Interim Trail/Warfield recreation deal paves way for new councils as election looms
By Tayla Scott
The City of Trail and the Village of Warfield have reached a new recreation and library agreement.
“Our five-year agreement expired in January and we didn’t renew it,” said Bert Crockett, the mayor of Warfield. “So we met with [Trail] and the negotiations broke down. We figured what they were asking was too much. We opted to go to a reimbursement program in which the citizens [of Warfield] would go in [to Trail facilities] and pay the fees, then bring the receipts back to us and we would reimburse what it cost them.”
The Village of Warfield reimbursed $13,000 to its citizens who used Trail facilities. Now that Warfield and Trail have entered into a new agreement, Trail will reimburse Warfield the $13,000.
“We already paid $13,000 of our citizen’s fees. So [Trail] will give us that money back. So basically they’ll just credit us that,” said Crockett.
The facilities that Warfield citizens paid for in Trail were, “The library, the gym, the aquatic centre, the field house, the ball parks, all that stuff. It’s quite expensive,” said Crockett.
The Village of Warfield used the reimbursement program from the end of February, when Warfield opted out of the previous agreement with Trail … until now.
The City of Trail and The Village of Warfield have recently reached a new interim agreement for use of the Trail library and recreation services. It will expire 18 months after January 2014.
The Village of Warfield will pay $90,000 for the first year of the interim agreement and $45,900 for the last six months.
“Now we’ve re-established an interim agreement for 18 months,” said Crockett. “This is a contract to give the new council an opportunity to get settled in before they have to get into something pretty heavy. It gives them a little lead in time to get familiar with everything and get the information they need to enter into bargaining when it comes to a five–year agreement, which is where I think Trail wants to go with all of the municipalities and rural areas.”
When this interim agreement ends, “all of the municipalities have to get together and come up with some type of an agreement for recreation,” said Crockett.
In a press release the mayor of Trail, Dieter Bogs said, “We’re satisfied with the agreement. We recognize the toll this has taken on the public, in particular the sports organizations that rely heavily on Trail’s services. We are relieved to have reached an agreement, and are happy to be working as one community again. While the city ended up agreeing to a reduction in the overall contract amount, we felt this was necessary at this time as part of bridging the gap and providing an opportunity for the next councils to review the matter in greater detail in the hopes a longer-term agreement can be reached that will ensure sustainable service for residents in both communities going forward.”
