On Wednesday, August 24, the councils of Kneehill County and Three Hills gathered with members of the Three Hills Fire Department to celebrate the delivery of a new Fire Tender to serve the residents of both Town and County.
Reeve Jerry Wittstock opened the event with a welcome message, including highlighting the collaboration between the municipalities. “As a collective team, we continue to build fire services within our community of Kneehill area for the safety of our residents in both the Town and County,” said Reeve Wittstock.
Mayor Ray Wildeman echoed the sentiment, “the collaboration between all here is appreciated and what makes this project, and evening, a success.”
Members of the Three Hills Fire Department were also thanked for their dedication as volunteers helping our communities in times of need. They also served up hamburgers and hotdogs for a crowd of approximately 120 residents during the two-hour event.
The new Tender has a high/low pressure pump and holds 13,600 litres of water. It is replacing the 2001 Tender that only held 4,000 litres. The new truck is a Tender/Engine combination unit with a fire pump that can provide 5,000 litres per minute of water to the fire, increasing the level of service to our communities.
Kneehill County Council has made apparatus replacements a priority in recent years with the purchase of 4 engines in 2020 to serve our area, a 2018 brush truck for Torrington, and this year, two Tenders have been purchased (Torrington and Three Hills). This Tender, ordered in 2021, came in at $590,000. With the increasing costs of apparatus, Kneehill County has been able to dedicate funds through good financial planning processes, implementing annual contributions to help prepare for these purchases.
Kneehill County and the Town of Three Hills have a collaborative agreement on fire services in the area, and continue to work together to provide an efficient and effective service.
Should anyone in the community be interested in volunteering for the fire department, please contact the Town of Three Hills or Kneehill County respective Community Services departments for more information.

Kneehill County council has had ongoing discussions about the challenges rural residents face accessing reliable, high-speed internet and, during the regular Tuesday, August 16 council meeting, they voted to support a letter from the County of Paintearth to the provincial government to lobby for ongoing funding support for rural broadband development in Alberta.
The federal government announced some $2.75 billion in funding through the Universal Broadband Fund (UBF) to support development of rural and remote broadband projects in November 2020; however, the funding was only available on shovel-ready projects, which left some municipalities unable to apply for funding prior to the application deadline of March 2021.
“A number of municipalities have put their name forward to help support this (letter),” Kneehill County Reeve Jerry Wittstock said during the meeting. “I think it’s important the province understands you can’t have a shovel-ready project if you don’t understand, or don’t have the capacity to get there.”
The Mail previously reported Kneehill County approved a contribution of $2,000 towards the Kneehill Regional Partnership (KRP) regional broadband study in April 2022; the study was to be broken down into three phases, with the first to capture the needs and desired outcomes of residents within the KRP-the towns of Three Hills and Trochu, villages of Carbon, Acme, and Linden, and Kneehill County.
Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Mike Haugen explained there have been some staffing challenges since then and, at this time, the project has stalled.
However, it was noted, once these challenges have been resolved, having a “pool of funding available” would allow the project to move from a study to reality.
Council unanimously voted to support the letter from the County of Paintearth.