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Council approves Trans Canada Trail efforts, new street and cemetery names

(PHOTO: Council meets January 19, 2016. Sarah Anderson. REPORTER. Copyright Rogers Media)

Tuesday night’s council meeting saw the approval of several new naming proposals, three for roads in the community and three for cemeteries, as well as the approval of a direction to staff to look into connecting Fort McMurray to the Trans Canada Trail.

The meeting also saw the first reading of debenture by-laws and a notice of motion for the March 8 meeting from Councillor Keith McGrath on a proposed governance structure realignment.

Motion

“It took me two years to prepare this. It’ll take me five minutes to read it,” said McGrath.

The motion asks that council give its support, in principle, to realigning the wards as follows:

  • the boundaries of Ward 1 be expanded to include Draper and Saprae Creek and the number of councillors representing Ward 1 be increased to seven.
  • that the boundaries of Ward 2 be contracted so that Ward 2 becomes a northern rural ward, extending from the border of the Northwest Territories to the line bisecting the province at the same latitude and the same southern border of Wood Buffalo National Park but not including the Park itself and that the number of councillors representing Ward 2 be decreased to one
  • that Ward 3 be expanded to become a rural or central rural ward extending from the southern boundary of Ward 2 as contracted to the northern boundary of Ward 4 but excluding the expanded area of Ward 1 and one councillor to continue to represent Ward 3.
  • both the geographical territory of Ward 4 and the single councillor representing Ward 4, the southern rural ward would remain unchanged

The motion also asks for support creating an executive committee of three councillors who would work full-time and would participate fully with the Chief Administrator’s senior leadership team to implement the strategic directions of the whole council.

It also moves to create a full-time deputy mayor’s position that would have duties above and beyond filling in when the mayor is away or if the position is vacant, with those duties being set out by council.

The motion, if approved, would direct Mayor Melissa Blake to write to the province’s Minister of Municipal Affairs to let them know what changes the RMWB is making and to ask that any regulatory changes necessary be made.

There are some changes that would have to be made under the Municipal Government Act and some that can be done in-house.

Nothing will be decided until the motion is debated on March 8.

Debenture by-laws

At the meeting Tuesday night council passed the first reading of four by-law considerations involving borrowing money to fund capital projects.

Any time the municipality borrows money for these kinds of ventures there must be a debenture borrowing bylaw amendment approved by members of council.

The four projects up for consideration, namely the Prairie Loop Project, the Urban Infrastructure Rehabilitation Project, Lift Station Upgrades and the Flood Mitigation Construction Project, have all already been approved by council, as well as some borrowing costs for the projects.

Staff now need an approval to borrow a total of $49,706,567 to be borrowed over either 10 or 20 years with the total amount to be borrowed for all four projects $193,601,567.

The annual debt service payment will be $15,766,851, which combines the principal and interest.

All of these projects, as well as the funding are accounted for in the 2016 plan for capital projects.

Elsie Hutton, Chief Financial Officer for the RMWB, explained that should any of the projects be cancelled or deferred the money will not be borrowed.

The second reading and any potential debate on these by-laws will take place at the March 8 meeting of council.

Trans Canada Trail

Council approved to commit $500,000 to connect Frot McMurray to the Trans Canada Trail and approved a direction that administration look into ways this might be achieved.

Ron Fetzko with the McMurray Sno-Drifters spoke on the motion, saying they’ve already done a good deal of the legwork and would like to be included in any considerations as administration draws up plans.

That prompted a motion from Councillor Stroud to include the Sno-Drifters and any other relevant community groups in the plan.

Administration will work with the Trans Canada Trail Foundation to link the system to some existing and some new trails within the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo.

The $500,000 in funding will be included in the five-year capital plan to be provided in 2018. The Trans Canada Trail Foundation also provides a grant the RMWB can apply for of up to $500,000.

In the recommendation approved at council it states staff will ask that Mayor Melissa Blake be listed among other mayors in Canada who have been declared “Champions” of the trail.

Councillor Allan Vinni was unsure if that would be something Mayor Blake was comfortable with, she said she was, and the vote carried unanimously.

Street naming

Council approved three street naming recommendations from the Community Identification Committee.

The road within the Abraham Subdivision will be called Abraham’s Gate; the road in Surmont Creek off Hwy 881 will be called Tobin Way; and Wop May Way will be the name for the road previously known as Golden Hawk Road.

Cemetary naming

There were also three naming proposals for area cemetaries from the Community Identification Committee which were also approved unanimously.

The cemetary off Real Martin will be called the Woodlawn Cemetary, the one in Abasand will be called Highview Cemetary, and the downtown one will be called Pioneer Cemetary.