Around 80 people attended the community engagement session on the Medicine Lodge Ski Hill on Feb. 22 at Bentley Community Hall, including councillors from Lacombe County as well as the Town of Bentley.
“The conversation was a good conversation. It’s a diversity of opinions, some people obviously for the idea of creating a bike trail and looking at the expansion of recreation opportunities, but also some concerns from the local residents or the homeowners in and adjacent around the hill,” said Marc Fortais, chief administrative officer with the Town of Bentley.
He said some of these concerns were things like how to deal with the garbage or trespassing on private property.
“These are all really good points and concerns that are being raised, and I think given the turnout, there’s definitely a lot of interest in the project, and I think that it’s a good process because we are getting a diversity of opinions through that consultation process.”
The Town of Bentley is currently in an Indigenous consultation, working through the process with Indigenous partners to have conversations about the hill and the history of the area.
“From that we are currently running the survey. The survey link is available online and as many people that can complete that survey the better, because it just helps us with the broad picture of how this can be a good community based asset.”