700 mayors, reeves and councillors from across Manitoba will gather in Winnipeg for the next three days to discuss issues and take seminars on ways to do their jobs better. It's the annual Municipal Officials Seminar put on by the Association of Manitoba Municipalities. AMM President Chris Goertzen, the Mayor of Steinbach, expects Tuesday's provincial budget will also get a lot of analysis.

2016 04 chris goertzen municipal seminar
AMM President Chris Goertzen at 2016 seminar in Brandon"There's going to be a lot of talk about how we can be a continued strong partner with the provincial government and looking closely at how that budget is going to affect our communities and affect our citizens in how we deliver services. It's going to be an interesting time to be at this conference together with municipal officials from across the province, looking at this budget and deciding how our relationship is moving with the province."

Goertzen says AMM's priorities are for the province to continue working to reduce red tape and to put more money into fixing municipal infrastructure. As for the seminars at the municipal meeting, he expects one will get a lot of attention.

"One seminar that many are going to be looking forward to is how the Manitoba Municipal Board is working together with municipalities to further be more efficient. There's new board chair of the Municipal Board in the last number of months and so we have both the vice-chair and the new board chair coming to speak to us about how they are going to try and expedite the process (of decisions) so that we can continue to have growing communities."

Goertzen says AMM looks forward to using the Municipal Officials Seminar to share and develop ideas to have a better municipal government for citizens.