Antigonish town and county vote to merge … again

ANTIGONISH, N.S. — Antigonish town and county councils voted in favor of consolidation for a second time on Tuesday evening.

The votes were held at the request of Municipal Affairs Minister John Lohr, who wrote to the councils last week saying that if they reaffirmed their support to consolidate into one municipal unit the government would introduce special legislation to accomplish it during the upcoming sitting of the legislature, which starts Feb. 27.

As was the case during the vote in October 2022, the motions to consolidate passed by narrow margins.

Antigonish town council passed the motion four votes to three, with councillors Mary Farrell, Andrew Murray, deputy mayor William Cormier and Mayor Laurie Boucher voting in favor. Councillors Sean Cameron, Donnie MacInnis and Diane Roberts opposed the motion.

The county council passed the motion with five votes in favor to four against with councilors Donnie MacDonald, Hughie Stewart, Remi Deveau, deputy warden Bill MacFarlane and Warden Owen McCarron supporting it. Opposed were councillors Mary MacLellan, John Dunbar, Gary Mattie and Harris McNamara. Coun. Shawn Brophy declared a conflict of interest in keeping with advice from the Department of Municipal Affairs.

Tuesday night’s motions were the latest in a long and contentious struggle.

“We have lots of opportunities and there’s lots of challenges facing everyone around infrastructure, affordable housing and just attainable housing,” said Warden McCarron after the vote.

“How do we stand up and address some of those things? Tonight was a great step forward to align ourselves with some of the provincial and federal goals around housing and infrastructure and a creating a community that is caring and concerned about its constituents.”

Mayor Boucher echoed the warden, adding that the past 20 years has seen expectations for municipalities grow to include investment in doctor recruitment, climate crisis initiatives and affordable housing.

The councillors for both the town and county who were opposed spoke about how they’d heard from many residents who said they weren’t necessarily opposed to consolidation, but they were opposed to the process followed and felt there should have been more information available and a plebliscite held.

“This is not the democratic way,” said town Coun. Sean Cameron before voting against the motion.

“Democracy only works when information is freely presented and people can make informed decisions. Taking away the democratic rights of the citizens is not a path that I chose to take. The backroom politics, that not all councillors were privy to, around this have created a split in both councils. It has created an even bigger split in our community.”

A polling firm hired by Let Antigonish Decide last spring found that 70.4 per cent of residents believed consolidation should have gone to a vote.

The group challenged the authority of the councils to seek consolidation through special legislation at the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, which ruled in favour of the councils. The group is now appealing that ruling.

Municipal elections are scheduled to be held provincewide this October.

The previous plan was to have the current councils’ tenure extended by a number of months to allow consolidation to proceed. As it’s now been delayed by over a year, it remains in the hands of the Department of Municipal Affairs whether municipal elections will be held in Antigonish this coming fall.