Laurentian University's creditors vote in favour of plan that allows school's survival

Kate Rutherford, Jonathan Migneault - Sept 14

Laurentian University's creditors have voted in favour of a plan of arrangement that sets the roadmap for the Sudbury, Ont., university to exit its insolvency proceedings, allowing it to continue to operate.

For the vote to pass Wednesday, the plan needed a majority of creditors to vote yes, and they had to represent two-thirds of the value of the claims Laurentian owed.

The Laurentian University Faculty Association confirmed 522 creditors voted in favour of the plan, which represented 87.4 per cent of eligible votes.

The creditors who voted in favour of the plan represented 68.9 per cent of the value of the total claims Laurentian owed. To pass, the plan needed at least 66.6 per cent support.

What is a plan of arrangement?

The vote on a plan of arrangement is one of the last steps of the university's insolvency proceedings, under the Companies' Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA), that started in February 2021.

The plan sets out the terms among Laurentian and its creditors, and outlines the steps it will need to take to rebuild as it exits insolvency.


Now that the vote has passed, creditors will get cents on the dollar, and the university will go ahead with a plan to pull itself out of its financial hole.

Had creditors voted no to the plan, Laurentian said it would have had to shutter its doors and liquidate its assets, including the buildings on its campus.

"In a liquidation, students would be required to transfer to other universities and all faculty and staff would be terminated, other than a small group retained for a period of time to assist with the transition of students, including the provision of transcripts upon request, as well as assisting with the maintenance of assets," Laurentian said in an FAQ from a website dedicated to its insolvency proceedings.

The university also said that in the event of liquidation, it would have had to wind up its pension plan for staff and faculty members, and that would "involve a reduction in pension benefits for many current and future retirees, as a result of the funding deficiency."

Fabrice Colin, president of the Laurentian University Faculty Association, said creditors can expect to get between 14 per cent and 24 per cent of the money they are owed based on the plan's terms.

Over 500 creditors listed

A court document filed in February 2021, when Laurentian filed for insolvency — which under the CCAA allowed it to operate while it dealt with its financial issues — listed more than 500 creditors.

They ranged from large banks like RBC, which was owed more than $71 million, to local construction companies, government agencies, and terminated staff and faculty members.

Ahead of the Wednesday vote, Colin said he was "cautiously optimistic" creditors would vote in favour of the plan. The faculty association recommended its members vote yes.

"If the plan is rejected, there is absolutely no guarantee that, for instance, we will have a stronger negotiating position or that the province will support the second round of negotiations," he said.

"And again, in addition, there is a risk that the university could just be shut down."

Now that creditors have approved the plan, Laurentian will present it for court approval on Oct. 5. Pending approval by the courts, the plan can be implemented.

Despite a tumultuous year, Laurentian has continued to offer its remaining programs. In August, the university said it had a 25 per cent year-over-year increase in confirmed students heading into the fall term.

An updated plan

Late last week, Laurentian's administration filed an amended plan that would see the payout period to claimants shorten from four to three years.



Tom Fenske, president of the Laurentian University Staff Union, 

said he was hoping the vote would pass.© Erik White/CBC

That's because the province and Laurentian have come to an agreement on the purchase of the university's assets in a shorter timeframe.

In May, the province said it would purchase up to $53.5 million worth of Laurentian's real estate. Although it hasn't said what real estate it would buy, that money would go to the university's creditors.

The Laurentian University Staff Union had recommended that members who were eligible vote in favour of the plan of arrangement.

"I think I would lie to you if I said I wasn't anxious," staff union president Tom Fenske said before the vote.

"The risk of a no vote is too great and we just don't see any evidence that there would be more money injected."

Some advocated for 'no' vote

But some terminated faculty members believed they could get a better plan if they voted no to the current offer.

Eduardo Galiano-Riveros was a Laurentian physics professor, but lost his job in April 2021, when the university cut 69 programs and fired nearly 200 staff and faculty members.


In April 2021, Laurentian University shut down 69 programs 

and fired nearly 200 staff and faculty members.© Erik White/CBC

Now, he works at Hamilton's McMaster University and represents some of the 111 former Laurentian faculty members who lost their jobs last April.

"We are still advocating for a no vote so that the administration and the province will go back to the drawing board and come up with a fairer, more equitable plan of arrangement which then we as creditors might be in a position to support," Galiano-Riveros said prior to Wednesday's vote.

Galiano-Riveros said he, and some of his former colleagues, do not believe Laurentian would have shut down if the plan of arrangement hadn't been approved.

"Statistically and historically speaking, typically there have been a number of amendments for plans to be accepted and receiving a positive vote," he said.

But Laurentian argued there was not going to be a second chance.

"If Laurentian cannot obtain the necessary support of its affected creditors to the plan, it will be unable to resolve and settle its substantial debts. As a result, it is expected that the university will cease operating and will commence a liquidation process which would include a sale of all assets including all buildings and real estate," the university said in its online FAQ.

