High River Mayor all in on tourism

A report from the Foothills Tourism Development Zone says to achieve its full potential, the zone needs an unprecedented commitment to prioritize tourism. 

The report was brought to High River town council last week.

The presentation laid out ways that could be done stating that "Public and private partners must commit to taking a regenerative approach to tourism that ensures a positive influence on the economy, enhances the quality of life for residents, preserves agricultural and ranching heritage, and protects the ecology of the natural environment."

Mayor Craig Snodgrass agrees with the report but says there's still a lot of hypocrisy in Edmonton.

"This report talks to exactly how important tourism is to this province, it's a multi, multi, multi-billion dollar industry that primarily focuses on the usage of our eastern slopes and yet in the same breath they are giving the go ahead to clearcut logging in the Highwood Pass and along Highway 40 and then you go south into the Crowsnest Pass into what they call the Southern Rockies Region of Tourism, this very government has started to allow these coal companies to start poking around to do exploration on Grassy Mountain, which opens the door to all the coal mining that comes north into the Highwood Pass," Snodgrass says.

He calls it ridiculous that the provincial government is willing to spend this much money on a tourism report while the same areas where people want to come and enjoy are the same areas, he says, the government is tearing down.

"If the government is serious about providing economic benefit to the Crowsnest Pass I would think it would pay more attention to a multi-billion-dollar industry being tourism than the pennies that the province gets out of these coal mines."

He says clearcut logging just off Highway 40 in K-Country could also be done in a much more environmental way.

"You don't need to go to clearcut, you can do other types of forestry in there and you can replant trees and it takes them awhile to re-grow and be useful again as far as logging, 50, 80, 100 years or whatever it is, at least it regenerates itself at some point the coal mining is dead and gone."

The Tourism Report includes a Commitment to Regenerative Tourism as one important aspect.

It also highlights aboriginal involvement.

It outlines five Tourism Destination Zones, Okotoks, High River, Bragg Creek, Diamond Valley and Nanton.

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