Two Borders council downsizing, ward changes pass

The Municipality of Two Borders council approved a bylaw to reduce its number of councillors and redraw its wards after a public hearing Thursday evening.

The 7-3 vote will see council shrink to five councillors from nine, while keeping the reeve position. The three current wards will also be reconfigured into five wards.

Reeve Sandra Clark said the approval from council is what she expected to happen.

“I’m not surprised by the result — it’s the same result as we had in 2024 when we first made this map,” Clark said Friday morning.

“I’m happy that it’s done in lots of time before the general election, and that gives the Municipal Board more time to review it.”

The province’s review is standard procedure for changes made by councils.

The public hearing had seven residents ask questions about how council arrived at the new ward layout, how reducing the number of councillors will save the municipality money and how a smaller council can handle the municipality’s needs, Clark said.

“The meeting sort of went as we anticipated,” she said.

The new system would see the municipality save $40,800 on councillor wages alone. The new wards will also be more similar to each other in population.

Two Borders became a municipality in 2015 after the province forced all municipalities with less than 1,000 residents to merge. The old municipalities of Albert, Arthur and Edward became Two Borders, with three wards representing the former municipalities.

Currently, those three wards have three councillors each, although they have different populations, which didn’t align with the Municipal Act.

If the province approves the change, the new wards will come into effect for the October 2026 election.

Most of the new ward boundaries run from the North Dakota border to the northern edge of the municipality, and that’s part of the reason one councillor voted against the change.

“The way they were going to divide the (wards) were ridiculous,” said Ward 2 Coun. Bob Renwick on Friday. “It was right from one border to the other. I didn’t care for that.”

He said a better way to redraw the wards would be to follow the boundaries of the former municipalities where possible.

Another problem Renwick said he had was cutting the number of councillors in the first place.

“You can’t be everywhere, you know. It takes a lot of people to cover everything.”

He said because of this decision, he might not run again in next year’s election.

Neighbouring municipalities Brenda-Waskada and Pipestone each have six councillors, Grassland has seven and Sifton has eight. The Town of Melita, which is surrounded by Two Borders, has only four councillors.

Association of Manitoba Municipalities executive director Denys Volkov said municipalities know what’s best for their communities.

“There is no silver bullet on how you structure your council,” he said.

“We look at democratically elected councils — they make the best decisions for their community,” Volkov said. “If council voted for that model, then you know that they felt that is the best model for them.”

The changes should be approved by the province before next year’s election, a spokesperson for Municipal and Northern Relations Minister Glen Simard told the Sun.

Simard reached out to the municipality Friday, following earlier contact, said Caedmon Malowany.

“These kinds of moves aren’t done in a vacuum. The department worked with the municipality to let them know what they could and could not do,” Malowany said. “Since they consulted with us on what they wanted to do, likely there’s going to be no concern.”

» alambert@brandonsun.com