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By Ben Tompkins

Government Investments

Village of Muenster, Englefeld receive TSS funding for regional land use and partnerships

Jul 26, 2023 | 9:09 AM

The Government of Saskatchewan has invested more than $700,000 under the Targeted Sector Support (TSS) Initiative, to support 16 projects across the province.

These include two projects in the northeast, which are meant to build stronger community networks through partnerships, planning and collaboration.

“Building a strong Saskatchewan requires investment into local government initiatives to help create better communities,” said Government Relations Minister Don McMorris.

“Our government will continue to invest in important projects like these and is proud of the ongoing work and relationships with Saskatchewan’s municipal associations to support progress, innovation and growth in our province.”

Northeast projects include the Village of Muenster and the Village of Englefeld, which have received a combined $134,500.

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A total $34,500 will go towards Muenster for a regional land use feasibility study including updates to land use planning tools, while $100,000 will go towards Englefeld for the EQWL regional partnership.

“This project will enable Humboldt and Muenster to look at how the land between the two urban centers would best be used, and what type of development should be occurring. The planning tools that we use as municipalities that allow us to look at things logically this way are usually our official community plans and our zoning bylaws,” explained Jan Sylvestre, administrator for the Village of Muenster.

“We have been working with the town of Watson, the Village of Quill Lake, and the RM of Lakeside and we’re trying to find projects that all four of us need to do that we can work together on to help us save some money. We want to update our OCPs and then redo our zoning bylaws so that we have the same regional requirements and can work together in more areas than what we are already,” added Lani Best, mentor for the Village of Englefeld.

The TSS Initiative provides cost-shared grants to support municipalities partnering on projects focused on dispute resolution and relationship building; capacity building, regional cooperation and municipal transition.

The $1.5 million annual funding available is allocated from the municipal sharing program and covers up to 75 per cent of eligible project costs.

“The funding enables us to not only update what we have but do it in a way that works well with all of our neighbouring municipalities, so it allows us to update our current bylaws and regulations to make sure we’re keeping with the times and that we we can anticipate contemporary requests for land use in our area,” Sylvestre told northeastNOW.

“We’re newly trying to establish regional partnerships and none of us have a lot of funds with the rising costs. Everything has just gotten so expensive, that the funding is just timely because now we can afford to do it sooner than later, whereas without the funding, we probably would have been putting this off for two or three years,” Best mentioned.

Projects are reviewed and approved by the TSS Steering Committee, which consists of representatives from the Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA), the Saskatchewan Association of Rural Municipalities (SARM), the Saskatchewan Association of Northern Communities (New North) and the Ministry of Government Relations.

This is the fifth round of projects approved under the TSS Initiative. SUMA administers this funding on behalf of the TSS Steering Committee.

According to the provincial government, cities, towns, villages, resort villages, rural municipalities and northern municipalities are encouraged to begin conversations with their neighbouring communities about projects under this program and apply for the sixth TSS intake, which is expected to open this fall.

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