Last night's council meeting

Attended last night's council meeting out of concern for public safety and where we stand having basically no fire departments anymore, and therefore possibly no fire protection?

Well, I and a room full of people, including pretty much the entire executive of the Ratepayers Association, sat patiently throughout what turned out to be almost two hours of a dreary and boring council meeting in which everyone like trained seals voted unanimously on every issue with little to no debate, or argument, or disagreement. At no time during this meeting was the firefighting issue brought up? Not once! Almost like they were sweeping it under the rug, out of sight, out of mind.

At the end of the meeting during Public Input I took advantage of the opportunity to speak up and post the question as to the fact they as council cancelled Thunder in the Valley out of primarily safety reasons, but yet they show little to no concern for the safety of the public after firing Jamie Margetak, resulting in mass resignations in our Blairmore, Coleman and Hillcrest fire departments, while knowing, in all likelihood, this would happen? I respectfully asked what is our contingency plan? And further stated that more than a dozen inquiries had been made through our Municipal Facebook page asking for this information, none of which was acknowledged by way of a reply?

At first the mayor just ignored my request for information and when I insisted on an answer, he basically told me he didn't have to and wouldn't provide me with one, and then proceeded to disparage those who go on Facebook? When I wouldn't accept this and demanded an answer, he signaled for the secretary to call the cops on me? What's with this guy?

What followed was a chorus of others in the public gallery taking their turns during this Public Input session voicing their concerns by way of statements and accusations at how council conducts themselves with Billy Kovach stating that "this was the worst council we have ever had" and "who are you people, we don't know you anymore?", followed by Jordan Painter getting his two cents in by calling the mayor a liar, after getting caught in his BS about what actually went down at the Blairmore Fire Department meeting, with Jordan having actually been at this meeting himself, personally. Others also made some really good comments of which I won't go into here as I'm sure Randy Spencer on CJPR and our local newspapers will do a better job than I can in giving you all the nitty gritty details.

In conclusion, it was evident to all with eyes to see and ears to hear that this mayor and council felt themselves under no obligation to inform the residents they serve with details as to where we stand regarding public safety, and what in fact is our contingency plan? In fact, their actions suggest they brought in the new Fire Chief that they did, BECAUSE of his past experience in cleaning house in his former community, and what we are presently going through was premeditated? Part of a plan for which we are being kept in the dark that includes quite possibly and unnecessarily endangering the pubic in order to achieve their diabolical ends.

Things never seemed bleaker in the Crowsnest Pass.




The exposure of a lie is as valuable to a community as a clearly expressed truth.