Stirling councillors discuss drought and flood protection program

Posted on April 10, 2025 by admin

By Kristine Jean
Southern Alberta Newspapers

The Village of Stirling’s drought and flood protection program will be revisited at a later date, following council’s discussion about a proposed application for the program at a recent regular council meeting.   

The application was in respect to a potential storm water management project for the village, but ultimately, councillors accepted the discussion item and a related report – which outlined available funding for storm water management, as information.  

“We were looking at a parcel of land to purchase which would enable us to perform storm water management within the village boundaries,” said Village of Stirling CAO Scott Donselaar, adding the land purchase did not materialize. “The report detailed the (required) application process to receive funding through the program.”

Donselaar noted the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, who administers the funding via a grant, would not be opening the fund again until the fall of 2025. 

“We need to have the land in place first, to be allowed to undertake the studies to then get the funding,” he said. “It’s one of those programs where they want shovel ready – so when they issue you the funding, they want you prepared with all your materials to do design and go to tender right away.” 

Donselaar pointed out that although a land purchase did not materialize, the area in question in the village where the parcel of land is located, has been looked at for possible storm water management.   

“On the northeast corner of town, there is storm water run-off, where we have some overland water issues in that area …. and that portion of land on the northeast corner is substantially lower,” explained Donselaar. “So we saw a parcel (of land) for sale and thought it would make a good strategic investment to be able to develop a storm water management system internally.” 

The drought and flood protection program will return to council at a later date, as the program is part of the Village of Stirling’s infrastructure master plan (IMP), noted Donselaar. The IMP also envisions a (storm water) project by the village but on land further out in the county, that has been identified for potential future annexation. 

The storm water management plan is also part of the IMP and covers all roads, sidewalks, water, sewer and storm(water). 

“(It) identifies areas that need immediate improvement, areas we could look at for improvement and comes up with the methodologies and options for us to be able to address it,” said Donselaar, adding that a big component of that portion in storm water is looking at the northeast corner of the village.