Pictou County Chamber of Commerce supports amalgamation plan
'If we don't do this now, with the opportunity before us, we'll have really missed the boat'
The Pictou County Chamber of Commerce said the proposal by four municipalities in the county to amalgamate is a good one, and will lead to a better tax structure for business and a renewed focus on attracting investment.
"To me, it's the unification of political will in the county," said Jack Kyte, the chamber's executive director. "A focus on the future, the ability to create a strategy to do a better job in investment attraction and the retention of the people that we have here."
He said amalgamation should go ahead, despite the fact that the towns of Westville and Trenton are not involved.
"We have to go with the municipalities that are willing to try this," he told CBC Radio's Information Morning. "If we don't do this now, with the opportunity before us, we'll have really missed the boat."
Studied since the 1960s
He said there have been studies on reducing the number of municipal units in the area since at least the 1960s, but the different councils couldn't sit down and hammer out a deal.
"Ironically, Westville was one the first municipalities to push the idea of amalgamation. But they couldn't come to terms with the other municipalities on this, which has been an ongoing problem here," Kyte said.
"These municipalities cannot agree on things, so that's why nothing ever happens. We got four of them to agree this time, and they're moving forward."
On May 28, residents in the towns of Pictou, New Glasgow, Stellarton and the Municipality of the County of Pictou will vote in a plebiscite on whether to support the agreement to amalgamate.
However, the vote is non-binding. The final decision rests with the four councils, who will decide after the plebiscite whether to move ahead with the deal.
They have a June 20 deadline if they want to pull out of the memorandum of understanding.
The amalgamation plan still also needs approval from the Nova Scotia Utility and Review Board.
The plan calls for the four towns to combine in time for this fall's municipal elections.
'I think this is a good deal'
Evidence submitted by the four municipalities to the UARB said the financial and service situation will be better under a new combined municipality.
Critics said new capital funding from the province and its pledge to maintain current equalization payments for the first five years of the new municipality mask the real financial situation facing the new entity in the long run.
"I don't pretend to understand the intricacies of municipal funding, but I do know our equalization payments from the province are going to be maintained for five years, which is great," said Kyte.
"I can't imagine that the province is going to increase equalization to municipalities in the near-term, and so I think this is a good deal. No one knows what will happen five years out in any endeavour that we do, we have people who are afraid what will happen five years out, 10 years out."