Galiano-Riveros said that might not matter in the end for himself and other faculty members who lost their jobs.

"Right now, we don't look out for the interests of the university. We're no longer connected to the university," he said.

"They kicked us out in a 15-minute Zoom meeting. What we are looking out for is our interests and those of all the creditors."

Doctor who blew whistle on atrocities of residential schools honoured in Ottawa

Olivia Stefanovich - Sept 30,2022 - CBC

One hundred years ago, the former chief medical health inspector of what was then known as Canada's Indian Affairs department walked through the doors of a publishing house in Ottawa.

He carried a manuscript called A National Crime. It was published in 1922 detailing the appalling and deadly health conditions in government-funded residential schools.

On the second National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, Dr. Peter Bryce is being honoured with a plaque in front of the very same building of the publishing house that released his work, James Hope & Sons, at 61 Sparks St.

"It allows us to more critically think about our history and to uplift and celebrate some of these great people who resisted all the wrongdoing," said Cindy Blackstock, executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society and a member of the Gitxsan Nation.


Cindy Blackstock, executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society, is behind the effort to honour Dr. Peter Bryce.

© Olivia Stefanovich/CBC

Similarities between Blackstock and Bryce

Blackstock, whose organization is paying for the plaque, said she sees parallels between Bryce's work and her own advocacy for Indigenous children's rights.

Bryce first blew the whistle in 1907, explaining how the practices in these institutions and underfunding of health-care services for the children who attended them were leading to death rates of 50 per cent.

He reported that inadequate sanitation, poor ventilation and overcrowded classrooms and dormitories were leading to major outbreaks of disease, including tuberculosis.

He was ignored.

The federal government of the day stonewalled him by cutting his research funding, barring him from speaking at medical conferences and eventually pushing him out of his job.

Blackstock filed a human rights complaint against the federal government in 2007 — 100 years after Bryce first spoke up — accusing it of underfunding child welfare services and denying essential health services to First Nations children.

"Just like in Dr. Bryce, when we brought the case and we were showing the evidence that Canada was discriminating against children, they retaliated," she said.


Marie Wilson of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission holds a shesheguin, a traditional Cree baby rattle, wrapped in a beaver pelt. The rattle is a reminder of her commitment to the families and children missing from residential schools.

© Jamie Pashagumskum/CBC

Blackstock was surveilled by the government and she continues to fight for compensation for children in court — 15 years later.

"That story is the same. Where I hope our stories are departing is that the Canadian public is not as much in the dark as they were back then," she said.

Marie Wilson, who served as a commissioner with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission from 2009 until 2015, said the plaque presents an opportunity to inch Canadians forward to a deeper way of understanding their country.

"It's really a story about what happens when you ignore the facts put before you and what happens when you act as if the lives of some children are less valuable than the lives of other children, and when you do that along racial lines," she said.

"That has been the history of residential schools and their consequences."

Blackstock said she also hopes the plaque dispels myth that people in the last century didn't know any better and no one was outraged.

"None of that was true," Blackstock said.

"What I hope people take away from seeing it is that Ottawa really is the command and control of residential schools."

'When the headlines die, the children do too'

The Caring Society's theme for Sept. 30 this year is resistance.

It's working with a youth group, the Assembly of Seven Generations, to hold public historical tours throughout Sparks Street in Ottawa to point out buildings where key decisions about residential schools were made.

The group's co-founder, Gabrielle Fayant, said the effects of the institutions are still felt today through intergenerational trauma, and the overrepresentation of Indigenous peoples in the criminal justice and child welfare systems.

"This isn't just something that happened in the past," Fayant said.

"It hasn't fully been settled. It hasn't fully been healed. It's an ongoing genocide."

More than 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forced to attend government-funded residential schools operated by the Catholic, Anglican and other churches between the 1870s and 1997.

In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission reported that the residential school system amounted to cultural genocide.

Last July, Pope Francis declared that what happened at the institutions was genocide after issuing a historic apology on Canadian soil.



Gabrielle Fayant is the co-founder of the Assembly of Seven Generations, an Indigenous-owned and youth-led, non-profit organization.

© Olivia Stefanovich/CBC

To mark the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, the Caring Society played a CBC Radio documentary, first aired on Sept. 30, 1978, about Bryce and then-deputy superintendent of the Department of Indian Affairs, Duncan Campbell Scott, who rejected Bryce's recommendations. The documentary was presented again on Thursday evening to the public at the Beechwood Cemetery in Ottawa, where Bryce and Scott are both buried.

"The lesson from history we need to draw from Dr. Bryce is that when the headlines die, the children do too," Blackstock said.

"That is our opportunity today … We cannot turn the page because public pressure makes all the difference."

