As 2020 wound down, SooToday asked its staff to recall their most memorable stories of the past year.
In this personal retrospective, David Helwig looks back on the COVID-19 pandemic, his controversial reporting on downtown crime, Tenaris's big expansion plans, the Civic Centre facelift fiasco, and SooToday's four-year legal battle to gain access to a forensic report detailing the relationship between Dr. Kim Barker and Shaun Rootenberg at Algoma Public Health.
Was 2020 one of those 'best of times,' 'worst of times' years in Sault Ste. Marie?
No! Bloody hell no! It was flat out, the worst year ever!
What the Dickens, how can you even ask a question like that?
The Year of our Lord 2020 was the age of COVID foolishness, the epoch of incredulity, the winter of pandemic despair.
It was a year in which many of us felt like we were hurtling toward the nether regions with nothing to brake our descent.
After reviewing a year's worth of journalistic efforts, I've chosen the following as the big news stories of 2020, at least the ones in which I had a hand:COVID-19, story of the year
I played a relatively minor role in SooToday's extensive coverage of the coronavirus pandemic.
Newsroom colleagues Darren Taylor and James Hopkin and our crack team of desk editors did most of the heavy lifting.
My contribution largely involved tracking the pandemic response of the City of Sault Ste. Marie.
Working the COVID-19 story took me back to a time more than 30 years ago when I wrote regularly about infectious diseases and other issues for Canadian Medical Association Journal, at the time one of the top five most-cited medical journals in the world.
That was before the Internet really took off, and knowledge about new pathogens was generally available only at medical school libraries.
As I reported on outbreaks of new diseases, I put in many hours rummaging through library stacks.
When an outbreak surfaced in a city that didn't have a local medical school, I'd show up the next day at the medical officer of health's office and drop off a thick package of every major research paper published on the new threat.
I'd hear things like: "Oh... you have no idea how much this means to us. We actually know very little about this thing!"
That was then. Today, public health officials and even members of the public have instant access to the latest research developments.
Most days, I personally appreciated the pandemic work done by Algoma Public Health and Mayor Provenzano.
I feel much of the credit for Algoma's low number of COVID cases is attributable to their efforts.
Downtown crime
Let's get one thing straight.
I'm a journalist. I'm not a publicist for the police or people at the Downtown Association.
In 2020, I reported extensively on concerns about crime and security issues downtown, which seemed to worsen as the opioid crisis hit us, exacerbated further by the coronavirus.
I told you the stories of business owners including Richard Kim, Krista Nolan and Jane McGoldrick.
Journalists are the chroniclers of our society.
We report on both the triumphs and the tragedies.
Everyone who lives or works downtown knows there are problems and they're getting worse, not better.
It's time to stop attacking the messenger and get serious about making things better.
SooToday will be at City Council, the Downtown Association and the Police Services Board to report on the search for solutions.
Civic Centre glazing and cladding fiasco
The work was supposed to have been done by May 29, 2019.
The exterior recladding/reglazing project on our 46-year-old waterfront Civic Centre is largely completed.
But rebuilding the front atrium hasn't even started and is expected to take another six months.
A bond company is now calling the shots and the project is running a million dollars over the initial tender of $6.9 million.
This story will obviously extend well into the new year.
Will Cy Rheault Construction finally get 'er done in '21?
Tenaris Algoma Tubes
SooToday was the first to tell you the best local news of 2020, a $70-$80 million investment by Tenaris Algoma Tubes to transform its Sault plant into the most comprehensive pipe manufacturing facility in Canada.
The project is expected to include a 30,000-square-foot building addition with 75 new jobs created in the first year, and 50 more full-time equivalent jobs.
Supreme Court of Canada decision on Algoma Public Health
Dr. Kim Barker fought us tenaciously, for four years.
The former medical officer of health at Algoma Public Health fought all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada, trying to keep SooToday from accessing the KMPG forensic report probing the relationship between her and the interim chief financial officer she hired, Shaun Rootenberg.
Dr. Barker lost.
The revealing KPMG report was released to me at 4:52 p.m. on Thursday, Jan. 31.
Barker then issued an apology to her former colleagues at Algoma Public Health.
She nonetheless insisted the KPMG report was full of inaccuracies.
The following are some of my other memorable news stories of 2020:
- 30 years after City Council passed a controversial language resolution, our city-owned public library finally added French and Ojibwe to its English-only wayfinding signage
- Kyleigh Provenzano, wife of Sault Ste. Marie's mayor, thought she was just a tired mom. A CAT scan found there was more to it than that
- Black Lives Matter signs at Algoma University were set on fire, prompting a promise from the mayor to work harder on race-relations issues
- a 91-year-old Hockey Hall of Famer was chosen to lead a City of Sault Ste. Marie city committee
Finally, I'd be remiss not to mention that SooToday/Village Media was declared the Sault's company of the year at the 14th Annual SSMARt Innovation Awards.
That story reminded me of what I said when announcing the publication of SooToday's 50,000th news story back on Dec. 20, 2010:
"Today, I wish to thank all past and present SooToday news staff - Carol, Donna, Rick, Ken, Pete, Brad, Tyler, Mike, Ron, Andrea, Chris, Hilary, Darcy, Natasha, Serena and Scott."
"Over the past nine years, we've proudly blazed our own unique trail through the changing landscape of community journalism."
"We've significantly changed the tone, content and immediacy of local news. We've been loved, hated, sued for millions of dollars, derided and, perhaps most importantly, widely copied."
In 2020, Village Media didn't slash our workforce in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Thanks to our brilliant strategists, marketers and administrators, we've actually been growing the company and adding new positions!
As the year neared its end, SooToday became one of the first local news operations in Canada to be trained in solutions journalism by Journalists for Human Rights.
Solutions journalism involves reporting on successful responses to social problems, creating opportunities for meaningful discourse, stripping away excuses and holding power to account.
Could that approach work in Sault Ste. Marie?
Let's hope we can all do better in 2021!