Medicine Hat Minute: Manufacturing Hub, Fire Engines, and Traffic Calming Measures

Medicine Hat Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Medicine Hat politics

This Week In Medicine Hat:

• There will be a meeting of the Public Services Committee this morning at 8:00 am. The Committee will receive the Medicine Hat Public Library 2022 Annual Update and the Managing Director’s Service Area Update, which includes the Towne Square Market Pod Rental process and the Responsible Animal Ownership Bylaw. The City of Grande Prairie is requesting that the City of Medicine Hat second a resolution at the 2023 Alberta Municipalities Conference in September, so the Committee will consider that resolution. It proposes that the Rural Municipalities of Alberta advocate for compensation from the Government of Alberta when municipal fire services provide Medical First Response when Alberta Health Services paramedics are delayed.
  
  
• The Energy and Infrastructure Committee will meet on Thursday at 4:30 pm. No agenda is available for this meeting yet.
  
  
• This weekend and next, Medicine Hat is hosting a Jehovah’s Witness conference with an expected 9,000 attendees. Tourism Medicine Hat says that local businesses should prepare for extra customers!

Last Week In Medicine Hat:

• S3 Group, a Swift Current-based agricultural equipment company, announced plans to create a new engineering and manufacturing hub in Medicine Hat. The company said it plans to hire 30 people in the fall and expand to a local workforce of 100 people in the next three to five years. S3 has acquired a 16,000-square-foot facility in the southwest industrial area, and there are plans for the Medicine Hat location to become the company’s central testing and prototype development hub.
  
  
• Council has unanimously approved adding the purchase of two fire trucks to the current budget cycle. Originally, the new trucks were set to be ordered in 2024 and 2027, but due to supply chain issues, Administration recommended ordering them now to meet expected in-service dates. Moving the purchases up may actually save the City $460,000 in expected inflation, as placing the order now provides a price guarantee. The cost of each truck is $1.5 million.
  
  
• Council heard a report that suggested lowering speed limits and increasing traffic enforcement will not be enough to mitigate concerns about noisy and dangerous traffic on residential streets. The City will be installing two mini roundabouts along Eighth Street as part of a traffic calming pilot project. Larger sidewalks, expanded pedestrian crossings, and speed humps along Ranchlands Boulevard will also be installed over the next year.

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