Minister Kim Masland announces funding for new athletic facilities at Liverpool Regional High. Photo Ed Halverson

New athletic facilities and a walking trail are coming to Liverpool Regional High School.

Public Works Minister and MLA for Queens Kim Masland announced a combined $2.75 million from three levels of government to replace the school’s existing soccer field with artificial turf and build a 400-metre-long gravel running track.

The new artificial turf field will resolve long-standing issues with drainage.

At Friday’s announcement Masland said Queens has a history of producing world-class athletes and construction of the new field will support future athletes by allowing them to train closer to home.

“The big thing for us is we want to make sure that we’re providing a facility that people can use in our community. We have amazing athletes. We talked a little bit today about Sarah Mitton and [in] the announcement we talk about our special Olympians,” said Masland. “Many of our athletes have to travel to Bridgewater to be able to adequately train, so this will be able to keep people home and also bring people here for events.”

LRHS Principal Todd Symes says the effort to replace the school field began about six or seven years ago.

“Students always went to other schools and were kind of jealous or envious of facilities in other schools had and then logistically, a lot of our students had to travel to participate, to have the same advantages that a lot of other areas already had,” said Symes. “So, the students themselves came up with an idea. They came up with the design to come up with a plan and they were adamant that they wanted something done. So, we had students that were with us for 3-4 years. They worked the whole time they were here to engage community members, to draw designs, to work with staff members, to initiate development of a non-profit society and they were the ones who started the dream.”

Symes says the current funding will build the track and field and students will be approaching the community to help raise another $200,000 to realize the entire vision, including a Mi’kmaw learning trail.

Masland says the tender to replace the track and field will be released later this fall and the new field is expected to be completed in 2024.

Damaged retaining wall on Shore Rd in Western Head. Photo Ed Halverson

Also announced Friday was $1 million in funding from the federal and provincial governments to protect two stretches of Shore Rd in Western Head which are dealing with erosion and flooding.

Work will include reinforcing an existing retaining wall and excavating existing rock and gravel to provide more protection against the effects of climate change.

Masland says work on that project will be performed by local Public Works staff beginning this fall and finishing in spring of 2024.

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Flood waters submerge cars up to their windows in the parking lot of a Bedford restaurant. Photo: Communications Nova Scotia

The Milton Centennial Pool appears to have been the greatest casualty for the Region of Queens in this weekend’s storm.

The storm washed out roads, and 100-series highways in neighbouring Hants and Lunenburg counties as well as Halifax with reports indicating between 250 and 300 mm of rain fell across Queens County on Friday.

Despite receiving a summer’s worth of rainfall in a single day, Region of Queens Mayor Darlene Norman says Queens County got off relatively easy.“We were very, very fortunate here in Queens compared to Lunenburg,” said Norman. “There was no major damage to infrastructure. There was a road wash out on St. Catherine’s Rd in Port Joli.”

Norman says Port Medway and Liverpool fire departments were prepared to go in with their Zodiac boats to evacuate the 45 residents on that road.

The provincial public works department initially estimated the road would take four to five days to repair but after the water subsided, they discovered the major culvert was still intact and the road was repaired by Sunday morning.

Norman says a few driveways have been washed out but for the most part, Queens residents were spared the major damage experienced in other areas of the province.

She spoke with an official at Nova Scotia Public Works and in his words, “he said, Darlene, it ain’t pretty, but we got their driveways fixed. But he was just so impressed by the politeness and the patience that people had as they understood that this is serious, and they will get their driveways fixed.”

Unfortunately, the storm caused significant damage to the Milton Centennial Pool, and it will not reopen the rest of this summer as engineering and public works staff assess the extent of the damage.

The Region of Queens has been wrestling with how to replace the Milton Pool for over a year.

Council recently decided to move forward with a new outdoor pool to be located alongside Queens Place and are awaiting designs.

Anyone enrolled in swim lessons will be contacted and issued a refund.

Mayor Norman says staff will continue to monitor and assess damage across the county but if anyone sees damage that doesn’t look like it’s being addressed, they should contact the municipal office.

“If there are concerns and you see no one and it seems like you’ve been forgotten, then it’s probably because people are unaware. So, please always make a contact. Let people know when you are need of help,” said Norman. “And thank you to every volunteer fireman, neighbour, friend who helped each other and looked after one another because that’s what we’re all about.”

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Cleaning up after flooding at LRHS. Photo Bradley Judge, South Shore Regional Centre of Education

A teacher is being credited with preventing extensive damage to Liverpool Regional High School when they discovered flooding over March Break.

Around 6:30 Saturday night the teacher returned to school and noticed water on the floor.

They notified the custodian who traced the leak to a defective filter under the sink in the second-floor cooking lab.

Water had soaked the floor and flowed through the first-floor ceiling.

The custodian contacted the operations department at South Shore regional centre for education and it wasn’t long before custodians and staff from several other schools across Liverpool arrived to help clean up.

Within three hours the custodians had dried all the water and a restoration contractor was brought in to assess the extent of the damage.

In addition to many ceiling tiles coming down, ceilings in the change rooms and in the wood shop had to be taken down and will be replaced.

Flooding damaged tech ed shop and locker rooms at LRHS. Photo Bradley Judge South Shore Regional Centre of Education

Coordinator of Operations Bradley Judge says that work is underway and will continue into next week.

But any students or staff hoping for an extended break will be disappointed.

“No worries at all about reopening. It’ll be reopened safely after March Break. We still may have a few areas left to touch up. But talking to the admin people at the school we can work around it,” said Judge. “For example, if the tech ed shop isn’t 100 percent good to go they can use another area. So very slight inconvenience, luckily.”

Judge expects the school should be back to normal within a couple of weeks thanks to the quick actions of everyone involved.

“It’s very lucky. There was a lot of water and if that teacher hadn’t have walked in it would’ve been far worse than what it was,” said Judge. “And if our staff wouldn’t have cleaned it up as quickly and as efficiently as they did we would’ve been facing something different.”

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Twitter: @edwardhalverson

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