City bringing key issues to municipalities conference

City of Red Deer representatives will meet this week with Community and Social Services Minister Sabir regarding social and safety challenges, and Energy Minister Marg McCuaig-Boyd about the importance of pipelines.

They won’t, however, be meeting with Health Minister Sarah Hoffman regarding hot topics including hospital expansion and needle debris.

“We’ve said that if she is unable to meet at AUMA that we need to meet in very short order given the crisis circumstance in many of those health-related issues in Red Deer,” Veer explained.

“I think, by far, our biggest issues centre around the availability of resources,” AUMA President Barry Morishita. “The municipal sustainability (MSI) grant, and the end of that program, is a huge problem going forward for municipalities.”

Red Deer, for example, currently receives about $20 million in annual MSI funding for capital projects. For now, the province has committed to continuing the MSI program until 2022.

Morishita said municipalities are also concerned over the continual download of costs and responsibilities from the province. Cannabis legislation and more equitable police funding are also high on the agenda for this week’s conference.

Around 1,700 delegates – including mayors, councillors, administrators and staff – are expected to be at the conference which officially gets underway Wednesday at Westerner Park. It’s the first time the AUMA has taken its annual fall conference outside of Calgary or Edmonton in over 20 years.

“It gives us a chance not only to the real Red Deer that we are, but the Red Deer we are becoming,” Veer explained.

by Troy Gillard (Twitter: @Troy_Gillard)

City bringing key issues to municipalities conference

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