A Sundre councillor recently expressed the opinion that the municipality should do more to support groups and organizations that offer a variety of recreational opportunities, especially for youth.
“The teenagers in town, I know we’ve all heard the story,” said Coun. Cheri Funke during the July 30 meeting.
“There’s nothing for them to do and it’s starting to get very apparent that they have taken to other extracurricular activities that I would prefer my child not to be doing.”
Although Funke conceded the point that organizing youth activities is not part of council’s mandate, she mused what more the municipality could do to reach out and offer assistance to help organizations inform residents about planned events. Perhaps groups could be invited as a delegation to present information to council, she suggested.
Coun. Richard Warnock reminded her that very few people attend council meetings and that such presentations would receive a limited audience. So a public open house format might be a preferable course of action, he added.
Another suggestion, brought up by Coun. Charlene Preston, was to provide an online platform that organizations could use to spread the word about upcoming plans.
All of the above are suitable and sensible options that certainly could help local groups reach more residents.
However, while council undoubtedly should include within its mandate efforts to facilitate informing the public about local events as much as possible, people also have to make an effort to inform themselves. There are already numerous initiatives in place to let the public know about upcoming plans.
Perhaps the Greenwood Neighbourhood Place Society’s monthly newsletter, Sundre On The Go, is the first to come to my mind. The Sundre Municipal Library also prepares a monthly shout-out promoting upcoming programs and activities. Both are available in a physical as well as digital format. Then, there are the numerous local organizations’ social media pages. From hockey and curling to soccer and baseball as well as basically everything in between, many associations feature their plans online.
Additionally, the municipality is developing a new website — which remains under construction — that will offer verified third parties the ability to create event listings. Even the Round Up’s page has been redesigned and will eventually feature a local community event listing. However, these are not quite complete.
This is probably also a good time to mention the upcoming ninth annual Sundre Community Recreation Registration and River Valley School Welcome Back BBQ, which takes place Thursday, Sept. 6 from 5-8 p.m. at the community centre’s gym. This event is an ideal opportunity for people to not only discover what is available in the community, but also to ask questions and learn more about the programs — ranging from dancing to scouting — before making any commitments.
The efforts of organizations and volunteers to provide local recreational opportunities are nothing less than commendable, and residents rarely need to look much further than GNP to find out what’s happening.
But no matter how much information groups compile and make available, people actually have to go out of their way to find it and should not expect details to just fall in their laps.
