Alberta’s Minister of Infrastructure and Airdrie-Cochrane MLA Pete Guthrie toured Cochrane Thursday, meeting with local seniors’ housing advocates at the Big Hill Lodge and Bethany Care, and to hear them tell it, the aging Big Hill facility may be on tap for some overdue funding in next spring’s provincial budget.
The application for funding – the process required by Minister of Seniors, Community and Social Services Jason Nixon – is complete, and will be forwarded on to Edmonton, where the minister will discuss it further with his department.
Guthrie said he facilitated the meetings with Nixon, the Cochrane Society for Housing Options and the Rocky View Foundation (RVF) to get things rolling on his top priority for Cochrane now that the Highway 1A/22 interchange is underway.
“I wanted to bring Minister Nixon down to talk about what the numbers look like, what are they thinking about for that future project,” he explained.
The Foundation provides affordable housing options for seniors living in the Rocky View region. The Town of Cochrane was also represented by mayor Jeff Genung at the meeting.
“The meeting was fantastic, and it got a very high priority with the Minister, after seeing the state of Big Hill,” Guthrie said.
The facility’s aging, crumbling condition has been a source of concern for a few years. Cracks in the foundation are clearly visible and have been for some time.
Town of Cochrane Coun. Susan Flowers also attended the meeting. She is chair of the Rocky View Foundation.
“He realizes it’s extremely important that we get a new (lodge), but there's also many needs across the province,” Flowers said.
Flowers confirmed the application is all but complete.
“Yeah, it's pretty well ready – there's a couple of details we're finishing,” she said.
Flowers is optimistic the town will get good news in the spring budget.
“I don't know what the odds are exactly, but I think there's a really positive chance that they're going to fund it,” she said.
Now the real work starts, according to Flowers – raising money locally to augment whatever may become available from the province.
“There’s a lot of fundraising we’re going to have to do in the community,” she admitted.
To that end, she said, the RVF is going to form a fundraising committee.
And while Nixon stopped short of announcing anything, it was clear from his remarks after visiting the aging site that he sees the need.
He called his visit to Big Hill Lodge “very informative.”
“We’re looking forward to seeing that application, and what I will do is go back and make clear to Edmonton what I saw at the old facility, which is clearly an aging facility that has significant infrastructure issues, and make sure that that need is understood,” he said. “I’m excited to go back to Edmonton and have a conversation with the department.”
He added that it’s difficult for him to see issues like Big Hill Lodge clearly unless and until he experiences them first hand.
“The challenges in that facility are really hard to see when reading a paper,” he confirmed. “It’s very different when you tour through it and see the cracks in the wall, and the circumstances that they’re facing.”
Nixon has close ties to the community. He called himself a “half Cochrane” resident in his comments to local media. He lives near Water Valley and his parents live in Cochrane.
Guthrie went on to lay out the timelines involved in bringing the issue forward for budget consideration.
He said the department will take October and November to do all their evaluations from around the province, and narrow it down to the projects they’re going to move forward with.
In December, they go to the Treasury Board with their recommendations.
Guthrie said if all goes well, there’s a possibility the paperwork for funding to replace Big Hill Lodge will be completed in time for cabinet consideration in January, followed by the release of the provincial budget in February.
“That’s why we felt it was important to get the minister here before the deadline for application shifts,” Guthrie added.