Do we have the capability or the number of houses out there to support this?

So my answer to this one is we will be.

We've got a lot of work to do to become prepared.

And I made this the theme of my state of municipality address a month or two ago.

We are going to be the recipient of this incredible opportunity.

Tens of thousands of new people will come and work here with their families.

More investments will pour in.

What can we do in the next five years to accelerate that? Are we going to open up new spots to develop homes? Are we going to start putting more buildings in the air? Are there enough people to actually build these things?

How did, how did we get here? How did this process begin?

Well, I'd like to share a few thoughts with you, Dan, and with your, with your listeners, and I might ask for your, uh, your patience while I, while I get them all out.

But I, I wanna start by saying that my office and I have completely cooperated with the auditor general.

We're gonna continue to cooperate with, with any further investigation.

I've got a great deal of respect for the AG's work and, and I and my, and my office accept the conclusions of, of his report.

As some of your listeners have, uh, have noted, there is an investigation ongoing, so I can't talk about that.

That would be inappropriate.

Uh, I think that, uh, my callers and, and I would imagine many in HRM are, are concerned that we're, we're spending money inappropriately or at least not getting the best bang for our buck.

Why not go out and check and see what the public has in mind for it?

So that's exactly what I wanted.

My proposition was let's go out and do a time-limited expression of interest call for reusing the structure, but with a caveat that any proponent for it to be a credible proposition had to be able to come in with about a minimum, I said, of 75% of the cost of the rehabilitation of the building.

That rehabilitation is going to be around $20 million.

So what we don't need and what's not going to be helpful is to have people various community groups that don't have any money consume time with proposals that will never go anywhere because they can't be funded.

The HRM can't fund $20 million.

We're not in a position to do that.

This is a piece of property that has a whole lot of caveats, to use your word, attached to it because of the library itself being a memorial and that it's built sort of that park is a burial ground.

How does a development like the scale of the one that's being built right now on Pockwock manage to get moving forward today? with very little information to residents on plans for a way out if there's an emergency?

Well, off the top, we need to listen to residents and their concerns and take those very seriously.

That's one of the reasons why we have such robust public participation around things like the regional plan and now the suburban plan.

There's no question that egress is top of mind for residents and it's top of mind for our planning department as well, as well as for our fire departments.

And, you know, one of the things that I'll raise that residents will have to sort of face and get used to the idea of is, you know, we all understand that it can be very attractive to live on a cul-de-sac and the quietness that can happen there, the ball hockey, it's safe.

You get accustomed to a quiet, safe environment there without a lot of through traffic.

Well, that very quietness is what we're talking about.

Your thoughts on this rent control plan and phasing it out after 27th?

So what about all the embassies, all the diplomacy that happens in Ottawa, all the tech startups that happen here?

Not only do we have the consulates, which is the link to the embassies, but we have also the ecosystem of associations, startups, AI.

It's in Montreal.

And also, the city of Montreal, always been a city that's been seen as a city very close to Europe, but also a North American city.

But let's not forget one of the underdogs in this fight, Halifax.

Yeah, my name's Andy Fillmore.

I'm the mayor of, uh, the Halifax Regional Municipality, the capital city of Nova Scotia.

[upbeat music] Halifax exists because of its military history.