Witless Bay Days kicks off

By Mark Squibb / July 28, 2023

The first ever Witless Bay Days festival kicked into gear Thursday and the festivities continue into Sunday afternoon.

The festival grew out of last year’s Come Home Year celebrations and is being organized by the Come Home Year committee and the Witless Bay Kin Club, in cooperation with the Town.

Activities include a softball tournament, Witless Bay Idol competition, community breakfast, Fire Hall Open House, family fun day, bobber race, concerts, and more.

Council extended its thanks on Wednesday to the many volunteers working to make the festival a reality.

Southern Shore Minor Hockey to maintain alliance with Goulds Minor

By Mark Squibb / July 28, 2023

With several heat warnings declared this week, hockey season may seem a long way off yet. Board members of the Southern Shore Minor Hockey Association (SSMHA) however, are already gearing up for a great year.

The group held its annual general meeting (AGM) this June, and were able to fill a number of board positions up for nomination.

“We’re happy that individuals stepped up to fill those roles,” said SSMHA President Mark Sullivan. “We’re excited for this next season.”

The AGM also gives the board a chance to review the past season discipline by discipline.

“Everyone gives an update on how the season went, what some of the successes were, and what can be learned or what opportunities for improvement there are next season,” said Sullivan.

The association will also continue its long-standing relationship with Goulds Minor Hockey.

“It’s not an official merger, more like a quasi-merger,” said Sullivan. “We pool teams in many of our divisions, all of our divisions really, with the exception of U7 and U9. And the reason is to be competitive against the much larger metro associations.”

Both associations remain separate entities with their own boards of directors.

Consultant to scope out potential bridge site

By Mark Squibb / July 21, 2023

Bay Bulls council last week voted to award a contract valued at $5,405 plus HST to consulting firm GeoMaterials NL as part of Phase 2 of the Long Pond Walking Trail project.

Deputy Mayor Jason O’Brien explained the purpose of the contract is to investigate the potential placement of a new pedestrian bridge.

In a follow up e-mail, Town Manager Ashley Wakeham said the bridge is being proposed for the south end of the pond.

The motion was approved unanimously, excepting that councillor Shannon O’Driscoll was absent and thus did not vote.

Wakeham steps up in Bay Bulls Town Hall

By Mark Squibb / July 21, 2023

Bay Bulls council wasted no time filling the position of Town Manager recently vacated by former manager Jennifer Aspell, who just last week finished her first week as the new Chief Administrative Officer of Witless Bay, choosing an internal hire with six years of experience at the town hall.

In fact, Bay Bulls council appointed former Town Clerk Ashley Wakeham to the new position even before Witless Bay council announced publicly that it had hired Aspell.

Members of Bay Bulls council unanimously voted to appoint Wakeham during a private meeting held June 29, about a week before Witless Bay council moved to hire Aspell during a special Friday night meeting of council held on July 7.

Members of Bay Bulls council then ratified the decision to appoint Wakeham during its next public meeting on July 13.

Following the vote, various members congratulated Wakeham on the new role.

“It’s well deserved and she’s more than qualified, so we’re pretty happy to have her,” said councillor Corey Ronayne.

Wakeham will continue fulfilling the duties of Town Clerk, but council hopes to hire a new office assistant, and soon. Following the appointment of Wakeham to the new position, council formed a hiring committee, comprised of Mayor Keith O’Driscoll, Deputy Mayor Jason O’Brien, and Wakeham, to oversee the hiring of a new assistant Town Clerk.

Along with the appointment, council moved to grant Wakeham the authority to sign Town cheques and appointed her as the town’s ATIPP Coordinator.

Masterless Men know how to put the festive in Shamrock Festival

The Masterless Men bandmembers include, starting from left: Mock Greene on bass, Wilf Curran on guitar and lead vocals, John Curran on guitar and lead vocals, Greg Walsh on fiddle, and Dave Lush on banjo. Greg and Dave also sing backup and harmony vocals. Masterless Men photo.

By Mark Squibb / July 21, 2023

Brothers John and Wilf Curran of the Masterless Men have played in many a festival in their time, but there’s nothing quite like playing the Shamrock Festival in their hometown of Ferryland.

“For myself and John, we’re playing at home, and we don’t often get the opportunity to play at home,” said Curran. “And I think with the exception of a couple of weekends we may have missed because the band was booked somewhere else, we’ve played almost every single festival. And you’re playing before your hometown and seeing your friends and people you haven’t seen in a while, and so it’s nice to be able to perform for them. And sometimes you do different songs, songs that you probably didn’t do at the festival the weekend before, because you’re home and you know some of the guys there like these certain songs. It’s really special.”

The band has been a festival mainstay from the very beginning.

“The Masterless Men have been involved with the Shamrock Folk Festival since the Masterless Men were formed, which was 32 years January past,” said Curran. “Even before the band was formed, my brother John and I performed in the festival in its early days.”

