Brandon mayor reflects on second pandemic year

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This article was published 31/12/2021 (1374 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Never did Rick Chrest imagine he would someday be leading Brandon through a global health crisis when he first announced his candidacy for mayor in 2014.

But here he is, 22 months into the COVID-19 pandemic, approaching the final year of his second term as the head of city council.

As mayor, you do not know the challenges your community will face. The one thing you can guarantee is that there will be challenges.

“No matter what you envision … the issues, challenges, ups and downs will never be precisely what you expect because there’s always going to be unforeseen things,” Chrest told the Sun in a year-end interview earlier this month.

“That said, though, you do expect that you may be dealing with emergencies.”

Brandon had no shortage of emergencies this year. In addition to the pandemic, the city faced significant fires, consequences from climate change disasters, and its own legacy in relation to the discovery of bodies at former residential school sites.

A second pandemic year meant the city had some of the tools necessary to navigate another round against the health crisis.

Months after the province’s vaccine rollout began, Chrest was happy to report that close to 85 per cent of the Brandon population has been immunized against the virus.

Vaccines meant the local economy could reopen to full capacity and cherished community events that were cancelled last year could return to the city.

“We’re in a better place, obviously, for the economic health of our community and our residents — [a] much better place,” Chrest said.

“That said, some of the social considerations in our community continue to be a challenge. And, over the period of the pandemic, we have, unfortunately, definitely seen an uptick in some elements of poverty, homelessness, food access, mental health issues, addictions.”

To combat some of these challenges, the city developed and supported a number of initiatives this year, including the Community Wellness Collaborative, a community housing and wellness co-ordinator, and the Downtown Wellness and Safety Task Force.

The task force, designed to identify issues of cleanliness and security in downtown Brandon, as well as develop solutions to those matters, received an overwhelming number of applications.

“That was very gratifying to see that there [were] that many people that were interested in putting up their hand and wanting to help out the situation,” Chrest said.

“The virtue of Brandon is that we’re big enough to have lots of things, lots of amenities, lots of organizations, lots of individuals that are prepared to roll up their sleeves and get involved. And yet we’re still small enough where most of the people kind of know each other. And so therefore, the opportunity to connect the dots and work collaboratively is better.”

Not only was collaboration possible at the community level, but with provincial and federal levels of government, too.

Brandon has enjoyed a positive relationship with the province, as well as the Liberal members of Parliament in Winnipeg, who have direct access to the federal governing party, Chrest said. This has helped the city secure funding from both levels of government for projects like the Sportsplex — for which $11.5 million has been committed — and a substantial water treatment plant upgrade and expansion, which has received $125 million.

The water plant — “the biggest project in Brandon’s history” — will be especially important moving into the future, Chrest said, considering the impact climate change has had on other communities in Manitoba. The City of Morden, for example, applied strict water restrictions in the spring to deal with the threat of water shortages amid extreme drought conditions.

The mayor noted the success of this year’s Flood Protection Subsidy Program, for which the city initially allocated $100,000 in spring. Last year’s major flooding event precipitated the city’s funding initiative for sump pumps and backwater valves.

“Almost every municipality’s infrastructure could [have] never been designed and built to take these huge surges that we’ve had. We had a couple of pretty big ones this summer. But certainly, the big kahuna was the summer of 2020, where we had probably two months worth of rain in a few hours, just overcharged everything and caused enormous flooding.

“So as a result of that, we’re kind of responding with significant planning. You’ll see the possibility of significant investments that we’re going to be needing to make.”

The city’s upcoming budget deliberations in January could reveal such investments. It will be the current council’s last budget before voters head to the polls on Oct. 26, 2022.

Chrest could not say for sure if he plans on seeking re-election, but told the Sun it is a decision he intends to reveal in February. With zero competition in 2018, he was acclaimed Brandon’s mayor. Although it allowed him to continue serving the city, Chrest admitted it is healthy to have some competition.

“Elections do draw out ideas and energy. It’s the way our system was designed and the way our system works the best. We need strong competition for every position — every ward, mayor’s seat, school board. That’s the best for our community.”

In terms of civic engagement, Chrest said voters heading to the polls is another thing he is concerned about. “Voter turnout has been going backwards, and that troubles me.”

There was an approximate 2.64 per cent voter turnout in the Ward 5 (Meadows-Waverly) byelection in May. Chrest noted the unusual pandemic circumstances may have contributed to this. However, the unofficial voter turnout in the 2018 municipal election was only 16.86 per cent, according to media reports.

“We’ve got a very engaged, thoughtful, spirited community,” he said, but hopes Brandonites will pay more attention to civic politics in the future.

On a final note, there was possibly only one other theme that dominated 2021, aside from the pandemic.

Reconciliation.

Chrest said the year was marked by efforts of collaboration between Brandon and surrounding First Nations communities and confronting the impacts of the former Brandon Indian Residential School.

He highlighted the efforts of the Brandon Urban Aboriginal Peoples’ Council (BUAPC) to facilitate these relationships.

“[They’ve] done just a fabulous job of building bridges in our community between First Nations organizations and non-First Nations organizations. It’s just come a long way.”

BUAPC co-ordinated many of the local elements of the first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, which Brandon recognized through a weeklong series of events in September.

“I think that Brandon — we have a long way to go, but we’re on a pretty good path,” Chrest said.

“But I believe our community is trying hard to follow our own path of reconciliation, and we’re making improvements every day.”

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