One of Nova Scotia's best known and most celebrated historic sites is facing an uncertain future after the latest round of federal spending cuts.
Roughly 400 pink slips were issued at Parks Canada locations across Atlantic Canada Monday, and the historic Fortress of Louisbourg in Cape Breton – long considered a gem of international tourism – has been hit particularly hard.
As many as one-third of the positions at the fortress, the Alexander Graham Bell site, the Cape Breton Highlands National Park and three other sites are on the chopping block.
The fortress could have lost 120 jobs but today workers were told that efforts were made to spare staff from outright layoffs.
"They cut a few hours off everybody, so this way everybody was able to keep their positions," says fortress animator Glen Daigle.
A spokesperson for Parks Canada in Cape Breton declined to release specific details about the extent of the cutbacks until all workers have been briefed.
"Today is really about informing our staff about those impacts, and how staff will be impacted, today is about that," Maria O'Hearn told CTV News Monday. "We'll be in a position to talk about the cuts publicly at a later time."
Local business owner Linda Burke runs a general store, which includes a take-out and supermarket. She caters to both locals and tourists and she says her business will take a hit because of the cutbacks.
"I think it's awful, I think it's terrible. The way the economy is, we can't really afford to lose the jobs right now," she says. "That's pretty much all we have in town is the fortress, right."
With the tourist season about to begin, a shortened season and fewer hours of daily operations are possible spinoffs of the cutbacks at Parks Canada.
With files from CTV Atlantic's Randy MacDonald
