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Oh, Februshitty. Look what you’ve done to our fair city with your piles of snow and sheets of ice. Tensions run high as we mumble about beet juice and quibble over public versus private snow removal services.
And so far, March isn’t cutting us much slack either. With crews working around the clock to dig us out of our weather woes, one thing has been missing. Something of critical importance. An apology from our mayor and city council.
A real, honest to goodness, full-fledged, four-part apology. Not for the weather, of course, but for the mistakes our city’s leadership has made in how they’ve responded. Those mistakes need to be acknowledged, the harm cause by those mistakes needs to be acknowledged, commitments must be made to mitigate the damage caused in the short-term and commitments must be made to do better next time. A good apology and a good plan would go a long way to making things better, even as the snow and ice continue.
Here’s a draft speech the mayor might give if he were so inclined. Maybe in a press conference, a sort of direct heart-to-heart with the people he serves just to let them know that he really hears—and fully understands—our concerns and perspectives. For impact, we suggest he deliver it surrounded by the sixteen councillors that were elected with him to manage the affairs of our city.
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“Citizens of Halifax, I come before you today to apologize. As mayor and council, we designed a snow-removal plan that works fairly well under normal winter conditions. It was designed with fair service standards and an eye on the bottom line. But in the aftermath of the flash-freeze storms we’ve had since the beginning of February, our plan has failed.
“Let me make it clear that the failure was not on the part of the snow removal crews, municipal staff, or the incredible 311 operators, all of whom have been working extremely hard these past couple of months.
“The simple fact is, we did not anticipate the unique weather we’ve experienced, nor could we adjust our strategy fast enough when it became clear the plan wasn’t working. Like I said, the plan works well for snow. Ice? Not so much.
“As a result, the streets and sidewalks of our great municipality have been in terrible condition, the consequences of which should not be understated. Beyond the inconvenience, stress and delays for anyone driving around town, our poorly cleared streets damage vehicles. Businesses suffer too, when there is no place for their customers to park.
“Although we still have many residential streets with ice holes and ruts that are very difficult to navigate, most of our roads have gotten better. The graders we are using to remove ice-pack from streets are expensive and slow, but they are working. Sunshine, salt, and clear storm drains worked together to clear some of the ice naturally as well.
“When it comes to our sidewalks, however, our failure is persistent. For many of our fellow citizens walking is the only option, yet most of our sidewalks are not clear. People with mobility challenges are especially hard-hit, and are virtually immobilized by these conditions. Whether it is a trip to work or school, to buy food or see a doctor or just visit a friend, it is not acceptable that so many people are effectively cut-off from the outside world for so long.
“There is a cost for this failure and it is hard to calculate. It includes the value of lost business and lost productivity; of missed appointments, shifts at work and classes in school and the social cost of isolation. It also includes the cost of injury, not just to our healthcare system, but to the people who get hurt. For example, when a student at NSCC gets a concussion and misses weeks of class only to be left with symptoms that may never go away, the price she pays is immense.
“We can do more to make our city walkable again, and starting today, we will. Project Safe Step has two components. The first is an aggressive plan to remove sidewalk ice by hand. This includes cutting tools, jack-hammers, pry bars, shovels and boots on the ground. We will prioritize school zones, steep hills and main routes. Inspired by Paul Vienneau and others, we will also organize and support volunteer crews of citizens who are willing to help out.
“With hundreds of kilometres of icy sidewalks, we know we can’t do this everywhere. That’s why the second part of Project Safe Step is to generously coat sidewalks with traction sand or crusher dust on a regular basis. Priority one streets, for example, will get treated every 24 to 48 hours, as needed.
“This will cost the municipality money of course, but the price of inaction is too much for citizens to bear.
“Finally, we commit to spend the time between now and next winter to develop flexible snow clearing plans so we can react to conditions as they develop, including a better strategy for ice-clearing. We will work with contractors to make sure they have the resources and direction required to keep our city as safe as possible if and when we are faced with this kind of weather in the future.
“I have one more apology to make before I’m done here today. I need to apologize for the way I’ve responded to criticism thus far. Last month on the radio I told Sheldon MacLeod that the suggestion I wasn’t showing enough leadership was “just stupid.” In my interview with Steve Murphy, I came across as defensive and flippant. And many of us on council have responded to individual complaints by saying things like “Yeah, there’s ice everywhere,” “I’ve received hundreds of calls and emails” or “We can’t do anything about it.” Frankly, sometimes we may have sounded like we are the victims. Of course, we are not.
