Budget 2024 begins

With three months still left in 2023, Council sat down to look at a baker’s dozen of projects that have been proposed over the last year to see if these ideas still want to be pursued. Here’s a little of what they talked about.

Parking Lots

One of the items on the list is an expansion to the Flatbed Falls parking lot. “When we talked about the Flatbed Falls and Quality Falls parking lots during previous budget discussions, we didn’t even know who owns them,” says Mayor Krakowka. “I’m just wondering if staff have had the opportunity to find out any of that information? I know we couldn’t move forward on it because we weren’t sure.”

Jason Bradley, Director of Operations and Infrastructure says he has reached out to both the Peace River Regional District (PRRD) and the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure (MOTI). “It is a District parking lot,” he says.

Of course, he says, there is little room for expansion without disrupting the areas. “There are a few ideas for improvements there that I would like to pursue,” he says.

Mayor Krakowka says he was under the understanding that the Flatbed Falls parking lot was on Crown land. “I believe on the map I’ve seen, it’s Crown land not District owned land.”

Bradley says he will have to get back to the mayor on that.

Councillor Noksana says the trail needs an outhouse at the trailhead and maybe a garbage can, “just to keep the garbage down in the bush.”

Bradley says the garbage can at Flatbed was replaced this year.

Councillor Gulick says the push to expand and improve the Flatbed Falls parking lot originated with the Tourism Advisory Council. “One of the things we had talked about was expanding the parking lot in an area that maybe isn’t quite as close to Flatbed as it is now, but that it’s still accessible for people.”

She suggests having a secondary parking lot across the highway from Mackenzie. “There would be an opportunity to put a parking lot there, and people could walk from there,” she says. “It’s just for when it’s super busy.”

She says it might also be a good idea to put up signs showing people how to park at Flatbed. “It’s always interesting to drive by and see how people have chosen to park. They’re all over the place.”

Another parking lot that council would like to see improvements to is the Quality Falls parking lot. However, says Bradley, he is under the impression that falls under the auspices of Recreation Sites and Trails BC.

Councillor Noksana says she would love to see an outhouse and garbage cans at the Quality Falls trailhead. “We should be advocating for them to make improvements there,” she says. “It’s a very busy trail in our area.”

The mayor agrees that if the trail falls under provincial management, it should not be up to the District to put money forward for capital items.

Councillor Gulick says she wants to see something done. “Quality Falls is one of the most used trails around town,” she says. “I understand it would be a cost to us, particularly if we wanted to maintain Quality in the wintertime as well. Most people park on the highway and then walk across. Would we want to plow it or not?”

More importantly, she says, a bathroom there is imperative. “There is so much toilet paper left behind in the bush. It’s a site that’s used quite a bit and it’s part of the thing that people come to our town for. While I understand that it belongs to Rec Sites and Trails, I think there is merit in looking into how we might be able to work with them install an outhouse, even though that doesn’t necessarily belong to us.”

Trails

Councillor Noksana says she’d love to see more walking paths get completed. “We have a new jump trail further down than the paths go, and that’s causing a lot of children and adults to bike down the road instead of following a safe trail.”

She says she’d like to see official walking paths link other areas of town, too, like the Monkman RV Park. “We need to look at options that would help keep our active transportation users safe.”

Mayor Krakowka says there was also discussion previously about expanding the trail along Monkman Way to Highway 29, alongside Highway 29 to Mackenzie Way, then back down. “At the time, we did not have an understanding if it could be a concern from MOTI in regards to having enough room there.”

Bradley says as far as he knows, those discussions haven’t happened. “I was not aware of the depth of this trail system,” he says.

Mayor Krakowka says there was a map generated, probably during the previous budget discussions, that showed the potential expansions to the trail system.

Councillor Noksana says that if that loop were made, Council should look at a walking path to Flatbed. “We could talk to MOTI and see if we could put in a crosswalk, too.”

Krakowka says he doesn’t expect a crosswalk would fly with the Ministry. He also says it would probably be a good idea to get the map of the proposed paved “active transportation trails” in front of the current council, as they probably haven’t seen it. “I know we were waiting to have staff reach out to MOTI to make sure that we had the right-of-way on that side of the highway. We might not.”

