ATHABASCA – Athabasca County administration will be reviewing and possibly revising policy around the maintenance of cemeteries, churches, and community halls in the region to address “mission creep.”
During the Aug. 22 budget and finance committee meeting, county councillors passed two motions — one to create a grant program and another to create a prioritized list — after hearing 50 per cent of properties currently included on the small mowing program list are not indicated as county responsibilities within relevant policy.
Interim CAO Pat Vincent noted liability issues, workload management, and operating costs as reasons for reviewing the policy and establishing clear criteria for mowing maintenance eligibility moving forward.
“The way that we’ve operated this summer, so haphazardly and on a non-routine basis has left everybody wondering what kind of service we provide,” Vincent told council.
He said that two mowing crews worked on the 78-item list — including campgrounds, halls, cemeteries, fill-stations, lagoons and other properties — prior to COVID-19 but following the pandemic, only one staffer remains. Vincent also noted that revising policy to better encapsulate the scope of the program will ease county liability for any damages incurred while providing maintenance.
Coun. Camille Wallach motioned for admin to draft a grant program that would allow community halls in the region to apply for funding to hire private contractors, which passed 8-1 with Coun. Natasha Kapitaniuk opposed.
Kapitaniuk put forward her own motion that administration create a prioritized list of properties to remain on the list before grant funding is allocated — further debate on which action should be pursued first was quelled when reeve Brian Hall maintained both could occur simultaneously, as properties not included on the current list might benefit from grant funding.
Kapitanuik’s motion for more information passed 9-0, and councillors will review a prioritized list and a draft grant during the next committee of the whole meeting — no date has been set.
According to Cemetery Operation and Maintenance Policy 3680, Boyle, Colinton, George Lake, and Ellscott Municipal cemeteries are named as properties for which the maintenance and operation is a county responsibility. Additional maintenance “on a timely basis only, and as budgets allow, for non-county administered cemeteries within the county boundaries” can be requested by a cemetery committee.
In a chart breaking down the cost of service for each property on the mowing list, the maintenance of seven county administered cemeteries — Grassland, Meanook, and Perryvale being additional properties not named outright by the policy — rings in at $4,433.13 per cycle, with three cycles executed each summer.
Twenty-one non-county cemeteries and church properties are also on the mow list, with per-cycle maintenance costs reaching $9,784.06 — more than double that of county administered properties.
Hall noted despite the potential for changes to the list, they are mindful of continuing the good-will maintenance or providing grant funding for contractors.
“One of the outcomes of a discussion like (this) is it enables the local community around that cemetery to look after it,” he said, adding “the county doesn’t need to compete” with community interest in preserving “the long history of the region.”
