Mayors Demand Immediate Action On Northern Issues
Tuesday, December 08, 2009 at 12:24
An ultimatum of sorts is being delivered to the provincial government.
The New North municipalities group says it wants to see progress made on long-standing issues in time for a January meeting with provincial cabinet ministers.
Failing that, executive members are calling for a large delegation of northerners to descend on the legislature in Regina.
That pledge was drawn up at yesterday’s annual New North gathering in Prince Albert — a meeting no one from government bothered to attend.
New North chair Bobby Woods says many people are frustrated by the government’s unwillingness to respond to their concerns, and thus are calling for action.
“Some of these things have been going on for 15 years, when New North first originated, and we’re still talking about the same things today. And they’re asking what has happened, why come they’re (the problems) still here. We’ve got housing issues, we have social problems, we have economic development concerns, and we’re still talking about the same thing and we haven’t really made much advancement. So those are the kind of things, and there’s a lot more that they want us to touch on, so we’ll be doing that,” Woods says.
Meantime, the mayor of Turnor Lake says he’d be happy just seeing some progress on a road link to his community.
Marius Montgrand says residents of his village have to drive on 29 km of unpaved road just to get to the highway.
“There’s a lot of new vehicles in Turnor, and we’d like to see it get paved there, even if it doesn’t happen all in one shot — even 10 km a year, we’d appreciate that,” Montgrand says.
He says the main road in town could also do with some upkeep, as many motorists are using the town dugouts as roadways.