ATHABASCA – A further contribution from the Town of Athabasca, along with a generous personal donation from a local resident will help prolong the lobby effort by the Keep Athabasca in Athabasca University (KAAU) advocacy group and maintain the traction its message has been gaining with government officials.
Athabasca town council’s Dec. 21 meeting started off with a visit by Dr. Alex Kondra, a longtime resident of Athabasca and tenured academic at the university, who had a few words to say about the importance of keeping university jobs in the community, even as the university moves toward a near-virtual existence. He also backed up his words with the $7,500 worth of $100 bills in his pocket, which he donated to KAAU campaign.
Kondra has a PhD in Business Administration, majoring in industrial relations, with minors in organizational analysis, economics and statistics, and has been with Athabasca University for 20 years, filling several high-profile administrative roles in that time. He is currently the program director for the Faculty of Business MBA for Executives and an associate professor.
“I’m intimately familiar with the institution,” Kondra said. “We're losing something in the neighborhood of 300 to 400 positions from the Athabasca footprint. If you know anything about economic multipliers, that means at least another 300-400 jobs lost. This is a devastating number. This is not trivial. This is a very existential threat to this community. It will not happen overnight. The drift will be slow; some people have already decided to up and move; I know people who are; and I know many people are stressed that they're not back in the office.”
As a tenured faculty member, Kondra said he has a luxury that many don’t to encourage the community and council to continue to support the advocacy effort.
“If we start to depopulate … it threatens hospitals and schools, the value of your homes will decline because there'll be no demand for them — we may lose doctors and services shops — so this is a really critical activity that we're undertaking,” said Kondra before handing over the thousands of dollars he was happy to put toward the cause.
Kondra went on to say he wasn’t hopeful in the beginning, but after seeing the amount of traction the campaign has gained with the help of a consultant from Canadian Strategies Group (CSG), his hope for the future of the university in Athabasca is being restored.
“I thought that was a wise move,” he said.
Of course, funding that consultant is the biggest challenge.
Also, on the agenda later in the meeting, councillors passed a motion by a 5-2 margin to approve an additional $15,000 in the upcoming municipal budget toward the KAAU coffers in 2022. Coun. Sara Graling and Coun. Loretta Prosser voted against the motion.
The Town of Athabasca voted to contribute $7,500 to KAAU earlier this year to help hire CSG to lobby government insiders to make them aware of the potential catastrophe in the loss of AU jobs and what will happen when the university implements its near-virtual policy. After some cajoling Athabasca County matched that donation, and private citizens like Kondra have donated thousands of dollars as well.
For its part, Athabasca University has maintained throughout the campaign it is committed to the Athabasca community and takes issue with the numbers being put forward by the advocacy group.
The cost to keep CSG on the books comes in at $7,750 per month, said CFO Jeff Dalley, who has been tasked with handling the accounting of the KAAU donations that come into the town office.
During discussion of the request for funding, Coun. Dave Pacholok said he supported the request and was glad to see the progress that has been made but didn’t know where another donation from the town would come from.
Dalley noted CSG has been paid for November, but the group is still short for December. Mayor Rob Balay said that would have to be made up by the group, as the money from the town would be budgeted for 2022 and would have to be used in 2022.
Coun. Jon LeMessurier asked Balay for a rundown of how the previous money has been spent and how it has benefited the town.
Balay responded that progress is being made and meetings with important players are scheduled and in the works.
“The use of professional lobbyists to open doors that we wouldn't have been able to open, to have conversations with government officials that have been able to put pressure on the government into seeing the importance of rural economic jobs and sustainability and investing in rural Alberta,” he said.
The committee has determined that as much interaction with the important players before the provincial budget comes down in the spring is key to a positive outcome, he said.
“There are more meetings scheduled in the new year with the university. Also, there's a couple other very viable alternatives that are out there as well that the government is considering.”
Coun. Graling said she was interested in looking at alternative strategies as well, like meeting with the incoming president and trying to repair the relationship with AU administration.
“I would like to recognize the very good inroads with important people that have been made, I think that's a sign of the strong leadership that we have at our table and at the county's table,” she said. “It seems to me as an outsider that maybe there's a fracture between the leadership of the university and the councils. I think if we're going to continue these efforts, that's more the direction I can see having long-term success with.
The new injections of cash will keep CSG on the books until May.
