Niverville’s town council convened on April 5 for a regularly scheduled meeting. Deputy Mayor John Funk was not in attendance.
Council approved two requests for the Niverville Olde Tyme Country Fair, which will be held on June 10–11 this year. They agreed to allow Main Street to be closed off for the annual event and also approved the sale of alcohol.
“The Niverville fair serves as a huge tourism and economic driver for our community,” said Mayor Myron Dyck. “We do see a lot of people from outside the community come and they get to see what our community is. Some have chosen to move to Niverville based on those experiences here.”
Mayor Dyck offered his kudos to all the volunteers who make the fair happen, noting that more than 500 volunteers are required each year.
On April 12, the Province of Manitoba will be presenting their annual budget and Dyck noted that he has been invited by local MLA Ron Schuler to attend the presentation.
First Responders
Dyck also discussed an upcoming meeting with the College of Paramedics of Manitoba. He has significant concerns about some new procedures that are being set in place for first responders.
Until now, first responders have been required to take 120 hours of training before they can be certified. New regulations will now require them to take more than 300 hours of training.
Dyck is concerned that this increase in time commitment may prevent some potential first responders from choosing to serve their community.
He is also apprehensive about a change in how first responders maintain their certification.
“The ongoing training used to be objective in that you would write an exam so everyone was getting tested by the same standards,” Dyck said. “Now it’s gone to subjective. They want you to investigate something about your job and write a report about what you’ve investigated and how it helps you do your job. That’s very subjective and it could be rejected by the grader.”
Dyck will also be discussing with the College an ongoing issue regarding liability insurance.
Last year, CAO Eric King described the problem.
“The College of Paramedics of Manitoba is treating all paramedics and volunteer paramedics the same,” King explained. “If it’s your career or if you work 50 hours a year, you pay the same registration fee to the college [of $2,500]… The College does not recognize the Town of Niverville’s liability insurance for our volunteers as sufficient to cover our volunteers, so that doubles the cost.”
Dyck and two colleagues plan to attend the meeting with the College of Paramedics and attempt to persuade them that these new rules could have significant consequences for Niverville and other towns and municipalities.
“We want to see what we can do to ensure that those First Responders… who so willingly and wonderfully serve our community, that we’re able to retain them,” Dyck said.
Odds and Ends
A conditional use permit was unanimously granted to Todd Matthews, who plans to open a concrete company based at 420 Wittick Street.
Finally, a third reading was given to the bylaw governing the use of municipal resources in an election. This bylaw is required by the Municipal Act in order to establish the rules and procedures for the use of municipal resources during the 42-day period before a general election or by-election. Council unanimously approved the new bylaw.