Airdrie City council will be revisiting the feasibility of bringing an arts and culture-focused council to the city – something that has been discussed in the community for a number of years.
A notice of motion brought forward by Coun. Darrell Belyk on Nov. 1 asked to provide a more clear timeline and direction for administration to develop a concept for the arts and culture council.
“This motion is just to give that direction to administration,” he said during the regular council meeting Nov. 1.
The item garnered much debate among the councillors, who mentioned this is something the City has looked at for a number of years due to a need vocalized by members of the arts community.
Coun. Candice Kolson said she has been a critic regarding the cultural master plan that came forward in the past, and asked administration for more of an update on the City’s current direction in terms of supporting arts and culture.
“An arts and culture council sort of comes out of the middle of nowhere and still does not address arts and culture all that well within the city of Airdrie,” she said.
Clay Aragon, manager of recreation, culture, and planning with the City, said part of the importance of the notice of motion was to get a better understanding of how to better address artistic and cultural needs in Airdrie.
“We are jumping into a solution here in terms of an arts and culture council, but that might not necessarily be what is needed,” he said. “Part of what we are doing right now [consists of] a series of engagement processes, [and] having more detailed conversations with arts and culture groups in Airdrie to understand what they deem to be missing.”
Kolson said in response to Aragon’s explanation, she sees the City not moving forward with anything “ever as far as arts and culture goes in the city.”
She mentioned it was great to have the newly installed Dr. José Rizal monument come through council.
“It seems like that is sort of the way we go as a city, administration, and as a council,” she said. “We are not proactively seeking how we can incorporate the arts into our day-to-day decisions. We missed the mark with our cultural master plan, and I’m not blaming council or city staff, I just think there is a missing unit.”
While discussions have been centred around bringing some sort of council in or at least having the conversation in 2023, Kolson said that timeline is too far away, and something should be done sooner.
Coun. Tina Petrow said with council having had this conversation a number of times, there is no need to push timelines in order to gather information that has already been collected.
“We just need to update what was already done and move forward with this,” she said.
Coun. Al Jones brought up an online survey hosted by local filmmaker Mitch George, which asks residents what they are looking for in terms of arts and culture representation. George hopes to establish a collective to help local creatives and to campaign on behalf of the arts community as a whole.
“There is something in the works already coming from the community,” he said. “I do think there has been a significant appetite within the arts community itself to come to the table with some of their ideas and being a little more proactive.”
Mayor Peter Brown clarified the whole council is in favour of seeing a committee focused on the arts brought to Airdrie, whether it’s community driven or a committee created by council.
A meeting will be held by the Community Services Advisory Board on Jan. 10, 2022, which will be followed by an update to City council on Jan. 15, 2022, when a decision will be made
Jordan Stricker, AirdrieToday.com
Follow me on Twitter @jaystrickz
