Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
Residents serviced by the Municipality of Victoria County's water utility will likely see an increase in their water rates over the next two years following a decision by Nova Scotia's utility regulator. However, the amount that rates will jump is still uncertain, as the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board wants the municipality to submit a new rate study after the board took measures to insulate customers against significant rate hikes this year.
A Victoria County resident is speaking out about a road in his area that he said has been washed out since late November. David Stirling, 68, of New Campbellton spoke to the Cape Breton Post about the “ongoing” poor state of New Campbellton road, a 13-kilometre (km) stretch at the base of Kellys Mountain that he said is filled with potholes. “It’s been washed out since the 24th of November,” said Stirling. “It has two culverts running underneath the road and when they plug up, the water runs over top of the road. And of course gravel and water don’t get along together. Needless to say, the water wins and the gravel takes a hike.”
Some Nova Scotians in northern Cape Breton have been able to get around storm-damaged roads by boat, but in another part of Victoria County, others are still cut off and waiting for relief, after heavy rains and high winds battered the region last week. "It's very heartbreaking out here," said Bev MacAskill, who lives on Oregon Road just off the Cabot Trail. "We have no way to get out except by helicopter."
David Gabriel knows his beloved Baille Ard forest dodged a bullet when last week’s storm damaged, but didn’t destroy the south end Sydney trail system. “It’s saddening, but it’s not horrific,” said Gabriel, the frontman of the Baille Ard Recreation Association. “It’s not like we haven’t been through this before and won’t go through it again. We have our smallish group of volunteers, and we’re looking for a few more to help out, and we have some equipment, so given enough decent days we can patch it up before winter so people can continue to enjoy the trail.”
It could be "days or weeks" before things get back to normal in flood-ravaged parts of Cape Breton following the rain and wind storm that swept across Nova Scotia, according to a provincial transportation official. Jamie Chisholm, the Department of Transportation's eastern district director, said Wednesday the hardest hit areas were Inverness and Victoria counties. "We've had multiple bridges compromised, some washed out completely, several roads that are impassable right now," he said.
"A lot of it, we're going to find, I guess, more damage as the water recedes, because it's really hard to tell until the water recedes," he said. "It's probably easier to describe the number of roads that don't have problems than the ones that do." The Emergency Management Office is asking people in Inverness and Victoria counties to stay off the roads. Lyle Donovan, EMO co-ordinator in Victoria County, said more than a dozen roads are washed out and a man was injured when his car got stuck on one of the damaged roads.
