'Enough is enough': Fort McMurray requests amalgamation review

As the ongoing battle over Fort McMurray's rural-urban divide boils over, the province is being asked to intervene.

A coalition of rural stakeholders, upset over what it sees as unequal taxation and poor living conditions, has asked the provincial minister of municipal affairs for a third-party review of the 1995 agreement that formed the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo.

At a committee meeting Monday, Wood Buffalo councillors voted unanimously to "send an expression of support" for the rural stakeholders in their request to the province.

"I think they have some real and valid points," Coun. Colleen Tatum said Tuesday.

"We're trying to decrease the distance between living in urban Fort McMurray and a rural community. The quality of life should be similar, and right now it's not."

Earlier this month, the coalition claimed a victory when councillors reversed their earlier decision to defer spending on a proposed $46.8-million recreational facility in Conklin, south of Fort McMurray. The project will now be reinstated.

A vote on it came at the end of a heated meeting, during which coalition members outlined their concerns with what they called Wood Buffalo's "dictatorship" approach to local government.

"When they established the conditions of amalgamation in 1995, the circumstances of the region were very different," said Mayor Melissa Blake, who noted that the municipality has yet to receive a response from Municipal Affairs.

"We've seen an incredible increase in the amount of industry area, a huge uptake in population in the urban service area, and even the development that has happened in some of our rural communities is something that has certainly shifted over time.

"It seems to make sense to take another look and make sure we're benefiting every community."

The great divide

Coalition spokesperson Ron Quintal said Tuesday that rural communities in the region have been getting a raw deal since the agreement was struck more than 20 years ago.

"When it comes to necessities in our rural communities, the disparity is huge, the gap is huge," Quintal said. "We've basically had to pay the majority of the tax revenue within the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, but there hasn't been an equal share of services and infrastructure in our communities.

"The rural communities have finally said, enough is enough."

For years, Quintal said, council has been investing a disproportionate amount in Fort McMurray's urban centre, while residents outside the city limits are left to foot the bill.

Budget imbalance

Unequal taxation is at the root of the imbalance, Quintal said.

About one-third of the municipality's population lives outside the urban centre. Those rural areas contribute a staggering 95 per cent of the area's tax revenues, in large part because of the presence of oil and gas operations located nearby.

However, Quintal said only 4.3 per cent of the RMWB's 2016 operating budget will be spent on rural communities, and just nine per cent of its capital budget, after deferrals.

Even so, Quintal said the RMWB has not lived up to its obligations — rural communities rarely benefit from the sizable financial contributions they make, and rural businesses are forced to pay the same tax rates as their industrial neighbours.

"When we have oil companies that are completely surrounding all of these rural hamlets and it's the highest tax revenue of any municipality in Canada, and we still have these communities that don't have pipeline water and sewer, I think we need to step back.

"We still have people using outhouses."

"In an urban centre, someone relieving themselves in an outhouse at 40 below would not fly, the taxpayers would not allow that to fly."

Quintal said the coalition doesn't want to fracture the municipality. He hopes instead the review spurs the creation of a separate rural budget, which would be managed by rural councillors, so the hamlets have a stronger say in regional decision-making.

"Creating a split is not something that would benefit the city Fort McMurray, the rural hamlets or even the oil companies that surround us," said Quintal.

"Ultimately we need to look at how Fort McMurray does business today and see how we can do better."

A spokesman for Municipal Affairs said the department has not received a formal request from council to become involved.

"The committee voted in favour of making a recommendation to council to have Municipal Affairs help pay for a third-party review of the amalgamation agreement, but we're not sure of the extent council wants us to become involved, Jerry Ward, public affairs officer for the department, said in an email.