“I’m sorry if we haven’t always responded to your complaints with the compassion and sensitivity that you deserve. You were right to complain, and we were wrong to act like nothing more can be done. It can, and starting right now, it will.
“Thank you.”
Extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary measures. Somewhere in all the snow and sleet and ice there lies the potential for this city to come together, be creative, and dig ourselves out from this mess. Our mayor and city council can lead the way.
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This article appears in Mar 12-18, 2015.
Typical Dippers, wanting something useless. What good is an apology? How on earth could anyone have foreseen what this winter had in store? We haven’t had a winter like this in a long, long time.
Nope, I don’t want the city or it’s contractors to spend ten’s of millions of dollars to purchase additional equipment and have workers on standby to deal with a once in a decade snow fall that lasts a few weeks. Suck it up – it’s Canada in winter.
And ITT we demonstrate why Halifax is never gonna go anywhere.
Any innovative idea, any change to the status quo gets vetoed by those who can’t think of anything different and those who benefit from the current mess. Right now, we are literally paying construction companies to drive up and down the streets in retrofitted trucks and Bobcats, fucking up people’s driveways and yards and creating sheets of ice on the sidewalks. This is because we have not specified any standard for the work. It’s obvious we need something different. But the first person to suggest that something is very wrong gets called a “Dipper” and told “that’s how we do things here”. Why the hell do you think people get sick of it and move away?
Is it so damn radical to say “you only get paid if there’s no ice on the sidewalks”? In other provinces, cities recognize that there are extreme weather events and actually fucking plan accordingly. They do not write their plans around “mildly warm” winters and accept the cheapest offers available; they write them for the REAL kinds of winters that those cities experience and only give contracts to companies who are prepared. Would you take a haircut from someone with a pair of child’s scissors, or get your engine block fixed by some guy in his driveway, just to save money? Would you live in a building that was only designed to withstand 5 km/hr gusts? No? That’s what the city has chosen to do right now. For all this talk about “BEING BOLD” and “the IVANY REPORT SAYS” can we actually do something different for once instead of saying “if you don’t like it, then leave”?
PS: I’m a CFA who stayed to work in a private sector job and I voted Liberal for 3 years before your provincial government told me to go fuck myself and took my graduate rebate so tourist traps out in the country could get employees for $6 an hour. Does my opinion matter?
M2A, how on earth is begging for an apology doing something? It’s useless. The City screwed up, big time. But to define a Mayoral apology as something of “critical importance?” Please. Self-righteousness at its finest.
I have lived here my whole life, born and proud to be from here so I take every liberty in saying that this government is fucked. We need to stop being so good damn ignorant and unwilling to listen to other people/provinces who have been through this so many times before. To be honest places like Calgary and Edmonton have ok snow removal systems but their ability to react to a crisis such as this is well beyond what we could ever do. Why is this? I can only imagine its due to the fact that they’re a bunch of smarter less stubborn people who actually want their city to thrive and do well to be honest were our own worst enemy. We bitch better than anyone else in the country but plan terribly for an outcome that is staring us right in the face. Sure no one could have known this would have happened this year but you don’t plan for the best possible senario and cross your fingers. You create a great thriving city that generates enough money by not only attracting people here but keeping its residents here to open great business’s and contribute back into the economy so you can god damn afford to make a proper plan.
Also just cause your high level government doesn’t mean you need to be making close to or above 6 figures a year that money could be going into paying the “boots on the ground” because clearly your decision making skills are not worth the hard earned cash that we as citizens are dishing out to pay you.
@M2A
I’m a CFA too, and your depiction of Halifax as some change-hating hellzone that’s “never gonna go anywhere” is funny because it’s so…local. And inaccurate.
People who ask why don’t we do snow-clearing differently are not told “that’s how we do it here.” Almost EVERYONE wants a change. Hence this article.
As well, given that the federal NDP has a higher percentage of the popular vote in Nova Scotia than in almost any other province, and given that we recently had a provincial NDP government, I don’t believe people are running around using “Dipper” as a pejorative–at least, not more than they do anywhere else, DAK1928’s dumb comment notwithstanding.
If you’re a CFA, you’ve rapidly internalized the province’s self-defeating negativity (which is really my only complaint about this awesome place). Plus the irrational comparison to other places: I’ve lived in Toronto and Edmonton and Montreal and Vancouver, and none of those places are especially better at dealing with harsh weather. (Edmonton is probably worse, because pedestrians really ARE second-class citizens in that town. And in Vancouver, the city practically shuts down for a light dusting of snow, let alone the kind of weekly freak-blizzards we’ve been getting.)
