Flin Flon’s long-in-the-works plastic bag ban has been put on the backburner by city council.
Flin Flon Mayor Cal Huntley said the bag ban, which has been discussed by council for months but has never reached the point of presenting a bylaw, would be postponed due to the use of single-use plastic bags during the COVID-19 outbreak.
“The plastic bag ban that we were in the process of putting in place, we’re going to forego it for the foreseeable future,” said Huntley during the April 7 city council meeting. The meeting was held remotely, with all participants logging in from different sites using the program Zoom.
“It doesn’t fit with the situation we’re in right now,” Huntley said.
“I believe the provincial government has asked most of the communities that implemented it to repeal that law at this point in time, given you can’t take your own shopping bags into the grocery stores and places like that.”
The measure is not completely off the board and will be discussed further after the pandemic is controlled.
“It’s something we’ll be looking at in the future again, it just won’t be happening quite as quickly as it was initially planned,” Huntley said.
“Nobody expected something like this to take place.”
Council received letters from two separate school groups in support of a ban on plastic grocery bags, one batch last summer and another batch earlier this year.
School request
On the lighter side, council received a letter from a pair of young Winnipeg students curious about the community.
The students, identified only as Elisha and Alicia, attend Ecole Belmont School in Grades 4 and 5. The pair found out about Flin Flon as part of a class project.
“We are learning about your city, Flin Flon. We found out about your Flin Flon Public Library. We really love to read and so we really want to go there one day,” reads the letter.
“We also heard about your drive-in movies. Sadly, we have never been to one, but we would like to go. We would love to go to Flin Flon one day.”
The students requested a pamphlet or a set of stickers from the City as part of their project.
Huntley said the City did not have stickers available, but they would send the students a package of goodies including City of Flin Flon pins.
“We have a package ready to go as soon as they get back to school,” said Glenna Daschuk, city chief administrative officer.
Fire chief’s report
Council also received the monthly report from Flin Flon Fire Department Chief Jason Kuras, detailing five separate calls for service during the month of March.
Department members were called out for an EMS assist on Bellevue Avenue March 2 and a fire investigation the same day at Channing Drive relating to a pot that caught fire on a stove before a resident threw it out the window. The person managed to contain the fire and firefighters came to ensure no additional flare-ups took place.
A few days later on March 6, firefighters responded to a fire investigation at Aspen Grove after residents smelled smoke. Crews searched inside the building, finding a leaking water heater inside that tripped a breaker and caused a smoky smell.
A snowmobile fire on Adams Street was the fourth call of the month, reported March 9 in the afternoon. The fire was extinguished before firefighters arrived on scene.
The final call of the month came March 21, when a call of a structure fire on Ross Street was reported. A faulty electric baseboard heater had burst into flames but was contained quickly. Firefighters then isolated an electrical panel to stop any further damage.
Councillor Tim Babcock said the department had changed some of their existing practices due to COVID-19. Regular training programs for the department have been postponed and all fire practices during the outbreak have been cancelled. New cleaning and disinfecting policies have been brought in to limit the chances of a firefighter getting sick while in the field.
“I spoke with one of the captains last week to check and see how they’re doing with this. He said they’ve adopted new training and new procedures to make sure that everybody’s safe there,” he said.
“They’re not hoping for any calls, but when there is one, they’re ready to go.”
