BONNYVILLE – A local business owner wanted to clear the way when it comes to issues surrounding snow removal within the Town of Bonnyville.
During council’s regular meeting on March 10, Joel Olszowka, owner of J.O.E. Ltd., discussed a letter business owners received from the town in October 2019 regarding removing snow from their parking lots and where they can pile it.
The letter, sent from CAO Mark Power, to business owners stated the practice of removing snow and ice from private properties and placing them onto the highway, draining areas, or other public places in town is prohibited. Doing so would negatively impact the stormwater drainage, and it’s a violation of the municipality’s traffic safety bylaw.
“At the time that you’re handed that as a business owner, you’d like to work together with the town and come to some sort of agreement or a way we can work together on this, amongst other things,” Olszowka told council, adding he saw it as a kick in the face for those who were struggling.
“With the economy being so bad, businesses aren’t doing so good and they’re leaving the town at an alarming rate. Businesses are empty and on a daily basis there’s no vacancies.”
His other suggestion was for the municipality to provide equipment or split the cost with business owners to help relieve the financial burden they face when it comes to removing snow.
Mayor Gene Sobolewski stressed those are extra expenses the town wouldn’t be able to take on due to their budget having a significant deficit.
“The town doesn’t tell you to remove the snow (from your lot), you choose to remove it. You want to put it into a ditch where there’s going to be consequences to that, not only for the business owner but for the town itself, and then the town incurs costs as a result of that snow,” he stated.
If the town did it for one business, Coun. Ray Prevost noted they’d have to do it for anyone who asked.
“I don’t know how you could possibly fix this to be fair to each individual business owner. I don’t see a solution,” said Prevost.
After receiving similar feedback from the business community in January in regards to where to put excess snow, council tasked administration with looking into locations for a municipal snow dump.
Along with discussing the issues surrounding snow removal, Olszowka used his appearance in front of council to touch on the need for the town to have a better relationship with its local businesses.
“In life, everyone’s going to get together and complain about something. But, why does it have to be that way? Why can’t we work together? Why do the business owners feel like they’re getting mistreated by the town? I’m not asking for monetary breaks or handouts, I want to have a good relationship with the town. What can we do to work together to develop this town, stop the bleeding, and help the businesses?”
One suggestion offered by Coun. Elisa Brosseau was to organize meetings between the municipality and local entrepreneurs, with the assistance of the Bonnyville and District Chamber of Commerce, like the County of St. Paul has.
“We’d like to have something like that happen here. If you can spread that information, we want people to come together in a setting where among peers we can talk, but they need to come out and talk to us too,” she stressed.
Sobolewski was on board with the idea of meeting with local businesses.
“I wouldn’t mind having a representative on it, but I think it should be a committee that’s organized by a group of business owners and things like that to be able to have a dialogue.”
The possibility is being looked into, with some involvement from the municipality.
