Cheers &Jeers

CHEERS to Jennessa and Ethan Wolfe of Valley, who recently captured a bevvy of medals at the recent Nova Scotia schools track and field championships in Stellarton.

The brother-sister combo won eight medals at the provincial championships, including five golds, with Jennessa earning gold in the high jump and triple jump and a bronze in the long jump and Ethan earning gold in the 100 and 200metre events and the long jump as well as silver in the triple jump and javelin.

Jannessa’s high jump of 1.66 metres bested a 39-year-old CEC record set by her coach Tammy Armstrong. She was also recently awarded the school’s outstanding senior girl performer in track and field. At the same time, Ethan’s strong showing helped propel Central Colchester Junior High to second overall in the junior boy’s standings.

Now that the school season is over, both will concentrate their efforts on their Truro Lions track team that practises at the Cougar Dome and the TAAC Grounds during the spring and summer months. For Jannessa, she has her sights set on the Legion nationals and perhaps the Canada Games.

We also have to give cheers to Myka Wilson, who is following in her aunt Leslie’s footsteps by winning gold in the long jump, triple jump and was part of the École Acadienne of Truro’s 4x100 relay team.

Leslie Wilson competed for CEC and the University of Toronto and is a Colchester County Hall of Famer. Who knows what the future will bring, but the day could come when Myka joins her aunt on the podium.

JEERS to Scotiabank that announced recently it is closing two branches in rural Prince Edward Island.

The bank is relocating services from Kensington and Crapaud to a new state-of-the-art location in Summerside during the 2023-24 fiscal year. Unsurprisingly, the mayor of Kensington, Rowan Caseley, isn’t buying the explanation and expressed frustration at the consolidation, saying it’s just another service being taken away from rural communities.

What’s happening in these two communities is something people across the country have been seeing too much of in recent years as businesses put profit ahead of people and bleed important services out of smaller places and move them to larger, centralized locations, not to increase efficiencies as they claim, but to bump up profits.

For many people, things like going to the bank are as easy as turning on the computer and logging onto online banking, but there are still people who don’t use the internet and – rightly or wrongly – don’t trust the technology.

While businesses are within their rights to make these decisions, and it’s really only the shareholders who can cause them to give pause, it’s still frustrating to see yet another service taken out of small-town Canada.

CHEERS to Colchester County for taking the time to make sure it gets its wind bylaw right.

The municipality recently decided to extend its six-month moratorium on new wind turbines for another six months while it continues to gather input and information on best practices.

This input will include reaching out to the public, including those who could be impacted by having these giant turbines near their homes. The county is also going to reach out to other municipalities to see what they’re doing and, perhaps most significantly, as much as these turbines could play a significant role in helping Nova Scotia achieve its plan to increase the use of renewable energy, the fact is these structures have a life cycle, and no one wants to see their remnants left to crumble naturally – or become an eyesore.

With turbine heights now more than 600 feet tall and interest in putting them in locations that may not be visually appealing, we need to ensure setbacks are appropriate and resist the urge to ban them outright because they do have a place in producing the greener energy we’re looking for.

We want our elected leaders to look beyond the increased tax revenue to balance the pros and cons. But we also want to avoid a NIMBY (not in my backyard) situation. What we need is a balanced, evidence-based decision based on science and fact. That’s why news the county isn’t going

to rush it is so welcome.