BRIER ISLAND'S BURNING ISSUE

Residents Feel Frustration Over Drugs Has Reached Boiling
Point

WESTPORT -- Many of Brier Island's 285 residents say they're fed up
with a drug problem on their island and neighbouring Long Island.

Some island sources who have asked not to be identified have said the
fire that destroyed the 132-year-old Westport Academy building on the
weekend was likely arson and was tied to a handful of people who are
angry because they want an end to the use of illicit drugs in the community.

The RCMP has accepted the arson theory.

"There was no good reason for that fire to start," said Digby RCMP
Const. Jeff Gillis, who was at the Sunday-morning fire.

"We are quite confident in our assessment" that it was deliberately
set, he said on the weekend.

The old schoolhouse was built in 1873 and was purchased recently by
the Village of Westport.

The building, located next to the island's fire hall, was engulfed in
flames when firefighters arrived.

The three members of the Westport village commission are concerned,
like many others, that a few people are trying to intimidate
townspeople.

"Things have been escalating. Finally it has come to a head. Folks
have said we've had enough," said Dave Pugh, a Westport village
commissioner and president of that community's volunteer fire department.

Another Brier Island resident said Saturday that islanders held a
meeting three weeks ago about the serious drug problem on Brier and
Long islands.

The resident said six or seven people are trying to intimidate people
on the islands.

And another island resident said that during the fire he heard someone
shouting, "Let her burn!"

Westport Academy, a large two-storey building, was used to store many
antiques, including the island's old horse-drawn hearse, last used
some 50 years ago.

The fire spread so quickly and was so intense that it was first
reported by someone on another island.

"The first report was from Freeport, believe it or not," Mr. Pugh
said. "The other island saw it at 3:05 (a.m.)."

Freeport is at the western tip of Long Island, and Brier Island is
across Grand Passage. A ferry connects the islands.

Volunteers from Tiverton and Freeport were ferried across the passage
to assist.

"Without their help we would have had a hard time saving this
building," Mr. Pugh said of the Westport fire hall, a six-year-old
structure beside the Westport Academy.

The heat was so intense that a window blew out of the fire hall and
shingles melted to the roof.

"It was touch and go there for a while," Mr. Pugh said. "There were a
lot of people put in danger here that night."

The roads on both islands were barely passable, he said.

Westport residents also found it odd that the entire island was
experiencing a power failure when the fire broke out, and the old
school had no source of electricity to begin with.

"The power was off to the whole town," Mr. Pugh said of the blackout
during last weekend's snowstorm.

"It came (back) on about three-quarters of an hour after the fire got
going well . . . and that was around 4 o'clock," he said Tuesday.

Investigators won't say much but they're paying special attention to
the fire. A couple of insurance adjustment bureau representatives have
been to the scene, along with investigators from the RCMP's major
crime unit and the provincial fire marshal's office.

On Tuesday, RCMP pulled over a car as it approached Islands
Consolidated School in Freeport, where 138 students from both islands
attend grades Primary through 12.

Mounties arrested a 21-year-old man and his 15-year-old male
passenger, both from Digby. Police found 16 quarter-ounce bags of
marijuana inside the vehicle.

The pair were charged and released. They are to appear Feb. 20 in
Digby provincial court.