**Read full story in the Sept. 30, 2021 Free Press**
Visitors to the Omniplex, Park Valley Pool and other municipally owned facilities in Drayton Valley will not have to show proof of their Covid vaccine status to use the facility.
Town council made the decision at a special meeting on Wednesday morning.
The motion “is saying no to vaccine passports if you want to boil it down,” said Mayor Michael Doerksen.
Instead it will be left up to individual user groups to introduce their own Restrictions Exemption Programs if they are unable to operate under the province’s new rules, which include a limit on event capacity of unvaccinated users.
Doerksen said he’d received more than 300 emails, phone calls or text messages prior to the decision coming to council, while councillor Tom McGee said it was one of the most divisive issues he’d faced in 18 years in public office in Drayton Valley.
Council also removed a restriction exemption program brought in last week for the MacKenzie Conference Centre and the Total World Fitness Centre.
While he said he supported the motion on Wednesday, Doerksen said it was important to recognize the severity of the health crisis in the community. He said he was frustrated when he saw people openly flouting health recommendations at a time when Drayton Valley has one of the highest rates of Covid in the province.
“We all have an individual responsibility to be better at reducing the amount of Covid in our community,” he said.
For more on this story see Thursday’s Free Press.
