There are many notches on Sundre's proverbial belt indicating the municipality is not only sustainable but also actually growing.
There are many notches on Sundre's proverbial belt indicating the municipality is not only sustainable but also actually growing.
In no particular order, some of those notches include the fact the community has seen its population increase over the past several years, councils past and present have built up substantial reserves and even boasted modest surpluses leading to low debt servicing, as well as a record number of people stopping by the Visitor Information Centre last year.
And of course there's the undeniable strength of the local economy made resilient through diversity — oil and gas, forestry, agriculture, outdoor recreation and tourism all play a major part in ensuring Sundre's long-term viability.
Although Coun. Myron Thompson recently faced some heated criticism from colleagues as well as members of the public after he introduced a notice of motion to initiate a sustainability review through Municipal Affairs, the veteran councillor was not wrong to start a discussion to convince once and for all any skeptics who express doubts about Sundre's viability.
"Are we viable? Yes," said Mayor Terry Leslie during a council discussion on the matter at the Jan. 30 meeting, when Thompson withdrew his motion but encouraged council to pursue an internal review.
"But why are we viable? Our (low) debt level, our plans that we have in place, the addressing of leaks in our water and wastewater system, the fact that we have reserves of $5 million that we put away for projects, the fact that we're going to spend $700,000 to $800,000 in the next year, but we're also going to put away that much in reserves," the mayor said, adding councils past and present have increased the amount of funds in reserves to cover capital project costs while still managing to decrease the municipality's debt burden.
"We know that there has to be a balance. We're not near approaching our maximum debt level, nor do we want to."
But those figures aren't all compiled comprehensively yet, and those answers should be put together, which will take some time to do. Helping that process along, the mayor suggested, is a self-assessment questionnaire from Municipal Affairs that can be filled out in-house.
"We need to have some facts first so that we can go through this with a little bit of clarity and understanding. Then I think we need to go to the public," he said, receiving council's support to begin working with administration on coming up with ideas and options on moving forward.
Simply declaring that Sundre is sustainable is one thing, but having a comprehensive document outlining specifically why the municipality is viable will provide an additional tool to convince people who are considering investing in our community.
Sounds like a worthy pursuit for council to dedicate time to.
— Simon Ducatel, editor
