Maybe it’s because I’m getting older and I don’t care what anyone thinks of me (not that I ever did), but I have to ask what kind of place do I live in that values hockey rinks more than housing for the homeless?

What leads me to ask this question is the recent decision by the CBRM to send back 4 million in emergency housing funding to Ottawa, while in the subsequent 3 days following CBRM’s decision to send the money back, it was announced that 3 different hockey rinks will receive government funding to do refurbishment and/or to carry on operations.

Those rinks being the Coxheath Arena that will be getting 4.3 million dollars from the Nova Scotia government to do renovations, the Canada Games Complex which will receive 8.2 million dollars from the province for a near complete makeover of the arena at CBU that was built in 1987, and the Emera Centre in North Sydney whose ownership and operation will be assumed by the Cape Breton Municipality at a cost of 250 thousand dollars a year.

I know that comparing hockey to homelessness might seem like comparing hockey rinks to healthcare or hockey sticks to hospital beds, but what I’m exploring here are priorities and values. What does our community collectively value? What are our community's priorities?

As that great Australian philosopher Brian Johnson once said, “Money Talks,” and if you look at where the Money is going and not going in Cape Breton, Money is telling a truth about Cape Breton, and that uncomfortable truth is that Cape Breton values and prioritizes hockey over homelessness, and in turn humanity.

It's my opinion that Cape Breton and its associated politicians, and most importantly the bureaucrats who fork out the Money in Sydney, Halifax, and Ottawa must redirect where the money is going in our community. The politicians in particular have got to stop catering to the small but disproportionally influential and continually diminishing percentage of our population who actually play hockey. Future government funding that might go to hockey rinks (...and that’s what they are) needs to be diverted to more important community infrastructure like housing, healthcare, roads, transit, libraries, education, etc.

Until this fundamental change in thinking and prioritization occurs, Cape Breton truly will not be the caring community that it portrays itself as. We as a people cannot leave anyone behind. We collectively as a people can’t value a person by whether they play hockey or not.

Hockey is a game and not a life - nor is it what gives a life value.