A citizens’ group in Indian Head, Sask., plans to keep pressuring Ottawa to reverse its decision to close the Prairie Shelterbelt Centre.
The Save the Prairie Shelterbelt Program group recently presented a petition to Regina-Qu’Appelle MP Andrew Scheer that contains 3,800 names calling on the prime minister to keep the centre open.
Group spokesperson Bruce Neill said Scheer promised to take the petitions to Ottawa.
Other petitions are still in circulation in Saskatchewan, and Neill hopes landowners and interested parties from Alberta and Manitoba will also take up the cause.
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The federal government has said it will close the centre, which has provided free trees to landowners for 111 years.
Next spring will be the last for tree distribution from the centre.
The government is also looking for a buyer to take over the operation.
Neill and Gord Howe, both former managers of the centre, are heading the community group that has rallied to keep the facility open and under government operation.
“I know for me and Gord Howe, we invested so much of our careers and our time in this, we’d feel worse if we didn’t do anything,” Neill said.
He admitted it’s an uphill battle against a majority government.
However, the group has already won one concession. The deadline for a purchase agreement to be in place has been extended from Aug. 31 to next February.
Neill said the group he speaks for is not involved in putting forward a proposal.
He also said it still isn’t clear what will happen to the land and buildings occupied by the shelterbelt centre.
The federal government has said agroforestry research done at the centre will continue, but Neill said employees won’t have a place to work if the land and buildings are sold unless some kind of arrangements are made for them to stay on the site.
