The following article was originally published by the Chronicle Herald on October 23, 2008
http://thechronicleherald.ca/DCW/1086248.htmlBRENDA MacDONALD TWO CENTS’ WORTH
IT’S BEEN five days since the municipal election. I should be taking a wee break from writing about anything political.
No way.
Because I feel that this election failed to adequately address one very controversial community issue, I’m already busy preparing for the next one. I’ve vowed to comprehend this complex issue — even if it makes me cry tears of frustration. Given that it is a bureaucratic matter — something I’m not generally quick to comprehend — I’m hoping to start with the most basic information.
While I have found the books Embroidery for Dummies, Gluten-free Cooking for Dummies, and Bartending for Dummies, I’ve not yet been able to find the one book that I truly need to understand the issue — Amalgamation for Dummies.
I truly thought that amalgamation (or should I say de-amalgamation?) would be the hot topic of this now-settled election. I thought I would learn a lot about it.
No sooner had the election been officially declared than Sheila Fougere announced support for a plebiscite on the issue of de-amalgamation. Throughout the campaign, her website boldly posed the question: "To split or not to split?"
This is a valid question, given that a Corporate Research Associates Inc. survey taken this past summer revealed that 61 per cent of those HRM residents polled answered yes to the question: "Do you support or oppose splitting HRM into two municipal units, one for rural residents called the County of Halifax and one for urban residents, called the City of Halifax, the capital of Nova Scotia?"
Don Mills, the president and CEO of Corporate Research, is quoted on the company’s website as saying: "The needs of urban residents and rural residents are sufficiently different from each other that residents are clearly looking for separate councils to deal with these different realities. . . . The current governance structure in the HRM is not working and perhaps it is time to face the real issue."
Since the first major grumblings that such statistics, questions, and statements caused in mid-September, however, I’ve read and heard relatively little on the matter. I saw nothing about it in the candidates’ pamphlets that were dropped in my mailbox throughout the weeks of the campaign.
It seems to be this election’s forgotten issue.
How long will it be, however, before amalgamation (de-amalgamation?) comes back to haunt us — and the new mayor and council?
Having considered the Corporate Research website and the statistics it provides, I don’t think that the dust is anywhere near settled on this issue. For even more revealing, to me, than the 61 per cent "snapshot in time" poll result from this past summer, is the trend of increasing discontent that is obviously being established. In the winter of 2005, only 48 per cent of those asked the above question were in support of change. Support for a split has steadily, albeit erratically, increased ever since.
It will be interesting to see how our new mayor and council handle the growing dissatisfaction with the current model of governance. Will the divide between rural and urban HRM be balanced through tax reform? Will the municipality divorce? Or will the status quo simply be maintained, the clear message of dissatisfaction from HRM residents ignored?
Nothing left to do, really, but wait and see — and learn.
With four years left until the next election, I should have enough time to grasp the complexities of the issue. It sure would be easier if I had that Amalgamation for Dummies book, though.
I’ll certainly be keeping my eye out for that one in bookstores everywhere.
(community@herald.ca)
Brenda MacDonald is a freelance writer living in Cole Harbour.