“I remember back when we were doing the other trails,” says Councillor Gulick. “It was cheaper to do all the work at once, rather than to bring somebody back in again later. So I would want us to do a fairly good look and figure out what needs to be done. Talk to the Tumbler Ridge Mountain Bike Association (TRMBA) and find out where’s their next trail are going to be. Talk to Economic Development and see if they have some ideas about what’s coming forward in the future. We’re also talking about the revitalization of downtown, so trying to make connections and stuff there…I have no problem with it but I think we want to make sure we do something fairly comprehensive.”

CFO Natalie Wehner says the plan is to do each trail as a separate dollar figure. “When we bring this part of the budget deliberations forward, Council can make decisions and whether they want to do it all, or do parts of it. It gives a lot more options. Maybe you want to do it as a phased project, part of it in 2024 and part in 2025. While I appreciate doing it all in once, I would recommend against it being one project.”

Councillor Norbury suggests putting this discussion on a PPC agenda. “Invite some user groups and other stakeholders to look at where they think it should go and find out what everyone would want. Everyone’s going to want everything, but if we can get everyone in the same room and have a discussion, we might find out that it’s similar for a lot of people.”

One of the items on the list is the Jump Trail, which is now finished.

Activities for youth

Councillor Gulick points out the list says for Council to give staff direction. “What I would prefer here is that we actually reach out to the youth—whether it’s we bribe them with food, or we bribe them with a gift card, or whatever—to get their feedback. I don’t think it makes any sense for us adults to make a decision on what youth are going to participate in. I think that could change greatly, but I would rather have 12 pie-in-the-sky ideas, rather than us put a batting cage in and all the youth go ‘lame.’ I think it could be a simple enough thing with setting up at the community centre and/or the high school and elementary school to see what could be possible out there. You know, there might be stuff that we could do at very little cost that the kids would think would be the coolest thing ever. Maybe even if it’s throwing some money at the library for virtual reality stuff, because the kids sure like that. The money isn’t necessarily in their budget to make sure everything stays up to par.”

Councillor Hofman says that as a parent with teenagers, ‘I don’t know’ is “pretty much the only answer you’re going to get. I did have a couple of thoughts coming up, so I’m just going to throw them out and we’ll see on the list of rejected ideas by teenagers, but that’s fine.”

He suggests setting up floor hockey in the arena. “I think we can probably set up two floor hockey areas to play. I mean, you don’t need the full rink if you’re going to be on your feet.”

He also suggests setting up a lacrosse box . “It’s basically an outdoor arena where they could continue playing hockey all year round.”

He suggests a outdoor arena for hockey and skating in the winter.

Finally, he is wondering if the racquetball courts could be converted into something for the youth.

Director of Community Services and Facilities Denis Bento says the racquetball courts are not utilized as much as he would like them to be.

“There are a lot of comments about extending the gym, having a gym there as well. I know our fitness instructor does classes in there, but it would be a really nice idea to expand our gym there or have youth programs there.”

Barring changing the courts to something else, Hofman says, the town could look at getting kids interested in squash or racquetball. “Have some sort of introductory program and see if the youth would get into it for over a summer program,” he says “I know there’s some racquets and some equipment to borrow. They’re nice courts. They’ve been maintained, and I’d like to see some use there. Maybe whacking a ball at 100 miles an hour will appeal to them.”

Bento says this summer there was pickleball, ball hockey and dodgeball offered. “We also have a user agreement with the school where the students can come and under the supervision of our fitness instructor, do fitness programs, utilize the pool, arena and gym for free.”

Mayor Krakowka points out there is an outdoor rink down at the golf course, beside the sledding hill, where there is a heated shack. “I don’t want to say it gets flooded every year, because it is definitely weather dependent,” he says. “I know last year there were conversations in regards to keeping a Zamboni there, so they had that option.”

He mentions the youth society came in and talked about how they couldn’t offer more programs because it wasn’t within the budget they had. “It was said then if they were to take it on, we could increase their budget to oversee that for the District. So to me we got to look at that too, whether we want a society overseeing some of this concept, or if we want District staff. If we expect staff to run it, that’s staff time, and staff is already at capacity. If we’re going to start adding a whole bunch of stuff, we would have to add staffing or talk to the Teen Centre Society about taking it over.”

