News Highlights for Southwest New Brunswick: April 18-25, 2020

Premier Blaine Higgs has called a general election that will send New Brunswickers to the polls on September 14, 2020. While this will be the first general election in Canada since the pandemic began, St. Croix voters have were already expecting to go to the polls this fall for a byelection.  The riding has been without an MLA for almost a year now since the death of the Honourable Greg Thompson last September. St. Croix candidates Rod Cumberland for the People's Alliance, Andrew Sutton for the Green Party and Kathy Bockus for the Progressive Conservatives were nominated for their respective parties in early 2020, along with the original Liberal candidate Karen Ludwig. Delays in the byelection due to the pandemic led Ludwig to step down this summer to pursue a job opportunity. Ludwig was on hand last week alongside Liberal leader Kevin Vickers last week for the virtual nomination event for new St. Croix Liberal candidate John Gardner of Honeydale. With the election announcement on Monday, Gardnerhas than four weeks to campaign. 

Gardner spent Monday and Tuesday of this week meeting with residents of Bayside who are concerned about a rezoning issue in the rural area. Little Bay Lobster, one of the largest lobster exporters in the world headquartered in New Hampshire, is hoping to establish a lobster distribution center on the grounds of an existing gravel pit adjacent to the St. Croix River. This proposal requires rezoning the land from "rural" to "Light Industrial" in order to be used as a seafood warehouse operation. This type of rezoning is actually not allowed in countries like the United States, which has many Bayside residents worried about how the proposed project could affect their residential area in terms of noise, environmental pollution and property value, as well as the effect it might have on the local economy for New Brunswick's lobster industry. 

The local residents are also concerned that a lack representation in the area in the midst of a pandemic and a general election will lead to this project going ahead without proper oversight, especially when there's already an Industrial Park in Bayside better suited for a seafood warehouse. The Southwest Service Commission is holding a virtual public hearing of objections to this amendment of August 26 at 6pm. Participants need to pre-register by phone at 466-3141 or online.

The deer population in St. Andrews in an ongoing  safety and health concern for residents of the area. Mike Holland was in St. Andrews last Thursday prior to the general election announcement when he was still Minister of Energy and Natural Resources to meet with town council to discuss effective options for controlling the local deer population.