Town of Sundre council has voted not to participate in a one-day facilitated economic development strategic planning session.
The session was requested by administration officials last month and after several discussions, council opposed the idea during the council meeting on July 2.
During the meeting, mayor Annette Clews said she does not support spending $3,500 of the town's money to conduct a session, in which councillors already participated in on April 20.
Kelly Starling, a temporary assistant economic development officer with the town, said she would provide an in-house session to save the town money.
Coun. Myron Thompson made a motion for council to participate in the in-house session, but every other councillor opposed the motion. Coun. Tony Jordan was absent from the meeting. Council then agreed not to have a session at all, after Coun. Chris Vardas made the suggestion.
Starling said the information gained from council during the April 20 session is not enough to develop an economic development action plan.
“This report cannot be utilized as the economic development foundation, as it is not based on fact nor is measurable,” said Starling, in a report to council.
“The plan is not at all encompassing, it focuses strictly on business attraction with no reference to the foundation that is key to business attraction, business retention, housing, labour, zoning, etc. It is not a good tool to base any business attraction opportunities on at this time,” she said.
Council has expressed a desire to focus strongly on economic development, she said, adding that economic development can mean many different things.
“Unless the council and the management team are all on the same page as to what the direction is, it is impossible to provide a roadmap and therefore unlikely to succeed,” she said, in the report.
“Economic development requires a strategic plan that will take in all pillars of economic development (economy, community, sustainability and environment) with an action plan for implementation that is agreed to and bought into by everyone,” she said.
The request was for council to participate in the session with the town's management team to create a plan to use as a guideline for the economic development team from 2013-2015.
During the meeting, Coun. Paul Isaac suggested that Starling and/or Kim Galloway, the town's economic development officer, discuss economic development desires with councillors one-on-one. He said this would allow for the economic development team to gain each councillor's input.
Starling said that there is a list of things that councillor's have said over the years that they would like to see focused on in the economic development department. She said the list has compiled over the years and she feels it is time for council to revisit the list.
Administration initially requested the session from council during the governance meeting on June 10, where the discussion was tabled until the council meeting on June 17. However, three councillors opposed.
During the June 17 meeting, council voted to table the discussion until Starling would be available to attend a meeting, where she would better explain the request.