And while much has changed since the festival’s inception in 1986, such as the inclusion of family friendly sessions complete with bouncy castles and laser tag, much has stayed the same.

“The Southern Shore flair, the Irish flair, hasn’t changed at all,” said Curran. “I see some of the same faces I used to see way, way back in the early days… the people who go because they love music and they love to get outdoors.”

Curran added the Southern Shore Folk Arts Council building is the perfect venue for a night of singing and dancing.

“The Saturday afternoon session is on the deck, so you’re right out on the water,” said Curran. “And then the building itself, the way they’ve maintained the building’s structure and kept all the old wood is phenomenal. I go to a number of events at the Folk Arts Centre and I’m in awe of the old wood and the rafters and the way they’ve renovated it. It’s just a beautiful place to spend an evening.”

The Masterless Men (not so named, it turns out, because the men don’t have wives, but in a nod to a group of legendary late 18th century and early 19th century runaway seamen and workers who escaped servitude from early Newfoundland plantations to live as free men away from the coast) will be playing Saturday evening, along with the Dolly Kits and Karla Pilgrim and the Mayflowers.

“It’ll be a fun night, because they know how to have fun on the Southern Shore,” said Curran.

The Southern Shore Crush Orange U11 girls team goes undefeated

The Southern Shore Crush Orange U11 girls team went undefeated at this year’s Const. Moss Memorial softball tournament. It’s the second year in a row the team has won the tournament. In the back row from left to right, are coach Nicole Martin, Kennedi Pardy, Kayleigh Dalton, Bree Joyce, Rhea Doyle, Abbi Sullivan, and coach Audrey Dalton. In the front row, from left to right, are Italia Costello, Lauren Johnson, Emilee Martin, Grace Boland and Jenna Keough. Missing from the photo are Leah Legge and coach Laura Doyle. Photo by Anne Windsor 

Festival to get an earful of talented home-grown duo the Dollykits

The Dollykits include (from left) Kelsey Arsenault and Katie Barbour.

By Craig Westcott / July 14, 2023

There's a new act performing at the annual Shamrock Folk Festival next weekend, but they're old hands at performing, despite their young faces, and no strangers to the stage in Ferryland.

The Dollykits are scheduled to play in the main event evening session Saturday night with the Masterless Men, Karla Pilgrim & The Mayflowers, and other special guests. The duo is composed of Kelsey Arsenault and Katie Barbour.

"We've been playing together for I would say 20 years," said Arsenault. "We grew up together, but as a duo we just started in the last year gigging together more seriously. But we've been playing together forever."

The pair, both actually from Ferryland, play everything from Irish traditional to country to folk covers "with a few of our own originals as well."

Both are extremely talented singer/songwriters in their own right.

"I've actually got a solo album coming out at the end of the summer," Arsenault noted, "and Katie has written some on her own. But we'd like to get into songwriting more as a duo as well."

Arsenault has a song debuting today, Volcano, which will also be included on the Gallery Walls album later this summer. If Volcano is anything to go by, the album will be well worth getting.

Arsenault said the pair won't be performing much of their original material at the festival, which is better designed for Irish-Newfoundland traditional sing along type music, which they both also enjoy.

Both artists have played the festival many times.

"I grew up playing the festival," said Arsenault. "It was my first gig actually. The first time I ever sang on the stage was up on the Southern Shore."

She was 4. Arsenault performed with her mom Rhonda O'Keefe Arsenault.

So far, the Dollykits have played The Black Sheep and O'Reilley's downtown.

"We've been busy all summer," said Arsenault. "We haven't done a ton of gigging this summer, but we also played at the Keeper's Kitchen up in St. Shotts."

The Shamrock festival will be the biggest crowd to see the pair perform together as the Dollykits. By all accounts, it will be worth seeing.

"They're really good," said Don Maher, co-owner of The Black Sheep on George Street. "They're really engaging. The audience here loved them."

Arsenault's full-time job, meanwhile, is with the CRA, but she is also a certified Music Therapist with a Masters degree from Waterloo University. Barbour is a teacher. But being from Ferryland, with music pretty well in the blood, neither can stay away from the call of singing and songwriting on the side.

The name of their act is a tribute to their respective grandmothers.

"My grandmother's name was Dolly (O'Keefe) and Katie's grandmother was Kit (Clowe)," said Arsenault. "The two of them have since passed away in the last couple of years, but we were both very close to our nans and we thought we'd do a spin on both their names as a way to kind of keep them alive and to breed a little bit of their legacy into what we do."

Moving one bay over

Witless Bay hires former Bay Bulls manager Jennifer Aspell

By Mark Squibb / July 14, 2023

In another Friday night meeting, Witless Bay council last week voted to hire Jennifer Aspell as the Town’s new Chief Administrative Officer.

