November Year in Review

Michael Oleksyn/Daily Herald Prince Albert Mayor Bill Powalinsky spoke during the announcement of the Play it Forward: Connecting Communities Campaign at the Lake Country Co-op Leisure Centre on Friday morning.

Crime, public safety, and a new homeless shelter dominated discussion as voters gathered at Carlton Comprehensive Public High School on Oct, to hear from Prince Albert’s three mayoral candidates.

Incumbent Greg Dionne and challengers Bill Powalinsky and Brittany Marie Smith spent 30 minutes answering questions chosen by the Prince Albert Chamber of Commerce, which organized the event. The next half hour was dedicated to curated questions from the floor.

During his opening remarks, Dionne said he supports building new homeless shelter, but would not vote to open one in a neighbourhood where residents opposed it.

“I support the neighbourhoods,” Dionne told attendees. “If they don’t want a shelter in their area, I totally understand, and I will not support it.”

Candidates seeking spots on the next Prince Albert City Council had a chance to make their case to voters as the Prince Albert Chamber of Commerce hosted their Ward Can- didates Forum on Friday, Nov. 1.

Candidates running in the Nov. 13 election announced their determination to focus more on homelessness, crime, and addictions if elected.

The chamber hosted nine candidates running in the various wards.

Among these are two sitting councilors seeking re-election.

Coun. Daren Solomon of Ward 8 and Coun. Dawn Kilmer in Ward 7 spoke on the importance of continuity and the ability to continue progress made in the past four years by returning to council.

Solomon has already been elected by acclamation in Ward 8, while Kilmer is running against former councillor Dennis Nowoselsky, who did not attend the forum.

“In the last four years when I came into the position, I decided I needed to listen,” said Kilmer, who is a former Carlton Comprehensive Public High School.

“I  need to listen, and I need to take what people have to say, weight what is put before me, and then make a decision that is transparent that I can stand behind and that, when anybody asks me about (it), I can tell you why I made that decision.”

Premier Scott Moe’s new cabinet will have two members from Prince Albert when it begins work in the Legislature this fall.

Moe named newly elected Saskatchewan Rivers MLA Eric Schmalz as Minister of Government Relations and Minister Responsible for First Nations, Metis, and Northern Affairs.

Longtime Prince Albert Northcote MLA Alana Ross takes over as Minister of Parks, Culture, and Sport, Minster Responsible for the Status of Women, Tourism Saskatchewan, and the Saskatchewan Liquor and Gaming Authority.

In early October the sites for new Francophone Schools in Saskatoon and Prince Albert.

The new CÉF school in Prince Albert will replace École Valois and will be designed to accommodate up to 350 Pre-Kindergarten to Grade 12 students, including 51 childcare spaces.

It will be located near the Alfred Jenkins Field House.

Roger Boucher, the president of the Parent Council for Ecole Valois, said they are happy to see the project making progress.

“I think it’s exciting to have made headway,” Boucher said. “I think there’s a lot of work to be done moving forward because really that that’s the first step in the new school. We’re now at step one.”

For the first time in 12 years, Prince Albert will have a new mayor after challenger Bill Powalinsky unseated incumbent Greg Dionne on Nov. 13.

Powalinsky, the former chair of the Prince Albert and District Chamber of Commerce, finished the night with 4,424 votes compared to Dionne’s 2,923. Entrepreneur Brittany Marie Smith finished third with 867 votes. “I am humbled,” Powalinsky said during a Wednesday night media scrum at City Hall. “It’s still feeling a little bit surreal. I’m excited about getting to work with the new council, and we’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Powalinsky based his campaign on three main issues: reducing crime, addressing homelessness, and renewing trust. On Wednesday credited his team and family for helping get the message out, and said the platform resonated with Prince Albert voters.

“The folks that I talked to have said that they liked the platform and they really, really want to see crime, homelessness, and renewing trust at City Hall as being things that happened,”

Powalinsky said. “I think that’s been the important part of the campaign: meeting people and talking to them and really echoing what their wants and needs were in my platform.”

Dionne was seeking his fourth term as mayor after being elected in 2012, 2016, and 2020. He did not attend the public watch party at City Hall on Wednesday, and did not return requests for comment.

Powalinsky said Dionne has been a strong support and cheerleader of the City, and deserves respect for those efforts.

