Hello Chestermere! First of all I want to thank the all the volunteers who put together the Volunteer Job Fair, spearheaded by Synergy. I was so sorry to miss it as I was heading back to Edmonton, but I heard it was a great success! “We have the cause, you have the effect” was the slogan. Check out my ChestermereRockyview Facebook page for my assistant’s pictures of the great organizations that participated. Giving back to your community helps us to engage in the things that are important to us, to build community, and make new friends and learn new skills.
I see from the Chestermere forecast that Mother Nature is throwing another snowball at our agricultural community. Please spare a thought for our farming friends as they deal with a very difficult situation trying to get ready for seeding and of course having to be available 24/7 for calving in very bad weather. They will get ‘er done though, as usual.
And now, welcome to story time folks and the next chapter in the provincial/federal drama that is full of the evil protagonist “Kinder Morgan” and featuring provinces who deny the need for these pipelines. BC and Quebec are ok with filling our water ways with…poop, please look on line and meet Mr. Floatie. The most frustrating part is that Canada continues to buy resources from regimes that are massive polluters and have brutal human rights records. It is the never-ending saga of three “powerful” people that would have you believing that they really care about the people they represent. It is truly interesting to find out that a fully funded, privately owned environmentally responsible pipeline may end up being owned by…you guessed it…your Government. So here is the new story line. Trudeau interrupts his trip to Peru as it became apparent that our country’s fearless leader may need to meet with the two major players involved in building/protesting the pipeline. With a May 31st drop dead date for Kinder Morgan to still stay in the game, the clock is ticking for these 3 leaders who hold our well being in the palm of their hands, it is drama worthy and we all hold our breath waiting to hear about this emergency meeting. Here is the result of said meeting. Trudeau stated the obvious, that his government has the authority to make sure that Trans Mountain is built. Well…phew! I was beginning to worry that he had forgotten that this is his jurisdiction. Secondly he stated that he was going to take whatever financial and legislative action that is needed to make that happen! Ok, great! What does that mean? The federal government might be going into the business of pipelines but we are not allowed to know what the negotiation will look like. We will be told once the details are hashed out. Then the Prime Minister said he was pursuing legislative options. What I do not understand, is first of all, why would anyone even think about investing public dollars in the pipeline until we find out whether or not the Prime Minister is actually going to support the pipeline. You can invest every dollar you have into the pipeline, but if you cannot get it built then what is the point? The meeting brought no consensus. In fact, now officials may be asked to come in and address concerns around ocean protection plans. The meetings were centered around what BC wants. That’s right. It is all about what BC wants in terms of improvement. In fact Horgan announced that he would continue to block the pipeline. Kinder Morgan has suspended all non-essential spending on the pipeline project.
As you know I will be seeking the nomination for the new riding of Chestermere-Strathmore. There are some great volunteer opportunities for those of you who are interested in politics as we put together a new board for the new area, door knock and other fun opportunities. We will be hosting Town Halls, calling the membership and hopefully we will see you at the doors. We will keep you updated on the date of the Chestermere-Strathmore AGM once the date is chosen, so you can come out and vote for the board that will represent you and replace the Chestermere-Rocky View board. The Chestermere-Rocky View Constituency Association communications sub committee has recently decided to send out surveys to the Chestermere-Rocky View membership. The Chestermere-Rocky View “surveys” do not come from myself or the president of the Chestermere-Rocky View Constituency Association or the UCP and are not to be confused with the substantive survey questions coming from the United Conservative Party, which are quite intense and long. Please, if you are a member and have the time to take the United Conservative Party survey, it is well worth the time to participate in helping with foundational policies for our founding AGM. I am so excited to see many of you at the founding UCP AGM. As we head towards nominations please remember you must be a member in the UCP to vote in the nominations. We will keep you updated as to when that will be. As always we love to hear from you.
