WEYBURN – The highlight of the year for Weyburn-Big Muddy MLA Dustin Duncan was the opening of Weyburn’s state-of-the-art school, Legacy Park Elementary, while the biggest challenge of the year was dealing with COVID issues in 2021.
In a year-end interview, the Education Minister pinpointed the grand opening of the new school as easily the best part of his year, as Legacy Park opened alongside the City of Weyburn’s new Credit Union Spark Centre in September.
Duncan noted the opening of Legacy Park was the end of the school upgrades planned over a number of years by Southeast Cornerstone that included the renovations and new construction at the Weyburn Comprehensive School.
The building of this school led to the closure of three schools, Haig, Souris and Queen Elizabeth, with the latter torn down this year, and the staff and students of these schools are now all under one roof at Legacy Park.
“It’s a culmination of a lot of effort and planning over a number of years. That would be the highlight of the year for me,” he said.
The MLA also pointed out that for the province, there was about $10 billion of new capital spending announced by the private sector, including canola crush plants and a new potash mine, which will end up as the largest potash mine in the world once it’s completed.
There has also been an increase in work in the oil sector, and exploration for helium and lithium has also been taking place around the province.
Asked about Weyburn’s new hospital, he said, “The plan is still to get the tenders out in 2022, which will be awarded to a construction firm. I think we’ll be seeing the progress, including shovels in the ground.”
The plans for the services and layout of the hospital are being worked on, and once those are approved by cabinet, including the budget for the facility, then the tender documents will be drawn up.
In regard to COVID, he said, “I think this has been one of the most challenging years to be in government, to be at the table to make decisions. It’s been a challenging year as we try to navigate a global pandemic.”
Even at his constituency office, this has been difficult for him, as people on both sides of COVID issues have called him or emailed him their comments and criticisms, as his government either needs to do more, or to do much less. Duncan added there have some very difficult long conversations by phone with people, often an hour or more, as they argue their positions.
“It’s a heightened time in terms of emotions. Everyone is right or wrong. They can be pretty heated conversations and pretty emotional on all sides of it,” said Duncan. “It’s like everything else – you don’t always have all the answers.”
In his portfolio as Education minister, he’s also been dealing with issues around COVID and schools.
“It’s been a challenging year, and I’m not a health care worker. I don’t own a restaurant, so I’m not being hit by decisions,” he said.
Duncan noted that the vaccination numbers are going in the right direction, “and at some point, the pandemic is going to end, however or what ever that looks like. I have to think we’ve been through the worst of this, all things considered.”
Overall, the MLA said of the coming year, “There’s a lot to be optimistic about, whether you look at commodity prices or export numbers. We’ve recovered most of the jobs we lost due to the pandemic, and capital projects have been announced. I think there’s a lot to look forward to in 2022.”
