Council takes peek into 2019 capital budget

By Cole Parkinson
Vauxhall Advance
cparkinson@tabertimes.com

Vauxhall town council has started to explore items for their capital budget and three-year plan.

After passing a motion to approve the 2019 interim budget based on 50 per cent of the value of the 2018 approved budget, council has shifted their focus to capital budget items they want to see addressed in the coming year.

During council’s regular meeting on Jan. 15, council looked over the proposed list and discussed anything else they would want to add.

On the list presented in the meeting agenda were sidewalks, 1st Street to Highway 36, hall kitchen, sewer upgrades and paving of the complex parking lot.

“What I would really like to see is paving for the hall parking and pool area,” said Mayor Margaret Plumtree.

Another idea was around the pool entrance.

Council agreed that the entrance was a bit hard to find and would benefit from an upgrade.

One idea was to involve the Vauxhall Friends of the Pool Society, who was a big force in getting the pool up and running.

“I wonder if tourists can find the entrance, so I was thinking some beautification. Put a sign up or something. With that, we haven’t heard from the Friends of the Pool Society for quite a while and I know they did some fundraising after the pool was built. I was thinking that they may still have some money in their bank account, maybe they would be willing to work with us on that. They may have some ideas of what they would like to see,” continued Plumtree.

She also suggested having administration reach out to the society to see if they were interested in working together.

Lighting in that area was also brought up as some on council felt it was quite dark in the complex parking lot and surrounding areas.

“Do we need to look at lighting in that parking area?” asked Coun. Ray Coad. “I’ve been there a couple times in the dark, and I don’t know if it is just me or not, but it seems to be (dark).”

One suggestion was to look into solar lights, which administration has used in the past.

Solar lighting would be a quicker and less expensive option as they could have it in place in a relatively short amount of time.

“It doesn’t involve digging up the ground,” added Coad.

Location wise, a thought was to put it on a shed in the area as it would provide sufficient lighting to those walking at night.

“I wonder if we could put it on the ag society shed, if they would let us. It would be good security for them too but it would also light up where there was movement,” said Plumtree.

With those additions to capital budget discussions, council also made a motion to direct administration to contact with pool society to brainstorm ideas for pool entrance which was passed unanimously.

Coun. Jake Wiebe was absent from the town council meeting.

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