SUMA

Council hires the Chief Administrative Officer - sometimes called the City Manager - to manage the day-to-day operations of a municipality.

All other municipal staff report directly or indirectly to the CAO.

Important reminders to our GBI subscribers as municipal elections near.

The Town of Redvers, located in Southeast Saskatchewan, started their “Memory Pots” project in 2015. The intent is to have a way for residents or those who have or had family in the town commemorate or remember lost loved ones.

The project started with about 20 pots. By 2022, there were 60 and the Town made the decision to upgrade from small wooden pots to tall black planters, pictured here, which remain on the street year round. In the off-season, the pots are decorated with seasonal items.

Typically the memory Pots feature plants or flowers with a custom made sign which includes names, dates, quotes, and pictures of passed love ones. In 2023, the Town added QR codes on a separate stake from the main sign, which takes the visitor to a website of the sponsors choosing – an obituary, or a special song or article are common.

The Town takes photos of each Memory Pot and posts them to their social media pages and makes a recap video for YouTube. This is a key aspect of the program, allowing those sponsors who are not residents to see their Memory Pot once it is posted.

This year the town has 69 pots purchased, with 70 available. They have plans to purchase more next year.
As the years pass, although we do not wish it to be so, our memories, commemorations, and traditions for our loved ones fade. The Town believes that this is a wonderful way to remember, seeing a Memory Pot tended to and flourish in the name of their loved one. They are very proud of our Memory Pots and feel it is a uniqueness they can truly call their own.

Congratulations to all new and returning MLAs. SUMA looks forward to continuing our work together on files that impact Saskatchewan's cities, towns, villages, resort villages, and northern municipalities.

Join SUMA CEO Jean-Marc Nadeau and other municipal leaders and stakeholders across the province on Cross Border Network's
Live show tonight at 7:30 PM CST for in-depth analysis and commentary on !

LIVE SHOW: Saskatchewan Votes 2024 Join us for Municipal Affairs live from Regina as we cover the Saskatchewan Provincial Election Night! Tune in at 7:00 PM CST for in-depth analysis and comme...

Over the last two weeks, our team has been travelling across Saskatchewan in preparation for our live Saskatchewan Provincial Election Night Special.

During our journey, we’ve connected with mayors, councillors, and other key stakeholders to understand how this election will shape the future of municipalities.

Today, we’re joined by Warman Councillor Richard Beck

Youtube: https://youtu.be/0bL62gSbCKc�Apple: https://apple.co/41p5I2I
Spotify: https://bit.ly/3tkvb0E

SUMA

Municipal Affairs is Part of the Cross Border Network.
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SUMA took on mental health and addictions as a cornerstone advocacy issue in February 2022 because we recognized the clear need in our communities for greater supports, and hazards of not having them in place.

Proactive mental health services pay enormous dividends by reducing the costs and strain on healthcare, bylaw enforcement, policing, and corrections. Similarly addressing root causes of addiction, such as trauma, and supporting people with harm reduction until they are ready to access rehabilitation, can lead to huge healthcare saving related to overdose response, inpatient care and HIV transmission.

We need the next Saskatchewan government to invest in proactive mental health supports and harm reduction services through increased, long-term contracts with Community-Based Organizations.

Climate change is already having an effect on the severity of Saskatchewan’s flood and drought cycles, and the potential for damage to municipal infrastructure is enormous, especially due to floods, and forest or grass fires. Municipalities need help to adapt and become more resilient.

SUMA has created a Municipal Eco-Action Centre, but we need the next provincial government to come to the table with funding for adaptation. We also need better environmental stewardship, including the adoption of a formal wetland policy, support for proper landfill decommissioning, and innovation in solid waste management practices.

Homelessness is a major issue for municipalities, despite them not being responsible for social services or healthcare.

While there are inflationary factors partially to blame, the province’s changes to income support programs are directly increasing homelessness. The average Saskatchewan Income Support Program recipient receives $300 less than the minimum cost of living each month, making them choose between rent and utilities or food. There is a similar shortfall for those on the Saskatchewan Assured Income for Disability Program.

We have also seen substantial underinvestment from both the federal and provincial governments into social housing, which is the least expensive way to provide shelter for the unhoused.

We need the next provincial government to address homelessness by increasing SIS and SAID rates to meet minimum costs of living, investing in social housing, and making direct rent and utility payments to landlords/providers opt-out, rather than opt-in.

The Town of Wolseley was a top 4 finalist in the 2024 Kraft Hockeyville contest.

The community volunteers came together to plan and organize the entire campaign. The "Kraft" Bear was used as a marketing strategy to promote Kraft Hockeyville to the vehicles passing by on the TransCanada Highway.

Our offices are closed today in lieu of the Thanksgiving holiday.

We'll return on Tuesday, October 15 to serve you.

Bylaws are essential to keeping our urban municipalities safe and thriving, but they can be difficult to enforce. Many communities cannot afford a dedicated bylaw enforcement officer, and the RCMP generally do not provide enforcement for bylaws unless there is a clear public safety threat. Even when a ticket is issued, it may go unpaid and ignored unless the municipality is willing to go through the already overburdened provincial court. We need the next provincial government to implement an alternative, streamlined system for municipalities to prosecute bylaw infractions, and to provide more funding and training for officers to enforce bylaws at the municipal level.

Today, on , we are experiencing an unprecedented homelessness crisis in our province.

As temperatures drop, the physical risks associated with being houseless increase exponentially – data from the SHA shows that the number of frostbite related amputations in Saskatchewan increased from an average of four from 2012-2020 to 18 in 2022. This trend is one of many troubling shifts related to homelessness in our province, resulting in both staggering human-related costs and substantial financial costs to our province and our already over-burdened healthcare and policing services.

SUMA has been advocating for solution-based policies: increasing the amount available and distribution method of SIS and SAID, an increase in supportive housing, and addressing the mental health and addictions crisis, which can be directly correlated to the increase in homelessness in our province.

Municipalities depend on property taxes as their primary revenue stream, but they have very little control over property assessment, which is set out in policy by a provincial agency. We need the next provincial government to remove unnecessary complications to the system, such as the provincial percentage of value for various property classes, to make the system easier to administer and explain to residents. We also need to have property assessments occur more frequently to help reduce major swings in property taxes for local residents and businesses, and potentially reduce the number of property tax appeals that occur.

Thank you to everyone who attended our provincial election forum this morning.

A special thank you goes out to the NDP representative Erika Ritchie and the Saskatchewan Party representative Lori Carr for giving us their time, and our president, Randy Goulden, for moderating.