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From Thursday, April 5th Cape Breton Post

Island to get more nursing home beds

Provincial health minister makes announcement in North Sydney

Section: Northside/Victoria

By Julie Collins, Cape Breton Post
Seniors in Cape Breton will have access to 64 more nursing home beds.

Nova Scotia Health Minister Chris d'Entremont made the announcement to a packed house at the Clansman in North Sydney, Wednesday.

The Northside Community Guest Home Society was awarded 39 nursing home beds. My Cape Breton Home for Seniors was awarded 13 residential care facility beds for Sydney and 12 for North Sydney.

These 64 beds are part of 125 new beds previously planned for Cape Breton.

"Many seniors want to live in their homes as long as possible," d'Entremont said. "But should they need additional help, they want to know it's there and they want to find it in a place that they can call home. We are building a long-term care system that meets the needs and reflects the values of Nova Scotians.

"As part of Continuing Care, we are also doing more home care and more training for continuing-care assistants because we know we are going to need a lot of those workers."

Through the Continuing Care Strategy, Cape Breton will also receive another 88 new beds from a total of 832 that will be built by 2010. This brings the total of new long-term care beds for Cape Breton to 213.

"Work around where these new beds will be located is now complete. Our decision-making process is based on evidence and on the ground information from the District Health Authorities," he said. "The department looked at critical data including the number of people waiting for long-term beds at home and in hospital, population trends, the health of our seniors and the current demand for and supply of services."

Cape Breton North MLA Cecil Clarke said the number of new beds for the Northside with Wednesday's announcement is 64.

"This is significant when you consider a care facility can proceed with 36 beds," Clarke said. "This is about quality care for our citizens at a time in their lives when they need it the most."

Cape Breton Regional Municipality council is expected to make a final decision later this month on the sale of a parcel of land for the expansion of the Northside Community Guest Home to accommodate the 39 additional beds.

The Continuing Care Strategy is a 10-year plan to enhance and expand Nova Scotia's continuing-care system.

"This is certainly a great day for seniors," said Sherry MacNeil of My Cape Breton Home for Seniors. "We will be placing 13 beds in Sydney and 12 in North Sydney and will be able to provide quality care in a home-like setting."

Rev. Karen Ralph, vice-chair of the Northside Community Guest Home Society, said the society looks forward to bringing new elements to health care.

"We are looking at expanding our role in the community, which includes a unit for younger members of the community who have debilitating illnesses," Ralph said. "We're grateful to the staff for their support, the board for years of hard work and government for recognizing the need."

From Saturday, April 7th Cape Breton Post

Financing in place for new school in Waycobah

Section: Cape Breton

By Laura Jean Grant, cape breton post
Construction of a new school for the Waycobah First Nation is expected to begin this spring.

The federal government, through Indian and Northern Affairs Development, announced a $7.5 million contribution over two years to the Mi'kmaw Kina'matenewey for the construction of two new First Nations schools - one in Shubenacadie and one in Waycobah.

The Mi'kmaw Kina'matenewey is an organization that oversees education in 10 Mi'kmaq communities in Nova Scotia and over the last several years all member communities have pooled money to raise about $9 million for the two new schools. That, combined with the federal government's contribution, will pay for the bulk of the construction costs and any additional costs will be the responsibility of the individual communities.

In making the announcement, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Affairs Development Jim Prentice said the $7.5 million is part of a national $50 million investment in school infrastructure projects across Canada. He said the government is committed to addressing education needs in First Nations communities.

"We will continue to work in partnership with First Nations and provinces to ensure an effective education system in which First Nations people can excel," he said in a release.

The new school in Waycobah will accommodate Grades Primary to 12 and will provide modern facilities and learning technologies to the approximately 400 students in the community. It will also have space for community services and gatherings.

Waycobah Chief Morley Googoo is thrilled the project is moving ahead.

"We are very encouraged and excited with the movement that has taken place on the new school which will be located within the heart of our community," he said. "The new school will provide a great learning environment for our future leaders."

Googoo said the new school also demonstrates what can be accomplished when First Nations communities partner with one another and with other levels of government.

This is a comment from the editor placed in the Saturday, April 7th Cape Breton Post

School tinkering strikes nerves

Section: Comment

The governing Tories warned in advance of the spring provincial budget that finances were tight and some promises and commitments would have to be deferred. But when the budget came down on March 23 it wasn't immediately apparent where all the trimming had been done.

