No topic was off the table when Minister of Service Alberta Nate Glubish came to town.
Glubish was in Bonnyville on Friday, Aug. 30 as part of his province-wide tour to discuss issues facing Albertans.
From rural internet to registries, the topics covered at the Shaw House circled around concerns Bonnyville and area residents share. Glubish described these items as "the most relevant to the local community."
"This was helpful for me to understand what are the local challenges here for folks in Bonnyville, because that allows me to make sure that I'm not sitting in Edmonton trying to anticipate what's going to work best for the folks out here," he explained. "I wanted to listen and learn from them about the challenges they face and that means we can make more informed decisions about how to work with them to make life better."
The concerns brought up surrounding registries was consistent with what Glubish has heard during other meetings, and revolved around the viability and sustainability of the services they offer.
Town Mayor Gene Sobolewski stressed that the problems being faced locally aren't isolated.
"I wanted to point out to the minister that it's not one or two particular registries giving issues, it's inherent flaws within the systems themselves," he expressed.
Although he thought there were still some unanswered questions, Sobolewski believes the two-way dialogue with the minister about frustrations Bonnyville residents experience was important to have.
"I think a lot of the complaints, particularly with registries, are generated in rural Alberta. Just because of the mechanism of the privatization, and some of the constraints that you have in utilizing the same systems."
As urban and rural Albertans face different problems, Glubish said they worked collaboratively with MLAs to ensure the topics covered were ones that matter to constituents.
"It worked very well, and it's been very helpful to me as a new minister to really get a firm understanding of these issues at the local level all across the province," noted Glubish.
According to Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul MLA David Hanson, community meetings are one of the ways the provincial government is changing the way they interact with the public.
"You get to meet people that are on the ground, talk to the people, see the issues, and this was kind of an eye-opener for me as well. You get to hear from people first-hand who are dealing with the complaints," he continued.
When it came to internet access in some communities, gaining an understanding of where Bonnyville's services are at was crucial information for Glubish.
"In this day and age, technology is critically important to education and economic development. So it's really important that rural Alberta doesn't find itself in a position where it falls behind urban Alberta," he detailed. "It's a very difficult task to bring increased connectivity to remote areas in Alberta, and that's why it's so important for us on the tour to get an understanding of the local challenges and then figure out what are the tools available that will help us tackle it."
During the meeting, Glubish shared the strategic direction the province is proposing. It includes finding out what assets are in the ground for fibre optic cable, understanding what technologies are available to plug into, and finding out who could play a role in building the infrastructure.
"The consensus in the room seemed to be very much in line... that we're going on the right track. We've got a lot of work to do, and we need to make up for lost time. Over the last four years, we had a lot of inaction from the previous government on this file, so I'm playing catch up. This is a priority for me, and we're going to work very closely with the local community to figure out a way to work together to solve this problem."
Another aspect Glubish emphasized was finding a solution for rural Internet access with limited spending.
"As we face a period where we have financial constraints that we inherited from the previous government, we need to look for ways that don't necessarily involve throwing a lot of money at a problem, (but) still work towards... improving it for rural Albertans," he detailed.
The Service Alberta Minister also made local stops in Cold Lake and St. Paul. The tour began in Lloydminster on Tuesday, Aug. 20, and ends in Mayerthorpe on Wednesday, Sept. 4.
Glubish believes it's a great opportunity for him "to meet folks from all over the province, and to listen and learn from them."
"The next step will be to take all the information that we've gathered, review it, and work with our department staff to combine this into a strategy and then after we'll have a bit more to say on what the next steps will be."
