ATHABASCA — When Jason Kenney announced Nov. 24 the province would now be enforcing a 25 per cent capacity for businesses, it forced some service providers, like the Athabasca Regional Multiplex Society (ARMS), to make some hard decisions.
At the regular ARMS meeting Nov. 26 representatives from the Town of Athabasca and Athabasca County held a long discussion with new general manager Jennifer Edworthy before going in-camera to debate the financial aspects of closure before ultimately deciding to shutter all services starting Nov. 28 until at least Jan. 2, 2021.
“We decided as a board due to the mandatory restrictions put on us due to COVID that it would be in the best interest to close the facility,” ARMS chair Rob Balay said Nov. 27. “There’s no more hockey, no more curling, no more figure skating so, we tried to find the right balance between serving the community and economically as well.”
Balay added that staffing decisions will be left up to the new general manager Jennifer Edworthy, who started Nov. 9, but Edworthy did lobby to have the facility remain open during the public portion of the meeting.
“Currently we are very close to the capacity of 25 per cent of what we can hold so there’s not a drastic change from that,” Edworthy said. “How do (Alberta Health Services) deem spontaneous use and drop-in? It’s open to interpretation.”
The decision impacts not just fitness users but the Farmers’ Market as well, which just moved indoors into the fieldhouse for the winter, would have been entering one of their busiest times traditionally and market manager Yvonne McDermid had to quickly inform them of the change.
“There's a lot of disappointed vendors,” McDermid said. “And I feel bad too for the general public out here; people aren’t wanting to drive into the city and this could have fulfilled some local shopping for people right now.”
“In the end, our final decision was just that probably as a public health issue that it served the community probably to its best interest to just close down altogether,” said Balay.
Heather Stocking, TownandCountryToday.com
Follow me on Twitter: @HLSox
