The City of Yorkton had an eventful 2014, but one which saw lessons learned from the past and one which sees positive developments moving forward. Mayor Bob Maloney recently sat down with The News Review to discuss the past year.
One thing that dominated again was flooding, with eight inches of water over a weekend leading to flooded streets and full basements. Maloney says it seems to be the new norm, and it has been a focus of the city for the past several years. While the city had been considering taking money out of the drainage budget to do something else, Maloney says the past year has proved that it still needs to be a priority for the city, especially if we keep seeing storms of the same magnitude.
The flood could have been worse, however, and Maloney says that the drainage systems installed at the moment have worked well, noting that if none of the upgrades occurred areas like Broadway would have been hit hard again. As the ground is still saturated with water and floods are predicted for the next year in some RMs already, Maloney says that there needs to be a reaction that addresses this as simply what Saskatchewan weather is now.
“I think, provincially, the government is going to need to take more strident measures to control runoff. You’ve got people who have never had water on their land, and when you’ve got a section of land flooded that’s money out of your pocket.”
With the level of rain the province is having to handle, Maloney says it’s something he has never seen before and he hopes to see an end to the years of excessive rain.
“I’m thinking a couple years with just enough rain to get a good crop would be nice.”
One of the good things the city is seeing is the upcoming opening of the Parkland College’s Trades and Technology Centre. Long in the works, and with significant investment from the city in the form of the land granted to its development, Maloney credits former mayor James Wilson as well as Yorkton MLA Greg Ottenbreit with its successful development, and once students begin attending in the fall of 2015 he sees it being a big benefit to the city.
“I think over the long term, education contributes so much to your community, through the graduates in your community. Trades and technology people are more likely to start a business, and that’s where the value is. People staying in your community in higher level jobs is a good thing, but when someone starts a business that changes the whole dynamic of what makes a community work.”
Both the flood and the development of the college have been considerations in one of big projects the city has done this year, which has been the rebuild of Dracup Ave. Much of the work is to replace an old storm sewer main that couldn’t cope with the volume of water it was required to handle, something which contributed to the hardest hit area in this year’s flood being in that area. Given that the area needed construction as it was, the plan also saw the installation of the services the Trades and Technology centre will require.
“We thought, if we’re going to tear up the street we might as well get all the work done. That’s something our former city manager Dave Putz was very committed to, planning, that will serve the city well.”
Planning has been a priority for the city, and this will continue to be a theme into the future. One of the advantages of this approach, explains Maloney, is that when federal and provincial funds become available, it’s often on short notice and the city needs to know what they need to accomplish. That means having the plans in place and ready so applications can go in and funding can be procured.
Maloney says that infrastructure is the issue all cities in the province face, and says that issues are shared province-wide, the mayor of Vonda has the same worries as he does, just on a different scale.
The city has many plans that are difficult to fund, especially as the level of funding from the federal government has been low for new projects, though Maloney says that the revenue sharing agreement with the province is the envy of other provinces. He says the city’s growth might be challenging in some ways, but allows it to accomplish what it needs to do.
“The growth in our tax base is helping us do stuff, because we have money coming in. If we weren’t growing we would be in a much worse position than we are growing, that’s something people need to understand. When you add business, when you add more jobs in your community, you’re growing your tax base which allows you to do more things. If you have no growth at all, it would be a difficult circumstance to try to balance budgets and provide services people want.”
There is also a priority to do the “fun stuff,” as Maloney describes it, the things that make the community a better place to live, things like getting two of the soccer fields near the Water Treatment Plant open for 2015, and continue working on the popular walking trail network. He says that while there are serious infrastructure needs, it’s also a priority to make the city a place people want to live.
“I love the community, the people here are so friendly. I’ve been the mayor for two years, and it can be a difficult job in many communities... people in Yorkton are so gracious.”
