Bowden council agrees to ball diamond lease

Bowden town council voted Feb. 13 to renew its lease with the Bowden Agricultural Society for use of the ball diamonds adjacent to the agriculture grounds for a further one-year term. The move was made after a presentation from the BAS about working together more closely with the town on community projects.

While Keith Bailey, president of the BAS, said he would like to continue to offer up the diamonds to the community, councillors expressed some concern about the town continuing to provide maintenance to the facilities that only two or three Bowden residents use. Most of the use of the diamonds comes from ballplayers in Innisfail and Olds, while the town cuts grass, rakes the infield and provides shale to the infield, among other maintenance items. The town doesn't specifically track the amount of money it spends maintaining the diamonds, instead putting that in general expenses.

“It's got backstops and dugouts and everything already so it's a shame to walk away from it (but) we're subsidizing out-of-town people to use (the diamonds),” Mayor Robb Stuart said.

Coun. Wayne Milaney lamented the fact that another community resource might be lost, due to lack of use. He said while the town tries to provide facilities for residents' use, not many people are taking advantage of them.

“It seems every time we do something like this, we keep going backwards. It's sad to see,” he said.

Bailey said he would like to see the ball diamonds kept up by the town so the BAS could provide those facilities to residents.

“I'd like to see the ball diamonds stay in use because the town needs facilities … for people to use. If you take the ball diamonds away, that's not very good for the (community), I don't think,” he said.

Bailey also said the BAS is interested in partnering with the town and the recreation board on other community projects as well.

Bylaws updated

Council updated the water, wastewater and solid waste bylaws at the last council meeting. Rates to the customer haven't changed from last year in any of the bylaws. Rather, wording changes were made to the bylaws, updating terminology and other minor changes. The bylaws haven't received a major update since 2002.

“Our goal in reviewing bylaws and policies are to address those things that council has identified as priorities first and then go from there,” said Andy Weiss, chief administrative officer for the town.

Some of the things that will be up for discussion in the upcoming weeks include the Land Use Bylaw and Municipal Development Plan that are currently under review, the traffic bylaw and the unsightly premises bylaw.