Pharmacare coverage for working families was one obvious deferral, and the finance department came out with a list that named some others, such as a healthy living tax incentive and a new disability allowance. This things rarely grab attention, however. Some are of interest only to small groups, while in other cases the government is not taking away something that was eagerly anticipated or generally known.

An obvious exception is the deferral of school projects, which came to light only some days later within the affected jurisdictions. The government should ask itself whether this piecemeal trickle of bad news and negative reaction in the wake of a budget makes good politics. It would be smarter to spell out explicitly everything that's being deferred and why.

The two flashpoints have been Middleton, which sent six busloads of students to Halifax to protest against the delay in construction of a promised gym, and Cape Breton where government intentions on both new school construction and renovation projects have the affected communities stirred up.

In both Middleton and Glace Bay, what got people rattled was not simply that the projects weren't funded but that the omissions seemed to say there was no longer any firm commitment. Education Minister Karen Casey tried to mollify Middleton by committing in writing to tender that project in February 2008.

The department did somewhat the same thing by agreeing to recouple the Northside Elementary School and Glace Bay junior high - two promised new schools that the school board has been trying to move in tandem. Only the Northside school was named in the $58.5 million capital plan for the province but now they're rejoined with a renewed commitment that students will be in the new schools in fall 2009.

In such a controversy, people look to riding maps for a political explanation and very often they think they see it. Cape Breton North is held by a Tory and Glace Bay by a Liberal. The government's explanation is that the Glace Bay school was left aside because of difficulties finding a suitable site. Whatever the truth, people are apt to conclude that while being on the right side of politics may not guarantee a school when you want it, it can't hurt.

The tinkering with the capital list is no cause to man the barricades but it does reinforce the caution that while a government announcement is a step up from a political promise, multi-year announcements in particular have to be taken with a grain of salt as well. And in some instances, such as the second consecutive deferral in completion of the Riverview Rural High School entrance project, government seems to be perversely flaunting some sort of wonky element in its own way of doing things.

Our front-page photo last Saturday of Riverview principal Betty Crosby looking down from the walkway to nowhere serves as a satiric comment about how government plans and builds. We're wondering how she got up there and whether she ever got down.

Hole on Dominion Street has been filled

Section: Glace Bay/New Waterford

By Sharon Montgomery, Cape Breton Post
A bootleg mine under Dominion Street is now a part of history.

Sean MacLellan, engineer technologist with the Cape Breton Regional Municipality, said the hole has been filled in and the road was reopened Wednesday evening.

He said minor cleanups were done Thursday, but the road remained open.

Over the next while - as the weather and ground conditions permit - workers will continue with minor repairs to homeowners' properties, such as driveway and yard work.

He said as well the road will be maintained with gravel until asphalt is available later this spring.

MacLellan said the bootleg mine under the road was bigger than they had initially believed. It was about 25 feet deep.

"We found a small tunnel and two rooms (where coal was dug out)."

He said the road right-a-way is about 66 feet. About 60 per cent of the bootleg mine was under the pavement section of the road. It is estimated there was anywhere from 15-18 feet of ground cover above the mine.

"We really appreciate the patience of the public," said MacLellan, adding they received no complaints while the work was being done.

The sinkhole was discovered on Bernie Burt's property at 123 Dominion St., March 7. After the top was lifted by an excavator March 14, it was discovered to be 15 feet deep and part of an old bootleg mine that continued into several 'rooms' under the road.

Burt has since had the hole on his property filled and CBRM public works officials decided for safety reasons to begin road repair work immediately.

From Monday, April 9th Cape Breton Post

Province preparing for tourism season

Section: Our community

By Matthew Daye,
Spring is starting to make itself known which is a sign this year's tourist season will soon be upon the many businesses and attractions around the island.

Debbie MacKinnon from Knotty Pine Cottages located on Smokey's Mountain, which was hit hard this passing winter by the closing of the Cape Smokey ski hill, is worried for this summer as well.

"We've been a little slow getting our reservations for the summer so far," she said. "I don't know if it has to do with the gas prices or whatever it is. I really don't know."

Adele Poirier from Nova Scotia Tourism said the province has been holding its own the last few years, but the way tourism works is changing.

More and more people are making reservations at the last minute and using the Internet to plan their trips and because of this the province is changing its procedures.

"We have a new tourism plan that takes us in some new directions. It's called new realities, new directions," she said.

It involves three strategies.

The first is called Gateway, which involves focusing on areas that have direct flights to Nova Scotia. It's to appeal to travellers who want to spend their time at the destination, not just getting to it.

