Dear Editor,
On Wednesday August 8th 2018 there being nothing worthwhile watching on TV I attended an Information meeting held in the Hantsport Baptist Church which was arranged to discuss the ongoing situation regarding the impending Hantsport Halfway River bridge destruction & surrounding property erosion being caused by the nearby privatively owned Aboiteau recently washed away by the incoming & outgoing Avon river tides.
For those not familiar with the workings of an Aboiteau, it is a wooden sluice built into a dyke, with a hinged door, (clapper valve), that swings open at low tide to allow fresh water to drain from the farmland but swings shut at high tide to prevent salt water from inundating the fields.
At the front of this well attended meeting were 4 anonymous NS Public sector employees representing various areas of NS Provincial government.
No one at this meeting knew who they were as they were neither wearing name tags or had their names & organizations posted on the tables they sat at for this community meeting.
In the audience were some of the major Hantsport & area shakers & movers. Sir Graham Day opened the audience participation by telling the 4 officials exactly what they should be doing based on his knowledge & experience. One of the 4 public sector employees somewhat belittled his contribution & another member of the attendees called out these officials for their apparent trivialization & flippancy of the community’s concern.
After a while it became patently obvious just why the NS provincial taxation is at such a high level. One by one each of the officials passed the buck by saying that this issue wasn’t something their particular department could deal with & that other NS provincial departments should have attended this meeting. So many various departments...so many excuses.
People of NS & residents of Hantsport expect government leadership & obviously with this issue any semblance of leadership is missing.
At the end of the evening I came away from this meeting wondering why NS has so many highly public sector employees whose only expertise is passing the buck & blaming everyone except themselves for their apparent ineptitude.
Regards,
David Old
Hants Border