DIRECT ACTION GETS THE GOODS

In wheelchairs and walkers, Victoria seniors stage protest for park space


"The assumption is that we're old, we're quiet, we're not capable of standing up for ourselves. We are going to be saying what we need and making the point clearly."


VICTORIA — About 100 seniors, some more than 90 years old, staged a protest in Victoria Tuesday calling for a vacant school field to be transformed into an elder-friendly neighbourhood park.

Many arrived at the field using walkers, wheelchairs and motorized scooters, with organizers saying they were among more than 1,000 older people living in nearby care facilities.

Some carried placards demanding the field at the former S.J. Willis Junior High School be turned into a park, at least temporarily until the Greater Victoria School District decides what to do with the property.

"It's just dirty brown grass, all burnt," said June Meaning, who lives in a nearby long-term care facility and arrived at the protest with the assistance of a walking frame.

"It could have a little pond, places to sit in the shade," said Meaning. She said she was in her 80s and "a bit of a tree hugger."

A large sign saying "Seniors Need Parks Too" was tied to the fencing around the field.

Other seniors carried placards saying "Parks Should Be Accessible to Us All" and "An Oasis For Seniors."

Protest organizer Terry Dance-Bennink, 74, said the seniors have the support of local businesses, residents and nearby care homes.

She said the City of Victoria recently opened a new skateboard park near the field, but local seniors have no comparable outdoor public gathering place to socialize, exercise and enjoy the environment.

"The assumption is that we're old," said Dance-Bennink. "We're quiet, we're not capable of standing up for ourselves. We are going to be saying what we need and making the point clearly."

She said the seniors have approached the school district about turning the area into a temporary seniors park, but have not heard back.

The Greater Victoria School District said in a statement it had not officially received a request to turn the field into a park, but recommended that the protesters write to the Board of Education.

Anne Duggan, 85, said the protest organizers were pleased with the turnout.

"We have a very diverse group of people here and ages as well, with some well into their 90s who are here in their chairs," she said. "It's just wonderful to see everyone participating and sharing in the fun of developing this."

Both Duggan and Dance-Bennink said they were aware of a report last week by B.C. seniors advocate Isobel Mackenzie that found the province ranked last in Canada in providing key financial supports to seniors.

Victoria mayoral candidate Stephen Andrew attended the rally.

"Too often we forget about our seniors," he said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 27, 2022.

Dirk Meissner, The Canadian Press

Indigenous people more likely to have housing issues as population grows: StatCan

WINNIPEG — Angela Klassen Janeczko calls out to a young woman sitting behind a building in downtown Winnipeg to see if she needs any water or food.

I LIVE IN AN INDIGENOUS INNER CITY NEIGHBOURHOOD FOLKS LIVE IN HOUSES

AND YES WE HAVE SOME HOMELESS TENTS TOO

They know each other by name and Janeczko has seen the young Indigenous woman struggle with housing and addiction for more than year.

Janeczko works with the Bear Clan Patrol, a neighbourhood watch group in Winnipeg that walks through streets and alleys looking to help those most in need. She says they have seen rooming houses and apartment buildings become derelict. At the same time, rent has also gone up and nearby houses are selling for record amounts.

It is disproportionately affecting Indigenous people in the neighbourhood, she says, and many are ending up in tents tucked behind buildings, along the riverbank or in small community parks. The COVID-19 pandemic just exacerbated the problem, she adds.

“Treat people with humanity and respect,” Janeczko says, as she hands out some food to another person nearby.

Statistics Canada's latest release of 2021 census data shows the Indigenous population is still growing, although the pace has slowed, and is much younger than the rest of Canada. However, the data says, they are also struggling with housing in a system that's already stretched thin.

The census says there are 1.8 million Indigenous people in Canada, accounting for five per cent of the total population. The Indigenous population grew by 9.4 per cent from 2016 to 2021, almost twice the pace of the non-Indigenous population.

While the number of Indigenous people in insufficient housing decreased slightly, it is still much higher than the non-Indigenous population.

Almost one in six Indigenous people lived in a home in need of major repairs in 2021, a rate almost three times higher than for the non-Indigenous population, and more than 17 per cent of Indigenous people lived in crowded housing.

Statistics Canada says because of difficulties in collecting census data on First Nations and other Indigenous communities, some caution should be exercised in comparing census years. The agency says it made adjustments to track overall trends.

Wednesday’s census release comes as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government set housing for Indigenous Peoples as a priority. It was also a part of the agreement between the minority Liberal government and the New Democrats.

The 2022 federal budget committed $4.3 billion over seven years to help improve Indigenous housing, a number the Assembly of First Nations says falls far short of what is needed. The national advocacy organization had asked to see $44 billion to deal with overcrowding and homes in dire need of repair on reserves.

