Wednesday, November 5, 2014

Council Meeting Nov 4, Crowsnest Pass


Some important issues dealt with at council last night. First reading were done on both of the following bylaws. They will now come back to the next council meeting for second and third reading. At that meeting anybody from the public is more than welcome to provide input, there will be an opportunity at the start of the meeting for the public to participate.

Bylaw 897, 2014 – Animal Control Bylaw-the previous version of this bylaw in my opinion was very unpopular, it was very onerous, and unenforceable.  
 
Bylaw 900, 2014 - Council Procedural Bylaw-The previous bylaw I felt put too much decision making authority in the hands of the Mayor/CAO, this bylaw now returns the authority to council. Where in true democratic form decisions will be made by the majority of elected officials.

Fire department-Last week council met with the Fire chief, deputy fire chief and all of the captains and lieutenants from the Crowsnest Fire/Rescue Department at the Blairmore Fire Hall. It was a very blunt and open discussion with all sides agreeing that it was good that we had the meeting to open real lines of communications. The Fire dept members made it clear that training, structure, and working together were important issues. Council made it clear that our goal is to improve the fire service we provide to our residents where every possible. To increase the volunteer and expertise base where possible. The way the previous changes were handled was terrible but we has a community have to move forward. This leads to the following issue:  

Alberta Community Partnership Grant Application

Previously the Alberta government provided a regional collaboration grant which was used to fund the restructuring of the Fire Department back in 2012.
The government changed the regional collaboration grant to the Alberta Partnership Grant, due to our special status afforded us by the "Crowsnest Regulation" the municipality can apply as a regional entity we decided last night to proceed with a grant application. This grant will allow us the opportunity to further train our volunteers, and enhance the services we provide, without taking additional dollars from our tax levy.

Budget process, we have had a number of budget meeting with the next one scheduled for this Thursday 2pm in the council chambers, all meetings are open to the public. If you want to follow the process so far go to the following address pages 39 to 42.   http://www.crowsnestpass.com/public/download/documents/8825   

Survey on the logo/brand I have had a number of calls asking me how much it is costing us to do the survey? $175 the cost of the paper and the time of an employee to put the surveys in the utility bills and to post the information on our web site/facebook. Equivalent to the cost of one banner.





2 comments:

TransparencyCNP said...

Where can I find Bylaw 900, 2014 - Council Procedural Bylaw?

Crowsnest Pass Home said...

I have requested that it be posted on the Municipality web site.

Thanks Dean