Unofficial Election Results

*denotes incumbent

** denotes elected by acclamation

• Mayor: Bill Powalinsky (4,424),

Greg Dionne* (2,923), Brittany Marie Smith (867)

• Ward 1: Daniel Brown (344), Larry Vandale (265)

• Ward 2: Troy Parenteau (574), Meghan Mayer (425)

• Ward 3: Tony Head**

• Ward 4: Bryce Laetwetz (707), Perry Trustee (475)

• Ward 5: Stephen Ring (735), Shaun E Harris (539)

• Ward 6: Blake Edwards**

• Ward 7: Dawn Kilmer* (492), Dennis Nowoselsky (378)

• Ward 8: Darren Solomon**

Saskatchewan Rivers School Board (top five elected to five urban seats)

• Arne Lindberg (2,838)

• Darcy Sander (2,473)

• Alan Nunn (2,324)

• Barry Hollick (2,049)

• Mira Lewis (1,537)

• Shayne Morley (1,500)

• Timothy Yeaman (1,419)

• Daphne Masih (1,310)

• Cherie Rustulka (1,132)

• Kurtis Hamel (1,042)

• Alex Crawley (1,029)

• Michael Dormuth (788)

The Prince Albert Catholic School Division board of education was elected by acclamation

There is a new trustee in Subdivision 3 in the Saskatchewan Rivers School

Division after Jill Brown defeated longtime incumbent Jaimie Smith-Windsor in trustee elections on Nov. 13.

Smith-Windsor, who had represented the subdivision since 2009.

She was the longest serving incumbent up for re-election, and served as president of the Saskatchewan School Boards Association (SSBA).

Subdivision 3 represents Christopher Lake, Candle Lake, Meath Park and surrounding rural areas. Brown received 434 votes, while Smith-Windsor received 104 votes.

The margin of victory came as a shock to Brown.

“I was a little bit surprised,” she said. “It was very reassuring to see the amount of support that I have from all of the communities.”

Brown won all but one polling station, the one in Smith-Windsor’s home of Christopher Lake. She carried polling stations in Meath Park, Albertville, Candle Lake, Paddockwood and Spruce Home School. Brown said she appreciated the support she received.

The Saskatchewan Rivers School Division has a new chair and a returning vice chair.

At the Organizational Meeting on Nov, 22 the Board acclaimed Cher Bloom as Board Chair and Alan Nunn as Vice-Chair for the 2024-2025 year.

After director of education Neil Finch called the meeting to order, Bloom was nominated by Nunn with no other nominations. She was acclaimed as board chair.

“I do have a lot to learn, so I am looking forward to working with everyone,” Bloom said.

After more than five decades, the Frank J. Dunn Pool at Carlton Comprehensive Public High School is set to close.

The Saskatchewan Rivers Public School Division (SRPSD) and City of Prince Albert made the joint announcement on Nov, 27. A final closing day has not been set.

“There certainly has been a process to it,” said Jody Boulet, Director of Parks, Recreation & Culture for the City of Prince Albert. “It wasn’t a sudden decision by any means. We have been in conversation with Sask Rivers School Division over the past two to three years around our current infrastructure and what we were working towards, being the new Lake Country Coop Leisure Center and the aquatic space within that.”

Boulet said there were number of challenges the City faced with keeping the Frank Dunn Pool open. The biggest was that hosting criteria for swim competitions have evolved to the point where the pool didn’t qualify to host events. Boulet said it’s hard to justify operating a pool that couldn’t host competitive swim events.

He said the Frank Dunn space also restricted their ability to offer new aquatic programs, something they won’t have a problem with in the new indoor pool.

Sports

The St. Mary Marauders are senior boys city champions after defeating the Carlton Crusaders in straight sets on Oct, 30 in front of a packed gym at St. Mary

St. Mary took the sets 25-20, 25-13 and 25-23.

Head coach Rene Quintal says the Marauders were able to fight off some strong serves from Carlton all night.

“We did a good job defending some real fast serves, like from a velocity standpoint. Everyone of Carlton’s servers would have been serving the ball above 60 kilometers an hour, so we really struggled controlling the velocity of the serve and to be able to side out. I was happy that as the match went on, we were able to fight off there. We were putting a ton of pressure on our serve receivers, and I thought toward the end of the match, we were able to kind of fight through all that pressure and we were able to side out.”

For the first time in program history, the Carlton Crusaders will play for a 5A provincial football title.

“It’s really cool.” Crusader head coach Lindsay Strachan explained in an interview. “It’s such a credit to our kids to put ourselves in this situation.

It’s a great accomplishment. I’m looking forward to the opportunity.”

Carlton punched their ticket to the provincial final with a 39-13 win over the Regina F.W. Johnson Wildcats at Max Clunie Field on Nov. 2.

It will be the first appearance for Carlton in a provincial final in 29 years and the first at the 5A level. The Crusaders have played in three 3A provincial finals in 1984, 1991 and 1995.

Carlton has lost all three of their appearances in a provincial football final.

Carlton has only been competing at the 5A level for the past two seasons.

