Issue 41
SERVING THE ENERGY CITY SINCE 1903
www.estevanmercury.ca
Wednesday, February 14, 2018 Mailing No. 10769 | Publication No. 40069240
Estevan city council approves one marijuana dispensary for the community By David Willberg dwillberg@estevanmercury.ca
Estevan city council has decided that one marijuana retailer will be sufficient for the Energy City once the drug becomes legal. Council approved having just the one dispensary in Estevan at its meeting on Monday night, acting on a recommendation that came from the Estevan board of police commissioners last month to have just the one retailer. The Saskatchewan Liquor and Gaming Authority had said Estevan could have two retailers if it wanted. Discussion at Monday night’s meeting on the issue was brief. Mayor Roy Ludwig noted that Police Chief Paul Ladouceur wanted to have just one retailer at first, monitor the situation and then at some point in the future, add a second retailer in Estevan. Councillor Shelly Veroba, in making the motion Monday night to have just one retailer, said that when council decides a second retailer is necessary, it could be added. “ I d o n ’t t h i n k w e should start with two,” she said. Nobody showed up
to the council meeting to voice opposition to the one vendor system, and the only people in council chambers on Monday night were council members, city staff and the media. Ludwig said that due to all of the changes associated with marijuana legalization, including changes to bylaws, as well as the impact on local law enforcement, it would be easier to start with one retailer and add a second at a later date. “It’s just going to be a lot of things coming at our police, and everyone, actually,” said Ludwig. The city’s building inspector has been working on a bylaw and on zoning requirements, in co-operation with the police chief. Ludwig said those tasks are moving forward. The police board is discussing new issues that pop up related to marijuana legalization at each of their meetings. Cannabis is scheduled to be legalized in Canada as of July 1. “It’s all happening fairly rapidly as we move forward,” said Ludwig. The legalization of marijuana generated a lot of discussion at the recent convention for the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association,
Mayor Roy Ludwig says one marijuana dispensary is enough for Estevan for now, but a second vendor could come to Estevan in the future. File photo he said, because a lot of municipalities are scrambling to be ready for the legalization date. The mayor is confident the city will be ready once marijuana becomes legal, as the bylaw changes will be finished. And he’s confident the EPS will be ready as well. “The chief has been going to different conferences on this all the time,” said Ludwig. The retailer that council approves would be located in a commercial area, likely downtown, rather than in an industrial area. It also has to be a certain dis-
tance away from schools. Ludwig believes that council’s decision to have one retailer won’t result in pricing issues. “The price will be probably fixed by the liquor board commission,” said Ludwig. The mayor admits that some members of the public are not pleased with the decision to go with one retailer. Most of the dissenting voices that he has heard don’t want to see marijuana sold in Estevan. “Some of our elderly people would rather not see any, but the problem we have with that is the under-
ground economy (for marijuana) is here already, so for us to just say we’re not going to have it would be somewhat simplistic,” said Ludwig. “People would just order it online, or go to Weyburn and get it.” He added he knows of some who want to see two retailers in the community. Once it’s time to add a second retailer, Ludwig believes it would be as simple as having a recommendation from the police board to city council, and then council would need to be willing to have a second dispensary. It would have to fall under conditions out-
lined in the zoning bylaw. “I’m sure the licensing people would then decide at that time,” said Ludwig. “Interested parties would apply, and then they (SLGA) again would decide – like they’re going to with this one – who gets it. That won’t be a council decision. That will be the liquor commission that decides who gets this business licence.” The city hasn’t spoken with SLGA on whether it would be allowed to apply for a second licence at some point in the future, but Ludwig said council believes that won’t be a problem.
Estevan culture centres dealing with new budget cuts spite the cuts we have had, but we are going to be open year-round and we are still At the end of every trying our best to provide fiscal year, there is always programs and services for talk of budgets, and lately the community,” said Mark those budget talks have Veneziano, the directorincluded cuts to local cul- curator of the SVM. “As of right now we tural agencies. T h e E s t e v a n A r t s are still going to be operatCouncil (EAC), Estevan ing as usual but we won’t Art Gallery and Museum be able to expand as much (EAGM), Souris Valley as we wanted to for next Museum (SVM) and Souris winter because there is a Valley Theatre (SVT) all lack of funding.” The museum is going suffered a reduction in the grants they received from to lose their summer students who were integral to the City of Estevan. The cuts were revealed providing extra help during when the budget was re- the museum’s busy season. “We are going to have leased late last year. The city cited lower revenues scale back much of what this year, stemming from we wanted to do for 2019,” reductions in municipal said Veneziano. The museum has optoperating grants from the provincial government, ed to best deal with these as well as the govern- cuts by looking for grants ment’s decision to reduce from the federal governthe grants in lieu of taxa- ment. The museum has tion paid to municipalities. been cut 20 per cent and “This year is going to they must now find their be a great year for us de- own methods of offsetting
By William Acri
wacri@estevanmercury.ca
those losses. “Our staff has not decreased throughout this process; we still are running regular winter employment of one full-time position and one part-time position and overall we will be operating as usual with some limitations,” said Veneziano. The arts council has also been cut, and they will also be applying for grants and trying to find ways to raise extra money to make up for their loss of revenue. “The biggest thing we are looking at is other sources of funding, meaning we are looking to provincial and federal grants to make up for the shortfall in our budget due to the cuts,” said Melanie Memory, the administrator and accountant for the EAC. “We have been handed a 10 per cent cut to our overall budget and there is a lot of stress associated with relying on non-
guaranteed grant money for operating costs,” she added. The EAC is only receiving a 10 per cent cut. When Memory was asked about that amount, she said, “The arts council is very small; it only has one paid employee and the costs associated with the council are always going up. As such a 20 per cent cut could result in the council not being able function and could also mean a layoff of our only paid employee. “The most unfortunate thing is we have had to increase our fees like our art camp, for example. It was originally $75 last year per child and we’ve had to increase it to $90 this year.” Memory noted that getting grants is very difficult because the applications are complex and they get harder every year to qualify for. The most difficult thing about the
grants is the stiff competition. Additionally, once an application is sent off, a jury looks them over and may send them back for additional information. “Business for the Arts has been a great way to raise money for what we do. The way it basically works is however much money each group raises themselves, the government will match that amount in the form of a donation,” said Memory. The EAGM has been cut 20 per cent as well; they have laid off curator Sarah Durham, and Amber Andersen, the current museum director, will now go back to being the directorcurator of the museum, a role she held from 2011 to 2013. They have also lost their summer students, which provided them with a lot of help because they do so much educational programming and extra help is always needed in
the summer months. “The city covers 90 per cent of our wages and utilities, and because of that, if we lose 20 per cent of our funding, then we will have to lay someone off due to the large amount of wages that are covered by the city,” said Andersen. “As I have mentioned before I don’t feel like the city wanted to do this, they are certainly having budget issues as well and these cuts are also mostly coming down from a provincial level,” she added. With the loss of their summer students and their curator, there is a reduction in staffing that Andersen pointed to being about 33 per cent. The result of this is the current employees of the museum are going to have to take on more responsibility. This has also amounted to a reduction in programming and exhibits. A2 » CULTURE
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