RM Delegates attending this week’s Mid-Term Convention covered a lot of ground including issues around municipal governance, wildfires, beaver control, water drainage and more.

SARM President Ray Orb says a wildfire meeting was held with the affected RM’s as well as with officials from the Ministry of Agriculture, Government Relations, the Provincial Disaster Assistance Program, and Emergency Management Services.

"We talked a lot about the fires and the next day there was some point of privilege resolutions brought in, one on what Provincial Disaster Assistance Program (PDAP) would cover for wildfire damage," he said. "The other one was convincing someone in the province to ensure grassland in particular pasture land so that ranchers and farms could get some coverage that way."

He notes there’s also a lot of concern about the ongoing impact of flooding in the Quill Lakes area.

Orb says the SARM board is going to be making a plan to go out tour and meet with area producers and RM affected by flooding in that area.

There was some good news coming from the RCMP during the convention when it comes to Rural Policing.

The RCMP’s Assistant Commissioner Curtis Zablocki with F Division told the group they are seeing a trend with rural break-ins and thefts going down around the Province.

SARM President Ray Orb is pleased to hear more is being done with more RCMP recruits graduating, along with the development of the Province’s Protection Response Team and Innovation Saskatchewan’s work on surveillance with better alarm systems for rural areas.

"Even SARm and the RCMP have a better communication system between us," he said. "I think it's only going to get better and I think the visibility will improve, so I have more confidence now on what the RCMP is trying to do than perhaps a year or two ago."    

He says the number of RM’s that belong to the Rural Crime Watch program is growing, but he’d like to see more get involved.