The Beiseker Airport

Back in the early 1980s, Beiseker Mayor John Richter, deputy mayor Dan Benoit and myself decided to approach the provincial government and ask them to build a airport near our village as part of the provincial municipal airport project initiated by Premier Peter Lougheed. 

The province asked us to create a association of municipalities in our area, which could support a small airport. An airport association was created involving the villages of Acme, Beiseker, and Irricana plus the Municipal District of Rocky View (now, Rocky View County). After much planning and negotiation, a site was chosen for the new airport and the Association became the Airport Commission.

Under the leadership of the provincial Transportation  Department, the new airport was constructed and an AVPA was created for it. The Airport Vicinity Protection Area was designed to make sure that all buildings and all developments around the airport would not interfere with the airport's operation nor would the airport interfere with that development.  Any development in the AVPA and not following its guidelines had no recourse in the case of a disagreement.

The new airport became home to recreational flyers, who built small hangars for their airplanes and enjoyed the camaraderie of the small airport group. It was decided that the Village of Beiseker would provide the day to day maintenance for the airport, and each of the other members of would contribute a small amount supporting that operation.

Each village and the M.D. gave the airport commission a very small amount of money to accomplish this. Those funds, and the money collected from the leaseholders, contributed to the maintenance and operation of the airport.  The airport was still located with the Municipal District, and therefore all development permits and tax collection was to be done by them.  In those early days, the Village's contribution to maintenance and operation costs at the airport equal to about one half of 1% of Beiseker's yearly budget.

After several years, disagreements and legal challenges between the Association, the Municipal District, and one of the tenants at the airport forced the other three members of the Association to withdraw from the commission. This left Beiseker on its own to maintain and operate the airport.

The airport sputtered along for many years seeing little development and almost no maintenance. The village made little investment into the airport, but volunteers stepped up to keep the airport operational.  Eventually, the difficult tenant left the airport and operations there began to improve.

The provincial government eventually asked the village of Beiseker if they would be interested in taking over ownership of the airport. Village council indicated they would not be willing to take over the airport, until the neglected runway had been resurfaced. The province agreed and did resurface the runway and pave the main taxiways.  Rocky View County also agreed to provide a portion of the property tax collected at the airport back to the village for operations and maintenance. 

The future of this important Beiseker facility was looking quite positive!

An airport is an important facility to any community it serves.  Just like an arena, a swimming pool or a library, an airport adds to the fabric of any municipality lucky enough to have one!  When Beiseker was approved to get an airport, many municipalities were very jealous!  Ours was one of the last constructed under the program.  Beiseker has continued operating and maintaining the airport which does bring in some commerce into the village at very little cost.  In fact the cost to taxpayers to operate the airport has been almost nil for many years. 

At present we have a skydiving/parachute facility, a pilot training school, numerous recreational aviation hangars and a café at our airport.  Much of the normal maintenance is still done by volunteers, saving the village more money.

Presently, the Village and the hangar owners are in discussion now to officially subdivide the airport lot into separate hangar lots then explore the possibility of selling some of the lots to hangar owners.  The runways, taxiways and other areas will  still be owned and operated by the Village of Beiseker.  I support this move, and I hope an agreement will be reached in the near future. Stay tuned!

Beiseker's Finances & the AUMA

I am most concerned about our villages financial problems. 

The property tax hike this year was, in my opinion, too high. Now we are being told that our village has operated at a deficit for many years! 

During my term as mayor of Beiseker this village never ran a deficit! It is true that we chose not to fully address our Tangible Capital Assets and their depreciation. Which means that if the new airport runway surface suddenly crumbled, every piece of village equipment suddenly broke down, and every water pipe and sewer pipe in the ground sprung a leak all on the same day, the village would be in strife! 

The chances of that happening are slim and nil! Several years ago, the provincial government decided that it would be good idea for municipalities to create a slush fund to pay for replacements of our equipment and infrastructure, and account for the depreciation of its assets.  It might've been a good idea for larger municipalities - but for small ones like ours, it was totally ridiculous. If you take into account the depreciation and replacement of our tangible capital assets, the village would be in a deficit!  However, in my term as mayor the village always paid its bills and we actually ran a very small surplus!  

I think Village Council is getting some bad advice. I think they need to reread the entire Municipal Government Act and the auditor's reports from the last 10 years. Although I was one of five councilors, I was still hurt when I read that the former council was insinuated as being irresponsible in Beiseker's finances.  We did no such thing!

The AUMA Convention:

Every fall the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association holds a convention. They been held in Calgary, Edmonton, and recently again in Red Deer. Our village council has decided not to go to the convention this fall.  I think this is a very shortsighted decision, and needs to be readdressed! 

The convention gives municipalities the chance to address government officials in person directly. There is even a session which permits municipal leaders to directly address the many newly elected cabinet ministers involved in their operation! 

With the recent change of government, Beiseker needs to be seen and heard at this convention! Maybe just one councilor and the CAO should go, but someone needs to represent our village there!

New Commenting System

Howdy folks!  Rhys here.

As you may know, I help my Dad with the technical side of his blog - I make sure things run smoothly and that the blog looks good.  And part of it is reviewing all comments made on his blog.

I've mentioned before that the commenting system used here since Ray started Write Ray! in 2010 is far from ideal.  We've been looking for new solutions, and, starting today we're going to be trying a new commenting system called Disqus.

Disqus is used by a number of different websites, including the Rocky View Weekly.  This system will (hopefully) allow us to keep better track of comments, and have more accountability for everyone -- this means that anonymous commenting on this blog will now be disabled.

As always, I will be monitoring all comments made on Ray's blog before they are published.  If you have any questions, you can leave them below or on Facebook!

About Ray

• Ray has lived in Beiseker for almost forty years!
• Ray has been on Village Council for more than twenty of those years. He has held every position on council: Councillor, Deputy Mayor and Mayor.
• Ray retired in 1999 after 31 years as a teacher and school administrator. 30 of those years were spent with Rocky View Schools #41, with 17 years here at Beiseker Community School and 13 years at Crossfield Elementary School.
• Ray is now self employed at his home as a professional photographer and publisher.
• Ray has been involved in most aspects of volunteerism here in the village. He has been and/or is a member of; The Beiseker Recreation Board, the North East Rocky View Fire Association, the Beiseker Station Mueseum Society, Beiseker Recycling, Stage East Dinner Theatre, the Big Country Youth Justice Committee, the Beiseker Airport Society, and the Beiseker Community Education Advisory Council, the Drumheller and District Solid Waste Management Association, and the Kneehill Regional Water Services Commission
• Ray was a founding member of; Beiseker Recycling, Stage East Dinner Theatre, and the Big Country Youth Justice Committee.
• Ray really knows Beiseker!
• Outside the village, Ray is also a Senior Associate with the Calgary Stampede and a Director of the Aero Space Museum Association of Calgary.
• Ray and his wife Madeline recently celebrated their 40th Wedding Anniversary. Ray & Madeline have two children who now live in Crossfield and Didsbury.