Here is the second part of The Reminder’s one-on-one interview with Flin Flon Mayor Cal Huntley.
REMINDER: Your predecessor felt strongly that surrounding municipalities, including Creighton and Denare Beach, should help foot the bill for regionally used services based in Flin Flon, such as recreational facilities and the airport. Do you also feel this way? If so, how will you attempt to derive dollars from those communities?
HUNTLEY: Do I feel that way? I feel that the airport’s definitely regional. I think there are some very regional issues that are coming to the forefront, where there are benefits for Denare Beach, Creighton and Flin Flon to work together on.
I think part of doing that is developing those relationships from a win-win perspective where there’s something in it for everybody, and presenting it in that fashion.
And recreation is a typical one, where we should probably have some sort of representation from the whole area possibly managing recreational facilities in the region, be it Flin Flon, Creighton, Denare Beach, the whole nine yards.
But that’s a conversation in progress and we’ll see where it comes to, but the first step is ensuring that we have good, trusting relationships with our neighbouring communities and areas so that we can have the frank conversations we need to have to talk about services and implications for services if we don’t mutually decide how we’re going to manage those resources.
I mean, at some point in time, if we don’t do it to the best of our ability as a region, we may lose some services. And, you know, we’ll have to make those choices.
My bet is that we’ll find some common ground…and we’ll come to a resolution. We’re going to have to be creative. We’re all responsible to our individual taxpayers and we’ll go forward on that.
There’s no definitive recipe or method right now to generate dollars outside the region other than what’s in place right now. Will we get to that at some point in time? I sure hope so.
REMINDER: If that fails, would you look at more non-resident user fees?
HUNTLEY: We could do that. The problem with user fees – let’s take the recreational facilities as an example.
Recreational facilities are one aspect of the community that attracts people and keeps people in your community. So most communities, if not all communities, understand that they’re going to be subsidizing recreational facilities.
Now, it’s much easier to do that from a regional perspective, spreading that support over the whole tax base [rather] than just focusing on the individual users.
User fees certainly are a possibility, but you’d never be able to generate user fees that would allow you not to subsidize the facilities moving forward. So the best idea is a regionalization approach and [looking at] how we, all citizens of the region, can mutually benefit from the facilities and services being here and [carry] the weight of the cost of those facilities.
And again…at the end of the day, if you can’t afford it and you can’t come to some sort of a resolve as to how to afford it, then you have to consider what you can and can’t afford, and business realism comes into it. And if you can’t afford it, then you have to consider other options.
REMINDER: Are we in danger of losing any facilities?
HUNTLEY: Not in the near term. The only one that worries me a little bit is the [Aqua Centre]. And I think…if we want to keep that service in the community over the next five to 10 years, something’s going to have to happen down there.
I’m not sure exactly what. But…the previous council initiated a study and there are several options that are out there, and they don’t look unworkable.
But…as many other communities do, the community and region as a whole is going to have to get involved, probably, and help to support an initiative that could, one, attract funding dollars from the province or the feds, and, two, probably attract some dollars from interested individuals that want to see that kind of service in the community.
So there’s going to have to be some sort of a concerted strategic approach to funding whichever option seems to make most sense for the region.
REMINDER: When you say you’re worried about the Aqua Centre, what would happen if an upgrade can’t materialize? Is the building in a state where it’s going to have to close?
HUNTLEY: No. I just think that the pool, until something significant [and unwelcome] takes place structurally, will keep operating the way that it is right now.
And we’re going to do everything we can to make sure that nothing structurally does take place. So we’ll limp along.
But the pool itself is an old structure with some inherent weaknesses, and it’s not as user-friendly as a newer facility would be. And that would be something that at some point in time we want to be able to offer to the residents of this area.
Now, how we go about doing that, that’s going to be a concerted community and regional kind of initiative. That’s how I see that moving forward, with participation from the province and the feds, because communities our size cannot afford to solely fund the multimillion-dollar-type facilities that are in place [elsewhere].
[For] quality of life, if you want people to come up here, if the province and the feds want the tax dollars to come out of here, as they do significantly, then they have to start investing in the community as well.
REMINDER: A report release last year identified about 100 Aboriginal homeless people in the Flin Flon area. What role does the city have, if any, in alleviating the growing problem of homelessness?
HUNTLEY: I don’t think within the municipal government structure there’s a formal role for [dealing with] the homeless people.
In saying that, though, I do believe…if that’s a social concern in our community, it generally leads to areas where we do provide service, such as policing and different things like that, as well as low-cost housing and those kinds of things.
And I think that’s where we make our best impact, is lobbying the provincial government to provide low-cost housing for people that are in those situations.
I believe the social assistance side of things is managed provincially, and that becomes more of their responsibility.
On a personal level, I think each individual in the community needs to do their part if that’s seen as a fundamental concern in our area with regards to the usage of the food bank, [the Women’s Resource Centre]…and different places like that.
REMINDER: During your campaign you spoke of the need for a long-term infrastructure plan for the city that takes into account emergency work. You also advocated a “quality control program” so that “rework” is eliminated. Have you found any inefficiencies in the way things are done?
HUNTLEY: I think the best comment for that is, way too early in the term to actually respond.
I’m sure you’re aware shortly after my term started, we were made aware that the director of works and operations [Rick Bacon] was going onto a different career opportunity, and basically that’s where our time and effort has been spent right now.
So we’re ensuring that the day-to-day [work] gets done the way that it should. Knock on wood, we’re having a much better season than we had last year.
But our priorities are to fill that position and restructure appropriately so we can start to address some of the things that I mentioned there.
REMINDER: When do you expect to have somebody in place in that position? What do you do in the interim?
HUNTLEY: No organization is totally dependent on one person. And we will really miss Rick and the experience that he brings to the table and all that kind of stuff, but we have some very qualified people within the city to manage the day-to-day operations.
We’re at a bit of a risk with regards to projects going forward, and we’re actively recruiting right now. I can’t give you a time frame.
We’re going to do some preliminary restructuring within the works and operations area to allow us to continue to move forward and have the opportunity to see if we can actually attract a qualified person into that role. If not, we’ll probably do some internal self-development within our own [workforce].
The third part of this interview will appear Monday.
