The most controversial item on CBRM council’s agenda last night was dropped like a hot potato just hours before the meeting. The initial version of the agenda included a staff recommendation that the municipality sell 1,002 acres of land (in the form of five adjacent lots in the Coxheath area)Read More

CBRM council met on May 10 for a “Strategic Vision” workshop that, despite it’s rather vague title, actually had a clear—and important—purpose: councilors met to discuss quality of life, family recreation, public transit and affordable housing and homelessness. I’m going to focus on the latter because I think ensuring accessRead More

It was very disappointing to hear CBRM placing blame rather than taking accountability for their flawed actions, only to reverse course due to public pressure—Acting Municipal Affairs Minister Colton LeBlanc   While I don’t support Tory politics, Minister LeBlanc’s comments summarize my view on the five-million-dollar CBRM affordable housing debacle.Read More

Transparency 101 Amid the blowback from CBRM council’s rejection of a staff recommendation it fund a New Dawn/Ally Centre project with the $5 million it received under the federal government’s Rapid Housing Initiative (RHI), District 2 Councilor Earlene MacMullin took to Facebook to explain why she’d voted against the project,Read More

We’re supposed to be celebrating yesterday’s announcement that Cape Breton University has received $58.9 million from the provincial government to establish a medical school that will solve Nova Scotia’s healthcare crisis but I can’t drag my eyes away from the spectacle of CBRM council refusing the $5 million it wasRead More

Pick a lane? I live in the North End of Sydney and on a day a week or so ago when there were three cruise ships in port, I had a sudden vision of the area as a pedestrian-only district. It sounds crazy, I know, because at the moment, theRead More

There was—even cynical old me has to admit it—good news on the CBRM Central Library file during last night’s CBRM council meeting. In a memo to Council and staff, Mayor Amanda McDougall explained that the old Cape Breton County Courthouse in Sydney’s Wentworth Park (otherwise known as 70 Crescent Street)Read More

The CBRM is “considering how to best address temporary signs within CBRM and whether to regulate them.” Under consideration are those signs “commonly displayed as black roadside signs with interchangeable lettering” Back in 2015, Halifax passed a temporary sign by-law dealing with these — and other types of — temporaryRead More

A district energy system proposed for Downtown Sydney has undergone a significant metamorphosis since the last time it was on my radar, in January 2020. This scheme — one of a number of initiatives arising from a partnership between CBRM and Efficiency Nova Scotia that dates to 2015 — hasRead More

Here are the important takeaways from this morning’s CBRM special council meeting on the proposed new CBRM Central Library:   Aurevoir, HRDL? Council took a major step toward ending the agreement that has given a private developer, Martin Chernin’s Harbour Royale Development Limited, control over the proposed new library. AtRead More