OUTLOOK - The town council of Outlook met for a regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday night, March 22. Present was all of Council; Bob Stephenson, Sharon Bruce, Justin Turton, Kyle McLeod, Ryan Husband, and Kevin Grotheim, as well as Mayor Maureen Weiterman, Chief Administrative Officer Kevin Trew, and Assistant Administrator Rachel Sillers.
The meeting was broadcast on the Town of Outlook's Facebook page.
A number of topics and items were discussed, including the following highlights.
A delegation presentation from SaskPower with Alexis Doyle and Travis Sandeski was omitted from the schedule.
Recreation Report
Prepared by Megan Anthony
Jim Kook RecPlex
Skating Ice Time
We have sold 124.75 hours of ice time in February out of a possible 367 hours. We have offered a total of 138.50 hours of school skating, open ice, public skate, parent and tot and shinny. In total, we utilized 263.25 hours of ice time out of 367 possible hours. The 390 hours is based on us being open from 8:00 am-11:00 pm, 7 days a week using every possible hour for ice rentals.
Bowling Use
We had people using the bowling alley for a total of 62 hours in February which included bowling leagues, private rentals and drop in times.
Curling Use
We saw 58 hours of curling ice used in February. This included school bookings, curling club and private rentals.
Civic Center
The Civic Center was used 12 days out of 28 days in February.
Van Raay and Community Swimming Pool
Swimming Pool season is right around the corner! The pool hiring is 90% complete. I have a few interviews left to do as some of the applicants were away on holidays during the February break. Brennan Hefner was awarded the Pool Manager position for the 2023 pool season which we are all very excited about. He will remain a full time employee with the Town, working at the RecPlex in the Winter and Swimming Pool in the Summer. We will have 8 instructors/lifeguards, 2 lifeguards, 2 junior lifeguards and 3 pool cashiers this year. Most of the staff are returning but we have a few new applicants this year which is great to see! The swimming lesson schedule has been posted and we are aiming to do online swimming lesson registration after the Easter break in April.
Management
February was a busy month for administrative tasks. I completed the GICB grant and submitted it on February 28th. I am very happy with the work and guidance our consultants provided during this process. We organized a community registration night which took place March 13th from 6pm-8pm at the Civic Center. I am happy to share that we will be partnering up with OHS to do a trial run of swimming lessons and fitness classes within the Phys-Ed curriculum for grades 6-12 this summer - there is still a lot of planning to do with this project and my goal is to open it up to OES and LCBI for the 2024 pool season. A long term goal for this project is to offer the Bronze Medallion/Cross (certificate to become a junior lifeguard) courses to students 13+ during their Phys-Ed classes and offer an NLA (certificate to become a senior lifeguard) for students 15+ during their Phys-Ed classes. Students can obtain a high school credit through the NLA program as well so I feel it is important and beneficial for both partners to work together to provide this service to the teenagers in our community. I have been meeting and working with some non-profit organizations in our community to understand their future goals and plans and where they may have challenges. I have assisted them in small but large ways by passing on resources that may help them with their challenges. I plan on working with our community consultants within the Prairie Central District to possibly host a board governance course in Outlook as a lot of people on the non-profit boards feel they could use some training to understand their role as a board member. I am excited to dip my toes into the Community/Economic Development side of my position.
Public Works Report
Prepared by Luke Lockhart
Transportation:
- In anticipation of warmer weather and melting, we have started opening up water ways, swails, and catch basin drains, as well as moving or hauling snow from historical problematic areas. All pumps have been serviced, and tested and should be ready for spring runoff.
- While we haven’t experienced any accumulation of show as of late, we have kept up on sanding and scraping areas where water collects and freezes.
- Digouts on the highway for the water and sewer rehabilitation project have been filled and packed a few times over the last few weeks; we will continue to monitor and touch these up as needed.
- Data has been updated on our Infrastructure (paving) plan and is in the process of being tidied up into an easier presentable format. This working document will be getting a major facelift over the next year to better suit our desired use of it; currently is street by street, but will be broke down into block by block to easier identify and predict future needs.
Utilities:
- We will be hosting a workshop for Saskatchewan Water and Wastewater Association on sewage lagoon operations on March 8th with 5 members of our team attending.
- Moving forward with our raw water supply project, we will be setting up a temporary pump in one of the infiltration wells that were previously drilled to better determine the quality of water provided matches or exceeds that of the current delivery method.
Environmental Health:
- We have applied for renewal of our permit to operate the landfill and don’t expect any issues to come during the permit process.
