Red Deer Minute: Hospital Schematics, Integrity Commissioner, and a Tuesday Evening Event

Red Deer Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Red Deer politics

This Week In Red Deer:

• Today, at 10:00 am, the Council Agenda Review Committee will meet to review and confirm the agendas for this week’s public hearing and next week’s regular Council meeting.
  
  
• On Thursday, beginning at 9:00 am in Council Chambers, there will be a Non-Statutory Public Hearing on the Notice of Motion to ask the Province to remove the Overdose Prevention Site from Red Deer. This will be a unique public hearing as anyone will be allowed to speak regardless of whether or not they live in Red Deer. Interested parties can also submit written comments using the form available online, until February 14th at 4:00 pm.
  
  
• We're hosting a Pints & Politics event on Tuesday night at 6:00 pm at The Vat, in conjunction with our friends at the Alberta Institute. We're going to keep things simple and just have some casual drinks, with no formal agenda, as an opportunity for everyone to get together with like-minded Red Deerians. Come out and meet Executive Director Chad Krahn, as well as members of the Alberta Institute team. The event is free, but registration is required due to capacity limits. You can RSVP by clicking here. Hope to see you all there!

Last Week In Red Deer:

• City Council deemed the e-scooter pilot project a success and officially approved the scooters as a permanent transportation option. In 2023, 100,909 rides were taken on e-scooters, with an average distance of 3.35 km and an average ride time of 18.2 minutes. The program initially began with six companies participating, with Neuron and Bird being the sole participants in the final season. The program will continue without further changes, and the 2024 scooter season starts on March 15th.
  
  
• Alberta’s Minister of Infrastructure, Peter Guthrie, was at City Hall to announce the completion of the schematics stage for the Red Deer Regional Hospital expansion. The designs have been submitted to the Ministry of Health, and a public engagement session will be held sometime in March. The next stage in the project will involve detailed design work. Mayor Ken Johnston said he is happy to see progress being made.
  
  
• The City of Red Deer has appointed Steven Phipps as its first Integrity Commissioner & Ethics Advisor, a position approved by Council earlier this year. The Commissioner will investigate potential breaches of the Council Code of Conduct Bylaw and provide ethics advice to Councillors. The Council Code of Conduct Bylaw was updated, incorporating the role of Integrity Commissioner & Ethics Advisor, effective February 1st, 2024. Citizens can file written complaints, including specific details, to the Integrity Commissioner if they believe a Councillor has contravened the Council Code of Conduct Bylaw.

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