BARRHEAD-A Barrhead businessman is frustrated about the toll the province's public health restrictions and forced business closures are having on his fellow entrepreneurs and he believes the municipality needs to take a more active roll in protecting local businesses.
That is what Mark Vriend told Town of Barrhead councillors during their Feb. 9 meeting. Vriend and his family are the owners of Eric's Gym.
"I've talked to a lot of people from the mayor, the Barrhead and District Chamber of Commerce, Alberta Health Services to [Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock MLA Glenn van Dijken] and nobody has any answers," Vriend said.
He said there are "no bad people" and everyone is doing their best to get through the pandemic the best they can, the impact of public health restrictions have been unfairly disproportionate.
"Everyone has been impacted [negatively] by the pandemic, but the impact of the restrictions has impacted a relatively small group financially than the majority of the population," Vriend said, referring to small business in general, but specifically to those that have been forced to close for prolonged periods.
Because of provincial restrictions, Eric's Gym, which is currently closed, has only been open for six of the last 12 months. Nor does he believe that under the province's Moving Forward Safely plan will allow him to reopen anytime soon.
In Step 1, one-on-one indoor fitness training is permitted, by appointment only. Vriend said although that might be helpful for personal trainers, for small fitness facilities like his, that is not economically feasible.
"I can't use my building. I can't sell it. All I can do is pay the bills, taxes, water, gas and heat," he said.
Vriend also counts himself as one of the lucky ones. Due to his other business interests and savings, they can still buy groceries. He knows that others are not as fortunate.
Even with the provincial and federal government COVID-19 relief programs, which he has been reluctant to access, it has barely made a dent in the losses he is accumulating.
"It's not the money I am losing that I am most concerned about," Vriend said. "What I worry about and lose sleep over is that one morning I'm going to wake up and hear someone in the fitness community or another sector has committed suicide over what the restrictions have done to their business."
He is also worried about the strain the isolation and stress is having on people's mental health.
Although he understands that council has a limited number of levers to pull and is not sure what the municipality can do, Vriend said that as community leaders, councillors have the obligation of lobbying the various levels of government, whether it be for more subsidies and programs or the easing of restrictions.
He added that it would also be beneficial when the town is advocating on small businesses’ behalf that they need to have statistics available, such as the number of businesses that have been shuttered or have gone out of business.
“It would go a long way in showing that council was concerned about their issues,” Vriend said.
Vriend also suggested that the municipality could take a more active role in helping businesses that are struggling, especially those that have been shuttered, to forgive property taxes and utilities for businesses that have been shuttered.
Vriend pointed out that in the Feb. 9 issue of the Town and Country This Week, there was a story where an energy company was looking for partial forgiveness of taxes that were in arrears from the County of Barrhead and the county manager said that the municipality could forgive taxes owed partially or in full if they deemed it equitable.
In the spring, the Barrhead municipalities extended the deadline for when their 2019 taxes were due.
"When the federal government eliminated their tax exemption, councils all over the place including Barrhead voted themselves a pay raise because they thought it was unfair. How is that unfairness more than the forced closing of a business? I believe council can address the unfairness by at least not charging for garbage and water, because currently I am not a customer. The only water I am using at the gym is maybe once a week when I use the bathroom when I have to shovel the gym's sidewalk," Vriend said.
