Municipal leaders seek mandatory helmets for young skateboarders

Mandatory helmets for young skateboarders and scooter riders, a provincewide sanctioning body for combative sports, and a new revenue-sharing program between cities and the province are all one step closer to reality.

Municipal leaders from across the province voted on these three very different topics — and many others — at the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association convention this week.

A resolution tabled by the City of Red Deer calling on the province to create a unified sanctioning body to oversee combative sporting events in Alberta was passed.

Alberta is the only province in Canada without such a commissioning body.

“Imagine if you’re playing hockey, and the medical rules and registration rules were different in every city you went to,” Hard Knocks Fighting founder Ari Taub previously told Postmedia about Alberta’s current system for combative sports.

“It’s a pain in the ass to have to deal with everyone’s different rules. It’d be better if everyone just knew what the rules were,” he said.

Those rules encompass everything from licensing promoters, prefight medicals and even how events are advertised.

Another resolution that gained approval by AUMA attendees concerned making helmets mandatory for skateboarders, in-line skaters and scooter riders under the age of 18.

The successful resolution, brought forward by the City of Grande Prairie, noted that after a similar law was enacted for bicycle riders 15 years ago, the use of helmets among young cyclists rose sustainably.

The resolution stated existing helmet legislation is effective, but the popularity of activities like riding a scooter means changes should be made.

“Wearing a helmet while participating in wheeled activities can reduce the participant’s risk of head injury by at least 45 per cent,” the resolution stated.

Some Calgary skateboarders have questioned how effective such a law would be.

A resolution calling on the government to begin immediate consultations on developing a new revenue-sharing program was also approved by municipal leaders.

“The underlying issue here is that the municipal system is based on property tax revenue, which is inadequate to provide for the kind of infrastructure demands that our communities need,” Grand Prairie Mayor Bill Given, whose city was one of the sponsors of the successful resolution, has previously told Postmedia.

Wearing a helmet while participating in wheeled activities can reduce the participant’s risk of head injury …

One resolution that municipal leaders didn’t support came from the southern Alberta town of Taber.

The town, which drew international attention and ridicule in 2015 for a bylaw that slaps swearers, screamers and spitters with steep fines, put forward the failed resolution asking for support to repeal a federal bill to legalize marijuana.