🗞️ Water flows like beer at north end brewery

Oh hey Halifax,

The cost of living is fully out of control, and affording groceries is hard enough for us gluten-fiends who can survive off unrestricted Kraft Dinner-forward diets. But there are a whole slew of people whose dietary restrictions make the cost of groceries astronomical.

Let’s look at exhibit A: The Hickey family. Mom and daughter both have Celiac disease—a genetic autoimmune disease that causes people to get sick when they consume wheat, rye or barley—meaning the whole family adheres to a strict gluten-free diet.

Typical gluten-free diets are 200-500% more expensive than non-gluten diets. Crunching the numbers for the month of June, the Hickey family’s basic grocery bill was an astounding $2,600! That’s for a family of four and doesn’t include drinks, treats, toiletries or restaurants.

It’s not like these guys are doing this because Gwyneth Paltrow told them to; it’s a disease. It would be nice to get some more financial support, but the finance minister says it would be “inappropriate to speculate on any potential or prospective change."

I worked as a comms person at the finance department long enough to know that this statement translates to: “Nothing. We plan on doing nothing.”

Enjoy your day!

– Julie

🌡️ Traffic & Weather

Today: ⛈️ 25°

Tomorrow:☀️26°

Next Day: ☀️ 27°

7-day forecast

🚗 Driving, biking or busing today? Check out the current traffic conditions and ongoing road closures.

💨 Here is Halifax’s Air Quality Index and the smoke report.

NEWS

In Labatt’s north end brewery, the water will flow like beer

The sun is beating down, the UV index is high, temperatures are sky-rocketing and the people, well, the people are thirsty.

In other words: it’s beer time.

Breweries around Atlantic Canada are pumping out beer like water, with the exception of one that is actually pumping out water like beer.

The Oland Brewery in the north end of Halifax will now add canned fresh drinking water to its production line so that it’s ready and waiting in case of an emergency. It’s part of Labatt’s ongoing commitment to giving back to the community.

Since launching its disaster relief program in 2012, Labatt has produced water cans at its brewery in London, Ont., providing safe drinking water to communities affected by disasters across the country—from ice storms to hurricanes to forest fires. By pausing beer production to focus on emergency water production, Labatt Breweries of Canada has donated more than one million cans of water to support communities across Canada.

Now that production is moving to Halifax.

The Coast’s Julie Lawrence talked to Wade Keller—Labatt’s  director of corporate affairs for Atlantic Canada—about the how and why of water production in the Halifax brewery.

🤔 Need To Know

💸 Halifax police are warning the public of a recurring scam where a person pretending to be a family member calls the victim to say they need bail money.

🇨🇦 Analysts warn if threats of violence continue, MPs could be discouraged from connecting with voters—threats to MPs rose nearly 800% in the past five years.

SPONSORED BY EAST COAST UKRAINIAN ASSOCIATION

UNBROKEN UKRAINE, Charity Concert on July 24

Experience mesmerizing Ukrainian traditional dances and music performances by Jim Henman, Charlie A'Court, Brett Matthews, Benny Fong and Asif Illyas in the Barvinok 55th Anniversary Charity Tour on July 24th at the LightHouse Arts Centre to benefit the UNBROKEN rehabilitation center in Ukraine.

Buy tickets and donate online to support war-affected Ukrainians.

CITY

Halifax’s bureaucracy fails two emergency readiness audits

On a muggy Wednesday morning that promised high temperatures in the afternoon, Halifax’s auditor general turned up the heat early in council chambers at the Audit and Finance Standing Committee. AG Andrew Atherton put the city’s feet to the fire yesterday as he dropped two reports, the Management of Business Continuity Audit and the Enterprise Risk Management Audit.

Both of these reports are somewhat theoretical, as there’s no direct cost to the city that can be audited if the city is not ready to respond to emergencies. That’s not to say there aren’t direct costs to the city for not being ready, like $11 million in emergency fence rentals, but rather those costs are too dynamic and unpredictable to audit. As a result, these audits were about the risks or vulnerabilities that lead to things like wasteful emergency fence rentals, and the AG determined that Halifax is exposed to some massive vulnerabilities and a lot of risk.  

In general, what the AG found was that the city’s bureaucracy loves exposing itself to needless risk due to a lack of central direction in the bureaucracy. This in turn has led to bad continuity planning and inadequate risk management in the HRM.

The Coast’s city hall reporter Matt Stickland has more on what these two AG reports had to say about HRM’s emergency readiness.

