Much ado…
It seems we don’t have enough to grumble about each week in Prince Edward County. Now we must invent problems. Manufacture grievances. Our American neighbours have spent much of 2020 courting with civil unrest, led by a now-clear-for-all-the-world-to-see grifter seeking to distract folks while he fills his pockets from the nation’s treasury. As that country […]
Shire Hall knows best
It took six years for this community to hammer out a new secondary plan for Wellington. After many brainstorming sessions, interactive public meetings, stacks of white papers, dozens of iterations, and revisions, the shiny new Wellington secondary plan was stamped, sealed and approved in 2016. It replaced a plan that had endured 36 years. But […]
Waste
There is a new garbage man in town. Waste Management trucks will disappear from County roads and streets next month, and shiny new trucks (or, perhaps, repainted old ones) will begin prowling our neighbourhoods. The best bit is that Shire Hall has elicited a sweet bid from upstart trash contractor Environmental 360 Solutions that could […]
Fragile things
It’s about jobs. About the dignity of work. The feeling of satisfaction of something accomplished. Something made. Today. Yet, economies are complex organisms. More natural than man-made. We may plant seeds, but with no certainty of growth. Wrong place. Wrong time. We can nurture our economies and work to protect them. But we can also […]
Coming of age
Our municipality took a profound and determinative step toward adulthood this summer. There was no ceremony. No celebration. Indeed, one had to look closely to see that something had changed at all. The unassuming document was tucked away—the sixth item in a July council agenda. Yet its quiet arrival marks an important milestone in the […]
Unmute
If you want to keep a secret, you must also hide it from yourself. – George Orwell, 1984 Who decides our story? Who shall speak for history? Which voices ought to be elevated? Which ones silenced? That we are even pausing to consider such questions, suggests we may have already ventured too far into Orwell’s […]
Motivated buyers
Oh to be a real estate agent in Prince Edward County. Business is good. Really good. Some are reporting more sales in the last couple of months than in all of 2019. According to Treat Hull, of the brokerage firm Treat Hull and Associates, sales this year are already outpacing last year by 18 per […]
Oblivion
There are three wee streets just beyond Wellington’s commercial core—West, Water and Narrow. (Each street name decidedly practical and descriptive rather than aspirational or commemorative.) Together with Main, they form a tidy residential block. They are quiet, small, unpretentious streets. As the village has developed and activity expanded, however, the pressure on these streets has […]
Measure
It is a test. A test of resolve. A test of determination. Of imagination. Our community has been assigned the task of raising $16.5 million toward the building of a new hospital in Picton. About the only thing that can stop a new hospital from rising in our community at this point is indifference. That […]
Object lesson
History is complicated. It is awash in contradictory and competing versions of events. Mostly written by the victors. What are we to make of these contradictions? Whose story are we to believe? Are we equipped to make these judgements? As a community? As individuals? Our community heard from an academic late last month, arguing that […]