Big wide smiles in the area as business and industry booms

It’s ironic, but getting a business to brag about some big project, big or little investments, can be kind of like pulling teeth. It’s been a long few years, let a business reporter tell you.

Lately, however, it’s been a sea of big wide smiles in Medicine Hat.

In the last two month, the News has reported extensively on... Deep breath ... A major cannabis production facility and data processing facility, a propane facility in Empress, windfarms near Bow Island and Oyen, new work at the Lantic Sugar plant in Taber, talk of hemp processing in several rural regions.

General renovations are ongoing at car lots, gas stations, and hotels.

There a new apartment block, truckstop, grocery store, three new hotels, and a further renovation at the Medicine Hat Mall looking to come online.

Feast or famine it seems, but it’s clear that sometimes these take time. The 11-22 Seed Co-op is an example. Its officials were happy to talk with the News this week about a proposal to build a new $10 million plant this year on Highway 41A, but times have been tough as well.

“The co-op was incorporated in 1961, but ’61 and ’62 were severe drought years in southern Alberta,” said current chairman Garry Lentz. “There was some trouble raising shareholder equity. But in 1963, 350 shares were issued on the same day.”

Lentz, who’s made a study of the co-op’s receipt books and history, also says the project was originally paid in thirds by the province, what was then Improvement District No. 1, and the member shareholders.

How it works

The price at the pump is a cause for grumbling, but the rejuvenation of oil prices, now topping US$71 for West Texas Intermediate, have bigger, better effects on the Alberta economy. That’s not to mention provincial finances. Consider this: — The current provincial budget includes revenue projected with oil at US$59 a barrel;

— Each extra dollar adds about C$265 million to provincial revenue because royalty rates are partly based on the WTI rate;

— Plus, there’s an extra boost in general revenue related to higher economic activity.

So, were the price to hold, it’s an extra C$3 billion-ish in revenue.

Likewise, a weaker Canadian dollar also increases revenue, each cent worth C$200 million, and the current budget predicts an 80-cent dollar over the course of the year.

Important to note here, is that the “year” in question is the financial year that runs from April 1 to the end of March, 12 months later.

All things together, the government could chop a third to half off the much-maligned deficit in time for the 2019 election.

Wild about Harry

Can you believe it was 11 years ago that Prince Harry pulled into Panorama Lanes one night to bowl a game? It touched off a flurry of royal sightings in Medicine Hat, despite the second-lieutenant, who is now sixth in line to the British throne, being on active exercises at CFB Suffield for most of June.

Our man was set to take the plunge early Saturday morning, maybe you heard.

Current scuttlebutt around the base is that some statement could be made this year on the future of British Army Training Unit after the end of the current agreement in 2022.

A look ahead

Council sits on Tuesday to account for Monday’s holiday and will discuss new charges for curbside recycling program as well as discuss intermunicipal collaboration framework.

100 Years ago

The Russian Revolution might have brought the Hat to Hanna rail line closer to reality, the News reported this week 100 years ago. The Canadian Northern Railway project — and the possibility of a junction with the Canadian Pacific Line in Medicine Hat, had been stalled for two years due to a lack of steel and capital owing to the war in Europe.

However, Mayor Mervyn Brown told the News he’d been told by the federal railways minister that steel had been found in the United States that had been previously designated for delivery to the Russian imperial government before it was overthrown.

Locally, the CPR Men’s store operated by Harry Ireland was ready to expand again. The News noted that Ireland opened the store ten years earlier with only five pairs of boots in stock.

Collin Gallant covers city politics and a variety of topics for the News. Reach him at 403-528-5664 or via email at cgallant@medicinehatnews.com