Municipality of the District of Yarmouth, Nova Scotia

MUNICIPALITY OF THE DISTRICT OF YARMOUTH, NOVA SCOTIA sidewalk development.We have quite a portion of the TransCanada Trail (the former rail beds) in our community and Council is trying to strategically build out walking infrastructure to leverage that trail. In the last five years,MODY has invested $1.6 million into that.On the green side of things, our nine-year-old Municipal building was constructed with many environmentally-conscious attributes. Most notably,we heat and cool with geothermal; in- terestingly, the field where those geothermal pipes are located has a community soccer pitch above it. We also undertook a $1.4 million project to retrofit our street lights to LED. “In partnership with some other municipalities, we built a windfarm on MODY land.Our invest- ment was $1 million.That project was completed two years ago, and we’ve done some analysis that shows we’re on track to have the ROI come ahead of the model that was forecasted.Another partner- ship we’re involved in is a big solar project with the Green Energy Committee. Solar is the next frontier.” Blinn: “Much like any other municipality,we like to leverage funds, so we’ve got a lot of hopes and desires for green energy. Photovoltaic is a case in point. But we’d like to see the economic conditions be a bit better before we step into that area.On the wind farm property, there is a huge field that could house photovoltaic panels, as well. If something like that were to present itself,we might bite. It’s some- thing we continually reassess to match our goals.” BVM: Are shovel-ready projects part of your eco- nomic development strategy? Brooks: “Definitely.One instance is the Interna- tional FerryTerminal at the Port,where the Nova Scotia-U.S. Ferry stops.The engineering has been done and we were shovel-ready when the financial opportunity arose to do Phase One redevelopment at that terminal.The primary reason for it is to meet Canada Border Services Agency standards, but also to upgrade to existing marine travel processes.MO- DY’s investment in Phase One will be $1.2 million. It’s a $10 million project that we’re share costing with the Town of Yarmouth, the Municipality of Argyle, the Province of Nova Scotia and the Govern- ment of Canada.Altogether, the multi-phase rede- velopment will require a $25 million investment.” Leland: “The end result is increased capacity for a service provider to operate a ferry service; it opens up alternatives for different types of equipment at the Port and allows for better traffic flow to get people processed faster. Because it’s an international entry point to Canada, it has all the dynamics that need to be accommodated for that. But it’s worth it. For us, increased access means more people and more dollars coming in.” Brooks: “Another smaller-scale, shovel-ready project we’re working on is at the Lake Milo Boat Club,which we jointly operate with the Town of Yar- mouth. It’s been 20 years since the Club had major upgrades, so we have the audit ready and when the funding becomes available we can address accessi- bility and comfort issues such as washrooms.” BVM: What is the Immigration Pilot Project? Brooks: “Seven municipalities partnered in the Western Region Enterprise Network (WREN) to create a pool of funding.The province matched that and created a regional economic development enti- ty that houses the Atlantic Immigration Pilot Project for this area.The AIP is focused on employers and is part of the response to the talent shortage we’re