Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. This was the message a few weeks ago from Joe Garcea, chair of the Taskforce on Municipal Legislative Renewal, speaking to the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities convention.
Municipal councilors last week suggested that Garcea heed the same advice.
The report and its authors received a thorough going over when the task force held the second of its planned public consultation meetings in Kindersley March 27.
A lineup of municipal representatives and individuals from across the region aired their views on the report.
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Every municipality and individual who presented a brief had one message for the task force: no forced amalgamation.
Amalgamation will happen, the task force was told, when the timing is right, but it must be locally driven.
It was accused of ignoring economic development that is happening in rural areas and instances where amalgamations have taken place and where municipalities are working together.
Don’t underestimate rural Saskatchewan, the task force was told time and again. Other themes were also repeated:
- Bigger is not better. Health boards and the provincial government, with their bureaucracy and their deficits, were used as examples to prove this statement.
- Local municipal government is the most effective and efficient form of government and it is the only one to retain the trust of its electors.
- Deficit financing, as recommended in the report, would not be a good thing.
- With the larger municipalities recommended by the task force, community pride and morale would be lost along with volunteerism and community spirit.
We’re not ready to give up on rural Saskatchewan yet, the task force was told.
It was also told that sharply reducing the number of municipalities would result in loss of local control, accessibility and accountability.
There was an air of expectancy with an undercurrent of uneasiness as the hearing got under way.
Garcea sat through it with a bemused look on his face, responding only when someone said something nice about his report.
To give him his due, he did sit through some harsh criticism. To give rural Saskatchewan its due, the hearing was conducted with grace and even tempers.
The vote was taken and, as expected, was overwhelmingly against forced amalgamation.
Will it happen? Once again, rural Saskatchewan sits and waits.
