Tens of thousands of Nova Scotians are without power this morning as a result of last night’s damaging and dangerous winds.

The winds brought down trees on power lines, causing outages right across the provinces.

As of 4:30am, Nova Scotia Power was reporting more than 770 outages across Nova Scotia, affecting more than 69-thousand customers.

There are dozens of outages throughout our region affecting thousands of customers.

 

 

While the Wind Warning is ended, Pictou County remains under a Rainfall Warning.

We could see 15 to 25mm through the day today and another 10mm tonight.

The winds are still strong, though not to the Warning threshold.  But we’ll see gusts to 70kh today.

 

 

Due to the winds in the forecast for this morning, Northumberland Ferries has cancelled today’s 8:30am crossing from Wood Islands and the 10:00am crossing from Caribou.

 

 

The Province is forecasting a deficit of 264.3-million-dollars for the current fiscal year — about 14.6-million less than the figure estimated in last spring’s budget.

Finance Minister Allan MacMaster says the slight improvement from the nearly 279-million-dollar deficit estimated in last spring’s budget is due to increased tax revenue.

Expenses are up 440.2-million-dollars, to 15.3-billion-dollars, due primarily to spending on health care, targeted cost-of-living support and debt servicing.

MacMaster says the pace of spending on items not included in the budget is not expected to reach last year’s record total of 1.7-billion-dollars.

 

 

The Nova Scotia Nurses Union says it’s reached a tentative deal on behalf of nurses working in 70 long-term care facilities across the province.

The union says details of the agreement will be shared with nurses before more information is released to the public.

If ratified, this wage settlement is retroactive to November 1st, 2020, and will expire October 31st, 2025.

About 11-hundred union members would be covered by the new deal if it’s ratified in a vote over the coming days.

 

 

The Nova Scotia government is investing two-million dollars in a new pilot program to help seniors live more independently in their homes.

The Community Aging in Place, Advancing Better Living for Elders program will pair seniors with a registered nurse, an occupational therapist and a handyperson who will work with them to identify needs in their daily activities and homes.

The program will be delivered by VON Nova Scotia, which will work with community organizations to identify and refer local seniors.

A total of about 300 seniors in the Preston and Kings County areas along with the Halifax peninsula will be able to enroll in the pilot.