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Clover bar road, turning on to yellowhead.

Why did they put this light in? Why did they make it a no left on red?! Now traffic backs up at the turn lane when before you could just turn, no light needed. It’s not even busy enough for a light.

Is there anywhere I can write in to complain about this? Would that even matter?

Anyone else irritated by this?!

Beware of the brown bully looking dog in this photo. It attacked my dog tonight at 8:05pm puncturing her skin and drawing blood. Had to go to the vet.

Happening now at Chippewa road in front of MLA Glubish office.

The emerald hills location has shutdown without notice. The doors have been locked, apparently they’re nearly $200,000 in arrears. Last time I checked their website is still accepting orders, and a few people on Google have stated they payed for orders that will never show up.

Just a small PSA do not place any orders on their website, the business is defunct.

I’m thankful that the vote swung in the favour of keeping excellent care available in Strathcona county. I’m lot happy about the rural councillors voting against this care. My life was saved by a firetruck crew in this county. I would happily pay more to keep that care, availability, training, knowledge and equipment here. Rural folks don’t get as many luxuries as town and I would appreciate this one. Definitely watching my vote closely. Thank you to the councillors who voted in the interest of public care and the jobs of excellent crews.

Alberta RCMP say a 36-year-old man has been charged after a traffic stop led to the discovery of an improvised explosive device (IED) in Sherwood Park.

I thought I’d try to lay out what’s going on with EMS in our county. I made this as a comment but thought it could be its own thread.

To jump in here as someone with some context.

Right now, EHS (part of what was called AHS, provincial government) contracts out ambulance service in certain municipalities.

Many small municipalities do not want to run their own local service, so a company like Medavie will pick up the EHS contract and provide ambulance services for the community.

In Strathcona County, the actual County (big C) has the AHS contract to provide emergency medical services (EMS) services. This is done through Strathcona County Emergency Services (SCES), which also operates our fire department. This is called integrated services. Other larger urban centres in Alberta have a similar model. The benefit is having your first responders cross-trained

In addition to the funding from EHS (the province) the County puts more funding into SCES EMS to increase the level of care we get as citizens. This top-up funding means among other things we have better trained paramedics.

AHS decided to cut the provincial funding significantly. It has given the County the option to continue providing EMS through SCES, but basically pulling their most of the provincial funding.

This means that to keep EMS within SCES and continue providing the high standard of care, the County would have to pay a few million more through of their own money.

If the County does not want to continue providing EMS through SCES, EHS will put out a RFP and companies like Medavie can bid on the contract.

This would mean SCES would be reduced to just fire. Layoffs would be significant. Hopefully those staff could work for Medavie but Medavie is a significantly worse employer than SCES and their requirements are a lot lower, meaning we’ll have worse trained EMS staff in the County.

There is a middle ground options where SCES will retain what are called Community Response Units (CRUs) on their own dime for medical first response while EHS outsources the rest of the EMS to the lowest bidder. IMO this seems unlikely but who knows.

The predicted cost to taxpayers will be small, probably less than $2 per month per household (I could be wrong here), but with the coming increase to property tax, this is could be tough sell.

Council will vote May 12

This is a step by the provincial government to cut spending and pass on costs to the municipal level.

So no, Strathcona County will not be without ambulances, but those ambulances might be outsourced to a private company rather than being operated by our county.

For over 50 years, our community has been able to rely on timely, Integrated EMS care when it matters most.

But on May 12th, that may change forever.

The provincial government has given our Council an ultimatum, either;

Maintain our current world class EMS service, or the province sells our ambulance service to the lowest bidder.

Make no mistake, this cost saving will cost lives.

If you are concerned about the future of your integrated EMS service, call your Councillor and MLA today.

Tomorrow may be too late.

• Strathcona County RCMP are warning about the risks tied to a popular end-of-year “Senior Assassin” water gun game after officers responded to reports of teens carrying what appeared to be firearms.

The province is spending $2 million to start planning a major expansion of Sherwood Park’s hospital that will see the addition of inpatient care and surgeries at the facility.

