(File photo/paNOW Staff)

By Nick Nielsen

Municipal election in November

Councellor Ogrodnick announces he won’t run for re-election

Aug 22, 2024 | 10:05 AM

With the Prince Albert municipal election coming up in November, three of the current city councillors have announced that they will not be running for reelection. One of the councillors who won’t be coming back is Dennis Ogrodnick, who has served eight years on council as part of two terms.

Born and raised in Prince Albert, Ogrodnick is very familiar with the city’s history and the people that have come out of it, including war veterans who helped protect this country. One of the projects Ogrodnick oversaw and is most proud of was memorializing these veterans in Prince Albert.

“We got 10 parks named after veterans, and I’m very proud of that. I have five in my Ward, so I’m very proud that we were able to honour veterans with the naming of parks and they’ll forever be remembered.”

As part of the Community Service Advisory Committee, Ogrodnick oversaw parks and green spaces, recreation facilities, cultural centres, and more. A big focus for the committee was not only making sure these parks stayed in working order for the people of Prince Albert, but that they were easily accessible to anyone anywhere around the city.

One of the parks in particular park in the city is outfitted to be accessible for anyone of an ability, taking into account things such as a slide with quiet rollers that don’t mess with the hearing of someone using cochlear implants. Ogrodnick believes that is one of the gems in this city.

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“We’re a city of green spaces and parks and we’ve spent a lot of money making sure that all areas of the city have a spray park and playground facilities and are accessible. So I’m very proud of that, very proud of the inclusive park at the fieldhouse. Canadian Tire and Malcolm Jenkins, along with the city, building that inclusive playground. If you have never been there, you should go and see it.”

While helping make the city a more beautiful place to be through parks and green spaces was a big focus during Ogrodnick’s tenure, he was involved in a lot of harder issues as well. One issue in particular Ogrodnick is proud to have put his foot down on was the Paratransit system in Prince Albert.

Before Ogrodnick’s time on council, the Paratransit system in the city shutdown for the night around 6:00 p.m., leaving those with certain needs without a means of travel around the city after that point. The province’s original plan was to provide taxi cab rides for people with physical disabilities and subsidize the cost, but Ogrodnick did not think that was good enough.

“I argued that the paratransit operators know what they’re doing. They provide dignity and respect to the clients that they serve, and they bring them from door to door providing that transit. I’m very, very proud of the fact that we expanded that contrary to the lies that were being spread about it, we never cut paratransit. We provide the dollars and the board and the executive director are the ones that make the decision. It’s a non-profit organization and they’re the ones that make the decisions and we provide the funding. We never, ever did cut their funding.”

While Ogrodnick believes he helped make the city a better place, there will always be challenges ahead for the next council that comes after. While securing the rest of the funding for the new rec centre being built will be a large challenge ahead, the biggest one facing the next council will be the slough of problems that surround homelessness in Prince Albert.

Mental health services are not a responsibility of the municipal government but rather the provincial. Ogrodnick cited a report from Dr. Chad Nilson that studied the homelessness in the city and recommended a Complex Needs Facility that could help with the homelessness and addictions problems currently troubling Prince Albert, and Ogrodnick urges the next council to stay on the province to approve such a facility.

“The province has to step up and address this. In Dr. Nilson’s report, he said that the emergency room at the Vic Hospital, 7 out of 10 patients that go there are there to stay the night. They’re really not, according to his study, emergency situations. So if the province built a facility, funded it and ran it to alleviate the pressures on emergency rooms, same thing in Saskatoon, Saint Paul’s Hospital, RUH, same thing. A lot of people go there because they’re homeless or they have mental health or problems or whatever. They don’t need an ER doctor and it’s tying up resources and spaces in that in that room.”

Despite the city’s challenges, Councillor Ogrodnick is proud to call Prince Albert home and thinks other should be too. He’s aware of some of the stigma surrounding Prince Albert, but he believes that people who give Prince Albert a try will find a reason to love it.

“Give it a chance. Don’t buy into the negativity. We’re so lucky. We have so much green space, we have so much park space, we have so much culture and recreation and sport for people to come here. It’s cheap to live here, our taxation is not the highest in the province. Housing is cheaper than Saskatoon, you get more house, more property. It’s a great place to live, play and work.”

Councillor Ogrodnick is taking his time away from city council to get back into teaching as a substitute teacher.

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nick.nielsen@pattisonmedia.com