- Landfill staff are currently taking training on operations, as well as some computer courses to better utilize our scale and software.
General Public Works:
- We have used this “slower” time to do a bunch of extra cleaning and organizing at the shop and our out buildings.
- Our newest staff members have started, and will continue to take job specific training such as confined space entry, hoisting and rigging, fall protection, power mobile equipment, etc. over the next few weeks to ensure compliance and workplace safety.
Chief Administrative Officer Report
Prepared by Kevin Trew
Human Resources:
• We are in the midst of recruiting personnel for the Van Raay and Community Pool for the summer with interviews taking place over the next couple of weeks – this summer we will not have Chantelle Segovia as the manager of the pool as she has taken a permanent position elsewhere. We are very confident that we will have a suitable replacement developed in house and we will confirm that very soon.
• In addition, our recreation staff will be shifting from winter to summer schedules soon, we don’t anticipate funding for summer staff at the 2021 level and we will not be hiring many additional staff other than pool staff.
• We are looking at the possibility of hiring an office student again; in addition we have committed to hiring a library summer programming student, our team at the library is very excited to take this on as they had a small taste of that in 2022 and hope to build on that success in 2023.
• The Kinsmen Park program will see some additional hiring although we hope to build on the successful partnership with Small Steps Early Learning Centre with a very positive program in 2022 followed up be an equally fantastic program in 2023.
• Unfortunately, Whittney has had to go on a short term health leave while she recovers from surgery; we have also heard from Darren who has learned that he is expected to return to work in July, our Public Works Team is beginning to make plans for his expected return.
• With the rink wrapping up later this month, we will soon say goodbye to those team members, it looks like generally the season has been a success and we look forward to financial reports reflecting that.
Policy and Procedural Items:
• The 2022 audit review has gone quite well, with the auditing firm of Jensen Stromberg attending our office once again; we should have a draft audited statement for Council to review in early to mid April.
• The 2023 assessment maintenance files have just been completed with SAMA, so we expect assessment notices to be sent out before the end of March to those property owners that are new owners in 2022, had a change in assessment or have requested us to review the assessment numbers in the past year.
Even if someone does not receive an assessment notice they CAN appeal their assessment during the assessment appeal period (while the roll is open); owners simply need to reach out to us prior to April 10 and we can send them an assessment notice even if it is not automatically triggered.
• We are excited to be planning our 3rd open house, this one set for April 5 in the evening. We are confident we will have a host of people turning up to get information on the various things going on with the Town – 2023 promises to be a very busy summer with a number of major projects coming to fruition; we will certainly be busy! Along with Town staff and presentations at the open house, we are looking for community groups to have booths as well; anyone interested should call Crystal at the office.
Successes this Month:
• Audit preparation – it isn’t fancy nor is it a very popular endeavour but our admin staff has put together a pretty methodical approach to the audit and, as often is the case, our auditor is generally a pleasure to host – it is a testament to the fine work our team does in the office to keep track of finances.
• Recruitment of volunteers to participate in committees – it really is an awesome community, when we ask for volunteers to serve positions, we are getting them – the cemetery advisory committee has been building up momentum and we have a few people stepping up to volunteer, it will be very exciting to see where this all goes in the next few years; in addition, we have a great team of volunteers with the Community Development Advisory Committee; these community champions are helping us achieve lofty goals and motivating our team to do even more in regards to tourism and community and economic development while continuing with recreation projects.
• Joint Council Meeting – we held a very successful joint meeting of Councils on March 1 with the RM of Rudy Council and staff – we discussed many topics of mutual interest and overall it is fantastic to be able to collaborate with a great group from the surrounding RMs. We look forward to a similar meeting held soon with the RM of Fertile Valley Council.
Learning Opportunities/Capacity Development:
• The sign up for PAD, pre-authorized payment, of utility and tax accounts continues to leave a lot to be desired; while we continue letting people know of the possibility, it doesn’t seem to attract many people to it; we can’t stress enough the convenience of PAD and how much more secure and easier it is to set up instead of post dated cheques (our goal is to discontinue this practice very soon) Anyone wishing to sign up for PAD should give us a call, we can do this over the phone. Pre-payment of taxes gets a few dollars off in discount in these early months of 2023, lightening the load closer to Christmas.
