Sean McIntyre, Mayor of Sylvan Lake. (Town of Sylvan Lake)

By Sheldon Spackman

Year In Review

Growth and sustainability a core focus for Sylvan Lake in 2020

Dec 30, 2019 | 6:00 AM

Core infrastructure was the focus for the Town of Sylvan Lake in 2019.

Mayor Sean McIntyre points to a number of major projects the Town worked on over the past year, including the first phase of the rehabilitation of 50 Avenue.

“It’s a really big project for us,” says McIntyre. “This will be a multi-year project, and this year we made lots of progress in putting major infrastructure underground in rehabilitating the road surface itself, burying power lines, preparing for crosswalks. That was a big project for us that we’ve been working on for a long time.”

Phase two of the project will commence in 2021 with the project slated for final completion in 2023.

After starting construction on the project in 2019, McIntyre says they will let that area rest next.

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Another piece of core infrastructure McIntyre highlights is the regional wastewater line from Sylvan Lake to Red Deer.

“That began its functions in July with no interruption to our residents,” he exclaims. “We’re very happy now to be no longer using our wastewater lagoons. That infrastructure is now in place where the City of Red Deer is treating not just the wastewater for the Town of Sylvan Lake, but for Red Deer County, Lacombe County and the five summer villages around the lake.”

Elsewhere, McIntyre says he’s happy to see construction begin on a new water reservoir for Sylvan Lake.

“While this may not be something that can be exciting to your average person, it’s very exciting for us because we’re helping to serve the residents of Sylvan Lake today and for generations to come,” says McIntyre. “We also constructed a roundabout at Highway 20 and Erickson Drive to really improve the safety and traffic flow at that intersection.”

Pogadl Park, the town’s newest sports and recreation area, is another initiative McIntyre is excited to see get underway.

“Phase 1 starts with four slow-pitch diamonds, and we also planned on constructing a bantam fastball-style diamond. Once the word got out that that was in our plans, it actually attracted attention from the Western Canadian Baseball League (WCBL) who ended up approving an expansion team to Sylvan Lake.”

If all goes according to plan, the WCBL will begin play out of a 2,200 seat stadium for the 2021 season.

Despite all the good news, McIntyre admits the past year has not been without challenge.

“We’re certainly dealing with the same economy as the rest of Alberta,” says McIntyre. “We’ve seen changes come from the provincial government in their spending and at the Town of Sylvan Lake. We’ve had to adjust our spending as well. We’re anticipating a slight decline in property values, so during budget presentations we had to make sure that we held that in our minds as we were dealing with what Operating projects and Capital projects that we would be working with.”

McIntyre says the Town actually plans to collect about $4 less in taxes from each household in 2020 than in 2019.

“We need to make sure that we are working strategically, both to pursue our goals as a community, but also to make sure that we’re working with our businesses and our residents to make sure that their own lives are sustainable and they’re not being faced with larger-than-normal tax increases at this time.”

According to McIntyre, residents can also expect enhanced online services from the Town next year.

“It will be more ways that our residents can interact and do the business they need to do with the Town online,” he explains. “We’ll also continue to work on our festival and events strategy. That is where we are either producing or attracting events to the community that help to bolster the economy and enhance the lives of our residents through the fall, winter and spring such as the Bull Riders Canada Championships here in November.”

McIntyre concludes that core infrastructure will remain the Town’s strategic priority moving forward, citing road rehabilitation on 53 Street and 50A Street as examples.

“We’re also working on enhancing some of our operational services,” says McIntyre. “Recently, council approved an increase in the service level for snow removal and we’re excited to roll that out. It is a small change, but we do think it will make an impact to our residents where they will see their snow plowed more often.”