WHEREAS urban residents travel to rural Alberta to visit lakes, streams, trails, campsites and other tourist attractions;AND WHEREAS the only tax base available to rural municipalities to provide services to these visitors is rural property tax; AND WHEREAS several years ago the Province of Alberta suspended any new funding for the Municipal Recreation and Tourism Areas Program site development grants;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts and Counties urge the Government of Alberta to reinstate some form of funding to assist rural municipalities in developing and operating minor tourist destination sites for the good of all Alberta residents.

In the mid 1980s, the Province of Alberta consolidated a number of provincial programs into a single grant program designed to assist rural jurisdictions in coping with the influx of recreational users to a variety of recreational settings in rural Alberta. The “Access to Pothole Fisheries Program” and the “Reservoir Access Program” were two of the programs that were absorbed by the new initiative, first called the Municipal Recreation Areas Program and subsequently renamed the Municipal Recreation/Tourism Areas Program (MR/TA).