🗞️ In Other News

🏢 NSCAD students will use student surveys as well as an upcoming town hall to voice their opinions and concerns on hot button issues like housing, food security, divestment and potential strike action.

🏠 The province unveiled a new online service meant to make it easier for tenants and landlords to deal with claims on security deposits. 

🎨 As part of a municipal project called Ride with Me, temporary curb extensions installed along some north end streets stand out from typical bicycle infrastructure thanks to the colourful designs of elementary school students.

🚨 Halifax police are investigating two shootings that happened in the early morning hours yesterday. The first incident took place around 1am near Lady Hammond Road and Robie Street; the second happened at about 5:40am around Booth Street in Dartmouth, and it lead to four suspects being arrested a few kilometres away in a house near Bras Dor Lane.

👉 The provincial government is pointing fingers at the municipalities for not requesting an emergency alert during flooding last week that killed a 13-year-old boy and caused extensive damage.

🐟 A new study from the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization predicts steep decline in global fish populations—including species in Atlantic Canada.

🗓️ Things To Do

Looking for something to do this week? Check out these Coast picks:

🗓 Halifax Gay Men's Chorus: This is the music that ignites us, empowers us and fuels us to keep going—to shine our light and share our flame! Come out for an out-of-doors free performance that celebrates the very YOUniqueness of one another. This is the place where everyone's included and worthiness is not up for debate. | July 19 | 5:30pm

🗓 David Myles — Live at the Shore Club: With two Junos to his credit, David Myles has established himself as a world-class entertainer with an uncanny knack for dispersing profound truths about the human condition through dynamic songwriting. | July 19 | 9:30pm | $50.54

🗓 2024 Nova Multifest: Get ready to embark on a thrilling journey of cultural discovery. This vibrant celebration promises to be a melting pot of traditions, flavours and rhythms, bringing together communities from around the world in a dazzling display of unity. | July 19-21

🗓 Daniel Woodrow “Fully Traumatized Comedy Tour” Ft. Clare Belford & Travis Lindsay: Was it the homeschool, being raised by white parents, his love of solo travel? Maybe even that botched kidnapping? Daniel draws from his unique background to provide a fresh perspective on racial humour, mental health and everyday life. | July 20 | 8pm | $20

Have an event to share? Let us know at [email protected].

⚓️ What’s In The Harbour

➡️ The Silver Shadow cruise ship leaves Halifax for Canadian seas at 12:01am.

➡️ The CSL Tacoma bulk carrier leaves Halifax for Burlington at 8am.

🛳️ The One Apus container ship arrives in Halifax from Singapore at 3:45pm.

🛳️➡️ The Vivienne Sheri D. container ship arrives in Halifax from Portland at 1:15pm and leaves for Reykjavik at 4pm.

🛳️➡️ The Volendam cruise ship arrives in Halifax at 8am and leaves for Canadian seas at 4pm.

🛳️➡️ The Zuiderdam cruise ship arrives in Halifax at 7:30am and leaves for Canadian seas at 5pm.

➡️ The Algoscotia oil tanker leaves Halifax for unknown seas at 7pm.

🛳️➡️ The Contship Art container ship arrives in Halifax from New York at 10:20am and leaves for Kingston at 10:30pm.

🍴 Where To Eat & Drink

🇲🇽🌊 Ride the Mexican wave on over to Wave Foods at The Local for the Cochinita Pibil Chalupa: braised pork shoulder, achiote, grapefruit, chimichurri aioli, pickled red onions and cilantro on fry bread.

🐔🥒 Make a big dill about your next sandwich with the Manitoba Honey Dill from CHKN Chop: fried chicken, lettuce, pickled onions, pickles, fresh dill, honey dill sauce.

👀 In Case You Missed It

💰 University of King’s College president William Lahey published a statement to the community writ large on the school’s divestment and disclosure status—which included complying with the university’s Responsible Investing Policy. Within it, he mentioned three student and alumni groups by name that have sent demands, written open letters or, as was the case with the King’s Student Union, amplified the demands of others. The Coast’s education reporter Lauren Phillips spoke with King’s Students’ Union president Sara MacCallum to get her response to Lahey’s statement and the university’s divestment and disclosure status.

🎧 NEW EPISODE - Grand Parade Podcast: In this edition of HFX Votes 2024 Matt Stickland sits down with two of the authors of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives report Building Inclusive Communities: A Policy Agenda for Nova Scotia Municipalities that Leaves No One Behind. Listen now.

🛣️ As Canada’s premiers gather in Halifax this week for their annual summer meetings, they're sending prime minister Justin Trudeau a unified message: stay in your lane.

That’s it!

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