Larger than expected growth in property assessments and a budget surplus could help Halifax regional councillors avoid a tax rate increase for the year ahead. Chief financial officer Jane Fraser presented updated financial numbers to council’s budget committee on Wednesday. Fraser told councillors her office has now reviewed the final 2020 assessment numbers, and the...
Halifax auditor general confirms the city’s website redesign was a mess
It will come as no surprise to anyone who has logged on to halifax.ca: the city’s auditor general has confirmed that the redesigned website was riddled with errors when it went live in 2017. But in a report published Tuesday and presented to council’s audit and finance standing committee, auditor general Evangeline Colman-Sadd wrote that...
Board recommends council approve Halifax police budget with extra $1 million
Halifax Regional Police Chief Dan Kinsella says he needs a budget increase of nearly $1 million for the next year to create eight new sergeant positions “to better serve the community.” The department presented its 2020-2021 budget request to the city’s board of police commissioners on Thursday, asking for an increase of $993,300 over the...
Halifax council aims for below-inflation tax increase
It’s early in the budget season, but Halifax regional councillors are hoping to keep next year’s tax increase well below inflation. Council’s budget committee met Tuesday to work toward creating the municipality’s billion-dollar 2020-2021 budget, and unanimously passed a motion to limit property tax increases for the year ahead to 1.5% on the average bill...
Province amps up its unwise and discredited biofuel efforts
Morning File, Thursday, December 13, 2018
News 1. Biofuel Last year, in her article “Life After Pulp,” Linda Pannozzo showed how as the old pulp industry is collapsing, the government is chasing two other forest dreams — biomass and biofuel. On the latter, she wrote: In 2012, when the Dexter government announced the defunct paper mill would become a business hub […]
Why did Bob Bjerke get fired and what does it mean for Halifax?
It's been three months and Halifax still has no Chief Planner, and the CAO is asking council to end run the Centre Plan.
Jacques Dubé worked as HRM’s Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) for just 11 months when he decided to can the city’s Chief Planner, Bob Bjerke. Bjerke had been heading up the city’s planning and development department for about three and a half years. His dismissal came abruptly, with no explanation to either him, or to the […]