OLDS — The Town of Olds' council has unanimously approved a one-time sponsorship of $1,000 to the Friends of École Olds High School for the 2025 Highest Standing Award.
Council made that decision during its July 14 meeting. The award, handed out annually, goes to the school’s green and gold quads.
This year’s ceremony of student excellence is slated to occur Sept. 26 at 7 p.m. in the theatre in the Fine Arts Centre.
This ask comes to council every year.
“We are very proud of our community support and participation in our annual event,” awards committee chair Kevin Hronek wrote in a letter to the municipality.
“Without your support we would not be able to recognize our students’ efforts and celebrate the involvement of our community at École Olds High School.”
Mayor Judy Dahl said the mayor hands out these awards.
“This is really a shining light on the students,” she said. “When you see them approach the stage and the look in their eyes, how excited they are, I think it's highly recommended.”
Coun. James Cummings stressed he supports the sponsorship but questioned the efficiency of having that request come back to council annually, rather than simply budgeting $1,000 for it each year.
“We discuss it every time it's coming across our desk. We simply unanimously say yes, because we support the school program,” he said. “Don't get me wrong, I'll agree to the motion, absolutely.”
Coun. Heather Ryan echoed that thought, wondering if there are other “one-time” sponsorships the municipality provides every year. She suggested they could all be budgeted for on an ongoing basis.
“That would free up the grant situation for actual one-time (sponsorships), because this is definitely not just a one-time,” she said.
Coun. Wanda Blatz understood the points Cummings and Ryan were making but expressed concern that those one-time grants could change one day.
“It's 1,000 for a few years, but eventually it could change, as could all of our grant requests,” she said.
“So to me, it's not really an onerous task to bring this forward to a meeting to say that we're going to do this, even though we are asked on an annual basis for money.”
Dahl noted O-NET, a formerly town-owned high speed internet and phone services company, sold to Telus last fall, has provided two or three sponsorships each year too.
She wondered what would happen in that case now.
“Everything that O-NET did was separate from us in terms of sponsorship. So whether not they continue to do it post-sale, I'm not too sure, but we didn't have anything to do with that,” the town's chief administrative officer Brent Williams said.