"People don't pack up the station wagon with the family dog and drive for two weeks anymore," she said.

The second is called Core Experiences, which is to build up the locations that exist.

The third strategy, called Courtship, is to take advantage of the Internet. Part of this strategy uses Google Earth with special plaid place markers.

This way prospective tourists can see possible destinations, with the bird's-eye view the program offers, but also with pictures and possibly video in the near future.

"As far as we know and as far as Google knows, we're the first to use Google Earth in this way," she said.

That strategy will also continue to update and explore new uses for the website, including letting people buy their whole vacation online.

Despite these new initiatives there may still be some problems with the upcoming season.

Gas prices, competition with other destinations, and the new passport regulations involving the United States, are the main concerns this year.

Donny MacLellan, a travel agent with Maritime Travel, says the determining factor for this tourism season is simple.

"If the weather stays nice, the people stay longer," MacLellan said. "If the weather gets bad they pack up and go."

This is from Wednesday, April 11th CBPost online.

Work about to resume on multi-use trail

By Nancy King

Cape Breton Post

SYDNEY — The effort to develop a multi-use trail between Port Hastings and Inverness is about to resume.

The 92-kilometre project — a venture of the Cape Breton Island Pathways Association and Inverness County Trails Federation — began last fall is part of the TransCanada Trail project. The intention is to bring it up to a multi-use, four-season standard. The second phase of the project will involve identifying a route for the trail from Inverness to North Sydney.

To date, more than 7.4 kilometres of ditching and 4.7 kilometres of grubbing have been completed from Troy Beach to Dunmore Road, 22 culverts have been installed, 57 kilometres of right-of-way has been cut and 40 kilometres chipped.

“Everything is going as planned and on schedule so far, we’d like to see the snow disappear so we can get some frost out of the ground and resume some construction work,” noted CBIPA co-ordinator Darrell Taylor.

As the season for increased trail use approaches, officials are warning users that heavy equipment will be performing work on it and sections may be closed at any time, without notice. Bridges may also be closed from time to time to allow for maintenance and upgrades. Users are asked to use extra caution, remain on the trail and adhere to safety signage.

“There will be a considerable amount of heavy equipment on the trail,” Taylor said. “There will also be materials being spread on the trail because some of these sections are low and they have to be built up to alleviate water problems.”

There will also be more chipping and right-of-way cutting over the next four months, he added.

Taylor said the group may have a report completed on the Inverness to North Sydney route over the next few weeks, and then it can begin to look at construction requirements and funding partners.

CBIPA and Inverness County Trails Federation have partnered with 28 corporations, organizations and government agencies on the project. To date, about $1.2 million of the $1.9 million project cost has been raised, and Taylor said the groups are still looking for additional partners to fund the remainder.

“We still have some partners to find to come onboard, but we’re in the process of trying to look at partners and avenues,” he said.

The trail is expected to be an attraction for not only Cape Bretoners but visitors to the island.

“In rural Cape Breton, we don’t have a lot of recreational assets to use, this one is definitely significant because it’s a multi-use trail that we can use all four seasons,” he said.

As well as this.
It really is an eyesore that should've been torn down long ago, but as long as it's torn down soon, with the current upswing in interest in the Sydney area, this land will be prime for a hotel or apartment development, and is directly beside Cabot House, Sydney's tallest building at 18 stories and a mixed use of commercial/office (first 3 floors) and apartments (other 15 floors).

No firm date set for demolition of former Keddy’s Motor Inn
CAPE BRETON POST STAFF
The Cape Breton Post

SYDNEY — A firm date to knock down the former Keddy’s Motor Inn on Kings Road hasn’t been pinned down, but the Cape Breton Regional Municipality’s bylaws and buildings manager said it’ll likely happen later this spring.

Rick Fraser said the municipality has been working with a representative of the property’s owner, businessman Hugh Lynch, on dismantling the building.

“We’ve met with the contractor and we’ve gone over his criteria for demolishing the property and what we would expect to see as part of that demolition,” Fraser said Tuesday.

He said some final details have to be reviewed before the building is torn down.

“But it looks like the owner is taking steps to do the demolition on his own.

“It would be prudent on us to watch what the owner is going to do to ensure that the property is (demolished) correctly.”

About three-quarters of the building has structural problems and is full of mould, Fraser said.

The asking price for the former motel, seen as an eyesore by some residents over the years, is $495,000. It’s been vacant for the last 10 years.

From in front of the old Keddy's site (which was next to Quality Inns...basically Motel stretch)