They say that time heals all wounds, but for Jeannette Rogers, the scab is ripped off and bleeds fresh every time an innocent person is killed in police custody. Losing someone in such a senseless way is a club nobody wants to be part of, but in the past few weeks, two more families joined […]
News + Opinion
Coast newspaper coverage of Halifax city news, breaking news, HRM municipal politics, city hall news, local business, downtown development, Dartmouth, Sackville, Bedford, Nova Scotia, Halifax councillors and the mayor
Posted inNews + Opinion
The Halifax byelection finally started, but it might not finish
Update: Mark Carney will be Canada’s next prime minister, following his overwhelming win—85.9% of the vote—at the Liberal Party of Canada leadership convention yesterday, Sunday, March 9. Carney must be sworn in by the Governor General (no date’s been announced for that yet) and has to form a cabinet, then he can call a general […]
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Auditor General blasts “arbitrary” and “unrestricted” university funding
On Tuesday, the province’s top watchdog, Auditor General Kim Adair, released her report on government funding to universities. It looked at how the Department of Advanced Education monitored the $2.5 billion it gave to Nova Scotia’s 10 universities over the past five years. “These post-secondary institutions rely on government, on average, for a third of […]
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The future of AI news is here in Halifax, it seems—and god, it sucks
A few weeks ago, I ventured down Quinpool Road and visited a company office that doesn’t exist. The building is real. And the company—at least in some notional sense—is real. But the other parts—who works at the company, how they’re connected to Halifax, what it bodes for our new digital era—I’m far less certain of. I […]
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Halifax libraries budget shows city working against itself on parking
The regular season of HRM’s budget debates ended on Feb 26, with a slew of routine budget presentations from HRM’s public libraries, the municipal auditor general, the city’s corporate service business units and the fiscal services business unit. Here’s how that meeting of the city’s Budget Committee—a group whose membership is all of council—went down. […]
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Bill 12 includes policy that could violate university workers’ rights
A controversial bill affecting university funding in Nova Scotia is being revived. Amendments to the old bill will change how schools enter crisis-planning mode. If passed, the province can require a university in financial trouble to follow a “revitalization plan” as a condition of funding. The amendments are included in a new omnibus bill–Bill 12–called An […]
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Where to buy groceries during Trump’s trade war on Canada
Update: After initial negotiations on Feb 3 led to Donald Trump delaying the imposition of tariffs for a month, the Cheeto-in-Charge announced they were back on the table earlier this week, taking effect on Tuesday, March 4. In the wild weeks since convicted felon and US president Donald Trump first threatened a sweeping 25% tax […]
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Will council end driving subsidies and let Halifax Transit succeed?
Halifax Transit gave its budget presentation late on Feb 20 and early into Feb 21, on days two and three of the budget debates about Halifax’s operations business units. Even as Halifax Transit is bringing back routes lost to COVID and adding $1 million in new spending, its annual budget is down $7.9 million. All […]
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Windsor Street redesign is dead; long live the Windsor Street redesign
Much like that other saviour, Jesus Christ, the Windsor Street Exchange redesign project came back to life at Tuesday, Feb 25’s council meeting after a brief period of being dead. Last month, council crucified city staff for not prioritizing council’s priorities in the new design for the Windsor Street Exchange and rejected staff’s proposal. One […]
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What to expect in the audit on university funding
Nova Scotians can once again look forward to reading reports on how the government spends public money. On Monday, premier Tim Houston caved to criticism and reversed course on a bill, specifically the parts of it threatening the independence of the province’s top watchdog, Auditor General Kim Adair. However, Bill 1, as it’s called, still […]
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Halifax is finally able to think about non-car options
Halifax’s budget debates, specifically the Department of Public Works budget, is where hope for the future goes to die. Even though there are reasons for optimism, it’s hard to maintain that optimism in the face of Halifax’s dire affliction: This city is suffering from a severe case of the tragedy of the commons. Before the […]
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The link between universities, NDAs and perpetuating racism
In 2021, C. Darius Stonebanks was fired from his full professorship at Bishop’s University after he raised complaints of systemic racism, he explains in a new video connecting non-disclosure agreements with racism. A non-disclosure agreement, or NDA, is a signed legal document restricting what information can be shared with others, depending on what is deemed […]