Michael Yellow Bird, dean of the University of Manitoba's social work faculty, says it is a byproduct of colonization. Forced relocation, a loss of sovereignty and decades of underfunding have contributed to poverty and poor housing for Indigenous people. The trauma and displacement caused by residential schools is also a factor, he adds.

Housing on-reserve also doesn’t work the same as elsewhere, Bird explains, and it can be a complex administrative process for First Nations to work with Ottawa to tackle those long-standing issues.

The effect of unstable and overcrowded housing on- and off-reserve can be the same, Bird says. Poor housing is connected to major health issues, mental health problems, poor education outcomes and higher rates of suicide, he says.

“These things are all so connected,” Bird says. “It’s the demography of these things that we know, that these critical factors are causing a number of different kinds of disorders in communities.”

The Liberals have promised to develop an urban, rural and northern Indigenous housing strategy and have budgeted $300 million over five years so that the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation can work with Indigenous communities to build the plan.

Affordability has become an issue in many real estate markets in Canada, but Indigenous people are more likely than their non-Indigenous counterparts to be living in a low-income situation.

The census found 18.8 per cent of Indigenous people lived in a low-income household. The rate was highest among First Nations people, particularly those who lived on a reserve.

"Nearly one-quarter of Indigenous children 14 years of age and younger lived in a low-income household in 2021, which is over double the rate among non-Indigenous children," said Annie Turner, with the centre for Indigenous statistics and partnerships at Statistics Canada.

Research shows that Indigenous people are also disproportionately homeless.

Janeczko walks through an alley with a handful of volunteers as the call of “sharp” echoes each time they find a needle. The group picked up more than 325 needles in a couple of hours during the recent patrol. Not every person without a home has addictions, but it can be a way those community members cope, Janeczko says.

Winnipeg has the largest Indigenous population of any major city in Canada and it continues to grow. Janeczko says every level of government has committed to studying the housing problem, but the people most affected need help now.

A sign on a nearby garage reads that a person has permission to live there. The young man inside thanks the Bear Clan volunteers for food and water as they check on him. Inside the garage is a makeshift living area with a couch covered in blankets, a table and a handful of personal items.

Janeczko explains the property where the garage stands used to be a rooming house that had about 20 occupants. When the owner died it was abandoned, she says.

The housing needs in the neighbourhood are immense, so the loss of an affordable rental space left many people at risk of being on the street, she says.

“The housing need is here,” she says.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 21, 2022.

Kelly Geraldine Malone, The Canadian Press

Calls grow to streamline licensing for doctors as health-care systems struggle


ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — As Canadian health-care systems buckle under the weight of doctor shortages, the past president of the Canadian Medical Association is calling for a national licensing pathway for doctors — and some provinces are on board.



The current system, in which each province has its own licensing system, is confusing and bureaucratically cumbersome, particularly for doctors trained outside of Canada, said Dr. Katharine Smart said in a recent interview.

A national physician licence could provide a single, streamlined process for verifying the credentials of internationally trained doctors, she said.

"To have (all the) provinces credentialing every university, or every country, independently doesn't really make a lot of sense," Smart said. "It would make sense that would be done once, for the country."

Doctors trained abroad arrive in the country hoping to practise, but are often stymied by the confusing and costlylicensing process, she said. Some ultimately leave for countries where it is easier to start working, she said, adding: "Many people are never able to enter the system and actually practise medicine."

The issue of cumbersome licensing for doctors trained outside the country has recently come to a head in several provinces. Last month, Ontario Health Minister Sylvia Jones directed the province's regulatory colleges to develop plans to more quickly register internationally educated doctors and nurses.

"The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario has already taken steps to facilitate interprovincial coverage with as little as a day’s notice to meet urgent needs," said college spokesman Shae Greenfield in an email Wednesday. He said the college has also proposed creating a new temporary registration class, "specifically designed to support mobility between provinces and territories."

Other provinces, including Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador, are working to streamline their procedures as they welcome Ukrainian doctors fleeing the war in their country.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Newfoundland and Labrador supports "exploring the concept of physician mobility throughout Canada, while maintaining our mandate of public protection," according to a statement emailed Thursday.

And Dr. Gus Grant, registrar of Nova Scotia's college of physicians and surgeons, said the idea of a national licensing system has merit, though he noted it would be an enormous administrative undertaking.

In the meantime, Grant said the four Atlantic provinces are discussing ways to co-ordinate licensingacross the region.

"I think that's more easily attainable and readily attainable," he said. "I'm excited by the momentum towards that right now."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2022.

Sarah Smellie, The Canadian Press

Salmon struggle to spawn amid record-setting drought, with tens of thousands dead in B.C.

Yvette Brend - Oct 5,2022-CBC

After three parched months, much of B.C. is experiencing drought and ongoing hot weather has left streams running dry, leaving no way for some salmon to return to their spawning grounds, killing hundreds in a mass die-off on the province's central coast.


