A fall to-do list for Rodney

Hey, Rod; I hear that working on finding a new media manager wasn’t taking up all your time and you’re having trouble figuring out what else you might do. Well, I’ve come up with some suggestions.

First, you need quick action requiring, not merely recommending, all businesses that employ people between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. have at least two people on duty. A sexual assault and vicious knifing shouldn’t be needed to see that this is necessary and taking this to the people, as Mark Parent seems to want to do, is to treat a section of the small business community with far too great a degree of deference.

If such businesses can’t afford the extra hours, let them close. I’m pretty sure that those who remain will do just fine. Requiring that businesses respect employees’ right to security should be a no-brainer. Why must we always treat the rights and interests of working people as if they were the noblesse oblige of owners?

Second, you need to address a whole range of signage problems on provincial roads. Those, for instance, who drive Highway 3 into Lunenburg will know that there’s simply far too little warning of the impending T intersection. And what little is there is mixed with far too many commercial signs.

The accidents there are numerous and losing one life to stupid signage policy, or a lack of flashing lights, is one life too many. I’m pretty sure there are other spots in the province that need similar, quick attention.

This is not to mention the exit from the 101 to the 102, airport-bound. Those of us know we’re taking our lives in our hands there, but tourists and young drivers don’t. At the very least we need signs that say, “Difficult exit/entrance, take care.” If you’re afraid that this might make the province more liable for accidents, then that should tell you what you need to do.

And you must stop the foot-dragging on the Windsor corridor of the twinned 101. The smart thing probably would have been to divert the highway to the south of Windsor, but now that the decision has been taken to keep the highway close to Windsor businesses, you need to build a fire under those unwilling to fast-track the process. This bottleneck will become a death-trap and those who are responsible for not acting fast enough will have to look in the mirror every time it takes or maims a life.

Finally, at least for now, you need to give much higher priority to youth violence in Dartmouth and Halifax. Waiting and whining until the feds agree on new law and order policies isn’t good enough, and indeed it’s doubtful that raising the penalty for such crimes will be enough anyway.

You need to divert more monies into the schools and youth action groups operating in Metro; you need significantly to increase spending on policing presence in the region, adding perhaps a special force that could be redeployed when the current bubble of violence is burst; you need to establish a focused, coordinated emergency effort to get crack off the streets; and you need to start listening a lot closer to the young folks who are acting out what must be some deep-seated anger. All of these initiatives would be welcomed by the city and by the rest of us.

Where should the money come from? Perhaps next time a transnational corporation asks for a provincial handout to create some jobs in Nova Scotia, the answer could be: “well, we’d like to, but sorting out why so many of our young people are in crisis is just more important to the province. Sure, we’d like some more jobs, but to be honest, folks will soon avoid moving to Nova Scotia and tourists will follow suit if our increasing national reputation for violence on the streets continues to compete with Toronto’s.”

None of these will break the bank, Rod, and they may well save some lives. The buck stops at your desk, and time is running out.