NEWS
1. EverWind
You may remember in November when the federal government announced it was loaning EverWind $125 million for a proposed green hydrogen project in Nova Scotia. Joan Baxter had this story about that announcement and some of the questions still remaining behind the proposal.
Well, it turns out that loan is actually for $166 million.
From Baxter’s latest story:
However, a Demand Debenture filed with Nova Scotia Property Online on Dec. 8, 2023 for the NuStar property that EverWind purchased in Point Tupper shows that the amount Export Development Canada has loaned EverWind Terminals Canada Ltd., EverWind Terminals Canada Holdings and Point Tupper Marine Services is $125 million — specifying that those are United States dollars.
The interest rate is 25% per annum.
In an email to the Halifax Examiner, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada confirmed that the $125 million debt facility for EverWind is indeed in United States dollars.
That works out to about $166 million Canadian — $41 million more public dollars than the public was led to believe back in November when the announcement was made.
The Global Affairs spokesperson offered no explanation of why this was not made clear in its Nov. 29 press release.
Click or tap here to read “Export Development Canada quietly finalizes loan to EverWind Fuels — not for $125 million but $166 million.”
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2. Andre Denny and the Criminal Code Review Board
Philip Moscovitch has this commentary on Andre Denny and the Criminal Code Review Board. On Nov. 27, 2023, Denny was granted an absolute discharge by the Nova Scotia Criminal Code Review Board more than 10 years after he killed Halifax gay rights activist Raymond Taavel.
Moscovitch writes:
Both CBC and the Canadian Press reported on Denny’s release this week, and both stories contained serious inaccuracies.
The CBC story says:
Denny, who has been diagnosed with schizophrenia, has been released on several conditions including staying in Nova Scotia, avoiding alcohol and drugs and living at an approved address.
For its part, CP inaccurately reports:
Under the board’s latest order, Denny must adhere to certain conditions. Among other things, he must maintain his mental health, abstain from alcohol and certain drugs and remain in the province, where he must follow recommendations from a mental health team and live at an approved address.
However, the ruling from the Criminal Code Review Board (formally, the “disposition”) states clearly: “It is ordered [that] an absolute discharge be granted.” An absolute discharge means there are no conditions attached.
Chris Hansen, spokesperson for the Nova Scotia Public Prosecution Service, told the Examiner that Crown Attorney Carla Bell confirmed that Denny received an absolute discharge on November 27, 2023. Hansen said reporting to the effect that Denny must meet conditions is “incorrect.”
Moscovitch goes on to explain the Criminal Review Board’s process and the steps that took place before Denny’s release.
Click or tap here to read “Andre Denny and the Criminal Code Review Board.”
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3. Emergency departments
“The annual accountability report that tracks emergency department closures at Nova Scotia hospitals was released Thursday, and the news is not good,” reports Jennifer Henderson.
Community hospitals are reporting longer, more frequent closures, and patients are waiting longer to be seen at regional hospitals and at the IWK children’s hospital. Available here, the Annual Accountability Report on Emergency Departments covers the period from April 1, 2022 to March 31, 2023.
Emergency departments (EDs) were closed a total of 79,813 hours. A temporary ED closure, also called an unplanned or unscheduled closure, is a change in the operational hours of a site, typically due to the unavailability of health care professionals.
Scheduled closures accounted for 47% (37,890 hours) and temporary closures accounted for 53% (41,923 hours) of the total closure hours. There were no ED closures at large regional hospitals or at the IWK. However, 19 emergency departments (more than half) experienced temporary shutdowns over the course of the year.
Click or tap here to read “Emergency department closures continue to rise in Nova Scotia.”
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4. Ben Proudfoot
This item is written by Jennifer Henderson.
Ben Proudfoot, a filmmaker who hails from Halifax, has once again been shortlisted for an Academy Award. The Last Repair Shop is a short documentary about the joy of music and the stories of the craftsmen who fix musical instruments for school children in Los Angeles. It’s also about the redemptive power of repair in today’s broken America. The trailer for the documentary by Proudfoot and Kris Bowers of Breakwater Studios can be found here.