Salmon counters for the Heiltsuk First Nation found Neekas Creek littered with dead or dying pink salmon over the first weekend in October, after months of record-breaking dry weather in B.C.

© Sarah Mund

The situation has scientists and salmon watchers concerned.

The Pacific Salmon Commission initially projected a return of 9.8 million fish to the Fraser River this year. By August, predictions were reduced to 5.5 million. This was readjusted again, on Sept. 28, to 6.8 million.

There were record-low rainfalls in September, and dry weather and heat has continued into October, a month known for rain. For some migrating salmon, that lack of moisture is proving deadly.

William Housty, the conservation manager for the Heiltsuk First Nation in Bella Bella, B.C., says crews from his band walk the creek beds and count returning adult salmon.

The number of salmon returning to the Neekas River, about 25 kilometres north of Bella Bella, has been declining for decades, from an average of 47,000 in the 1970s to just 750 in 2021, according to federal data from Fisheries and Oceans Canada.

This year's drought may have wiped out many more fish when water levels dropped after their return.

This past weekend, researchers discovered piles of lifeless fish – mostly pink salmon — floating dead or plastered together along the bottom of the Neekas near Spiller Channel.

By Oct. 7, Simon Fraser University researchers had tallied 65,000 dead pink salmon, according to Kyle Wilson, a biologist with Central Coast Indigenous Resource Alliance.

'Heartbreaking' scenes of dead fish

Photos and videos taken by German anthropologist Sarah Mund, who was helping Simon Fraser University salmon counters, show what appear to be hundreds of salmon, a few still gasping for air. Many were lying limp over logs or along a creek bed, or floating in shallow, warm waters of a creek that's usually much deeper this time of year.

"To see it kind of come to this magnitude is quite shocking," said Housty.

He estimates that if this scene is extrapolated over many creeks, it's likely hundreds of thousands of fish have died along rivers and streams in their territory this year, due to the warm temperatures and low water levels.

"All of those salmon that are just kind of wasted away and didn't even have the opportunity to reproduce is just heartbreaking," said Housty. "It's sad to watch the wild salmon deteriorate right in front of your eyes.

Housty said that the full impact of a mass die-off of fish won't be seen until about 2026, when the adult salmon spawned this year return. He estimates hundreds of thousands of fish have been lost.

Provincial ministries responsible for salmon and the environment offered emailed statements about the situation, but would not confirm the location of the videos or cause of the mass salmon die off seen in the images.

"However, we're feeling the impacts of climate change all around us in B.C. This is a highly unusual situation caused by recent drought conditions and it is very concerning to see the impact of drought conditions on wild salmon," the Ministry of Lands, Water and Resource Stewardship said in an email that outlined efforts to help wild salmon recover and better monitor their environment.

Every fall, salmon return to the rivers where they hatched from eggs and fight upstream to spawning grounds. Females dig a nest and their eggs are fertilized by males who cloud the water with their milt (seminal fluid). Most adult salmon then die, leaving their future to the fry that are able to develop and survive predators.

Wilson confirmed that the salmon in the videos and stills taken near Bella Bella were mostly pink salmon that had not yet spawned.

While it's not unheard of for salmon to suffer or die due to low rainfall, Wilson called this mass die-off "abnormal." He blamed it, in part, on the hot, dry weather, followed by a bit of recent rain that he says "tricked" salmon to head upstream, to their deaths.

He predicts very few pink will survive in this creek — and only in deeper pools higher up the waterway.

"For this generation, there will be a really low rate of return in a couple of years," said Wilson.

But it may not be a total catastrophe, he says, as pink salmon from other river systems may opt to spawn in the Neekas River.

Until then, Wilson says the loss of the fish will affect predators like bears, wolves and eagles.

It will also affect the commercial and Indigenous fisheries that rely on the salmon that return to wild central B.C. streams each fall.

Other B.C. creeks low, salmon struggling

The same scenario is playing out in other parts of the province that celebrate the return of salmon. Tens of thousands of finger-length salmon fry are released each year from streams into the Burrard Inlet.

Dave Bennie, who has volunteered at the Noon's Creek salmon hatchery for the Port Moody Ecological Society for 28 years, says "it's just so abnormal."

"I don't know what to say to kids. It's dry, there's no water. There's no fish," said Bennie. "[I've] never seen it this low."

He points out that salmon are jumping offshore, but the creek bed is so dry that the chum and coho returning can't get from the ocean into Noon's Creek to swim upstream to spawn.

"Every year, less and less come back," said Bennie, while sitting on dry rocks in a creek that he says would usually be flowing as high as his chest by October.

For now, surviving fry hide in the tiny pools below the rocks, but he says that leaves them vulnerable to predators like otters and blue herons, not to mention the unseasonable heat.

