Residents prepared for a fight as golf course developer eyes Cape Breton park

MABOU — Some in Cape Breton are angry and preparing to fight as a nearby golf course developer eyes the windswept beaches of West Mabou Beach Provincial Park.

Nadine Hunt was part of two previous campaigns to stop the Cabot golf company from expanding into the park on the west coast of Cape Breton Island.

This time is worse, Hunt said in a recent interview. The provincial government seems open to the expansion, she said.

“We feel powerless,” Hunt said, the sable-coloured beach stretching out behind her. “People have said, ‘We’ll be in front of the bulldozers.’ Many, many people have said that. It’s terrible if it’s going to have to come to that.”

West Mabou Beach Provincial Park encompasses about 2.8 square kilometres of sand dunes and beaches along the shore of the Northumberland Strait, in Mabou, Cape Breton. The park is home to more than a dozen rare and endangered species, including the piping plover, a tiny shorebird that nests in the sand.

It is the only known spot in the Maritimes to find the upswept moonwort, a fern whose thick leaves curl upward in clusters of finger-like lobes.

The park attracts tourists and locals, Hunt said. On Friday, a couple read books in lawn chairs they had set up in the sand. Other visitors brought dogs who swam in the ocean and chased thrown pieces of driftwood.

Cabot owns and operates two 18-hole golf courses in nearby Inverness, N.S., plus an 11-hole short course, three restaurants, a 72-room lodge and nearly 50 villas and homes, according to its website.

Kim Masland, the province’s natural resources minister, confirmed Thursday that Cabot has submitted a proposal for the park, though she said she hadn’t read it.

In 2023, Tim Houston’s Progressive Conservative government said provincial parks legislation wouldn’t allow for a golf course at the beach. But on Thursday, Houston said a great deal had changed since then, suggesting the province needs to spur economic growth and create jobs.

“We have a billion-dollar deficit,” he said. “The international trade relationships are different. So we need to be looking at opportunities and we need to have frank discussions about what those opportunities are.”

As for those who say the park should remain a protected area, Houston said there are plenty of parks across Canada that also contain golf courses. “In Nova Scotia, we can be open to that too,” he said. “If a company comes into Nova Scotia and says we have an idea, I think it would be irresponsible to not listen.”

The company did not respond to a request for comment, but it has a web page for what it calls its “Mabou golf project,” saying it is “exploring the potential for a new world-class course at West Mabou Beach.” Internet archives show the page was updated some time since March to remove a message on its home page saying it had decided not to proceed with the project after receiving community feedback.

People in the region are angry, Hunt said. They worry that discussions have been going on behind closed doors and they won’t have a say in the outcome. There were nine letters opposing a West Mabou beach golf development in last week’s edition of the Inverness Oran, the local paper.

“The anger is amplified even more this time,” Hunt said. “Like, the third time, are you kidding me? This company is coming back for the third time to try to get this park, after being rejected twice? What disrespect does this show for the community?”

Sivan Hobden said she and her husband moved to the area because they loved the park so much. She said the province’s current rules allow the premier to remove, without consultation, the public park status of a piece of land.

She worries the Houston government will use those rules to delist West Mabou Beach as a provincial park and let Cabot move in.

If the government is interested in supporting job creation and economic growth, they should tell Cabot to buy private land instead, Hobden said.

“That is the crux of the issue, they can just buy private land,” she said. “It would have the same economic benefits.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 30, 2025.

— With files from Michael MacDonald in Halifax

Sarah Smellie, The Canadian Press