MOUNTAIN VIEW COUNTY - County council has approved having reeve Angela Albers and councillor Alan Miller participate in a new provincial regional airport collaboration working group, which has been formed to promote and advocate for municipal airports with the Alberta government.
Mountain View County owns the Olds-Didsbury and Sundre airports.
The working group was formed following the recent Rural Municipalities of Alberta fall conference, when municipal elected officials, including Aalbers, met with MLA Shane Getson, parliamentary secretary for economic corridor development, council heard.
Following that meeting, Getson suggested it would be valuable for municipal representatives to form a working group in order to collaborate on best practices and to advocate to the province, Chris Atchison, director of legislative services told council.
An initial meeting of the working group was held Nov. 22 with representatives from Mountain View County, the City of Lloydminster, Drayton Valley and Clearwater County in attendance.
“During that meeting there was a lot of discussion around next steps and compilation of information and what resources would be available,” said Atchison.
“As such, we thought it would be appropriate to first seek council’s approval of our participation on this working group, which will have some resource requirements from administration as well as councillor remuneration to participate.”
Reeve Aalbers said, “I think it is a good working committee and if we can get some of these things though MLA Getson and get to the province on this, I think it will align very well with our economic development strategy. I think it also give us a lot of information about other airports that are comparable to Sundre and Olds-Didsbury.”
Coun. Peggy Johnson said, “I think it is an excellent initiative. I think it is a really good use of resources and there’s lots of good information out there we can glean through this and lots the networking that can be done that can translate into good things for economic development.”
Input will be sought from the county’s aviation advisory committee going forward, said Aalbers.
“I think it important that we get that input from our pilots and our airport users,” said Aalbers.
Coun. Miller said the group’s efforts could lead to future grant opportunities.
Municipalities would like to better understand where regional airports fit in with provincial plans to increase the transportation network and enhance economic development and diversification, Aalbers said.
Minutes from the Nov. 22 meeting were presented to council.
At that meeting participants held discussions in areas such as provincial/federal legislation, search and rescue/fire/air ambulances, and economic development, outlining municipal asks and future work required.
Regarding search and rescue/fire/air ambulances, the municipal ask was “Is there a larger role for regional airports to play in search and rescue/fire/air ambulance?”
The work required including answering questions such as “What are the regional airports currently being used for with respect to emergency services? What role do we think they should play in emergency services and what provincial amendments are required to make that happen?”
The working group is expected to meet again early in 2024.
Council carried a motion supporting Aalbers, Coun. Miller and administration’s participation on the working group.