Festivals planned to welcome the salmon, Bennie says, may have very few fish to celebrate. He fears for all the Burrard Inlet hatcheries.

"We could lose everything — all the work we've done for years and years."

Ottawa should move fast on promised $200M fund for Black-led charities, group says

David Thurton - Oct 4, 2022-CBC

The federal government needs to follow through quickly on its promise to create a self-sustaining investment fund for Black-led charities and community-based organizations, says a spokesperson for a group backing the idea.

Liban Abokor, a board co-chair with the Foundation for Black Communities, made the comment after Ottawa took another step in laying the groundwork for what's supposed to be a $200 million Black-led philanthropic endowment fund.

"While this $200 million endowment is certainly a historic commitment, it needs to move from commitment to action," Abokor told CBC News.

While Abokor praised the proposal, he warned that Ottawa can't afford to drag its heels.

"There are community organizations in desperate need of resources to flow right away," he said.

The Foundation for Black Communities has been pushing for the Black-led and administered endowment fund. On Monday, the federal government announced it's seeking an organization to administer the fund.

Proposals are due on November 25. Abokor said the foundation will be one of the applicants.

The government promised the fund in the 2021 budget. Housing, Diversity and Inclusion Minister Ahmed Hussen said the government has been conducting "extensive" consultations ever since. He said that, with the next steps now underway, he hopes to announce the fund's manager by the spring of 2023.

But Black organizations won't see funding immediately after the fund is put in place.

"The expectation is that at the conclusion of the first year … you'll have enough capacity built to start to see proceeds from the investment of that initial $200 million," Hussen told a news conference Monday. "Which is then expected to go in perpetuity to Black-led and Black-serving non-profits and charities across the country."

Concerns about the pace of the endowment fund project emerged after CBC reported last year that a federal loan program meant for Black entrepreneurs was difficult to access, offered unclear payment terms and asked invasive questions of applicants.

After the government announced the investment fund's next steps, the Parliamentary Black Caucus said it would be conducting its annual pre-budget consultations.

One of the joint chairs of the caucus, MP Michael Coteau, said ideas like the endowment fund emerged after Black Canadians pushed for such programs.

"Those are the types of ideas that have come from the community," Coteau said. "These are the ideas that people have gone out there and researched and championed."

The Parliamentary Black Caucus pre-budget consultations are open until Nov. 4 and comments can be submitted online here.

Climate Changed: Fiona demonstrated wild hurricane future, and need to adapt

HALIFAX — As she stood near the remnants of flattened homes in Port aux Basques, N.L., Denise Anderson said the thought of continuing to live next to the ocean is hard after a deadly storm foreshadowed the violence of weather to come.



"I grew up in this area, I wanted to come back to this area, but now I'm not so sure I want to," she said two days after post-tropical storm Fiona damaged the home where she has lived for three years, destroyed her neighbours' houses and swept one local woman out to sea.

Across the East Coast, similar emotions about the way climate change is altering life can be heard, as residents rebuild their homes and cope with weeks without power, and political leaders are asked how they'll prepare the coastlines and power grids to meet the next gale.

About 200 kilometres to the south across the Cabot Strait, in Reserve Mines, N.S., Reggie Boutilier pointed out a missing portion of his roof and wondered when the next storm would come. "It's only early in the hurricane season, and I'm thinking we're off to a bad start," he said the day after Fiona hit.

The scientific predictions on what's to come aren’t reassuring.

Canada's Changing Climate, a federal summary of climate science released in 2019, said fossil fuel emissions are likely increasing the intensity of tropical storms that form in the southern Atlantic and head north to the Canadian coast.

Blair Greenan, a federal scientist at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography who worked on the report, said in an interview that water temperatures off the Maritimes have gone up 1.5 C over the past century, adding a potent source of increased energy for the storms.

Anya Waite, a professor of oceanography at Dalhousie University, said the "sobering" reality is the warmer water shoots heat and moisture into storms like Fiona, giving them a longer duration and, often, a wider path.

While utility spokespeople referred to Fiona as "historic" in their news releases, Waite — also the science director of the Ocean Frontier Institute — says storms of this magnitude will become increasingly common. "We will be getting storms that have a lot more longevity because of the surface water being so much warmer," she said.

A "perfect trifecta" of conditions — general sea-level rise over the past century created by melting glaciers, storm surges and lower barometric pressures during storms — is also increasing the likelihood of coasts being swamped during hurricanes, she added.

"In terms of adaptation ... one of the main things is we will just have to move away from the coast," she said. "We love the coast so much that people are clinging to their last rock as it goes under. We can't do that."

Peter Bevan-Baker, the leader of the Prince Edward Island Green Party, saw an altered landscape as he drove around the Island last Friday, with thousands of trees down, farmers' barns destroyed and beaches that define the Island suddenly washed away. "The Island is changed forever," he said in an interview.

