By Steve Hubrecht
[email protected]
Mayors and councillors from the Valley municipalities recently partook in the annual Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) conference, once again participating digitally instead of in-person, owing to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
Prior to the pandemic, the conference provided a chance for council members from incorporated B.C. municipalities as well as rural area regional district representatives to get together, attend workshops, pass resolutions, and meet one-on-one to lobby with various provincial government ministers. The event went ahead last year, but COVID-19 restrictions meant it was held virtually, with participants patching in individually.
This fall, more than a year and a half into the pandemic, restrictions still prevented a ‘normal’ UBCM conference, but representatives from the Columbia Valley were able to get together in person at the Radium Community Hall, and jointly participate digitally in the conference. The local participants — Radium mayor Clara Reinhardt, Radium councillor Mike Gray, Regional District of East Kootenay (RDEK) Area G director Gerry Wilkie, Invermere mayor Al Miller, RDEK Area F director Susan Clovechok, and, for some of the time, Invermere chief administrative officer Andrew Young — made sure to remain socially distant and follow other pandemic protocols, but “it was still fun. We were able to discuss the resolutions amongst ourselves before voting on them, which was helpful,” Reinhardt told the Pioneer. “There were a couple of sessions that went really well, and the technology was much improved from last year, with better platforms. Certainly, you felt more like a participant this year than you did last year.”
“We had some good conversations,” said Miller, adding he was particularly pleased with a meeting he had with B.C. Minister of Municipal Affairs Josie Osborne, in which he outlined Invermere’s infrastructure needs.
“We explained how we were unable to get any grants for the current work on 13th Avenue upgrades, which is phase one of a larger project, we talked about our downtown revitalization, and we talked about library funding,” Miller told the Pioneer. “The provincial government has not upped provincial funding for libraries for many years now, and I wanted to push the fact that, especially with COVID-19, we need that safe space, with access to good technology, that the library provides. Libraries are not just a place to go get books, but to research, study, and access technology that you may not have at home. The government needs to up the ante on their end, and Minister Osborne agreed with me on that.”
In another meeting, Miller talked with representatives from the provincial Ministry of Energy, Mines and Low Carbon Innovation. “We are trying to figure out a new model to get people here on track with green energy,” explained Miller. “The District of Invermere does small incentives to encourage people to invest in green technology when building, but we haven’t had a lot of take up on that.”
Miller said that this year’s virtual UBCM meeting was a big improvement on last year’s virtual UBCM meeting, “but nothing beats the old face-to-face meetings. You have to remember, the ministers are doing up to 20 meetings a day with different communities across B.C., and each community thinks its issues are the most pressing. It can be tough to get your project to the top of the page, when they have so many meetings on the go, and I can’t help but feel that you make a better connection with the ministers sitting across the table from them, than you do through a screen. That said, I feel we’ve done a good job making our case at these meetings this year, and I am hopeful we’ll see some results.”
Reinhardt explained that the village of Radium Hot Springs had no pressing issues that required ministerial meetings at the UBCM, but that the RDEK has asked for a “full-on review of rural ambulance services, but we were denied that meeting.”
