’t attend. I haveRead More

Dr. StrangeJob has not fallen off the wagon since starting the pledge last week, so he is still hoping to catch the CBRM gravy-train. Since Joe Citizen’s CBRM Councillors’ Pledge continues to raise a stink with CBRM taxpayers, there is now talk about a new rank in council. Hence, theRead More

The Cape Breton Regional Municipality has been doing a much better job of submitting audited financial statements to the province on deadline each year. I know this because CBRM CFO Marie Walsh answered my queries — as did the spokesperson for the Nova Scotia department of municipal affairs — andRead More

If Murray Lewis, editor of Good Times, the magazine for retirees which comes 10 times a year with your Cape Breton Post subscription, wanted to introduce a little shock and awe into the assisted death debate, he probably succeeded in his editorial in the July/August edition. He strongly criticizes theRead More

Business Cape Breton (BCB) CEO Eileen Lannon Oldford left a special meeting of the CBRM council on 8 June 2016 in triumph—council had not only agreed that the CBRM should declare BCB its economic development arm, it had awarded the group a $115,000* “sustainability” grant to hang baskets of flowersRead More

Given my love of resource materials, it’s a wonder I haven’t discovered the Nova Scotia Tender Notices website before now — it’s where, “as defined in the Nova Scotia Public Procurement Act, all public sector entities in Nova Scotia are required to post their tender notices.” So what is theRead More

Raised a good Catholic boy, my initial point of reference to taking the pledge involves refraining from alcohol and going to meetings. So, imagine my confusion when I saw the invitation from Joe Citizen to take The CBRM Councillors’ Pledge. Granted, some of the gibberish spewing from local politicians isRead More

“Here they are George. This is just the kind I was telling you about. Aren’t they great?” “Look, Mary. I don’t know the first thing about campers. I’ve never even seen one this close before. In fact, I don’t think I’ve really seen one before at all. Why in theRead More