Morinville’s prospective mayors are both advocating for new services to serve the town’s growing population of young families, but say it will be a slow and steady approach.
Morinville is a much younger town than most in Alberta with a median age of 33, according to the 2006 federal census. By contrast, St. Albert just down the road is five years older with a median age of 38, while the region as a whole is 36.4.
The influx of young families has lead to calls for more services, especially in recreation with some looking for another ice sheet at the town arena, an indoor soccer facility or even a pool.
Mayoral challenger and current councillor Joseph Trapani said he would like to see the town start to satisfy some of these needs, but he said it should be a very slow approach.
The town could start to build a recreation centre, adding to it over time and building a facility specifically suited to the town’s needs, he said.
“We need to basically have a small leisure centre and then build one phase at a time so we are not broke like Spruce Grove or St. Albert.”
Incumbent Mayor Lloyd Bertschi said the town simply can’t afford those things today and while eventually something like that could be built, it is still a ways off.
“Even if we did a scaled-down version of that, we were in a facility that is way over our heads for our population.”
With the construction of the town’s cultural centre under way Bertschi said he would like to see how it works before moving ahead on any other projects.
“I would like to see how that shakes out before we get going on another one.”
The cultural centre is going to offer new opportunities to the town that have been gone since several groups became homeless following the closure of the Morinville Convent.
“I think there will be untold numbers of opportunities that will come forward.”
On the smaller scale, Trapani said he believes the town can expand on the programs it has but first it has to find out exactly what people want.
“It is just a matter of talking to parents who are coming to the programs and finding what else would they like to see.”
Many of the town’s programs are not well known and they should be doing more to spread the word, he added.
“That is almost like our bus system that was leaving to go to St. Albert and come back and that was the problem that people didn’t know about it.”
Bertschi said there is more the town could be doing, but generally there are a lot of good programs in the community.
“You can always do more, but I think we are providing an adequate level for some of the younger families, but we could be doing more for some of the families with teenagers.”
Both candidates want to see more done for teens and are promising a form of youth advisory board to give some recommendations to council.
Trapani said keeping youth engaged is a good way to keep them healthy and out of trouble.
“If they are not doing something then they could be doing something else that is not above board.”