Proudfoot, 33, was nominated for a 2021 Oscar for the short documentary film A Concerto Is a Conversation. He won an Oscar in 2022 for another documentary short called The Queen of Basketball. It told the story of Lucy Harris Stewart, a trailblazer in women’s basketball, who led her Mississippi college team to three national titles before becoming the first and only woman to be drafted by the NBA.
Proudfoot grew up in Halifax and has at least one cousin who is a music teacher. His father Gordon Proudfoot organized an annual fundraiser for Feed Nova Scotia and was a lawyer who also served as president of the Canadian Bar Association.
The nominations for the Academy Awards will be announced later this month.
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5. Cycling
“A Halifax trauma expert is calling on the municipal government to address an increase in cycling injuries,” reports Kathleen McKenna with CBC.
The number of cyclists injured by motor vehicles in Halifax has doubled every year since 2019.
Dr. Kirstin Weerdenburg is an emergency room doctor and avid cyclist. She says the injuries are not only increasing in numbers, but also seriousness.
“As a trauma expert, I started hearing and seeing more people affected by cycling injuries and the people that I saw that were affected by it were having much more severe injuries,” she said.
Weerdenburg says it’s important to consider the data to find out why this increase is happening.
“There’s probably a lot more people on the roads with their bikes, probably a lot more drivers.”
She said it’s vital to find out whether the infrastructure for drivers and cyclist to share the roads is working effectively and worries not enough focus is put on prevention.
Weerdenburg tells CBC that “we all have a shared responsibility at making the roads safer.”
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6. Oaklawn Farm Zoo
Oaklawn Farm Zoo in Aylesford is closing. The Rogerson family who own the zoo made an announcement on its Facebook page Tuesday.
As many of you know Oaklawn will not be opening in “24”.
We would like to Thank You for your kindness and support over the past 40 plus years.
Arrangements have been made at responsible facilities for the animals seeking new homes.
Having reached our declining years, we appreciate your respecting our privacy and wish you all the best in “24”.
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VIEWS
Calling out the bullshit behind corporate jargon and inspirational quotes
Over the holidays, I listened to this segment on the CBC show The Cost of Living. It was about corporate jargon. You know the words and phrases, I’m sure: synergies, deep dive, game changer, circle back, going forward, empower, drill down.
For the Cost of Living, Eric Anicich, a professor at Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California, describes jargon as this: “you could say the same thing in a way that is more accessible to a broader audience, but you choose not to.”
He said that when people use jargon they often do it for status.
“It’s similar to why someone might buy a fancy sports car, for example. It signals that person is wealthy and successful… I think of jargon similarly. It’s like a form of conspicuous communication that people use to compensate for feelings of insecurity or low status.”
Anicich said people lower on the hierarchy in the corporate world are more likely to use jargon.
But, as the show notes, jargon can also be used to distort meaning or make situations sound more positive than they are. Using terms like delayering or downsizing rather than layoffs doesn’t hide the fact that the people on the receiving end are losing their jobs.
Anicich recalled hearing a news interview with an investigator who said he needed “to get items of evidentiary value” to “catalogue in the investigative pathway.”
“What this person was saying on television was that the police need to collect evidence to try to solve this crime… the person communicated nothing of value and they did it in an incredibly complicated way,” Anicich said.
Anicich, Zach Brown, and Adam Galinsky also did nine experiments to find out why people use jargon. And again the reason was insecurity. From an article by Jessica Stillman in Inc.:
One, for example, asked volunteer MBA students to present a startup idea for a pitch competition in which they were told they faced higher-status competition (established entrepreneurs), other MBA students, or lower-status competition (undergrads). The researchers found that the more anxious participants were about their relative status, the more jargon they used. Another study analyzing 64,000 dissertations found the same pattern — the lower the status of the university, the more jargon the author tended to use.
