The Municipalities of Saskatchewan convention will take place virtually instead of the traditional in-person gathering (File photo/paNOW Staff).

By Aaron Schulze

First North Regional Meeting

Provincial funding, infrastructure deficits main concerns ahead of Municipalities of Saskatchewan convention

Dec 7, 2020 | 12:15 PM

Regional municipality leaders met for the first time since the Nov. 9 elections.

With two months until the Municipalities of Saskatchewan convention, community representatives from the North, Northwest, Northeast, and West Central got together to elect regional leaders and touch on the main priorities for the convention.

April Phillips, a Melfort councillor, was elected Northeast regional director. She said other municipalities are facing similar issues: infrastructure deficits, future provincial funding, and strain from the coronavirus pandemic.

“Every community has them and we’re depending on senior governments for help,” Phillips said. [Municipalities of Saskatchewan] does a lot of advocating for our communities and I’m very excited, as the director, being at that table and stressing the importance to senior governments that we need help with those infrastructure deficits. It’s always good to get together with your communities that are close to you and find out everyone has issues. We’re working together where we can and collectively advocating what we need going forward.”

As each community focuses on their respective strategic plans and budgets, and new regional directors learn their roles, Phillips said the leaders were only able to scratch the surface of their community’s issues. She added the leaders’ main priority is to prepare for the convention.

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“We get an awful lot of information that comes through convention and I suspect this will be no different,” Phillips said. “Keynote speakers and break out education sessions… a lot of the plans are in place. Us new directors, we’ll be getting up to speed on what our parts are going to be in convention… we’ll be looking to those who have been there before who have the plans in place already. We’re hoping all of the municipalities get on board.”

The Municipalities of Saskatchewan’s virtual convention will take place between Feb. 7 -10, 2021.

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aaron.schulze@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @SchulzePANow