Prior to the creation of the North Saskatchewan Football League (NSFL), the Crusaders competed in the Saskatoon Secondary Schools Athletic Directorate (SSSAD) in the 6A Division.

Strachan says the creation of the NSFL has provided more opportunity for all of the schools involved, including Carlton.

“I think that that is the value of the North Saskatchewan Football League for all of the teams that are in it, not just us, like being classified as a 5A League, which I think is the right fit.

When any program in our league has a really good group of kids and has a strong year, that gives us the opportunity as a league to compete for a provincial title. I think that’s the value of the league and that’s what’s exciting about it, because we played a lot of years in SSSAD where that probably wasn’t the case.”

Melfort marathon runner Robyn Luthi has completed her goal of running the six Abbott World Marathon Majors after completing the New York Marathon.

Luthi completed the New York Marathon on Nov. 3 with a time of two hours, 50 minutes, and 45seconds, which was another personal best.

“It feels amazing to finally have the World Major Marathons completed,” Luthi said a day after the marathon.

“It’s been a goal of mine since 2021 and it’s been a lot of work so I’m super happy that it’s done. It’s a little surreal right now.”

Luthi managed to complete her goal in three years.

“Once I set my mind to it I just wanted to get them all done,” she said. “Training wise, I’ve been making really big gains in time and running, so I thought that was the time to complete them all while I was still getting faster.

“I ran a 2: 50.45, so I had almost an eight-minute PB, which is actually unheard of on the New York course because this course is extremely hilly and hard. It would be kind of comparable to Boston as far as the terrain of the course,” she added.

I t was a game for the ages at Saskatoon Minor Football field on Nov. 9

The Carlton Crusaders capture their first ever provincial title with a 35-34 victory over Saskatoon’s

Bishop Joseph Mahoney (BJM) in a game that went right down to the wire.

In a post game interview, Carlton head coach Lindsay Strachan says hewas still in disbelief of the final result.

“It’s amazing. It doesn’t even feel real at this point. It hasn’t sunk in.

What a gutsy performance from our guys today, just so proud of their effort. Mental toughness to hang with it. It was a shootout and the defense pulled it out (with) a couple of bigstops at the end. It was exactly what we needed. Offense put up points all day.”

Arts

There was an interesting experiment at the Margo Fournier Arts Centre on Nov. 3

The Prince Albert Arts Board’s Parts for the Arts: One Day Choir with Kayleigh Skomorowski and Brock Skomorowski attempted to create a choir for a day.

The event was in the Margo Fournier Arts Centre and also paid tribute to the building’s namesake and the founder of the Prince Albert Boys’ Choir.

Kayleigh Skomorowski, who is on the Arts Board said the idea came about after a discussion their next Parts for the Arts event.

“I’ve been following on Instagram and social media. There’s been there’s a big movement in like New York with the Gaia Music collective. They’re called, but they do these big one day choir events,” Skomorowski said.

Skomorowski said there are a lot of pub choirs in major centres like Sydney, New York, and Toronto where people have a chance to sing with no commitment or prior knowledge. She wanted to try  something similar in Prince Albert, but with the whole community.

Mariia Ivoniak is a Ukrainian newcomer to Prince Albert who is looking to spread her love for creating embroidery.

Ivoniak has been in Prince Albert for two and a half years, but has been creating embroidery for almost 25 years.

In November, she began hosting embroidery classes to see if there was interest. After a few tests, she’s decided to offer more of them in the New Year.

“I like explain to everybody how nice Ukrainian embroidery is (and) how it’simportant,” Ivoniak said. “Remember this and show it to different cultures because it’s very nice. All Ukrainian people like this, and I think another culture will think the same. I know different ways to do it but from (the) start we must do something easy and after step by step I will show people how to make nice different blouse (and) different clothes.”

Ivoniak said one purpose is to expose people to different ways of creating embroidery.

The Saskatchewan Indigenous Music Awards surprised Canada’s Got Talent winner Rebecca Strong with their lifetime achievement award, called the Willard Ahenakew Award, on Oct, 12 at the EA Rawlinson Centre.

This was one of 14 awards handed out on the evening. The event recognized the work of Indigenous artists and was hosted by the Saskatchewan Indigenous Music Association (SIMA).

Strong became emotional while accepting the award on Saturday night because it was also the first award she ever received.

“Just being recognized for my achievements in life and in music, of course, (means) a great deal to me because of how hard I’ve worked my en- tire life,” she said. “Having the support of just Prince Albert and Saskatchewan is insane and I feel so loved.”

SIMA Vice President Sheryl Kimbley presented Strong with the award.

Kimbley has known Strong since she came to audition for Voices of the North as a five-year-old.

“Sheryl’s been a big part in my musical career,” Strong said. “Growing up, I was in all the showcases, so she’s always been someone who supported me.”

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