“What our research shows is that jargon is a status signal, just like an expensive car or a tuxedo,” Brown explained to Inc.com.
Is wielding language to show off an effective strategy? Just like owning a fancy car or handbag, fancy language lands differently with different audiences. “In fact, when a speaker communicates using the right amount of jargon for a particular audience, the audience likely doesn’t even notice that the words being used are jargon!” Brown notes.
A couple of corporate phrases I dislike the most have to be “thought leader” and “content is king.” I know in the social media world, people think everything is content, but it’s not really. And we all have thoughts, right? Good thoughts, bad thoughts, terrible thoughts. Does that make us all thought leaders?
I’ve written before about the bullshit and bafflegab that is especially common in the wellness and coaching industries. That Morning File piece all started when I wondered what the hell “authentic self” means.
A few years later, I still see the phrase authentic self around, and now I realize it’s yet another marketing term used to sell products and services, notably coaching services. Authentic self isn’t really authentic at all.
This is a jargon of its own and I am not the only one tired of it.
One of my favourite podcasts is “I’ve Had It” with Jennifer Welch and Angie “Pumps” Sullivan. Bascially, Welch and Sullivan spend 45 minutes each episode talking about stuff they’ve had it with. They’re quite hilarious.
On a recent episode, Welch and Pumps talked about how they’ve had it with inspirational quotes and how they consider it a red flag when someone shares such quotes all the time.
“No one really feels better after they read live, laugh, love,” Sullivan said. “Nobody’s like, ‘you know, I’m just going to embrace that and go forth and conquer.'”
Welch called those inspirational quotes a “layer of denial” for most people.
It’s a Band-aid. All those positive affirmation quotes that aren’t rooted in reality are just Band-aids that people use.
I’ve met people and they’re like, you know, they believe there’s a reason for everything, that everything happens for a reason. They believe that. And this is the inspirational quote world.
I don’t think everything happens for a reason. I think there’s a lot of fuckery, coincidence, good luck, bad luck. I think a lot of people do a lot of negative things and make a lot of negative choices that lead to horrible prizes at the end of that. And some people make good choices and good decisions and that leads to great prizes. But ‘everything happens for a reason’ is so dismissive of all the human suffering that is happening in the world.
I think these quotes are red flags, too. Also, can’t people think of their own inspirational words? I meet people all the time who have thoughtful and inspirational things to say and none of it is written on a nice photo and shared on Facebook.
Mental health advocate Dave Tarnowski created this Instagram account called Disappointing Affirmations as a sort of antidote to all the inspirational quotes and it’s so honest and refreshing. I heard about it via the I’ve Had It podcast.
Here’s one example:
Perhaps I will circle back on this topic because everything happens for a reason.
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NOTICED
Designs on wrapping paper
Halifax Bloggers shared this post by Stephen Archibald from 2014 about the patterns in Christmas wrapping paper from decades ago. Archibald writes:
If you follow this blog you will realize I have been known to save little pieces of paper that are well designed or feel typical of a moment in time. Over the years I’ve occasionally done this with swatches of Christmas wrapping paper, sometimes when a piece was being retired from active duty. Now there are enough examples to show you styles I find appealing.
Patterns over the decades include mistletoe, plum pudding, Christmas trees, holly, and cats.
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Government
No meetings
On campus
No events
In the harbour
Halifax
11:30: Traviata, car carrier, moves from Pier 9C to Autoport
13:30: Vistula Maersk, container ship, sails from Pier 42 for sea
14:00: SD Victoria, offshore supply ship, arrives at NB 4 from Portsmouth
15:30: Atlantic Sun, container ship, sails from Fairview Cove for sea
16:30: Annie B, container ship, sails from Fairview Cove for sea
20:30: Traviata, car carrier, sails from Autoport for sea
Cape Breton
19:00: Tanja, bulker, sails from Papermill for sea
Footnotes
I wrote this Morning File while wearing my new blue PJs with the polar bears on them. My kid gave them to me for Christmas. She has a matching pair.
