ATHABASCA – The Athabasca region is one step closer to having a Tourism and Economic Development (TED) committee again after Athabasca County councillors voted to approve the newest edition of the committee’s terms of reference.
During their June 29 council meeting, councillors voted 5-3 in favour of approving the newest edition of the document and appoint councillors Natasha Kapitaniuk and Camille Wallach to the committee — councillors Gary Cromwell, Tracy Holland, and Rob Minns voted against the motion, and Kelly Chamzuk was not yet present. The terms were forwarded to the committee by an 8-1 vote during the May 16 committee of the whole, and then tabled to the June 29 meeting at the May 30 council meeting.
For Holland, concern over the document seemed to stem from the clauses about the members-at-large; the new TED committee is going to have five members appointed by the municipal councils, but the committee will be able to decide to renew or not renew appointments.
“I find that concerning. The previous terms of reference had left it up to council,” said Holland. “I’m finding that there’s a little too much power in this version for the committee that other committees do not have. I’ll have to vote against it. I struggle to give this committee the ability to make those decisions, when other committees do not, and I’m worried about what that could possibly lead to.”
Wallach, who was one of the two county councillors who had been a part of the working group to develop the terms alongside reeve Brian Hall, was able to provide a bit of clarification.
“I think the difference is that we used to have members-at-large from each municipality, and now it’s just the general pool, so it isn’t between the municipalities appointing people. We’re trying to pull from the whole community, so it isn’t just municipalities specifically,” said Wallach, who appeared via Zoom for the meeting.
Kapitaniuk added that, at least in her interpretation, allowing the committee to make the decisions would save each council from having to pass the motion independently, which would create a lot of administrative backlogs — typically member-at-large positions are handled by the municipality in charge of the committee, but the new TED group is meant to be more collaborative.
“If it takes all three councils to approve all the councils at large, that’s going to create a lot of administrative work that isn’t necessary. If the committee is trusted to do the good work and run with the terms that it has, I’m certain that I would trust the committee to choose the best people for the job.”
Hall, who was the last councillor to speak, echoed the sentiments of Wallach and Kapitaniuk.
“We’ve been over this a fair number of times, and it’s not unreasonable in my view to have the representatives that we appoint to the committee as part of the larger group make decisions that are best for the committee and the region.”
