News | DrumhellerMail

Society formed to preserve Hanna Roundhouse

    A society interested in preserving Hanna’s local history is campaigning to raise funds to purchase the Hanna Roundhouse.
    The Hanna Roundhouse Society was formed officially in January of this year. The vision of the Hanna Roundhouse Society is to restore the roundhouse in Hanna and possibly build a cultural centre to support local rural communities along the railway.
    To get there, they first have to secure the property. Sandra Beaudoin, president and founder of the society said it is campaigning to raise funds to purchase the property on which the historical icon is situated.
    “The most important lots of the Roundhouse property is Lot 3 (Roundhouse building site) and Lot 2, directly west of the building,” said Beaudoin.
    The society has been in contact with the current owner of the property and has made them aware of its interest.
    “She (the owner) has provided us with a price for the two lots of $200,000, but will donate $30,000 to the Hanna Roundhouse Society, reducing our net price for the two lots to $170,000. The smaller lot directly along Palliser Trail (Lot 1) would be nice to have, but in order to start restoration and developing, Lots 2 and 3 are the most important and need to be purchased soon,” said Beaudoin.
    She adds the asking price provided to the Hanna Roundhouse Society, is to remain the same until December 31, 2011.
    In the meantime, the society has been busy doing groundwork. It is registered as a non-profit society and has opened a bank account. Donations are tax deductible. To spread the message they have a website at www.hannaroundhouse.com, and set up a Facebook group to keep interested parties up to date with developments.
    “We are trying to anticipate everything needed to be done to ensure the proper checks are in place prior to purchasing the roundhouse property and to be aware of any restrictions we may be faced with in developing the property,” she said.
    She has recently had an appraisal completed on the property and has had a structural engineer in to assess the integrity of the structure.
    The vision of the society is to restore the Hanna Roundhouse to its original state (or as much as possible), build a cultural centre directly west of the roundhouse lot to exhibit history of local railroad workers and railroad archives, as well as local settlers and prairie families. It also has the vision to construct a venue for live theatre, conferences or weddings. It would also be a venue to support local artisans.
    “There are many other ideas in the developmental stage with the focus of community involvement to support the communities in and around Hanna. Since the roundhouse is the focal point of the whole project, there will also be a strong theme dedicated to the railroad; but everything is dependent on purchasing the roundhouse property,” said Beaudoin. “The Hanna Roundhouse Society is in the process of applying for grants and will continue to do so. However, this process can consume a large amount of time and further delay starting the restoration work and in the preparation work required for the restoration.”
For more information or to donate to the not-for-profit Hanna Roundhouse Society, contact sandra.beaudoin1@gmail.com.

Carbon Quilters Guild disbands

    Due to a lack of new members, the Carbon Quilters Guild has recently taken the decision to disband.
    “It was sad, we did a good job and we enjoyed what we did there,” said Alice McIntosh, now former Guild member.
    “We have had great support, volunteers galore helping with our shows, our husbands stepped up too to help. People came from everywhere to come to the shows.”
    The idea of the Guild came up in May 1995, when three ladies, Dorothy Horne, Mary Cadman and Janice Montgomery sat around a table and discussed how to raise money for the Farmer’s Exchange building in Carbon.
    They came up with the idea of creating a quilt to illustrate the people and plans of Carbon and got to work.
    The idea took off and a guild was formed: the Carbon Heritage Quilters Guild.
    Although the group was Alberta’s Handicrafters Guild’s smallest branch, with as few as three members and at the most eight, the Guild enjoyed very successful events.
    All in aid of helping their community, the group organized 10 quilt shows which were successful family fun events and raffled off 11 quilts to raise money for organizations and causes.
    They also organized quilts challenges within the group and quilted to help residents in time of need, to give comfort to those affected by tragedy or help when life was difficult.
    Recently, due to lack of members, the ladies decided to close down the Guild.
    However, in the spirit that started the Guild, the current members, Alice McIntosh, Dorothy Nygard and Dorothy Horne, wanted to ensure the community benefitted from this decision. They decided to donate the money raised from selling the equipment and supplies to local groups.
    A total of $6,500 was raised and donated to the Carbon Library, to buy Audio and books, the Carbon Fire Department, to go towards the purchase of a new rescue truck, the Wellness Centre, to help upgrade or replace some of the equipment in their exercise room and finally, the Carbon and Area Restoration Society (CAARS), to help them with building maintenance and who are currently renovating the Farmer’s Exchange building.
    Alice McIntosh told The Mail “It is disheartening, quilting has been around for ever, it is an art and craft that comes and goes I guess...We’d like to see it carry on, but maybe in a few hours, somebody else will start it up again.”
    The Guild ladies told The Mail they will carry on quilting and will take with them the great friendships they have developed through the Guild.

The carts are coming

    Drumheller residents are soon to be introduced to the new Solid Waste Collection system.
    In the next two weeks, the town will dedicate the time of a summer student to help with the new system roll-out and people through the transition process, and the assessment of properties where residents with special needs live. Education packs will also be distributed, explaining where the carts need to be placed.
    Some details are yet to be finalized, but with tenders now awarded, a new bylaw in place, the town is putting together the process for the change in the waste collection.
    During their regular meeting on Monday, April 26, Council awarded the tenders for both the commercial and the residential new automated cart collection to H & H Huxted Services, in the amount of $1,339,600.44 and $657,764.64 excl. GST, respectively.
    In his report to Council, Al Kendrick, director of Infrastructure Services, explained the tenders were within the town budget, with the residential one within the current 3-year budget, and the commercial one not affecting the budget as it is an exclusive franchise.
    Having an exclusive franchise will also reduce the town’s administrative costs by monitoring only one provider and recycling services will carry on to be provided to most businesses as part of the exclusive franchise.
    The report also highlights the commercial tender is on average 16.47 per cent lower than the current charges to commercial users.
    A contract was also awarded for the supply of the 360 litre carts, equivalent to 5 garbage bags, for the new waste collection system to IPL for $203,326. As well as competitive pricing, the supplier was chosen for its presence in Calgary and being a Canadian company.
    This pricing includes options such as Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tags and reading equipment, delivery, distribution and education packages, although Kendrick told The Mail there may be savings on this pricing.
    “We still have a bit of negotiations with regard to the radio frequency equipment as well as the markings, we may end up stamping the Town of Drumheller logo on them….we haven’t really totally finalized the price.”
    The tags will serve a dual purpose.
    They will help track carts if they go missing, or are misplaced, and collections will read the tags and be logged.
    A first cart, which has a 20- year lifespan, will be given to each property free of charge and will be residents’ responsibility. Any further carts will need to be purchased by the resident from the town.
    As those carts will be public property and cannot be personalized, the RFID tags will help recover them if they go missing. However, the tags are only readable at close range, so residents are advised to secure the carts after collection days as loss or theft will be their responsibility.
    Residents should also familiarize themselves with Bylaw #10-10, created to take into account the manual and the automated collection, and includes a section on penalties, ranging from $50 to a minimum of $1,000 for contraventions to provisions in the bylaw.
    The date of the change over has not yet been confirmed as it will depend on the time it will take for H & H Huxted to be equipped with the new waste collection vehicle.

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