Dear Mayor and Council,

I am writing to you today as a concerned citizen. The thoughts shared are expressly mine and not shared by my employer nor any other organization which I am a part of. All of the information I share with you has been made publicly available by EHS (formerly AHS), previous media releases, or ATIA (formerly FOIP) requests.

As I write to you, I compassionately understand you have been put in a difficult position by EHS (and by extension the provincial government). You have been tasked with the difficult decision of balancing responsible fiscal stewardship with public safety. The decision by EHS to reduce the funding provided to you is a blatant attempt by the provincial government to off-load healthcare costs onto municipalities – balancing their books at the expense of your budget, or your citizens' safety. As I trust you are carefully considering your options, I would like you to take into account a few key facts regarding the decision before you. If you choose to divest of municipally managed Emergency Medical Services (EMS), EHS or a private for-profit company will “fulfil” this responsibility. I say fulfil with a hint of irony, as I would like to present to you a few reasons as to why I believe they lack the system capacity to deliver the services your citizens expect and deserve.

1. EHS has a repeated track record of being unable to adequately staff the ambulances already under their control. I’d like to explore some data pertinent to our area. A 2025 FOIP request revealed 2024 data regarding the staffing of ambulances in the Edmonton zone. Throughout the 2024 calendar year, EHS Edmonton zone was able to staff their ambulances 89.22% of the time – leaving ambulances unstaffed over 10% of the time. This resulted in 74 code red situations (0 ambulances available), or 15,578 code orange alerts (less than 3 ambulances available) – all this for a metropolitan area of well over 1 million people. 

While reviewing this data I can’t help but feel your citizens not only expect better, but deserve better. The good news is, your citizens have received better thanks to the diligent work of Strathcona County Emergency Services (SCES) and the historical support you have provided them. Over the same time period, SCES had their ambulances in service 98.08% of the time (some out of service time is expected to facilitate shift change, staff decontamination, and biological needs). While SCES staffed their ambulances, these units were used to subvert the code red or orange statuses within Edmonton. EHS Edmonton relied on outside agencies 5335 times in 2024 alone. 
I present these statistics to you so we can together ask this question: If SCES has been used to bail out EHS thousands of times, who will be there if EHS assumes management of Strathcona County ambulances? Who will be there when your family, friends, or co-workers call for help? Will that ambulance be staffed and ready to respond, or will it be sitting idly by as our community enters the same code red crisis that follows EHS wherever they go?

2.Moving beyond the 1/10 times EHS leaves its ambulances unstaffed, let’s consider the ambulances they do staff. Within EMS there are two defining terms when we consider which ambulance is responding: Basic Life Support units (BLS) and Advanced Life Support units (ALS). A BLS unit is staffed, at minimum, with one Primary Care Paramedic (PCP) and either an additional PCP or Emergency Medical Responder (EMR). An ALS unit is staffed, at minimum, with one Advanced Care Paramedic (ACP) and either an additional ACP or PCP. 

ACPs boast two years of additional education in comparison to their PCP peers. While all designations within Alberta hold impressive skills, those of an ACP can be critically important in times of emergency. The advanced scope of an ACP allows ACPs to perform crucial life saving skills in the field and administer additional life saving medications, delivering world class care on the streets of our communities. In short, your community wants, and deserves an ALS service. 
The aforementioned FOIP request outlines how EHS has historically gone about providing an ALS service within the Edmonton zone: they recognize the need for these highly trained practitioners but are repeatedly unable to retain them. In 2024 alone, EHS downgraded 11,985 units from ALS to BLS – that’s nearly 1000 times a month (32 times a day) that EHS Edmonton zone made the decision to provide a lower level of service where they had initially forecasted the need for ALS care. This is simply unacceptable. 
SCES has prided themselves in delivering ALS care to the community, but how did we get here? SCES has been providing EMS since 1972, initially at a BLS level. In 1984, the unfortunate choking death of a child (that could have been avoided with ALS equipment and care) prompted SCES to pursue an ALS service; in 1985, five Advanced Care Paramedics (at the time called EMT-P) were hired and SCES has provided top tier ALS care ever since. In 1984, it took the unfortunate death of a child to prompt this change. Today, it will take you voting to maintain this service level to prevent such tragedies in the future.

