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Town of Vegreville Seeking Assistance to Dispose of Museum Artifacts
Town of Vegreville Seeking Assistance to Dispose of Museum Artifacts
Michelle Pinon - News Advertiser
The Town of Vegreville has reached out to Ric McIver, Minister of Municipal Affairs, regarding the disposition of artifacts and collections from the former Vegreville Regional Museum.
During council’s Feb. 6 legislative committee meeting, the letter, which was in draft form was discussed. Mayor Tim MacPhee stated, “We’d like to get ahold of the Minister to make sure what we’re doing is within our rights.”
MacPhee then turned over the floor to Councillor David Berry. “With the dissolving of the Vegreville Regional Museum Society the artifacts, etc. within our facility, we have been wanting to repurpose the facility in different ways, and there’s a lot of artifacts there and collections that are questionable as to the purpose of being there, and what we really need is advice through the Minister or Minister’s department as to how to proceed with deaccessioning of these items.”
Coun. Berry said deaccessioning seemed like a strange term. “When items are taken into a museum and catalogued they become part of the public domain and it’s called accession.” With deaccession, Coun. Berry said they want to make sure they are following those procedures and that the Minister’s department would be able to provide direction and advice to the town.
Mayor MacPhee asked if any member of council was not in favour of sending the letter to the Minister, and no one indicated they were opposed to that.
Coun. Berry said there was a clause in legislation giving the Minister the right to change some of the terms of items that cannot really be offered to another museum and cannot be sold and at the moment cannot be given back. “We can get permission from the Minister to handle those in an appropriate manner. We can’t do that without being granted that permission. We have some of the procedures, but some of those procedures don’t work for us.”
MacPhee said, “Just to let the public know moving forward what our plan is from council directing the staff of the town. We’re not getting rid of everything at the museum. We don’t know what it’s going to look like eventually. We’d like to showcase stuff that’s very important to this region in different facilities or as we build out this Event Centre.
But right now there’s so much stuff. There’s so much duplication. So, Coun. Berry has been documenting quite a bit…We know some of the procedures, and we’ll be offering it to local museums first. But we need to get in there and get a good idea of what is important memorabilia from this region, what we’re going to keep and what we’re going to offer other museums.”
MacPhee said all of that would happen after they receive a response from the Minister.
According to the letter that was signed by MacPhee, it states, “I am writing to request assistance from your department in the matter of deaccessioning the Vegreville Regional Museum. Unfortunately, the Town of Vegreville does not have the staff expertise nor the funds to accomplish the task.
In 2021, the Vegreville Regional Museum Society dissolved and closed its museum. The Society surrendered its Certificate of Incorporation under the Alberta Societies Act, voluntarily revoked its charitable status under the Canada Revenue Agency and cancelled its membership in the Alberta Museums Association. The closing of a museum generally results in the deaccessioning of all artifacts. However, all items and collections, and the responsibility of deaccessioning, were left in a town-owned facility, and the responsibility of deaccessioning was left to the Town of Vegreville.
I am making this request for assistance pursuant to the Government Policy on ‘Disposition of Museum Collections and Objects,’ signed into effect March 19, 1996 by the Honourable Gary G. Mar, Minister of Community Development; the last paragraph of that policy reads: “Notwithstanding anything in the forgoing Policy and Procedures, the Minister of Community Development may allow an institution or agency subject to this policy to deaccession any historical object or collection on such terms and conditions as he deems appropriate.”
At the Feb. 12 council meeting, the item: Event Centre Walkthrough was listed on the agenda. MacPhee said they would set up a time and date for the walk through after the meeting.
