AMM deals with 66 issues at annual conference

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This article was published 25/11/2011 (5245 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Infrastructure and watershed strategies will be key components of the Association of Manitoba Municipalities’ lobbying efforts, president Doug Dobrowolski said.

“This past summer, we did our campaign to put communities first to try and highlight the infrastructure deficit in Manitoba,” said Dobrowolski, also a councillor with the RM of Macdonald. “(On Thursday morning) we met with the premier and cabinet and last week, I had a discussion with the premier on infrastructure deficits and how we are going to start paying for these things.”

Those issues, which in some way affects every municipality in Manitoba, may require innovative thinking to resolve, such as public-private arrangements to bridge the financing gap. One example of an extreme shortfall is the City of Brandon, which would need $165 million to fix existing needs for roads, sewers and water services.

“You can’t do it all at once, but you have to start somewhere,” Dobrowolski said. “We have to stop talking and start somewhere. The more we delay it, the more expensive it gets.”

RM of Birtle Reeve Roger Wilson, the AMM’s rural vice-president, said flooding and water management issues were a hot topic during a busy schedule of resolution debates.

“There’s always new things and this year in Manitoba the flood dominated pretty much all of our summer,” Wilson said. “Our municipality was impacted significantly more than it ever has been before, but we were spared the big hurt a lot of other communities around the lakes suffered. Pretty much everywhere in southwestern Manitoba had impacts from the flood. We will be dealing with that aftermath and we are still fighting that flood. Municipalities are on the front line.”

This year, 66 resolutions were debated, over the course of the four-day event.

“These resolutions give us our focus and direction for our year’s lobbying efforts,” Wilson said. “Often, the issues we have on the books don’t change an awful lot. The resolutions give us a little more ammunition.”

Dobrowolski said the convention, the first in Brandon after AMM resumed its inclusion of the Wheat City as a rotating host of the event, was a success on all fronts.

“They have put on a great show here,” he said. “We are very happy to come back.”

ELECTIONS — No ballots were cast for three board and executive positions as they were filled by acclamations. Wilson will remain as the AMM’s rural vice president, while Gladstone Mayor Eileen Clark stays on as urban vice-president. Town of Carberry Coun. Stuart Olmstead earned his first term on the AMM board as the western district urban director.