In many places, that relationships between urban municipalities and their rural brethren are usually tortured ones.
In many places, that relationships between urban municipalities and their rural brethren are usually tortured ones.
From cities of millions to towns of a thousand, residents in urban centres tend shoulder the costs of facilities and services that many people outside the municipalities' borders use.
The many rural areas surrounding them have a bad reputation for refusing put their financial weight where the users are.
And then, you have something that appears to be an Athabascan alternative.
This week, at a joint council meeting between council members from Athabasca County and the Town of Athabasca, the county voted to cover 60 per cent of the building costs for the new pool.
They're also going to help the town out, covering 50 per cent of the costs for roads - a basic infrastructure cost - up to the new school if the town approves the county's funding formula for the pool.
As county Coun. Warren Griffin noted, “this isn't earth-shattering. ” The county paid for 60 per cent of the Multiplex when it was built, too.
Though a conditional offer, it's an olive branch.
County councillors could have sat there, wringing their hands over whose land the road's on and who will get the benefit of more users at the pool. And of course, you could hear the occasional muffled shouts through the door during the in-camera session - which, for the record, the Advocate believes should have been public.
But our complaints of open government aside, the county stepped up to the plate for the betterment of the whole region. They heard the town's requests, and responded in kind. It's a compromise.
And when people work together to get projects like the school done, everyone in the area benefits.
