OLDS — Garage and yard sales are temporarily banned in Olds due to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Council unanimously passed a bylaw to that effect during its April 27 meeting.
“All garage sales and/or yard sales are prohibited within the town of Olds; and garage sales and yard sales may not be held at any driveway, dwelling, garage, premises, property, or public place,” the bylaw says.
Anyone found to be breaking that bylaw could be fined up to $10,000 or jailed for up to six months if they don’t pay that fine within 14 days of it being issued to them.
Town officials wanted to get a bylaw in place quickly because as CAO Michael Merritt said, now that spring has arrived, it’s prime time for garage and yard sales as people clean up their properties.
He said the bylaw will likely be refined if necessary over the next couple of weeks.
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A memo accompanying the bylaw said a call to impose the ban came from Brian Powell, the town’s director of emergency management.
“Aggressive public health measures are being implemented provincewide to limit the spread of COVID-19 and protect Albertans,” the memo said.
“All Albertans are strongly encouraged to follow public health guidance and do their part to keep themselves and their communities safe through good hygiene practices, social distancing, and other protective measures.
“Due to the widespread nature of cascading effects impacting the public, the Town of Olds is taking COVID-19 extremely seriously and putting in place temporary restrictions to help slow the spread of the virus.”
Community services director Doug Wagstaff told council the bylaw “imposes reasonable limits on bad activity” during “a public health crisis that we’re endeavouring to prevent from hitting our community in any widespread way.
“We approach it in good faith and with reasonableness.”
At the suggestion of councillors Mary Jane Harper and Heather Ryan, three provisions deemed to be unnecessary were dropped from the proposed bylaw, at which point the amended bylaw received unanimous approval.
Coun. Heather Ryan had raised some concern that the bylaw didn’t explicitly say it’s temporary, but other councillors didn’t seem to see it that way.
“Every bylaw technically is temporary,” mayor Mike Muzychka said.
“OK, that’s fine,” Ryan said.
