There’s nothing quite as rural as the annual agricultural fair, with its cattle shows and 4-H wind-ups and Main Street parades.
And so Manitoba’s fastest growing small town found itself the subject of some attention when it filed legal papers last month to expropriate its fairgrounds.
The town of Stonewall wants to buy the 20-acre grounds from the local agricultural society, which has owned the grounds since 1880, so it can build a recreational complex.
As soon as expropriation became part of the community debate over the fairgrounds – “the big ‘e’ word,” as deputy mayor Dave Kalnuk calls it – some people began to accuse the town of bullying the ag society.
Read Also
Final crop reports show strong yields, quality
Crops yielded above average across the Prairies this year, and quality is generally average to above-average.
The dispute is not as simple as a bedroom community outgrowing its rural roots, and is more complex than a small-town fair struggling for survival.
The expropriation is equal parts business disagreement, personality conflict and public relations nightmare.
The town and ag society have shared the fairgrounds at the south end of Main Street, for generations. Today, the land is surrounded by houses.
In the 1950s, when the ag society ran into financial trouble, the town bought the land in a tax sale and sold it back to the society for $1 – with a few strings attached.
The land had to always be used for recreation. The society would have to give the town the first option to buy the land back, for $1, said Kalnuk.
The ag society let the town build a hockey arena and curling rink on the land, in exchange for using the buildings during its annual June fair.
Growing conflicts
But since the mid-1980s, when Stonewall started to boom as a bedroom community for Winnipeg commuters, the town and ag society have found it harder to work together.
The town wants to replace the curling rink, add another arena, and build other recreational facilities, explained Robert Potter, chief administrative officer of the town.
It wants to start by building soccer pitches, a cost of $300,000 to $400,000. The town needs to own the land now, said Kalnuk, to get in line for millennium grants to cover some costs.
Since 1993, the town and society have danced around the land ownership issue. The town once offered to relocate the fair to a parcel of land just outside town, said Kalnuk.
But John Morrison, past-president of the South Interlake Agricultural Society, said town council has been less than accommodating.
He said the group tried to work with the town in 1993 to buy an 80-acre site on the edge of town for the fair, the recreation complexes, variety trials and horse races, but council wasn’t interested.
In January, the town offered the society $100,000 for the land, a price Potter and Kalnuk say is generous compared to raw land prices for developers in the town.
The society countered with $1.2 million. Morrison said he thinks this is more like the fair market value of the land.
“We’re worlds apart on what we think the land is worth,” said Kalnuk.
The ag society would spend about $600,000 of the sale to buy land and put up a building, said Morrison. It would then donate the rest to recreational facilities in the region as a lever to attract matching government grants.
Morrison said he thinks his approach is fairer and better for both parties.
He said he thinks expropriation will force council to pay a fair price for the land. The society is already talking to lawyers.
The ag society has 30 days to object to the expropriation. Then the provincial land commission will hear from both sides and set a fair value.
If either side disagrees with the value, the justice department will appoint an arbitrator to make a binding decision.
Mediation expert
Ironically, Morrison teaches dispute resolution and mediation courses to high school students.
“I am an aggressive personality,” he admits during an interview. “I can be difficult.”
Like most people who live in the area, he commutes into Winnipeg to work. He teaches at Red River Community College.
But Morrison is passionate about agriculture and defending the rights of farmers.
He farms 300 acres just a few kilometres outside the highway running round the city’s perimeter, land that has been in his family for more than 100 years.
“I can’t make a living now like the people who preceded me could, but I care about the land. I care about the community.”
