A glimmer of hope

Annapolis County Council’s return to chambers a positive sign

As the Time of COVID keeps grinding on, along with the economic hardships that the virus brought to us all, and the general nastiness grows all over the world, and the dreadful war in Ukraine gets more awful every day, I felt the zephyr of something new.

I think I saw a modicum of light, a small glimmer of hope last week at the special meeting of Annapolis County Council. I’m pretty sure it was there.

First of all, the council was live in the council chamber in that building in Annapolis Royal that really doesn’t have much personality, but I digress. Some people were masked and some weren’t. And I was able to watch the goings on as they happened. I didn’t have to wait until the video was posted a few hours later. That was pretty exciting.

The new manager of community outreach and tourism, Debra Ryan, gave an outstanding presentation on what we have here in the county and how we need to tell everyone – I mean everyone – about those treasures.

Bold and forward-looking, honestly. Then we heard from the CAO, David Dick, who also emphasized that he wants to look forward. He and Heather Fox-Perry, accounts payable co-ordinator, spoke about the upcoming budget process and how it is going to be different this time around. I won’t go into all the salient points. Budgets can be a bit mind-numbing but the approach being taken so far, was actually very interesting. And Fox-Perry did a masterful job.

At the end of the day, the big announcement was the sale of the internet infrastructure to Xplornet for $17 million. Now that sounds like a huge chunk of moolah, but there have been expenses over the years. So, I understand that the county, namely us taxpayers, may see about $2 million from the sale.

Every eight years, Nova Scotia municipalities go through a process to make sure there is an equitable number of voters in each district. We will be going through this possible redrawing of the district lines

(if needed) starting this year. Who knows, we might end up with bigger districts and fewer councillors.

Note to county councilors: I would really like to recommend that all council members get microphone lessons. Leaning way back in your chair and expecting the mike to pick up your utterings is not working. Shuffling your papers on your desk in front of the mike means we don’t hear your neighbour. There is certainly no trouble hearing a couple of the councilors – you know who you are; you would be heard in the parking lot.

Now that you are back in the council chamber, remember there are those of us out here who are interested in what you say. It’s sort of like remembering to unmute. We might not agree with you out here in taxpayerland, but we are interested.