Current Unfinished Projects:
• Highway Water, Sewer and Storm Water Replacement – Phase 2 is being presented to our Phase 1 contractor for pricing – there will be significant traffic shutdowns in the spring and early summer, we will be informing businesses and residential property owners along the highway very soon. Businesses can expect a visit where we expect feedback; residential property owners can expect a letter in the mail; we expect and appreciate feedback; now, more than ever, it is imperative that this work be completed so that we can accommodate a future Highway 15 rehabilitation project.
• Storm Water Outfalls rehabilitation – Accurate HD is expected to complete the outfall rehabilitation project this summer.
• Landfill Decommissioning of Old Cell – The source material has been secured – the tender is advertised and the end date is in March – the completion of this project is expected by September 30 of this year.
• Raw Water Intake/ Water Treatment Plant Upgrade Project –This project is divided into two parts - Our engineer is completing the design of the Water Treatment Plant Upgrade and we expect this to go to tender very soon; we will be doing further testing of the water from the test wells located on the east side of the river (adjacent to the golf course) March through most of April.
• Subdivisions Projects
o Railway Commercial/Industrial – it looks very promising that we will be making an announcement very soon regarding a new development start in the subdivision.
o Highway Commercial – CP Rail has indicated that they would be willing to lease us the land for a 1 in 500 retention pond as well as for source material for the Mann Street Subdivision when we are ready; this is great news – we will be looking at a lease agreement with them very soon.
o Residential – No news to report at this time.
• New Zoning Bylaw – Urban Systems has reported that they expect the first draft to be available at the open house April 5 and that they will take any feedback from the open house and then present it to Council for first reading – we will have a public meeting following first reading and will go from there.
Future Projects:
• There is a growing number of people wishing to discuss the Skytrail bridge – we are planning an information session this summer and will invite different community champions to discuss their commitment to the future of the bridge in Outlook as well as hear from people with capacities and expertise who want to help us get it reopened.
• We are looking forward to opening a few more properties up for tender very soon and we will be wrapping up the sales agreements with the successful bidders from the February tender very soon.
• The Town Hall Complex parking lot project will be proceeding as planned in 2023
• Our application was submitted for the Green and Inclusive Communities Building Grant where we applied for upgrades and enhancements to the Jim Kook Recreation Complex.
• We are eagerly awaiting news regarding a U22 Female Junior Hockey Franchise – we should hear very soon if this is a reality for our community.
• Our team is working at delivering on many of the capital projects planned for 2023 and they are keeping all of us working together to make them a success.
Bylaws
Council held the first reading of two bylaws: Bylaw 2(2023) Utility Administration Bylaw and Bylaw 3(2023) Water-Sewer Rates Bylaw. It was noted that the Town is switching to a monthly billing cycle from the quarterly one, citing concerns from some people related to affordability. Omitted from discussion were Bylaws 1 and 4(2023), in relation to Landfill Operations and Solid Waste Collection.
Reports of Administration
In discussing recommendations for Council to consider stemming from the Community Development Advisory Committee, it was noted that an increase in rent was being sought for the Outlook Gymnastics Club. The club has used upstairs space in the Jim Kook Rec Plex for years, and a new rate of $4800 per year was being recommended.
Though it was said that the current rates hadn't changed in over ten years, Councillor Stephenson said that a meeting with the Gymnastics Club may be needed to address some things before a new rate is officially passed.
Council next discussed a petition that was presented to the Town, brought forth by Matthew Lawless, which included the desire for a public meeting to be held in Outlook. The petition was received on March 2 and was deemed insufficient under a number of criteria under The Municipalities Act.
Discussing it, Councillor Grotheim said that he saw no issue with holding a public meeting, but there needs to be a set agenda for discussion as opposed to a vague and unclear direction.
It was said that if there were questions that people had, they were encouraged to either visit the Mayor during one of her weekly Monday sessions at the town offices building or attend the community open house event at the Civic Centre on April 5. Councillor Turton felt that there were enough avenues for questions to be asked, citing the upcoming event and Mayor Weiterman's weekly availability.
The issue will be left alone as is for the time being.
New Business
Three names have come forward to be added to the Cemetery Advisory Committee and the motion was made and carried to accept them. This now makes for eight people in the group, with six members of the public and two members of Council.
Discussing tax incentive applications for storefront enhancement, the motion to approve town businesses Lumber Plus and Jacq'y Jaye's Boutique was accepted and carried. There are five grants to be awarded per year, up to a maximum of $5,000. Another applicant, Reel Theatre, was found to be ineligible at this time for the incentive.
On the topic of an upcoming SAMA annual meeting, Councillors Turton and Husband were appointed as delegates and will attend the meeting virtually.
