Medicine Hat Minute: Merry Christmas, New Committee, and a Possible Growing Rift

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

This Week In Medicine Hat:

• Council is set to hold one more meeting this week before breaking until next year.in 2021 with a City Council meeting scheduled today at 6:30 pm.
  
  
• That meeting will be a Regular Medicine Hat City Council meeting today. The meeting will start in-camera (in secret) before moving to an open meeting at 6:30 pm where Council will hold several non-statutory public hearings - including hearings for amendments to the waste bylaw and the electric utility bylaw. Council is also scheduled to receive reports from the Energy & Infrastructure Committee, the Public Services Committee, the Corporate Services Committee, and the Administrative Committee. Council will presumably also approve the 2022 Municipal and Invest Medicine Hat Budget Update, as amended.
  
  
• Finally, it is, of course, Christmas this Saturday! From all of the Common Sense Medicine Hat team and volunteers, have a Merry Christmas. Thank you to every single one of our readers, donors, and everyone who said a kind word to us this year. We appreciate every single one of you and hope you have an excellent Christmas! Happy Holidays!

Last Week In Medicine Hat:

• With Medicine Hat’s newly elected Council sending back a budget update twice now, each time asking for more information from administration, there is a theory about a growing rift between administration and Council. Others point to the general inexperience of the newly elected Council members - that many of the first-time electees don’t know what they’ve gotten themselves into. Perhaps it's the opposite and the new Council are pushing administration to be more accountable. Only time will tell what's going on at City Hall.
  
  
• A motion to create a new Standing Emergency Management Committee was proposed by City Council (and is likely to be confirmed this week). The move comes in the wake of a new requirement of the Municipal Government Act which calls for at least three members of council to liaise with emergency management officials.
  
  
• A political convention will be coming to Medicine Hat next year. Wait no, not that kind of hot air... a hot-air balloon gathering was among the events chosen to receive a community vibrancy grant, to help put on a show next year. Willy and Cindy Taillon are local hot-air balloon enthusiasts and were inspired to host a Medicine Hat event after seeing a similar event be successful in High River. The public is unlikely to be able to ride in the balloons, at least in the first year, due to liability concerns, but may be able to do so in future years.

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