Meanwhile, thousands of people remained without power nearly two weeks after the storm hit, and complaints rose about the lack of basics such as heat, electricity, gasoline and even food for seniors in provincially operated buildings.

Yet, during briefings last week, the privately owned utilities Nova Scotia Power and Maritime Electric, which serves P.E.I., dismissed the suggestion that power lines should be buried, saying underground lines would cost up to 10 times more without eliminating the risk of outages.

Bevan-Baker said these kinds of "standard" answers don't recognize the changing climate realities. "I understand burying lines is an enormously expensive proposition, but so is rebuilding if it's a storm like this every few years," he said.

Blair Feltmate, head of the Intact Centre on Climate Adaptation at the University of Waterloo, said that while further studies on how utilities should adapt may be useful, the time for action arrived with the 170 kilometre-per-hour gusts that buffeted the region.

Endless scenario planning can become "a substitute for action," he said in an interview.

He said where housing or infrastructure was destroyed close to the shore, the rebuild needs to occur further inland. More crucially, modelling is needed on potential coastal damage throughout the Atlantic region, in order to set rules on building that take climate adaptation into account.

Solutions will vary. In some instances, higher seawalls will protect towns; in others, development may have to retreat, while tidal flats and marshes are created to absorb some of the sea's fury, Feltmate said.

Bevan-Baker points out that in P.E.I., there are close to 30,000 undeveloped lots near the coast, and yet there's still no provincewide land-use plan taking into account future storm surges.

Joanna Eyquem, a geoscientist who also works with the University of Waterloo climate adaptation centre, said the providers of key infrastructure — whether utilities, railways or ports — "really need to step up to the adaptation challenge" and consider climate change in all they're doing, something that is still not universal in Canada.

By contrast, in the United Kingdom, most similar organizations and companies report climate adaptation progress every five years, in addition to making mandatory climate-related financial disclosures annually, she said.

Feltmate said ordinary citizens have to act as well. His studies show many homeowners in flood-prone areas still don't have generators to run sump pumps if the power goes out and haven't graded their land to slope rainfall away from the buildings.

While some of the adaptation is costly, Feltmate points to research indicating that for each dollar spent — whether in cutting trees around power lines or creating power grids that are more decentralized — there are savings of five to six dollars in averted damage.

After prior severe storms, such as Juan in 2003 and Dorian in 2019, similar messages were delivered, and governments in the region briefly seemed attentive to the changing realities. But during election campaigns that followed, climate adaptation policies were only sketched out broadly and the focus shifted back to ailing health systems.

Will this time be different, after roofs are replaced, harbours rebuilt and freezers restocked? There are signs that even if officials are slow to change course, the urgency is sinking in at ground level.

In Burnt Islands, N.L., fisherman Murray Hardy gestured around his basement after shovelling out the mud deposited by Fiona's tidal surge, saying he'll prepare for the next hurricane by emptying out the space and replacing gyprock before mould sets in.

"What am I going to do? You got your home," he said, when asked if moving was an option. "I expect more of this. All they talk about is global warming and the tides and such. I'll just clean all this out."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 6, 2022.

— With files from Holly McKenzie-Sutter in Port aux Basques and Burnt Islands, N.L.

Michael Tutton, The Canadian Press

'Just chaos': P.E.I. residents turned away from lines for Red Cross Fiona payments

CHARLOTTETOWN — Frustration is growing in Prince Edward Island as some residents face their 19th straight day without power, and others wait hours in lineups for payments to offset the financial fallout from post-tropical storm Fiona.



Stephen Petrie said Wednesday he had spent more than three hours that morning standing in lineups in a Charlottetown mall, waiting to have his identify verified by the Canadian Red Cross. The organization is distributing $250 payments on behalf of the provincial government to Islanders impacted by the storm.

Petrie said that when his identity was finally verified, he was told he would have to wait another 10 days or so for an email transfer of the funds.

"It's just chaos," Petrie said in an interview, adding that many others were forced to wait in line alongside him. "Everyone's already tense and angry."

Red Cross spokesperson Dan Bedell said the organization is doing its best to meet the demand, adding that mobile payments centres could be up and running by the weekend.

"We only have a small group of volunteers in Prince Edward Island and just a couple staff," Bedell said in an interview Wednesday. "We have since deployed people literally from across the country to assist.

Fiona brought unprecedented destruction to parts of Atlantic Canada when it barrelled through the region on Sept. 24. The storm tore up trees, knocked down power lines and swept houses out to sea.

As of 4:45 p.m. local time, Maritime Electric's website showed that 1,042 customers in Prince Edward Island were still without power. The company has said it could be Friday until the last account is restored.

The province first announced last month that it had enlisted the Canadian Red Cross to dole out relief funds. The agency has also announced it will be distributing additional payments of $500, coming from donations.

