Mayor Michael Fougere says the City of Regina will find a way to keep both the Maple Leaf and Wascana pool projects going.
The $20-million projects were denied grant money from the community, culture and recreation infrastructure fund, which is something that has sparked a bit of a controversy on a federal and provincial level after Premier Scott Moe accused Ralph Goodale of trying to use his support for the pools to boost his campaign in the federal election.
Fougere said city council will still put in a request for the funding next year.
“In the meantime, we’re not stopping the development, certainly of the Maple Leaf pool,” Fougere said. “That one will continue to go forward as scheduled, and we’ll have the conversation with council, it may well be through reserves or some other way, but we will not stop the project because we don’t have funding this year.”
Fougere said while the city is happy to see funding for the Globe Theatre, they still want to see the pools funded.
“I do think that a pool for inner-city Regina is a priority; it certainly is for us,” Fougere said. “As for our what our priorities as a community, we’re telling both orders of government ‘here’s our priorities for this year: Globe Theatre, Wascana Pool and Maple Leaf Pool.’”
Fougere said Councillor Joel Murray’s recent comments over Twitter are not surprising, and show the passion council members have about municipal issues.
“We have incredible demands for infrastructure renewal like every community around our province, and I’m not surprised by those comments because these are real issues facing inner-city children who really are disadvantaged in many fundamental ways,” Fougere said. “Recreation is one way that we as a city are meeting those concerns.”
The province has said there are 23 pool-related infrastructure projects across the province seeking the CCR funding over the next 10 years, including Maple Leaf and Wascana pools, and there needs to be a way to spread those dollars out over the next decade.
