Council Overview
Information from Drumheller Town Council

Regular Council Meeting Monday, May 9, 2022

Mayor Heather Colberg opened the meeting and welcomed the public back to council chambers and council made several opening remarks.
Councillor Crystal Sereda announced on Friday, May 13 Travel Alberta is hosting an open house; registration to this event is required.
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Palliser Regional Planning Services CEO Devin Diano and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) coordinator Cody Dale-McNair gave council a presentation on how Palliser works for the municipality. They explained Palliser has been in operation as a planning commission since the 1970s and was reformed as an agency following changes to the Municipal Government Act (MGA) in 1995. They provide planning, GIS, safety code services and more to 24 member municipalities, including the Town of Drumheller; Councillor Sereda currently sits on the board of directors as Town representative.
Palliser is involved in helping municipalities with their Municipal Development Plans (MDP), Land Use Bylaws (LUB), and Intermunicipal Development Plans (IDP) as well as providing attendance and recommendations for Subdivision Appeal Board hearings.
They are currently working to develop a webmap to move documents and information to one centralized, digital location-not only to protect critical infrastructure data-but also to ensure information relating to specific departments is not lost due to personnel changes. The information contained in the webmap has both public and private access and has information regarding property lines and infrastructure integral to the Town’s planning documents.
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Operations and Community Development manager for Community Futures Big Country, Allison Roppel and Town of Drumheller Economic Development manager, Reg Johnston, presented council with the results of the Drumheller Region Business Survey.
A total of 113 businesses were surveyed between January and March 2022 in the Drumheller and Starland County region; the information collected during the survey will help Community Futures to assist and support businesses in the region.
Data from the tourism sector was presented based on its impacts on the local economy, and it was found some $70 million in sales directly from tourism is spent in the Drumheller-Starland region annually. This represents about 570 jobs in the community, and Ms. Roppel noted this information is helpful when applying for grants as it helps identify the impact of tourism.
80 per cent of the respondents surveyed were very positive about the state of their businesses, and about two-thirds of respondents were looking to hire within the next 12 months. However, these businesses did note the local labour pool posed some challenges.
Overall, about 95 per cent of businesses surveyed were supportive of tourism and 70 per cent said they aw direct impacts of tourism-both great indicators of the importance of the sector in the region.
This data will help Community Futures develop further initiatives with its partners.
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Mr. Johnston presented council with third reading of the amended Bylaw 01.22 Residential Development Incentive Program. Since it was last brought before council the rental rates and maximum amount for a home to qualify within the program were increased. Mr. Johnston noted, if approved, this information will be communicated to the public and developers.
It was recommended the bylaw be reviewed on a four year cycle with every new council.
Council unanimously approved third reading to amend the bylaw as presented.
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Flood Mitigation project director Deighen Blakely presented council with the bids for the Downtown Dike Phase 1 project. A total of three bids were received, though even the lowest bid of $3.5 million was approximately $1 million above the initially budgeted amount of the project.
Council was presented with the option to award the tender as presented or cancel the tender to undertake design reviews and re-tender the project in the fall of 2022, though this could see costs increase due to inflation.
Council voted in favour of cancelling the tender.
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Director of Infrastructure Dave Brett presented council with a tender to complete the Nacmine Forcemain construction. Five bids were received and the lowest bid of $1,207,461.68 came in under budget while meeting all criteria; bids ranged from $1.2 million to $2.6 million with an average of between $1.6 and $1.7 million.
Council unanimously awarded the tender to UG Excavating of Calgary for the amount of $1,207,461.68.
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Council moved to closed session and the meeting was adjourned.

Complete minutes from council meetings can be found on
www.drumheller.ca once they have been adopted.

Council Overview
Information from Drumheller Town Council Regular Council Meeting
Monday, May 2, 2022

Mayor Heather Colberg opened the meeting and announced the scheduled May 9 Committee of the Whole meeting will instead be a regular council meeting.
Councillor Stephanie Price was also sworn in as Deputy Mayor for the months of May and June 2022.
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Director of Protective Services Greg Peters and Communications officer Erica Crocker gave a presentation on emergency preparedness for Emergency Preparedness Week, May 1 to 7. Each person should have a kit with enough medication, food, and water for 72-hours in the event of emergencies or evacuation; the kit can also include important documents, cash, children’s books or toys, ropes, tarps, or other survival equipment and gear.
Additional information about Emergency Preparedness Week and the 72-hour kit can be found on the Town of Drumheller website.
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Leon Pfeiffer with RSM Canada presented council with the audited financial statements for the Town of Drumheller and the Drumheller Resiliency and Flood Mitigation Office (DRFMO) ending December 31, 2021. The finalized financial statements are expected to be released this week and a clean audit report was found.
Mr. Pfeiffer shared, as funding for the DRFMO is from grants and other revenues, it is imperative this is reported correctly; however, no significant errors or discrepancies were found in the financial statements and the audit did not find any evidence of improper or questionable payments or actions, and he was confident to say there was no fraud during the 2021 period.
In 2021, the Town showed $22.3 million in net financial assets and a total accumulated surplus of some $175 million.
Following this report, Director of Corporate Finance Mauricio Reyes presented council with a request to accept the audited financial statement report for the Town and DRFMO as presented; council accepted the presentation as information.
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Mr. Reyes presented council with the 2022 Tax Rate Bylaw and requested all three readings be held during the meeting. He noted the 2022 Operating budgets were previously approved on April 11 which included a 2.1 per cent increase to the municipal tax requisition and this bylaw is a simple housekeeping item to allow administration to levy these taxes.
The municipal mill rate for residential properties will increase from 11.85663 in 2021 to 12.10984 in 2022, while the non-residential mill rate will increase to 19.15279, compared to 18.73769 in 2021.
Some $12.4 million, which includes the provincial education requisition and the Drumheller and District Seniors Foundation (DDSF), will be collected; $9.15 million of this will be municipal requisitions.
Council unanimously consented to give all three readings and passed the 2022 Tax Rate Bylaw.
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Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Darryl Drohomerski presented council with a request to amend the fees and schedules which council adopted earlier this year. There was an error in the fee for the Central Alberta Assessment Review Board (CAARB) where the fee was increased to $200; this fee is legislated as $50.
Council approved the presented amendments to the fees and schedules.
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CAO Drohomerski presented council with a Council Code of Conduct review. This is a required review at the beginning of each term and is expected to be brought forward in June for approval.
Council briefly explained in-camera or closed sessions, and how council works together to provide response to email correspondence to all members of council.
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Manager of Economic Development Reg Johnston presented council with a request for direction on the multi-unit rental rate under the Drumheller Residential Incentive Program policy. Iin February 2022, Mr. Johnston was asked to bring the policy back to council for further discussion.
Based on feedback from the Drumheller Housing Administration (DHA), it was recommended to increase the maximum rental limit under the policy from a proposed $850 per month. Based on current market rent evaluations, rental costs range from $700 for a one bedroom to $1,000 for a four bedroom dwelling.
Drumheller’s current rental vacancy rate is below one per cent and rising construction costs could see this increase further as shelter costs increased by some 6.6 per cent year over year according to the Canada Consumer Price Index (CPI); this has been the fastest pace since August 1983.
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Council moved to a closed session to discuss Land Transfer Agreements under FOIP 24, advice from officials and adjourned the meeting.

Complete minutes from council meetings can be found on www.drumheller.ca once they have been adopted.