Bedell said the Red Cross is also overseeing the Fiona financial assistance programs announced in Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador. The provincial governments require that anyone benefiting from the funds must have their identifies verified, he said, adding that the same protocols are being used in all three provinces.

Bedell said there could be several reasons why Islanders such as Petrie needed to have their identities verified in person. Their online registration may have been flawed or incomplete, for example. And while many others have been able to provide their identification through email or Zoom calls, there are an abnormally high number of Islanders who don't have or cannot use those options, he said.

"We also have to bear in mind to some of the people most affected still don't have power yet," he added.

Of the 52,539 households on the Island that have registered for aid money, Bedell said that so far, more than 36,000 have been authenticated and more than 28,000 households have received payments.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 12, 2022.

— By Sarah Smellie in St. John's.

The Canadian Press

Fiona reshaped P.E.I.'s coastlines, stoking fears for the Island's future

Devon Goodsell - Sept 29, 2022- CBC

A picture of how much post-tropical storm Fiona has reshaped Prince Edward Island is beginning to emerge — and in some cases, whole coastlines made of sand and stone have been erased.

The storm hit P.E.I. in the early morning hours of Sept. 24, leaving widespread destruction.

Six days after Fiona, the cleanup is far from over, with the majority of the Island still without power, and downed trees and power lines still blocking driveways and roads.

As Islanders begin the long road to recovery, many are wondering where to rebuild and how far from the shore is safe enough.

"I never seen anything like this before," said Oyster Bed Bridge resident Wayne McCaron, whose home now sits closer to the water after Fiona took a six-metre chunk out of the cliffside.

McCaron's home is still a few hundred metres back from the water, but a nearby small cottage now sits right at the edge.


Oyster Bed Bridge resident Wayne McCaron says he's never seen anything like this storm.

© Martin Trainor/CBC

"Come this winter, if we get a couple of storm surges … I feel sorry for this fella if he doesn't soon get out," McCaron said.

"Whatever he's going to save there, it's pretty well stone walls is all that's going to save him now. Expensive!"

'Now it's just straight down'

McCaron's neighbour, Jonathan Davidson, says the surge was so high it threw heavy iron oyster cages right into the treetops.

And there used to be — like, there were staircases going down. Some of the properties had staircases and they're just washed away," he said.

"You can see how sharp of an incline it is now. It's just — it's a cliff," Davidson said. "There was a fairly decent grade that you could walk down at one point, but now it's just straight down."



Jonathan Davidson says staircases to beaches were washed away in the storm.

© Martin Trainor/CBC

Further along P.E.I.'s North Shore, the entrance to Brackley Beach in P.E.I. National Park was being guarded by Parks Canada staff on Wednesday. Fiona caused the worst damage the park's iconic sand dunes have seen in a century, leaving the dunes dangerously unstable.

"What we saw was up to 10 metres of the dune completely eroded away," said Chris Housser, a professor at the school of the environment at the University of Windsor who specializes in coastal science.

"It's almost like somebody cut the dune completely in half — about 40 percent of the volume of sand in the dune has been lost to the near shore. It will eventually come back, but it's going to take a lot of time — years to potentially even a decade."

'Theword that I have to use is the word relocate'

Fiona voraciously ate away at parts of Atlantic Canada's coast, demolishing wharfs, and sucking homes and shoreline into the sea.

The devastation left in the storm's wake has prompted calls for the federal government to do more about coastline erosion, by building up breakwaters and raising wharfs.

At a briefing on Wednesday, Minister of Infrastructure Dominic LeBlanc acknowledged the federal government needs to move quickly with new programs and more money.



The storm left huge swaths of the P.E.I. National Park coastline forever changed.

© Shane Hennessey/CBC

"The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has tens of millions of dollars annually to repair small craft harbours," he said.

"That clearly is going to need to be augmented in light of what happened, and I am very confident it will be. We are in the middle of renewing a number of our federal infrastructure programs."

Leblanc said he's meeting with provincial and territorial infrastructure ministers to map out the next generation of infrastructure programs.

"We have some money available now around disaster mitigation and adaptation. This is a direct line to climate change .. and to these atmospheric events," he said.

"In the part of the country I represent, Atlantic Canada, it is exactly these coastal communities that, in the case of a hurricane like we saw last week, face the brunt of these losses … So we need to find the right instructions to ensure people are protected."

Retired Department of Fisheries and Oceans scientist Denis Gilbert says the unfortunate truth for many people is that they might have to move.

"I'll be very honest and give you the full amplitude of my thoughts without any filter. I sincerely think that everywhere in Canada — and in the world — people are putting blinders on their eyes, trying to preserve what's there," he said.

The discussions are always to the effect of, 'Why doesn't my municipality or the provincial government or the federal government build a nice brick wall … to protect my house?' Theword that I have to use is the word 'relocate'."