So much bullshit to call out and so little time. Good job, as always.
Re the bafflegab: I have written numerous applications for grants (money, to the uninitiated) and the most common advice given to me was to “find the buzzwords.” So, one looks in the grant invitation for words like diversity, community, build, impact, representation, value, culture, worth, spin-off, economic, and the like, as the criteria for getting a grant – and then plug in those words (with examples that have more “words” attached) to ensure the application meets those criteria. It’s good advice, in one sense, but it feels fake because I am aware of the jargon principle. So I try to use those words no more than once – which amuses me.
Re: Jargon. I feel like it’s the opposite in Government. The higher up and more senior you go the more Jargon. Talking to Ottawa beurocrats is almost indecipherable at times for we the hoi polloi.
Totally agree, it really is a lot of bs. Recently after a rocket exploded after lift off it was explained by a Musk spokesman as “an unplanned sudden disassembly “. I thought it was just an explosion.
Re: item 1 – EverWind
“The interest rate is 25% per annum”. A typo?
Re cyclist injuries – while not offering any opinion as to whether HRM is safe or not for cyclists, or whether injuries are more severe these days I do want to comment on what appears to be a grossly inaccurate statement in the article.
“The number of cyclists injured by motor vehicles in Halifax has doubled every year since 2019.”
Using HRM’s Open Data of vehicle-cyclist collisions as reported by HRM police as the source of data the number of vehicle-cyclist collisions resulting in injury for the past number of years have been
25 – 2018
51 – 2019
27 – 2020
32 – 2021
46 – 2022
24 – 2023 to October 31
This is hardly ‘doubling every year since 2019’. In fact not one year since 2019 has experienced as many cyclist injury collisions as 2019.
We need to strive to avoid every injury as any one can be life altering but let’s not make statements not supported by the evidence.
The CBC article does not give the source of their injury statistics, but I am more inclined to believe cyclist injury statistics from an emergency room doctor than HRM police (especially when the doctor is calling for a closer look at the data).
When cycling, I’ve had numerous close calls thanks to inattentive drivers (same as when walking or driving) and never bothered reporting them to police. I know cyclists who have been brushed by careless drivers, and never bothered reporting it to police. I suspect some cyclists who are hit or are forced off the road by careless or even aggressive drivers don’t bother involving police.
HRM police have certainly indicated little interest in protecting cyclists. A prime example is the case of Linda Mosher who hit a cyclist and left the scene. Police didn’t charge her with leaving the scene because she told police she didn’t know she’d been in an accident. Police did issue a ticket for the mild offence of making an unsafe lane change. https://www.halifaxexaminer.ca/government/city-hall/law-disorder-linda-mosher-hearing-to-resume-in-three-months/ The ticket was fought, and, if memory serves, eventually dismissed.
Given the apparent lack of police interest, I suspect not all cyclist injuries are reported to the police, and I would not trust HRM police as the source of truth on cyclists injured by drivers. An emergency room doctor has considerably more credibility.
With regard to Ben Proudfoot, I believe that this is his third Oscar Nomination. A Concerto is a Conversation was his first nomination, then The Queen of Basketball. He is a very talented young man.
Hi Cathie. We just updated the story. Thanks for letting us know.
Cycling injuries… just last night had supper with friends, both avid peninsula cyclists, and now one is hobbling around with a cane due to being hit by an unaware driver in a van. Despite all the bike lanes, Halifax is not safe for cyclists. There are too many new gigantic buildings and developers and the city have not thought out what the additional car traffic they bring will mean to neighbourhoods. So far, what it means is impatient drivers, more aggressive drivers, and injuries to both bikers and pedestrians.
Everyone on the peninsula seems to be driving as if they’re delivering food and everyone off the peninsula seems to be in a race to get home. Traffic calming measures can work but they can’t be mild.
It will be Ben Proudfoot’s third nomination – he was also nominated in 2020. However, I do believe that he has made the shortlist of 15, that will be voted down to the nominated five in a few weeks.