A lifetime of service

Alex Morrison is going to crisscross Annapolis County.

The newly elected warden of the County of Annapolis has committed to visit the other 10 districts with their respective councillor to hear from citizens during the next month. He wants to hear what projects residents would like to see undertaken.

“I am all in favour of what I am calling citizen-based initiatives,” he said. “What helps the district, helps the county.”

Morrison said he would also like to meet with students and members of service clubs.

“I want to visit, and I want the councillors to visit, schools, 4-H, Rotary, Lions and all those (clubs) and get some young people involved.”

They are some of his priorities for his two-year term as warden. Morrison, 81, was elected by his peers during a Nov. 15 secret ballot. The District 6 councillor lives in Cornwallis Park with his wife Elizabeth McMichael.

EARLY LIFE

Morrison was born in Sydney and spent the first dozen years of his life there before moving to North Sydney when his father, who worked for the Canadian National Railway, was transferred there.

During one of his first days in Grade 8, classmate Paul Ratchford asked if he was going to the armoury that night for cadets.

“I said, ‘What’s an armoury and what’s a cadet?” he recalled. “I went and that was the rest of my life.”

He liked the order, regularity and clear definition of the hierarchy cadets provided.

“And it was a chance to get to know more people from North Sydney, Sydney Mines and the surrounding communities and

we learned things.”

He went on to have a more than 30-year career in the army and infantry, serving with Black Watch and the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry.

Morrison was the executive director of the Canadian

Institute of Strategic Studies in Toronto when the federal government closed the Canadian Forces Base (CFB) Cornwallis in February 1994.

Morrison was asked to be the founding president of the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre at the former base.

“I came down here on the 25th of February 1994, and really haven’t left,” said Morrison, noting the area’s residents were the main reason for him settling in the region.

He ran the centre until 2001 when he began teaching parttime for a year in the political science department of Dalhousie University in Halifax. The peacekeeping centre’s headquarters were relocated to Ottawa in 2008 with the training base remaining in Cornwallis until 2011.

POLITICS

District 6 Coun. Pat McQuaid decided not to re-offer in the 2012 election and suggested Morrison put his name forward. He did and was elected. He was re-elected in 2016 and 2020.

Alan Parish, who had served as warden since the 2020 election, announced earlier this year he would be resigning after his term as warden was up in November.

Coun. Brian (Fuzzy) Connell told Morrison that he and others would like to see him offer for the position.

“I was very happy that it happened in that sequence that a couple of my colleagues came to me in the beginning,” Morrison said.

Connell said Morrison will be a good leader and spokesperson for the municipality.

“He’s very passionate about his area and it’s shown over the years (in) his dedication to being a councillor, so he definitely fit the bill that I wanted to see for a warden,” he said.

Leading up to Nov. 15, Morrison said he had the same feeling as he has had for the previous three municipal elections.

“For the two or three days before the vote, oh boy, I had an upset stomach,” he said, while acknowledging he was aware of the support that existed for him around the council table. “You still worry.”

After the secret ballots were counted and Morrison declared the winner, he moved up to the front of council chambers to chair the meeting.

“The first thing I did was throw away the gavel. I don’t like gavels. I’ll just use my voice,” he said.

TO-DOS

The county is currently looking for a new chief administrative officer after David Dick was fired Aug. 29 after 15 months on the job.

The county has hired a Nova Scotia firm to help recruit for the position and Morrison said the municipality might have someone in place in February.

One issue that remains to be settled is what to do with the former Upper Clements Park property.

“That is a very attractive piece of land,” said Morrison, who is also the councillor for the district.

Some subjects he said the council needs to concern itself with are accessibility, climate change, forestry, transit, and equality, diversity and inclusion. He would like to see the county improve its website and upgrade its video/audio equipment to improve its the streaming of its meetings on the county’s website.