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On today’s CHMA daily news:
Mount Allison president shares September plans;
Town council lukewarm on economic recovery fund;
One symptom testing for New Brunswick;
Higgs on board with Atlantic bubble;
Mandatory masks on Moncton buses;
Talking media concentration with MLA Kevin Arseneau;
and a COVID numbers update.
TRANSCRIPT:
The province reported no new cases of COVID-19 again today.
There are still 27 active cases in New Brunswick.
Two people are in hospital, one in intensive care.
In Nova Scotia, officials marked thirteen days with no new cases of COVID-19.
They also reported one additional death related to COVID-19.
A man in his 60s with underlying medical conditions died several weeks ago. His death has been reported late because it was under investigation to determine if COVID-19 was a factor.
Nova Scotia now has no active cases of COVID-19.
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Mount Allison President Jean Paul Boudreau gave Sackville councillors a taste of the university’s plans for September at a virtual meeting last night.
Boudreau said the university is looking at reduced enrolment projections, though he did not say what those numbers are.
Across the country, he said enrolments projections are down anywhere from 10% to 40%.
Boudreau says Mount Allison is projecting a deficit in the millions of dollars.
He also pointed out that reduced enrolment this year will have a cascading effect over the next four years at Mount A, as the reduced first year class size moves through their studies.
On the flip side, he said small arts colleges like Mount Allison may be faring better than bigger urban schools because of the amount of physical space available relative to the number of students.
Boudreau said the university and the town need to be working together on recruitment:
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“I think it’s a bit early to tell but we’re going to, you know, our recruitment team is working, they’re sending out care packages, thousands of students, applicants. We’re on the phone. I get a list of students to call. They put me to work calling students and trying to recruit them to get them to come to campus. The kind of conversation we’re having here tonight, frankly, is important. They want to hear from us. They want to hear from you about how the town will welcome them. So it’s not just us recruiting them, we have, the town also has a responsibility. That is to step up and to support the ways in which you can create a welcoming community. That will help us with enrolment.”
One change planned for September is the use of the Civic Centre as a Welcome Centre for incoming Mount Allison students.
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“So the idea is you come off at exit 504 and you come down Main Street and you appear and you see banners. You’re welcomed to the town of Sakciville by the town of Sackville and by Mount Allison University, to the civic center. Again, this is still a work in progress. Keep in mind that things move very quickly in the context of COVID-19. Things are always changing rapidly, but we’re making great progress towards… I think it will be a welcome center but welcoming from the point of view of information, creating a kind of a one point entry, if you will, into the town of Sackville. So there’s clear guidelines for getting into campus into residences into your apartments, getting to your academics, getting to your activity. So we will control, if you will, the movement a little bit more into the town of Sackville that we might have done in the past.”
Whereas last year there were 830 students living in residence on campus, this year Boudreau says the number will be closer to 700, to allow for only single occupancy rooms, and one building reserved for students practicing isolation.
The university is planning intense cleaning schedules, and changes in food service for students, with electric golf carts circulating on campus to deliver food.
Mount Allison’s VP of finance and administration Robert Inglis said that Aramark is currently closed down, except for a few managers, but that he expects them to have a full team if not more in September, to accommodate a new COVID-friendly style of food service.
Boudreau said students will be taking a special pledge in September, promising to follow health and safety guidelines.
He would like to see that pledge extended into the community, especially where students are living off campus.
After Boudreau’s presentation, council got a snapshot of the town’s financial position.
Treasurer Micheal Beal explained that things are mostly stable because more than 90% of the town’s revenue comes from property tax collected by the province, and so far the province has not made any changes.
Though, Beal says, the town could be looking at stagnant or reduced tax levels in future, as the economic impacts of the shutdown play out.
In this year’s budget, however, Beals is projecting a surplus.
There’s about $120,000 in lost revenue from reduced building permits, arena operations, by-law enforcement and other areas.
But staff vacancies, reduced services and cancelled events will likely mean $250,000 in savings.
This leaves the town with about $130,000 in surplus in its operations budget for this year, money which Beals said could be available for an economic recovery fund.
CAO Jamie Burke told council that with their direction, staff could bring back a plan on how to administer such a fund in July.
