Saskatchewan’s non-renewable resource revenue should be excluded from the federal equalization formula with the money used for infrastructure projects in the province, says a village in the heart of the Bakken play.
The Village of Torquay wants the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA) to advocate for the proposition on behalf of its membership.
“[Other] provinces have stood in the way of Saskatchewan getting its natural resources to market, while also asking Saskatchewan to do more with respect to climate change,” says the village’s proposed resolution, to be discussed at the association’s convention next month.
Mayor Michael Strachan told the Daily Oil Bulletin that if SUMA supports of his council’s resolution, it would demonstrate to the next premier where Saskatchewan’s urban municipalities stand on the equalization formula when negotiations begin in 2019.
“Our small community is right in the heart of the Bakken, and right now we have eight rigs running right around Torquay,” he said. “We see the benefits from oil and gas for our community, and these funds going into equalization to provide for other provinces that don’t really want to be involved in oil and gas production is something we think should come back to Saskatchewan and be used for infrastructure in our province.”
Sean McKenzie, senior policy advisor at SUMA, told the DOB any elected council from an urban municipality can propose a resolution and they all are considered at the annual convention assuming they apply to municipalities in general and are not merely local issues for the proposing community.
“If the membership approves [the resolutions], they become more or less the focus of our advocacy efforts with government,” he said. “They are our advocacy efforts for the next year, and they stay on our books for three years.”
However, he added, SUMA members do not necessarily approve all proposed resolutions at their convention. In fact, according to McKenzie, on any given year probably a quarter of proposed resolutions will not pass. “It certainly varies from year to year, as does the number of resolutions we receive.”
Strachan hopes a majority of Saskatchewan municipalities will support Torquay’s proposed resolution and looks forward to discussing its validity. Non-renewable natural resources deplete over time, and once they are gone, that it is, he pointed out. If jurisdictions will not support oil and gas producing provinces such as Saskatchewan, then Strachan thinks unsupportive jurisdictions should not be receive that precious revenue.
“For Saskatchewan to be paying extra money into the federal pot, and then all the sudden these resources are gone, we would rather see this money benefit not only our municipalities, but First Nations that have an infrastructure deficit in this province, and they need money to fix it.”
Alternatively, he hopes the resolution, if SUMA approved, serves to demonstrate to other provinces just how important the oil and gas industry is to Canada, and they perhaps start to show greater support for the country’s resource development.
Other energy sector-related resolutions up for consideration at the convention in Regina includes one from the town of Moosomin that suggests SUMA meet with TransCanada Corporation to “explore the next steps for the Energy East pipeline project to proceed” in light of Montréal having elected a new mayor in November 2017.
This year’s SUMA convention will be held in Regina Feb. 4-7.
