Athabasca County council has voted to request their counterparts in the Town of Athabasca to review the appointment of the town’s member of the Tourism and Economic Development (TED) committee after an alleged incident at a committee meeting Aug. 17.
An email from county communications co-ordinator Karl Kopan said that after an in-camera session at county council’s Aug. 25 meeting, Coun. Warren Griffin made a motion to “authorize Reeve Splane to correspond to the Mayor and Council of the Town of Athabasca requesting they review the town council member appointment to the Tourism Economic Development Committee, due to the incident at the August 17, 2016, meeting.”
“The motion and incident involves a member of our staff,” said county manager Ryan Maier in a statement. “Adhering to policies and procedures we must follow, conversations that take place in-camera, and personnel issues cannot be discussed following the meeting or with the media. The Town of Athabasca has been apprised of our concerns. I can also say that we are always concerned about the safety and welfare of County employees in the commission of their duties and are working to ensure a similar incident doesn’t happen again.”
Kopan said in an interview the county is not able to comment about what happened, following the Municipal Government Act and their own policy.
“We’re just working on the issue, to hopefully come to a resolution,” he said.
“The town is fully aware of this issue, as is the interim CAO – CAO and coun-cil,” Kopan added. “Ultimately, we’ve communicated, I think, in the motion … It expresses what the county and council want to happen. In terms of what the town will do, that’s something they have to decide on.”
Coun. Joanne Peckham is the councillor named to the TED committee. Her alternate is Coun. Tanu Evans, and Steve Schafer her second alternate, according to the town’s website.
Peckham said she did not have a comment about the incident at this time.
The minutes from the committee meeting are not yet complete or approved, Kopan said, adding that they will be posted online as soon as they are.
– With files from Allendria Brunjes