Burke suggested the fund could support COVID-related expenses for businesses, including:
- purchasing personal protective equipment,
- capital improvements and renovations,
- developing online commerce or website improvements,
- or even converting land to food production.
Burke cautioned councillors that the town’s financial position in 2021 is still not known, and that what they provide now in terms of economic recovery may also be expected if or when there is a second wave.
Councillors expressed concerns over the idea of an economic recovery fund, many unsure of what exactly businesses would need, and worried about the perception of town council directly supporting private businesses.
Councillor Micheal Tower asked for a survey of local businesses, to give council a better sense of what is called for.
In the end, there was no clear direction from council on the fund, leaving it to CAO Jamie Burke to interpret and make the decision on how to proceed.
Chief Medical Officer of Health Jennifer Russell says the proposal for an Atlantic bubble is coming about because of decreasing risks across the country.
Russell said public health officials are still working on details around what would happen in the case of an outbreak somewhere within the bubble.
Premier Blaine Higgs says tourism-focussed businesses should be planning for an early July bubble opening, even though talks are still underway about how it will work.
Higgs says the premiers intend to make an announcement very shortly.
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“We want to be in a position that we all have the same rules. We all can move up together. And I just feel it sends a great message for us to be working together to restart, in an additional way, our economy here in the Atlantic region.“
Higgs says the goal is to fully harmonize rules with other provinces, which could mean making changes to New Brunswick’s own rules.
Higgs says he also hopes to be able to open up to the rest of the country sometime in mid to late July.
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This Friday, the Campbellton region will lift its temporary lockdown and synch up with the rest of the province in public health rules.
Chief Medical Officer of Health Jennifer Russell says that so far there has been no evidence of community transmission in the Campbellton outbreak.
She says all cases have been traced back to close contacts of original cases.
Russell also said the ability to offer high levels of testing is key to lifting restrictions in the outbreak area.
Russell recently announced an increase in testing across the province, allowing testing for anyone experiencing ONE of the symptoms from the list, including:
- fever or signs of fever, such as chills;
- a new cough or worsening chronic cough;
- sore throat;
- runny nose;
- headache;
- a new onset of fatigue or muscle pain;
- diarrhea;
- loss of sense of taste or loss of sense of smell;
- and in children, purple markings on the fingers or toes.
Russell says asymptomatic testing is still off the table, for the most part.
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“We do have pressure from different organizations at times to test asymptomatic people. And we have very, very special conditions under which we will test people that do not have symptoms. And again, we just want to be careful around that because we know the evidence around testing asymptomatic people is tricky with respect to how it influences the interpretation of the results. So in order to really be confident in our results, we are lowering the number of required symptoms to one. Again to make sure that we’re not missing anybody. And we want to confirm that there is an absence of community spread out there at this moment in time. So it’s giving us a level of confidence. But it also again gives confidence to the population in all communities, that the testing is available for them when and if they need it.”
New Brunswick has conducted 3,154 tests over the past 7 days.
The number of daily tests has been dropping though, with only 173 results reported Monday, one of the lowest numbers in over a month.
Codiac Transpo in Moncton will soon be requiring masks aboard buses, with exceptions for those with medical conditions that make mask-wearing difficult.
The mandatory mask-wearing will allow Moncton buses to carry more people.
As of June 29th, buses will go from a 6 person capacity limit to 50% of their regular capacity.
That will mean up to 20 people on each bus.
Other pandemic safety measures, like rear-door boarding and suspension of fare-collecting, will continue.
The changes in Moncton buses will also happen in Saint John and Fredericton.
The three transit agencies are collaborating on their pandemic response plans.
During this past legislative session, Green Party MLA Kevin Arseneau put forward a motion seeking to end the concentration of media ownership in New Brunswick.
The motion proposed a 40% cap on the concentration of print media ownership in the province, and the prohibition of the cross-ownership of media and non-media businesses.
CHMA’s Erica Butler called up Kevin Arseneau to find out more about his motion.
She started off asking him to explain why he felt media concentration in New Brunswick needs to be regulated.
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That was Erica Butler speaking with MLA Kevin Arseneau about his move to limit media concentration in New Brunswick.
CHMA Daily News is hosted Mahalia Thompson-Onichino, and produced by Erica Butler, with occasional contributions from Bruce Wark, Geoff de Gannes, and James Anderson.
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