Ag. Office in Provost to Close


 Alberta Agriculture may soon be announcing the closure of its office in Provost.

Staff at the local office said that the office is to close but there has been no date for the closure announced.

Farmers or ranchers wishing to inquire about services will be advised to call a centralized “call centre” in Stettler or deal with private businesses to discuss agricultural issues. Crop specialist Karla Barmentloo who moved to town only last summer said that her contract is over the end of this month. She is planning to move to Camrose where she has applied for a job with Alberta Agriculture.

She began her job as crop specialist in Provost in July 2001.

Most of the offices are being closed in Alberta with 16 “hub offices” remaining. Provost will not be a hub office. Currently there are 51 offices across the province including the one in Provost.

Client service representative Donna Pilgaard who works in the office said that she expects that her position will be abolished soon.

Alberta Agriculture’s Don Young of Lethbridge told The News in a telephone interview that the industry “has matured” and says they are looking for specialists to be “more specialized” and to answer more technical questions that deal more with the business of agriculture, not with its production.

Young adds that in Alberta “we need to focus more on the issue of value adding and processing.”

Cost cutting has also been reported as a factor in the closure of the offices.

More of story in Print version in March 13 edition of The Provost News
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Bantam Hockey Club Wins Provincial Hockey Title


Provost’s Bantam hockey club after their gold medal win at Bow Island on the weekend. Back row, from left: Jordan Acton, Mark Scammell, Brett McInnis, Tyler Peat, Brian Borton, Andrew Rab and Dwayne Harper. Middle: Tom Kohlman (manager), Fred Nelson (coach), Trevor Chopek, Trent Mayer, Chad Nelson, Brett Peat, Derek Bouma, Kevin Ganser (assistant coach) and Kyle Pilgaard (assistant coach). Front: Ryan Hala (gopher), Cash Prediger, Brad Schumacher, Mark Nelson, Shawn Pilgaard, Cole Angeltvedt and Brad Kohlman. Photo by Terry Schneider.

—For 2nd Year In Row

The Provost Bantam Hockey Club has won first place in provincial finals for the second consecutive year.

The playoffs were held at Bow Island over the weekend.

The Pahl’s Maintenance Bantam C hockey club, was coached by Fred Nelson who told The News on Monday that the winning team had a commitment to defense and had demonstrated a “real good overall team effort.”

In the second period of the final game he knew they were going to repeat as gold medal winners. “It felt great” Nelson recalls, as they were up six or seven goals to zero.

He didn’t really think at the start of the year that they would win gold again “but things worked out very well.”

On Friday morning Provost defeated last year’s silver medalists, Smoky River 7-2 and then in the evening Provost beat the host Bow Island 7-1.

More of story in Print version in March 13 edition of The Provost News
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