New Gym

For the last number of years, there has been discussions about ways to expand the gym facilities, from a purpose built daycare, allowing the gym to expand to that area, to moving the gym to where the library is, or where the teen centre is now.

“We looked at lots of options,” says Mayor Krakowka. “The previous Council was throwing out options to see what staff thought: how do we expand the gym? How do we expand the daycare? Do we move the gym? Build a different building expand the daycare into the gym? It sounds like staff is saying we’re at capacity in the gym. If so, what is the revenue? Are we losing money? Are we making money? And if we are losing money, is it because we don’t have the room? If that’s the case has staff looked at any kind of options?”

Bento says this proposal was before his time, so he’s not sure what the options on the table are. “As far as activity in the gym, it is a busy gym. If we had options to expand the gym, it would be good for the community. Definitely we can look at the numbers and bring it back to Council. As my experience there, the gym it is busy and I know there’s a lot of comments from the community that they would like to see more equipment, and there is no place to put more equipment.”

Councillor Norbury says part of the delay in the past has been not knowing what’s happening with the childcare centre, which also needs more space. “We’ve been talking about a new building for so long, and if we need a bigger gym, the natural expansion would be to take over the childcare centre. Nothing’s really happened because we’ve been waiting on a new building. I would like to first see what happens with our childcare centre. There’s a lot of moving pieces in this project and I think we still need to wait and see.”

In the meantime, says Mayor Krakowka, “Councillor Hofman pointed out earlier that the courts are not being used.” The mayor makes a motion to ask staff to investigate what sorts of things—from equipment to programs—can be moved to the racquetball courts.

Disc Golf

Councillor Gulick says she is not interested in developing a disc golf course. “We have one that’s there. I have only once seen anybody on it. So to spend any more money on it? I’m not really in favour of that.”

Councillor Noksana says she couldn’t disagree more. “We have had a user group—a very active, long-time user group—come out and specifically ask if they could use this land. They weren’t even asking for money. They want the land to make it better. They’ve told us stats how many people use it in other communities. I’ve driven by, I’ve seen vehicles there, I’ve seen families playing. This is a way that we can get a really cool disc golf course: by partnering with an organization that actively wants to do it. Why would we say no to them?”

Councillor Norbury says disc golf is something Council should be encouraging, because it has been growing in popularity in town. “We started off with a simple three hole course outside the community centre. Then we saw that expand into what we see today by the ball diamonds and and the saddle club. Now seeing that progression going from small to bigger to big to bigger? I think this is absolutely what we should be doing and supporting. Councillor Gulick may not have seen people out there, but I’ve seen people there. I’ve heard from community members that if we do expand this we could be seeing tournaments, as in there are tournaments in Chetwynd and in Dawson, and this is outside of the delegation that we had. We had a delegation ask for this. And if we’re looking at increased activities for our youth and our community, this is an easy, no or low staff activity. We just need to make sure that the place is mowed. And even now, even if we don’t mow it a whole lot, that’s fine. It adds another feature to the course.”

Bento says he talked to the Wolverine Nordic and Mountain Society about costs. “With everything: the concrete pads, the baskets, the service installation, it’s about $69,000. The good thing about disc golf is it’s just one time. The maintenance is pretty low.”

Wehner points out that the only catch is it would remain District property. “Applying for grants would need to run that through the District. We would also need to have an agreement done up with the user group for liability purposes.”

Dog Park

Something not on the list, says Councillor Hofman, is a dog park, which is something the community has been asking for.

Councillor Gulick says she’s not in favour of just building a dog park. “It’s been in front of Council before. I am not in favour of it unless somebody throws together a society and comes to us and asks for it. I think it’s one of those things that would again fall on the District. I think there is plenty of area for people to connect people with their dogs.”

Visitor Centre Upgrade

Another addition to the list is better conferencing features for the Visitor Centre basement. The mayor says there used to be monitors down there that were for that very thing. He’s curious to where those went.

Spray Park

Council has been discussing a spray park for years. It was on the budget for last year, assuming they could get a grant. They did not.

The spray park will remain on the budget for 2024, but with the same hope of getting funding from some other source. “I still support the concept of staying in the budget and hoping for a matching grant,” says the mayor.