Cabinet tour hits Lacombe

With the 2012-13 provincial budget about to be tabled and an election not too far off, cabinet ministers have taken some time to learn about issues of concern to Albertans.

If anything, it will give politicians a chance to consider what voters feel is important and use it in their campaign.

One of the meetings was at the Lacombe Golf and Country Club restaurant on Jan. 25 to give mayors, councillors and businesspeople an opportunity to speak their mind.

Ponoka Mayor Larry Henkelman, Rimbey Mayor Sheldon Ibbotson, some of their councillors, and Ponoka County councillors also attended.

Hosted by Lacombe-Ponoka MLA Ray Prins, deputy premier Doug Horner; Cal Dallas, minister of intergovernmental, international and aboriginal relations; Jack Hayden, minister of tourism, parks and recreation; and Innisfail-Sylvan Lake MLA Luke Ouellette answered questions on several topics including:

• Better communication between federal and provincial governments on environmental standards.

• How to address the labour shortage that appears to plague both small and large companies.

• Infrastructure regulations, including standards affecting road construction.

• Processing more of Alberta’s natural resources within the province instead of exporting.

Horner said a recent government survey showed Albertans’ main priority is education.

“When people talked about education, it wasn’t just class size. It was an overarching comment around K to 18. They want us to invest in the infrastructure, they want us to invest in students,” he stated.

Horner added health care — which included construction of care centres and senior care — was the second most important, and third was maintaining and building on current infrastructure.

The 2012-13 budget will be announced next week and Horner joked he would be thrown in jail if he divulged contents of the budget, but said three issues were considered when building it.

“I can tell you though that we, and many of the people in this room, worked very, very hard to see what we could do to move Albertans down the path of what they wanted us to do,” he stated.

Hayden added Premier Alison Redford also wants health care professionals to be looked after at all levels.

“We have a premier that has said that she wants to make sure that people are taken care of properly.”

Ponoka County Coun. Gawney Hinkley told cabinet ministers he had an easy fix to flooding in the Battle River that has affected the Wolf Creek Golf Resort, Ponoka County, Lacombe and Lacombe County, and farmers along the river.

“If you would allow me to get in a backhoe for 15 hours, I could solve your problem, but I can’t touch the water with a backhoe because of the environment. And I wish the government would get together with the people in the area and let us take care of a problem we could solve,” he stated.

The Town of Ponoka has first-hand experience in dealing with different provincial and federal regulations related to releasing effluent in Battle River and Henkelman took time to bring that to the ministers’ attention.

“We did have permission to dump our lagoons in the Battle River and it met Alberta government standards and regulations and (federal) Department of Fisheries came in and levied a heavy fine against the Town of Ponoka. It could have been a lot worse than it was, they negotiated with us, but it’s something that we have to work out between the Alberta government and federal government; we have to get the same regulations,” he explained.

Henkelman also mentioned the new eviction bylaw approved by the Samson Cree Nation in Hobbema and said he understood the need for native councillors to ensure a safe community; he did have some concern over where evictees would go.

“We will be working with the Four Nations,” he said.

Dallas took time to answer Henkelman’s questions and said ministers have been charged in their mandate to have constructive dialogue with Ottawa.

“Our ministers are on the road, they’re taking our business, your business, to Ottawa, and we’re having effective dialogue there,” he explained.

With regard to the Samson bylaw, Dallas said it would be important to consult with the Samson Nation to “fully understand what those impacts will be, but also that we can have constructive discussion around how can we support the work they are doing.”

Among other questions in the morning was how to increase the refining capacity of Alberta’s natural resources without exporting them raw. Horner said Alberta “will always be an export province,” but selling a value-added product has been discussed.

“It’s difficult to move to that level when it’s so easy to sell the raw product,” he explained.

Horner used the mad cow troubles several years ago as an example. “When the border was closed, we saw a tremendous amount of activity around building plants and getting value added. As soon as the border opened, all the cattle started moving freely again, you could just see it die off.”

For natural gas, market access will be important to be able to sell a refined product, which would need a co-coordinated approach to economic diversification.

“Alberta is sitting on the top three things that the rest of the world is going to be looking for: energy, food and fibre, and health care solution,” he explained.

Horner said the cabinet minister tours are not budget consultations but an opportunity to hear feedback from voters on what is important to them. “People know we’re out there and we are getting people coming up to us and talking about the issues that are in their heart and maybe pertaining to their personal circumstance.”

He has learned new things on every cabinet tour and suggested it happen more often.

Alberta will go to the polls sometime between March 1 and May 31.