County residents offer feedback on Morinville recreation facility project

Above: Aerial photo of Sturgeon County in Division 5, just west of town. All six county divisions were consulted in open houses and online in the County’s recreation survey. Divison 2 had the largest response. – Morinville News file photo

by Morinville News Staff

Feedback has been received from Sturgeon County residents on potentially funding the Morinville Rec Facility being built just east of Morinville on a 77-acre parcel of land.

Between June 6 and July 6, Sturgeon County hosted six public meetings, an online survey and offered residents the opportunity to host their own conversations to gather feedback about
investing in the project.

The County has collected and transcribed the information and posted it online in a “What Was Said” section of the Sturgeon County website. The July 3 and 4 meetings have not yet been transcribed.

Online and email responses exceeded the public meetings with 409 responses to the survey. Almost 37 per cent of those responding online resides in Division 2.

“This is the ideal approach for Sturgeon county to take,” one respondant wrote. “It allows us to donate to Morinville rec centre and we are free to give more in the future as the facility grows in phase two but does not tie us down to ownership.”

However, a large number of online respondents saw little to no value in contributing to the project due to proximity to their home or a concern over increased taxes.

“The majority out [sic] the residents including ourselves in our area do not find it convenient to proceed out to Mornville for recreational activities,” the respondent wrote. “I believe it is unfair to raise taxes to the entire community for a facility that is not relevant or convenient to all community members. We are against a raise in taxes to support a facility for use of a select few individuals.”

Now that feedback has been collected, County Administration will provide County Council with a recommendation in August based on the public input as well as the Regional Recreation Facility Master Plan, analysis of the Community Recreation Facility Business Case jointly developed between Morinville and Sturgeon County over the past couple of years, and the principles of Recreation Cost Share.

Final decisions are planned for November of this year when County Council deliberates on the 2019 budget.

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21 Comments

    • Maybe read “What was Said” before calling the residents a JOKE! They had some negative feed back but worth consideration! It is Coucil job to hear what the residents had to say.

    • Pimiskern Teena I did read it. Which was part of the reason for my comment. This county is a joke. One of the worst run counties in the province. Probably one of the least cooperative as well.

    • As a morinville resident the town should have planed this better. Asking for a $4M dollar handout for phase one is asking too much.

      Well are you aware of how large Sturgeon County is?

      Are you aware of who would benefit from using this facility in Sturgeon County or how many residents would actually use only phase one in this facility?

      Redwater residents would have to drive 50 min to and hour to use the facility in Morinville even though they have a rec centre with a pool. Are you aware that Fort Sask is closer for those residents who can shop at Walmart and other business that Morinville currently does not have.

      How about residents in Calahoo or Lily Lake. The use St. Albert, which you maybe unaware but the county only donated $500,000k to that facility, not the $4 million Morinville is asking!

      Sturgeon Valley residency’s can use CFB Edmonton Base gym and have same price as Morinville Residence with a pool and without Military families being only priority.

      I think those arguments are pretty good reasons.

  1. Do you pay more for using Saint Albert’s Recreation or Edmonton or any other County or town where you are not a resident of, if we would go in with Morinville our taxes would go up to because believe me they have to get the money from somewhere that is the reality of life and of wanting things for the community

  2. County residents have historically not paid their way when it comes to the services that the municipalities within their boundaries provide.

    Across the board the county uses about 40% of the services that Morinville provides, but pay a fraction of the cost of providing these services.

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