ATHABASCA – Athabasca County will not follow in the steps of the Town of Athabasca by contributing funds toward a professional lobbyist to represent the region’s interests in regards to the future of Athabasca University.
Instead, county councillors decided at their May 27 regular meeting to ask for meetings with Alberta Minister of Advanced Education Demetrios Nicolaides and AU Board of Governors chair Nancy Laird. Following a 6-3 vote against putting up to $7,500 into the lobby effort, as Town of Athabasca councillors did at their May 18 meeting, two motions to request the high-level meetings were passed.
John Ollerenshaw, representing the ‘Keep Athabasca in Athabasca University’ campaign, intended to appear as a delegation during the meeting, but a series of lengthy public hearings on land use bylaw amendments were already scheduled, so his delegation was scheduled for June 8 instead.
“It's nice to see that the rest of the community is starting to catch up to our advocacy efforts that we've been undergoing for over a year now,” said Coun. Warren Griffin who pointed out he, reeve Larry Armfelt and Coun. Travais Johnson, along with MLA Glenn van Dijken, had met with the Advanced Education minister last year to share some of the concerns they had for the future of the university in Athabasca.
“Coming out of that meeting the minister, very clearly, thanked us for telling them and was very clear in saying that Athabasca University is staying in Athabasca ... They have been consistent in that. I don't think we have much choice but to take the government representatives at face value on this, unless they change what they're saying.”
Griffin also noted the Tourism and Economic Development (TED) committee has been working on getting better broadband Internet access in the region, and would soon be sending out a survey to residents to gauge the speed of their connections and perhaps bring in some federal grants to help alleviate the situation, which would in turn make the area more attractive to prospective professionals.
Reeve Armfelt told council he had done some of his own research and found four jobs posted for Athabasca University — three required applicants to live in Alberta, while the other asked only that you live in Canada. That, he said, along with there being no apparent rush to have a representative of the Athabasca community on the board of governors is leaving the community out of the conversation.
“The total community has got to get together and promote one or two people to sit on the board of governors. Right now, we don't have anybody speaking for us at all. And, you know, somebody once said if you don't get a place at the table, you don't get to talk about the menu. Well, that's where we are at now,” he said.
Coun. Christi Bilsky then put forward the motion to match the town’s contribution of $7,500 to help the ad-hoc group hire a professional lobbyist.
“It’s not something I've been a fan of in the past, but in this case, with the time constraints going on the town has put in and I would definitely be in favour of matching that amount,” she said.
Before voting, CAO Ryan Maier wanted to make sure councillors were aware of the implications of supporting the motion, saying, “If we are putting in funding, then I think the statement we're making is that we don't really believe that Athabasca University intends to remain in Athabasca, and that we believe that hiring this lobbyist will help us at the end of the day.”
Armfelt replied: “In my opinion, you're exactly correct, we are making a statement. We are making a statement to keep Athabasca in Athabasca University, and we are making a statement that we're not in total agreement with the virtual broadband situation that the Athabasca University representative is telling us that we should be getting on their behalf.”
To that, Coun. Doris Splane said if council intends to make a statement, they should be 100 per cent sure what that statement is.
“There's got to be some clarity as to what we want in detail,” she said. “Before I'm willing to put out any dollars, I want detail as to what we're stating we want. I’m not saying I'm opposed to any of this, I just need detailed information before I can make agreements.”
“I just say we have to be extra cautious here,” said Coun. Dwayne Rawson. “We've heard from the president, we’ve heard from Gilbert (Perras, AU chief of staff, office of the president) a number of times, and they’ve assured us they're not leaving so we'd better be careful what kind of statement we make because it looks like we're saying we don't trust them, and I'm not prepared to go down that road.”
Armfelt went on to say they were making a statement no matter what decision they made.
“The problem that I see with the TED committee working on this is TED stands for tourism and economic development. This is not tourism and it's not economic development. This is like a piece of economy that's already in our division here … (and) to have Gilbert as a representative of TED, it also sends a message, and I don't think it's a very good message,” he said.
Johnson and Coun. Kevin Haines agreed there was little that was going to stop society’s move toward working in a digital environment, away from a central office space.
“I know when it comes to time, everything is going to change and evolve … I think we should be campaigning on maybe how we can use those changes for the better, instead of just saying that we need to keep the university here the way it used to be. We can't go backwards so that's not going to happen,” said Johnson.
“Through COVID, a lot of a lot of other businesses and facilities and places like them have done that and people are leaving the city and they're moving to rural areas to work from as well, so it's kind of going both ways and I'm not sure there's anything we can do to stop this,” said Haines. “I think it's a movement. It's a cultural movement that's been maybe sped up a little bit through COVID.”
The motion to help fund the lobby effort failed after a 6-3 vote with Armfelt, Bilsky and Coun. Penny Stewart voting in favour. Subsequent motions to seek meetings with AU Board of Governors chair Nancy Laird, and another with Advanced Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides, or suitable upper-level replacements, as soon as possible, both passed unanimously.
