Nov 2009
The Rural Municipality of Portage la Prairie didn’t sponsor any resolutions at the Association of Manitoba Municipalities’ 11th annual convention, but it was the inspiration for one.
The court decision handed down in favour of irate rural Portage ratepayers last year concerning the RM’s local improvement plan for funding its share of the Portage Credit Union Centre spawned a resolution sponsored by the Town of Russell at the convention in Brandon this past week. The resolution directs the Association of Manitoba Municipalities to lobby the Province of Manitoba to consider amendments to the Municipal Act and the Planning Act to take into account the adverse effects of the Concerned Ratepayers vs. RM of Portage la Prairie.
Portage Reeve Toby Trimble said delegates were concerned the court ruling, which stated the RM’s local improvement plan was not prepared properly, would be precedent setting and could hamper future funding for other municipalities.
While the RM’s predicament did raise some concern, Trimble noted, it wasn’t enough for anyone to speak to at the convention.
“There was not any debate on it,” Trimble said of the resolution.
Unlike years past, this convention didn’t see any really controversial resolutions, he added, but did see a lot of resolutions from municipalities seeking more money for just about everything.
“That becomes a little bit of a problem because there’s only so much to go around,” he observed.
The most important resolution passed for RM of Cartier Reeve Roland Rasmussen was the one involving wastewater management systems from private dwellings and businesses, which generate a wastewater flow of less than 10,000 litres per day. A proposed regulation under the provincial government’s Environment Act would prohibit the installation of new sewage ejectors throughout the province and obligate anyone who wants to sell their property to replace the sewage ejector with a disposal field or holding tank before the land could be transferred.
The resolution passed at the convention instructed the AMM to lobby the Province of Manitoba to have the new regulation apply on a case-by-case basis where there are scientifically justified environmental concerns and identified high risk areas.
To have a blanket regulation, Rasmussen said, makes no sense.
“There is no scientific proof that these ejectors are polluting the rivers and lakes,” he said.
Rasmussen estimated the cost to replace an ejector with a holding tank or septic field ranges from $10,000-$25,000.
“It’s going to be a hell of a cost,” he noted.
If a sewage system for a house is located right next to a river, the reeve conceded, it may warrant having the ejector replaced, but if a farm is several kilometres away from a water source, it shouldn’t affect anything.
Rasmussen also applauded the passage of a resolution to lobby the provincial government to establish a medical school at the University of Brandon. That resolution was tops with City of Portage representatives, as well.
“That was one that would be important for all of Manitoba,” said Portage Coun. Orville Wagner.
Wagner, who sits on the resolutions committee for the AMM, said there was a lot of discussion about having a medical school outside of Winnipeg.
Deputy Mayor Dave Quinn said the focus of that particular resolution, which was sponsored by the RMs of Roblin, Pipestone and Shoal Lake, was to try to help rural communities recruit medical practitioners.
“This was brought up by Roblin and Pipestone and Shoal Lake with the intention that if physicians are trained in rural areas they tend to stay in rural areas,” Quinn noted.
Wagner and Quinn also pointed to the resolution sponsored by the City of Portage la Prairie as being of great importance to the province’s municipal elected officials.
That resolution, a late one that didn’t make it into the convention’s booklets but was voted on nonetheless, instructed the AMM to lobby the provincial government to amend the Municipal Act to grant the same immunity to municipal officials as currently accorded to Members of Parliament and the Manitoba Legislature. That resolution would protect municipal officials from being sued for libel or defamation for things said while deliberating, discussing or listening to matters during municipal council meetings.
“That was passed unanimously,” Quinn said.
Other resolutions that would have an impact on Portage, Quinn said, were ones calling for AMM to lobby the government for more funding for libraries, tourism and museums.
“Anything to do with tourism and generating revenue for communities is very important,” he noted.
Not all resolutions passed, though. Two of the 52 resolutions up for debate and vote were defeated, one of those being one for AMM to lobby the provincial government to study how a series of local hospital boards can be combined with Regional Health Authorities (RHA) to improve their overall effectiveness and usefulness to communities.
While Wagner said he couldn’t speak for everyone who voted against that resolution, he suspected it was defeated because people didn’t want another level of government involved with the RHAs.
“RHAs already exist and local hospital boards would just be another level of bureaucracy,” he said.
The other resolution to be defeated was one get AMM to lobby the Province of Manitoba to make water, sewer and transportation priority areas for the Building Canada Fund and all future Canada-Manitoba infrastructure programs to avoid having that money spent on recreation facilities.
But, as Wagner pointed out, most of the Building Canada Fund money has already been allocated, largely making that resolution moot. He also pointed out the Portage Credit Union Centre was one such recreation facility that benefited from the Building Canada Fund.
Also at the convention, which more than 900 delegates attended, Doug Dobrowolski was acclaimed as AMM president and Town of Rossburn Mayor Shirley Kalyniuk was acclaimed by the delegate body and will serve as the Urban Vice-President of the AMM for a fourth one-year term.
Also acclaimed to the position of Rural Vice-President was Reeve Roger Wilson from the RM of Birtle, who will serve his second term.
The guest speakers at the convention included Sen. Romeo Dallaire, who led the United Nations’ mission in Rwanda during that country’s genocide in the 1990s, and who wrote “Shake Hands with the Devil; The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda.”
“Probably the most moving speaker and the best speaker I’ve heard in years was Romeo Dallaire,” Quinn stated, noting the senator spoke for more than an hour and didn’t refer to notes a single time, speaking directly from his heart.
He talked about leadership, the deputy mayor noted, based on his experiences in Rwanda, including one instance where he found a four-year-old boy in a hut where everyone else had been killed. Dallaire said he didn’t see a starving African child in that little boy when he looked into his eyes.
“He saw the exact same look in his own four-year-old sons eyes when he left home,” Quinn related.
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