“Jennifer is a capable and committed individual who has a strong track record in municipal and business administration,” said Deputy Mayor Lorna Yard. “Under her tenure the Town of Bay Bulls made great strides including the beautiful walking trail at Long Pond, as well as instituting processes and work plans that proved very beneficial to the efficient operation of the Town of Bay Bulls. Jennifer has built great working relationships with government departments and funding agencies that will prove greatly beneficial to the Town of Witless Bay.”

Aspell served as Bay Bulls Town Manager for the last five or so years, and was an integral part of that town’s monthly council meeting, keeping the meetings in order while also offering clarifications and further explanations to the media afterwards.

“Jennifer and her family have a long history of contributions and volunteering for the town of Witless Bay,” said Yard. “I know she has a passion for the town and is eager to put her energy and experience into moving the Town of Witless Bay forward in a positive manner.”

Aspell, who lives in Witless Bay with her family, once challenged a decision of the previous council when they approved a resident’s application to construct a garage on his property in June, 2020. Aspell had argued it would negatively impact the view of the ocean from her home. The Eastern Regional Appeal Board, during a hearing held on March 9, 2021, recommended the Town permit the construction of the garage as the dimensions fit the Town’s requirements and the impact on Aspell’s ocean views was thought to be minimal.

She is being called on to replace former Town CAO Sean Kavanagh.

Council voted to fire Kavanagh in June of 2022, but had to motion to fire him multiple times over the coming months due to procedural errors.

Aspell will be the sixth top bureaucrat at the Town Hall in Witless Bay in the last four years. Former Town Clerk Geraldine Caul served in the position twice. She left the Town’s employment earlier this year.

Former town manager sues Witless Bay council

By Mark Squibb / July 14, 2023

Former Witless Bay town manager Shawn Kavanagh has filed a statement of claim against the Town of Witless Bay seeking $135,329 in wages, plus punitive damages.

According to Kavanagh’s statement of claim registered at the Supreme Court of Newfoundland on June 19, the Town of Witless Bay hired him on February 1, 2022, to serve as Town Manager on a fixed term basis from February 14, 2022, through till December 31, 2024.

The agreement between the Town and Kavanagh specified a four-month probationary period during which time Kavanagh could be fired either with cause or without, but the agreement did not provide “clear and unambiguous terms” that would allow for the Town to fire Kavanagh outside of that probationary period nor before the expiration of the agreement on December 31, 2024, according to the claim.

None of the allegations contained in the document have yet been tested in court. Up to press time this week, the Town had not filed a Statement of Defence.

As alleged in the statement of claim, the Town fired Kavanagh on February 23, 2023, by written notice and without cause. The claim further alleges Kavanagh was provided only two weeks pay in lieu of the notice.

Kavanagh is claiming that in doing so, the Town breached his employment contract, and furthermore claims the termination was in violation of the Municipalities Act as appropriate procedures for dismissal of a town manager were not followed, and that this caused harm to his reputation.

Though Kavanagh declined comment for this story, during an interview in November of 2022, he claimed council had not followed proper procedure in that it did not inform him ahead of time that it would be voting to terminate him, nor was quorum met the first time council voted to fire him.

As a point of fact, the motion to terminate Kavanagh was brought before council a number of times and approved each time, although procedural errors meant the vote had to be recast time and time again.

Kavanagh, who is represented by Devin Drover of Benson Buffett PLC Inc, is seeking $135,329 in pay that he says the Town owes him, as per the initial agreement. He is also suing for punitive damages, interest, legal fees, and “such other relief as this Honorable Court deems just and equitable.”

Witless Bay Mayor Trevor Croft said this week he could not comment on the matter as it was a Human Resources issue.

Bay Bulls project comes in under budget

By Mark Squibb / July 7, 2023

In today’s world of inflation and post-pandemic prices, you often hear of projects going overbudget.

It’s much less common to hear of projects coming in under budget, but that’s exactly what happened in Bay Bulls.

During the June public meeting, council approved a release of $35,465 in funds earmarked for upgrades to Cemetery West Road and Station Road.

“Those are funds that were allocated to that project, but we came in under budget, so what we’re doing is formalizing, and sending in documentation to the Gas Tax Secretariat, to free up those funds,” explained Town Manager Jennifer Aspell.

Council, with the exception of Mayor Keith O’Driscoll and councillor Jason Sullivan, who were both absent from the meeting and thus did not vote on the matter, unanimously approved the motion.

Since 2019, the provincial government has allocated $437,116 in gas tax funds for the Town of Bay Bulls, based on a 2016 population of 1,500.

The former council had earmarked $152,678 of that money for upgrades to Winnonish Drive, but the new council unanimously voted to cancel those upgrades during the October meeting of last year. Instead, council applied to complete a 450-metre section of the walking trail around Long Pond at a total project cost of $95,508, plus HST, as per project estimates.