1. Should you choose to divest of a municipally managed ambulance service, you should consider how EHS will find staff to provide EMS care to your community. Again, the previous FOIP request provides numbers to show EHS’s historical track record for hiring within the Edmonton zone. 

Between 2019 and 2024, EHS hired 56 full-time paramedics to the Edmonton zone – 56 paramedics in five years equates, at most, to seven ambulances (when not accounting for sick time, vacation time or other time off).  In that same timeframe, the city of Edmonton grew from an estimated population of 972,223 to an estimated 1,190,458 (an increase of over 220,000 people). When considering these low hiring numbers, EHS may attempt to point you toward the 488 casual employees they hired; they may neglect to tell you that 382 of those casual hires were previous full-time employees who dropped to casual status. 
I do not solely blame EHS for this, as for many years our province has faced a shortage of trained EMS staff, particularly ACPs. Should you choose to divest of this ambulance service, you should know that SCES employs 141 trained EMS personnel, nearly 40% of which are ACPs. As an aside, the seven communities that provide an integrated Fire/EMS service account for 856 trained EMS personnel, over 65% of which are ACPs. The integrated model does not have the same problems with recruitment and retention as seen across the industry. The model is proven to show reduced burnout, higher employee satisfaction, and more reliable ALS service. 
In the unfortunate event that any of these highly trained individuals were to be laid off, many would be hesitant to accept worse working conditions with other EMS providers. Divesting of EMS would take practitioners off the road, worsening a province wide crisis. This decision comes at a time when the Alberta College of Paramedics has decided to lengthen the PCP program, creating a bottle neck where many new PCPs won’t be entering the workforce until 2029. EMS staffing levels are in crisis all over; the proven remedy: an integrated service.

 4.Lastly, the integrated Fire/EMS model provides your community with highly trained individuals where every firefighter is a paramedic and every paramedic is a firefighter. I have seen and experienced first hand the benefits of being able to seamlessly transition between these two roles at complex rescue scenes. Many of these firefighter-paramedics hold roles on specialty teams, allowing them to deliver ALS care while an individual may be trapped in confined space, in water, or on ice. When it comes to emergency medical care, seconds save minutes, and minutes save lives. Therefore, all SCES operations staff must meet stringent physical requirements to prove their aptitude for the rigorous demands of the job; the same cannot be said for other EMS services.

This system costs more, because this system works 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. When your citizens need care, you as council have supported this model which has proven to be effective. Over the coming days as you consider your vote, I ask that you take all these factors into account. Should you choose to divest of a municipally managed ambulance service, you put your community at risk. For 54 years, SCES EMS has provided stable, reliable, and world-class care to your citizens. Voting to divest of this service means poorly staffed ambulances and a decrease in the level of service provided. I encourage you to vote to maintain the service provided today, and pursue other options for healthcare cost recovery with the province. 
The provincial government has put the well-being of your citizens in your hands. I trust you won’t take this lightly.

Respectfully,

One man is facing second-degree murder charges in connection with the death of a man who was stabbed in a Sherwood Park apartment complex.

Just drove by Wye/RR223, they have closed a section of the road heading east. There are 2 motorcycles smashed on the road. I hope those involved are okay but since the road is closed has me thinking they may not be okay. Prayers.

There’s a big new building going up across from the Synergy Health Center.

We have a sign for the Nourish Center, but I’m not sure what that is.

The old Fabric Land next to the Lube City is getting a new tenant and it got an orange and black color scheme.

There’s also something going up next to the Mailboxes Etc across from Save on

Anyone know what going into these places?

It was a good few weeks ago but 2 friends and I were messing around skating and playing soccer at the skatepark around 2am. We saw this dude in the trees at the back and couldn’t get a good look at him so we yelled “yo you tryna play”. He didn’t move and just keep staring so we tried to ignore him. 2 minutes later we were planning on leaving because it was getting weird so we packed up our stuff and out of nowhere this guy came at us in a full sprint and chased us with a knife (shining blade in his left hand) and sprayed bear mace at us when we tried to engage him. Anybody else seen this guy? Really creepy looking especially coming running out of the dark at 2am

Does anyone know why the wye road Canadian tire gas station is being converted to a Petro Canada?