Anyway, all that aside, yeah, let’s make sure this sidewalk debacle doesn’t happen again. It HAS been super-shitty.
My main concern is that though roads get cleared well enough, the sidewalks have been treacherous throughout the winter. They rarely get dug out and if they do, it’s been so long that a thick layer of ice has formed. The south end seems particularly bad for this and it’s incredibly dangerous. If you have any physical limitation, you are particularly screwed. Halifax treats its pedestrians terribly and it’s so frustrating.
The fact of the matter is there are times plowing snow does not work, this is one of those winters. snowblower units on those sidewalk Bobcats, work much better than plow blades do.
I remember work crew dumping snow in Halifax Harbour after big storms when I was a kid. But this new contractor plowing, IMO needs to be done to a better standard, snow needs to be pushed as close to the curbs as they can get, the corners of intersections have to be knocked down so 1- visibility isn’t hampered 2- pedestrians can actually get from the side walk to the street, across it to the next side walk.more snowblower units would make this easier, plots move the big stuff on the roads, small tractor mounted blower units clear the sidewalks & intersections. Tow truck drivers & police become a bigger part of snow clearing , someone’s parked in the way tow them promptly.
No longer can a half assed job be tolerated, if you are to clear the roads , do so & if the equipment available isn’t doing it, bring in what will do it. I for one am sick and tired of every single winter …the snow budget is gone
It’s not rocket science, Bigger Budget for snow clearing, less 50 million dollar libraries for a few hundred people to use & instead cleaners streets & sidewalks for a few Hundred THOUSAND people to more safely use.
Common sense doesn’t seem to be that common. It has been a horrible winter but suck it up!!! pick up a shovel and help instead of complaining, I am so sick of people just looking for things to complain about and think they are helping by pointing a finger, if they put their energy into making things better and helping instead of flapping their gums we’d live in a much better place.
Dale McKearney, something tells me you drive an SUV and never walk anywhere. If an adequate effort to clean-up had been followed after the first storm and each one after, the sidewalks would not be in the deplorable condition seen for weeks. It is a leadership issue when citizens’ are faced with the real prospect of broken bones every time they step outside their home. It is not whining to ask that streets and sidewalks be safe for mothers with strollers, the elderly, and those with mobility issues.
I used be annoyed at the snow, but now I’m annoyed at how much people complain and whine about the snow. Stop complining. (complain-whining)
I can’t believe I’m just reading this now. I wonder when we will see this person post an article about how they’re struggling with property taxes and haligonians deserve a break from such high taxes.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The ice on the sidewalks, streets and driveways was not due to snow clearing techniques. If anything, the promptness of the snow clearing may have made things worse, as I experienced on my driveway. The bit of snow/freezing rain that iced over would have been less of a problem if it was on top of the foot of snow we had previously received. But, it was on the pavement, and no bobcat with any attachment outside a jackhammer was going to be able to deal with it.
Matt Spurway ( Robert Chisholm) owes all former residents of the Nova SCotia Home for Coloured CHildren an apology and then some for his appalling collusion with the NDP Dexxie lie he told his campaign people to tell residents they went door to door. I was privy to a meeting and was quite shocked then disgusted at the ease of which MS and his NDP partner in crime Cathy scripted canvassers to tell anybody who asked: that Dexxie ( my words ) that what happened to those children was unfortunate and we are working on it… the fact that it was an off cuff script was offensive enough but to know it was a fib to fool concerned voters is unacceptable. MS is now running in Dartmouth North. He is a phony and full of balony
As to the issue of snow.. as a driver and pedestrian the issue does ultimate fall on the lax and lazy of HRM employees namely the elected ones.. When I first came to NS in 1977 we had winters like this all the time with each winter getting milder…. most of you got pussified …. and forgot what winter looks like. WE are not in control of what Mother Nature spills on us HOWEVER we are in control of how we respond.. and HRM failed to respond timely and intelligently.
Save the apology.. like the one given to the NSHCC from the Liberals its useless and not worth the paper its written on… and start hiring folks not allergic to hard work HRM!…. The matter would not have ice-calated to dangerous layers of ice on all sidewalks if these over paid puffy public servants of HRM knew how to respond to those things that happened naturally/organically/really.
It goes to show that this govt and city council are once again ill equipped, pun intended, to deal with real life occurrences as they happen. They are so used to not doing anything or at least waiting until a 2 year study has not been conducted but pretend it was conducted… Mike Savage is a Liberal what did you expect … they spend more time lying about the work they allegedly do than actually doing the work…