While art may be open to interpretation, Drumheller’s Town Council wants its art funding policy to be clear cut.
    Council will seek to define its arts funding policy in the wake of a funding request from the Badlands Art Gallery September 15, 2014. The matter returned to Town Council and was discussed at its regular meeting Monday, October 6, 2014.
    Town Council directed administration to set up a contingency fund for artists in the amount of $5,000 subject to Council’s passing of the  2015 Capital Budget, and for further discussion on the ability of the Town of Drumheller to annually fund such a program.
    “What we’re going to do is look at it during the (2015) budget deliberations. But Council has asked administration to provide some policy. A funding request comes in, we need the policy to substantiate it. And we have to be able to let administration know that they have to budget for this,” said Mayor Terry Yemen, “and right now, we do not have that money in the budget. So we’ve asked that they incorporate into the budget deliberations, some policy that we can use to go forward with.”
    Included in that work will be the establishment of clear guidelines and criteria for similar groups and organizations seeking financial assistance from the Town.
    The Mayor said he’s heard from a number of the Town’s residents voicing their concerns over the art gallery’s request, and notes forming clear cut guidelines may help eliminate taxpayer’s concerns over setting an unaffordable precedent or viewing some groups in a more favourable light.
    “Obviously, we’re a small community, we don’t have a never ending pot of money. So once the money’s gone for 2015-2016, it’s gone. “ Regardless of the name the new policy is delivered under, the Mayor indicates residents would support having it in place, and he encourages further feedback.
    “I feel pretty confident going forward. I’ve gotten some direction from the people of Drumheller, and I think that they should be talking to the rest of Council, too, and letting us know what they think.”

Drumheller RCMP will be focusing on seat belt enforcement  for the month of October.

    Throughout the month of October, Alberta RCMP, along with other enforcement partners such as Sheriffs, will step up efforts to educate drivers on the proper use of seat belts and child safety seats.
     “Drivers are responsible for their safety and the safety of their passengers by making sure everyone is buckled up properly,” says S/Sgt. A.A.Hopkins.  “Of those who are ejected from a vehicle during a collision, 75 per cent die.  The cause of death is directly related to their choice to not wear a seat belt.”
• Each year, over 450 people are killed in Alberta in motor vehicle collisions and over 20,000 are injured. Over 30% of the people killed were not wearing their seatbelts.
•  Alberta’s collision statistics show unbelted occupants are three and a half times more likely to be injured than people who buckled up.  Research and collision investigations have shown that seatbelts increase your chances of survival by over 50 per cent.
•  In patient health-care costs are 50 per cent greater for unbelted crash victims than for those people who buckle up.
•    Road Safety research has established that the effectiveness of seat belts in preventing death and serious injury to occupants of light duty motor vehicles involved in potentially fatal collisions ranges between 39% and 60%, depending on the vehicle type(s) and size(s) and occupant seating position. This means that for every 100 unbelted occupants who die in a given year, as many as 60 of them may have lived if they had simply worn their seat belt.
•  According to the Alberta Motor Association “the use of a seat belt is perhaps the most effective way of reducing injury severity and likelihood of fatalities among vehicle occupants involved in a crash.