Monty Python was funnier. No. Check that. Monty Python is funny. Lloyd Hines? Not so much. Still, one can understand Tory MLA Tom Halman’s description of the latest twists, turns, twirls and top-this folly from the ongoing, never-ending Yarmouth-to-somewhere-in-Maine ferry fandango as “like a skit out of Monty Python.” Personally, I prefer to think...
Who’s not telling the truth? Bay Ferries? The Nova Scotia government? US Border Services? All of the above?
You would think — given the circumstances and the season of the sun — that government officials would do almost anything to avoid ending up naked, deer-in-the-headlights, in front of microphones where they might be asked impertinent questions about ferries that don’t ferry and related matters. You would be mistaken.
No! Really? Couldn’t be. But there it was. In virtual black and white. “If Yarmouth ferry sailed even once this year, it would be productive: official,” read the headline over CBC reporter Jean Laroche’s piece last week about the latest twisty turn in the long since careened-off-the-rails story of the Yarmouth ferry. You would think...
Don’t worry. Be happy. That’s only your tax dollars you see sinking
Nova Scotia Transportation Minister Lloyd returned from Washington last week bubbling over with optimism for a summer season — albeit much, much shorter — for the Yarmouth-Bar Harbor tourist ferry. Don't hold your breath. But do hold on to your wallet.
So Lloyd “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” Hines has returned from his airplane flight-of-fancy to Washington — the ferry portion of his trip having been unavoidably delayed/canceled/“soon” to be resumed — bubbling over with optimism. Perhaps it was just the summer humidity. During three, pre-July-4th-holiday days in the US capital — in the long foreshadow of...
Trails association wants to ban off-highway vehicles
Morning File, Wednesday, December 19, 2018
News 1. Northern Pulp Mill wins temporary injunction “A setback for the ‘No Pipe’ movement and a victory for the Pictou County pulp mill yesterday,” reports Jennifer Henderson. “Nova Scotia Supreme Court judge Denise Boudreau granted Northern Pulp a temporary injunction to prevent local fishermen from continuing with blockades she ruled interfered with a vessel […]
Fool’s Gold
Nova Scotia's Myopic Pursuit of Metals & Minerals (Part 4)
A Halifax Examiner / Cape Breton Spectator investigation. This is the fourth and final instalment in a series of articles on the push for mines and quarries in Nova Scotia. You can find Part I here. How the mining lobby is working to undermine environmental protection in Nova Scotia On a cold day in late November […]
Fool’s Gold
Nova Scotia's Myopic Pursuit of Metals & Minerals (Part 3)
A Halifax Examiner / Cape Breton Spectator investigation. This is the third in a series of articles on the push for mines and quarries in Nova Scotia. You can find Part I here. Cobequid Gold and Tatamagouche water The news broke in November 2017 on the front page of the free monthly community paper, The Tatamagouche […]
Biomass, Freedom of Information, and the Silence of the DNR Company Men
Part 5: Publicly funded information — not available to Nova Scotians — was provided to pipeline company based in Texas.
Documents show that the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources provided publicly funded forest age class data, currently being withheld from the public, to Texas-based Bear Paw Pipeline Corporation Inc., a firm set to build a natural gas pipeline in DNR Minister Lloyd Hines’ riding of Guysborough-Eastern Shore-Tracadie. In December 2016, Nova Scotia Environment (NSE) […]
Muzzling the Forest Keepers
A Field Guide to Boreal Felt Lichen and DNR Message Control
Endangered boreal felt lichen. Photo courtesy Brad Toms. A redacted email exchange recently obtained through a Freedom of Information request revealed that on November 7, 2014, Allan Eddy, the associate deputy minister of the Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources, was not happy with something he had just seen. Eddy was attending the annual science conference […]
Forest Tragedy
How the forest industry and compliant bureaucrats hijacked the public will
They were heady days. It was spring of 2008 and citizens started gathering in droves in community halls to talk about why the natural world mattered to them. A few months earlier Conservative Natural Resources Minister David Morse announced that Voluntary Planning would lead a year of independent public consultations on the province’s minerals, forests, […]
Friday on my mind: Morning File, Friday, August 5, 2016
News Views Noticed Government On campus In the harbour Footnotes News 1. Prison deaths “Two Newfoundland families have launched negligence lawsuits against Correctional Service Canada over the separate deaths of two women in a Nova Scotia penitentiary, alleging the prison failed to provide proper physical and mental health care in both cases,” reports Michael Tutton for the […]