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Petitioning for Municipal Inspection and Audit
Citizens’ Advocacy Group Petitioning for Municipal Inspection and Audit
Michelle Pinon - News Advertiser
A citizens’ advocacy group started off 2024 by launching a petition for a municipal inspection and audit of Lamont County finances.
The group is called Voice of Lamont County Community Awareness. It’s a Facebook group that currently has more than 335 members. One of those members is Lamont area resident Stephanie Harrold. She is one of about 10 members who are volunteering with the petition.
Harrold delivered more than 600 flyers to post offices in the hamlet of Hilliard, villages of Andrew and Chipman, and towns of Mundare, Lamont and Bruderheim late last week. The notice is advising rural residents of their intent and asking people to sign the petition at various locations throughout the county.
Volunteers will be on hand with copies of the petition for residents, 18 and over to sign, in parking lots, near post offices, and recreation centres. These began on Jan. 3 in Andrew and are scheduled until Jan. 17 in St. Michael. Harrold said they decided to set up designated meeting points with specific dates and times to rather than going farm to farm and expects to know more number wise this week.
“I’m confident we can get these signatures. We are going to have to work for it, but I think we’re going to get them,” added Harrold. She also pointed out that residents who do sign the petition will not have to worry about members of council or administration seeing those signatures as the petition will go directly to Municipal Affairs (MA).
It is believed by some of the members of the Facebook group that one of the reasons a recent petition asking for recalling Reeve David Diduck failed is because residents were too afraid to sign as council and administration would see those signatures and feared retribution. Harrold is hoping that won’t be the case with this petition as those signatures will remain anonymous. “I try to reassure them about that. There’s so many rumours and talk going around. I’m just trying to focus on the petition and tell people that you’re not doing anything wrong by signing this.”
The petitioners have until early February to gather signatures. Harrold said they don’t know exactly how many signatures they will require as that will be based on county census numbers. She said a census hasn’t been done in probably 20 years or so. She’s lived in the county for 22 years and has never recalled a census being done in that time. They are, however estimating they’ll require at least 777 signatures, and are aiming for 800 that would equal approximately 20 percent that is required by MA.
“I think that it’s important for people to understand that if you don’t like what you see happening in your county there is something that you can do.”
As to what may be the reason or reasons why several members of the Facebook group wanted to start the petition, Harrold believes it has to do with rewriting of Lamont County’s Land Use Bylaw and Right of Entry Bylaw that have been proposed.
“I think it all started for me with the new bylaws. There were a couple of bylaws that I didn’t agree with and I started going to a couple of council meetings. You start to see that they’re getting paid lunches. I’d like to see my taxpayers’ dollars hard at work and a lot of people are complaining about bad roads.
I wanted to get involved to see where my money is going, and they’re not being very upfront about wanting to let us see the books and stuff, and then you start to wonder well, what are they hiding? There’s been a lot of people talking about well they’ve done this and they’ve done that. I, personally feel sorry for these guys. I think that they’ve got a hard job to do. But they’ve had it easy for a long time. Not a lot of people have been watching or paying attention to what’s going on.
You always think you can trust your councilors, right. So, whether they’re shady or not, I just want to get a petition signed and let’s do an audit. If they’re clean then good on them. Then we know they’re doing their job properly. If they’re not, then we’ll have to deal with that. If Municipal Affairs finds they’ve done something shady then we’ll have to re-elect our councillors.”