10 YEARS AGO
• A new set of guidelines sent a signal to telecommunications companies that they better do their homework before applying to build transmission towers, the mayor said. Mayor Gail Surkan said telecommunications guidelines recommend by the municipal planning commission should go a long way to meeting residents concerns about communications towers
• Local RCMP backed off the throttle on a bid to merge the city and rural detachments. City RCMP Insp. Gilles Guertin and Sgt. Barry Hornung of Red Deer Rural RCMP appeared before Red Deer County council to discuss plans to amalgamate the two detachments. Having studied the plan since last January, officers from the two detachments planned on merging as early as Jan. 1, 2000, coinciding with their fiscal year, said Guertin. But RCMP officers decided to wait for a few months to give municipalities more time to review the plan and raise any concerns they had.
25 YEARS AGO
• The abortion rate in Red Deer dropped about 13.3 per cent since 1982 and Red Deer Pro-Life hoped its public education programs opposing abortion were responsible. Figures release by hospital executive director Gerry Vanhooren showed there were 233 abortions for the first nine months of 1984. If that rate continued, it would mean 311 abortions in 1984 compared to 359 in 1982 and 335 in 1983.
• Red Deer’s rail relocation plan got a major boost from a grant extension announced by Alberta Transportation Minister Marvin Moore. The province would provide $26 million a year for major corridor (highway) projects in urban centres until 1987, Mr. Moore told city mayors. Harvey Alton, deputy transport minister, told the Advocate Red Deer might qualify for the 90 per cent funding of a corridor project. The plan called for a roadway along the current rail line from the southern city limits to 32dn street. There the road would connect with 54th Avenue and Taylor Bridge.
50 YEARS AGO
• Plans to construct a multi-million dollar crude oil processing, gas-treating and sulphur recovery plant in the Innisfail oil field were announced by H. G. Bagnall, chairman of the Innisfail Operators’ Committee. The plant would be designed to process crude oil produced from the Innisfail field. It would have sufficient capacity to extract 10,000 barrels of crude oil daily, but was expected to operate at an average rate of 7,500 barrels. At that rate the plant would recover 8.7 million cubic feet of dry gas, 160 barrels of natural gas liquids and 80 long tons of sulphur daily. For maximum production, safety and economy, wells in the field were to be produced directly to the plant.
• More than 4,000 Red Deer residents took advantage of the free chest X-ray campaign being carried out in the city by the Alberta Tuberculosis Association in conjunction with the provincial department of health, it was reported by C.B. Pugh, director of surveys for the association. This represented about one-third of the people registered and showed a high percentage of total registration
90 YEARS AGO
• The Penhold Community Hall was formally opened with a reception to the returned men, some short speeches, some music, dancing and supper, the GWVA orchestra from Red Deer being in attendance. The spacious new hall was beautifully and generously decorated with flags, banners and bunting and about forty of the veterans were present to enjoy the programme given in their honour and to admire the hall dedicated to their memory. The proceeds of the evening were $175, some two hundred and twenty-five sitting down to tea.
• The regular monthly meeting of the WCTU was held Oct. 31 at the home of Mrs. BcBride, with 12 members and two visitors present. After the devotional exercises, which were conducted by Mrs. Houston, the business was taken up. This consisted mainly of the report of the provincial conventions held in Lethbridge. A pleasant feature of the evening was the presentation to Mrs. H. W. Trimble of a life-membership pin, in token of her services to the Union when temperance reform was not as popular as it is today.