Recreation board briefs

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The following are selected briefs from the April 12 Taber Recreation Board meeting:

WORKPLACE VIOLENCE AND HARASSMENT: Taber Recreation Board got a look at the town’s Workplace Violence and Harassment Policy which was updated earlier this year, which volunteers under the various boards in the community fall under, including the Taber Recreation Board.

“I think it’s good that we have it on our agenda because as new policies come in, it’s all within the new MGA (Municipal Government Act). It affects us as council members, but also people who sit on boards,” said Louie Tams, town councillor and recreation board member. “We have to co-operate with different staff and this is a reminder of what the reality is that is being dictated. It’s a good policy.”

WEATHER DELAYS: The continued grip of Old man Winter that does not see to want to leave Southern Alberta has delayed work on the West Trail Extension Project and the onset of spring outdoor sports such as baseball and soccer.

“Right now it is muddy and wet and so there is a delay,” said Trent Smith, recreation manager for the Town of Taber, in reference to the trail extension.

“But, we are still in the timelines that were projected to be.”

There is plenty of snow still covering various outdoor recreation fields including Ken McDonald Memorial Sports Park.

“There are a lot of users groups that are chomping at the bit to get going. The staff want to get going on it, but we can’t really do anything yet. Even when the snow melts, it’s still going to be soaking wet and you don’t want to put any type of heavy equipment on top of that,” said Smith.

“We’ve sent out an e-mail to all the user groups saying due to the weather we are still closed, but we will be on top of it as fast as possible. It’s going to be a late season like it is for everyone in this area.”

IPAD USE: In a previous recreation board meeting, discussions were made on if recreation board members were interested in getting iPads for meeting use.

“I didn’t think it was that important, because we all had iPads, but Darcy (Firth, vice chairperson) brought it up to me that the iPads also include setting up people who are on that board with a town e-mail that could accept larger files,” said Danielle Hansen, chairperson for the Taber Recreation Board. “The meeting before, we had to have a hard copy because our personal e-mails wouldn’t accept it.”

Potential iPads for the recreation board would be owned by the town and be transferred over to whatever town citizen decided to volunteer for the recreation board at the time. Recreation board members would not keep the iPads.

“There is an inherent problem if you do it on your own with a town e-mail because you will also be signing off on the town’s IT and they have access to your iPad to wipe it at any given time,” said Louie Tams, town councillor and recreation board member.

“They will wipe everything. It’s an option if you want to take that risk. I can get my e-mail from the town from my personal iPhone, but if you have a virus or whatever, it will wipe everything clean and your contacts or whatever. It follows with the town IT rules and how we have to operate.”

Requests have already been made for iPads for other boards in the Taber community.

Tams added the town is able to purchase iPads at discounted rates in its purchasing power compared to a citizen off the street.

“Another good thing about them is instead of having hard copies that have 200 page agendas, there can be substantial savings with paper,” said Tams.

Taber Recreation Board passed a motion unanimously to recommend to council that they purchase a required amount of iPads from council’s discretionary fund, for non councillor recreation board members.

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