Council hears audit update

DIDSBURY - Town council received a brief update from CAO Harold Northcott regarding the Didsbury Fire Department (DFD) safety audit during a special council meeting on Aug. 14.

Northcott said the town will likely be hiring Edelweiss Safety Solutions from Okotoks for the safety audit, although it's not quite a "done deal."

"They have 25 years' experience doing these audits," Northcott told council. "The cost on this will be somewhere between $4,500 and $5,000. What we don't have at this point is their recommendations, so it's not a done deal. In the discussions I've had with him, he felt we would probably have everything back to council on September 25."

The fire department safety audit is one of the steps the town and DFD are taking in response to eight firefighters resigning recently over concerns of safety and leadership in the department.

The concerns came out as part of a report by an independent organization, Caliber Planning, which was released to the public on July 25.

Coun. Bill Windsor asked how the town was doing in regards to following the recommendations from Caliber Planning.

"At this point, Deron (Reimer, manager of protective services) is on vacation," replied Northcott. "The fire chief (Craig Martin) and Deron have been working on this prior to Deron leaving last Friday (for vacation). So they've been working diligently on that. So they'll bring that forward. On September 11 (at the regular council meeting) we'll give you an update on that; all the policies they're working on so they can bring it to council for council's approval."

Northcott told council that it would be "a lot of work" since they were basically starting from scratch.

"It's not an enviable position for the fire chief, or Deron as well," he said. "It will be a lot of work to bring this all up to speed. All indications from Deron so far is that they've been working quite hard on this to get this information ready. On September 11 I plan on bringing several policies back to you."