In his inaugural state of the municipality address on Tuesday evening, May 21, Mayor Richard Ireland brought the business community up to speed on the latest municipal goings-ons, while also touching on the past and what's to come in the future.
He told the business owners at the Chamber of Commerce dinner at Pyramid Lake Resort that this year is about direction. And that direction can be traced to a single focus: relationships.
He spoke of community engagement, the recently-completed municipal services and structural review, the creation of a municipal tourism council, as well as the future undertaking of a 100-year asset management plan, and he noted that each initiative can be traced back to relationships.
鈥淓ngagement improves our relationship with residents. Improving service delivery and making more effective use of our operational structure improves both internal and external relationships. Facilitating partnerships for economic sustainability is clearly about relationships.
鈥淲e are a community. We are all in this together and we are all here for the long term,鈥� he said. 鈥淭he evolving state of the municipality is to do so together.鈥�
Last year was a year of change for the municipality, with the loss of a number of directors鈥擪en Quackenbush, Verne Balding, George Krefting and, more recently, Christopher Read鈥攁ll of whom took with them their corporate knowledge.
鈥淔ollowing a seismic shift in staffing in the spring of 2012, the municipality has been very busy confirming its direction and establishing a strong and sustainable basis for the future of our community,鈥� said Ireland, noting that some of that direction will come from the services and structural review that was presented to council and municipal staff last week.
That review, completed by Western Management Consultants, was the first of its kind since the municipality鈥檚 inception in 2001, and already it has led to 鈥渂etter planning and a more holistic approach to municipal management,鈥� he said, referencing administration鈥檚 approach to the 2013 budget process as an example.
The review will provide the municipality its first opportunity to reflect on how it got to where it is and where it will go in the future.
That future will include the fostering of relationships between the municipality and the community, said Ireland, noting that one way the 聽municipality hopes to foster those relationships is by creating a 鈥淭ourism Council,鈥� as was recommended in the 2011 Community Sustainability Plan.
The council will be called the Jasper Partnership. The idea is, through the council, the municipality will become a facilitator in the community鈥檚 economic prosperity.
鈥淲e tied this initiative loosely to our services and structural review.
鈥淟ooking at our services through that lens allowed us to better understand how much impact our own activities already have in the community, and how our organization can actively engage as a partner for economic sustainability,鈥� said Ireland, using sports camps and hockey tournaments as examples of activities that add to the local economy.
鈥淲e have one community and we have, effectively, one industry. It is imperative that we work together.
鈥淭he municipality is committed to moving in that direction.鈥�
