Council members say presence at FCM is necessary

Members of Prince Albert’s city council are defending sending multiple delegates to attend conferences such as the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) and the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA).

City councillors, as well as Prince Albert Mayor Greg Dionne, plan to attend this year’s FCM conference in Edmonton in June. The council members’ attendance at the conference comes at the per-person cost of approximately $3,879.59. If all members of council were to attend, it would, therefore, come at a cost of $34,916.31. The approximate cost would cover a five-night hotel stay, parking, meals, incidentals and vehicle costs.

The costs to attend have already been approved in the 2015 budget. This year, the mayor and council’s travel budget to attend conferences is $33,800.

On Monday, council agreed to allow members interested in attending the conference to go.

Coun. Don Cody offered the assurance for those who question the value of attending the conference that it has value. The FCM conference is referenced during committee meetings, such as the ones held by the Pehonan Parkway Board.

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“All of us that went the last time, I know, were very diligent to go to study sessions. We went to all the meetings. We didn’t miss any. We went to a lot of other things as well,” he said.

“I think it’s good to be able to see another city’s viewpoint. And we take ideas from those, and we take lots of ideas from [them].”

He plans to attend this year’s conference.

For Dionne, he bases his decisions to go to a conference on the net benefit he feels the City would gain from him attending. This year, he plans to go because the conference is in Edmonton and it will cost less to attend this one than at other times when it had been held in other cities, such as Vancouver or Niagara Falls, Ont.

He has assigned the councillors who are attending the conference sessions to go to. Dionne, himself, is interested in the talks that will be held about new arenas and new facilities and building infrastructure around it.

And it’s valuable knowledge for the City, which Dionne said is looking to build new facilities down the road.

“There’s more actually on the FCM agenda that is positive for our community and will give us a net benefit than other ones,” he said on Friday.

He explained that his view that the SUMA mayors’ caucus lacked a net benefit was behind his decision not to attend that meeting at that conference.

“There’s been all kinds of issues [discussed], but nothing to help us,” he said.

But he’s also looking ahead to future decisions about attending conferences.

“And so, we’re really going to be prudent with our budget and we’re going to look at these conferences and we’re going to go [and] they’ve got to show me that there’s a net benefit.”

tjames@panow.com

On Twitter: @thiajames