[5][2] After living in Halifax, Toronto, London, Stockholm, Vancouver, Los Angeles, and New York City, Zann returned to Truro in 2008.

[6] That fall she started a community campaign to restore a historic former academic building in downtown Truro, Provincial Normal College, into a cultural centre.

She raised $62,000 for a feasibility study following which the four-story, 24,000-square-foot provincially designated Victorian brick building was repurposed to become the centre point of downtown Truro – the town's new Central Colchester Regional Library, with a skating rink in front during winter months.

[7] During her first four years as a backbencher in the first NDP government in Nova Scotia Zann was appointed ministerial assistant for three positions: culture & heritage, environment & climate change, and deputy premier – unsuccessfully working to reinstate the Nova Scotia Arts Council and improve the film tax credit for the film and TV industry.

Bill 90 amended the Nova Scotia Provincial Exhibition Commission Act to increase the size of the board of directors to ten.

On April 8, 2009, Zann successfully ran for the Nova Scotia New Democratic Party nomination in the riding of Truro-Bible Hill.

[24] During the 43rd Canadian Parliament, she introduced one private member bill, Bill C-230, An Act respecting the development of a national strategy to redress environmental racism which sought to require the Minister of the Environment to develop a national strategy which would examine the link between race, socio-economic status and environmental risk.