FALL RIVER: Barry Dalrymple doesn’t care what they change Halifax Regional Municipality’s (HRM) name to, as long as no money is spent on the changeover.
The debate over the name came up during regional council’s Feb. 9 meeting - a meeting that had several bigger items Dalrymple had brought forward. That included the first reading regarding city water to be brought to the Monarch-Rivendale subdivision, in Beaver Bank.
“As the vice-chair of the grants committee, I had two half a million dollar applications on the agenda, so my focus was obviously on those projects,” the councillor for Waverley-Fall River-Beaver Bank said. “Quite frankly, I don’t care what they call Halifax.
“I wasn’t living here when amalgamation happened. I wasn’t here when they named it the HRM. I don’t call it the HRM. It’s always been Halifax. I was born in Fall River, raised in Windsor Junction and now call Wellington home. I don’t care what they call it.”
When the debate over the name change did come up at council, Dalrymple tried to not pay attention to it. However, he soon found himself standing up and letting his opinion on the matter be heard.
“I tried to sit there and let it blow by. I had no intention of speaking, but it went on for an hour-and-a-half and then once they got into it, they wanted to change the name to Greater Halifax,” he said. “While I don’t like it, I was okay with it, but I prefer Halifax. I was still fine with it until they started getting into whatever we change the name to we’re going to have to get into changing names on signs, the signs on the buses. They were getting into the $600,000, $700,000 and $800,000 price range.
“Well, you know what unfortunately, at that point in time I had to get up. While I don’t care what the name is, and I really don’t, I prefer Halifax, but I don’t care. I got up and simply stated I’m not in favour of spending one penny on a name change, not a cent. We’re going into a tough budget year, we have more things out there, whether its roads, water, parks, you name it we have things out there we need to spend money on. Signs for a name change and stuff like that is not one of them.”
The motion to look at changing HRM’s name has been tabled to find a committee to come back with a recommendation to council.
“My position is quite simple. Call it whatever you want to, but we’re not spending money on a name change,” Dalrymple said.
phealey@enfieldweeklypress.com