A merger of Murrays? Study to look at whether amalgamation could help southeastern P.E.I.

The southeastern P.E.I. rural municipalities of Murray River and Murray Harbour have taken the first step in a process to explore the possibility of amalgamating.

The council in Murray Harbour recently passed a resolution to support a study into the possibility of forming a new municipality in the Southern Kings area. Murray River's council passed a similar resolution Tuesday morning.

In a news release Tuesday, officials in Murray Harbour said the area would include the two rural municipalities as well as their fire districts, to create a new municipality of about 3,000 people. 

Terry White, the mayor of Murray Harbour, said the resolutions come from concerns in both communities about their future going forward. 

"We want to be sustainable. We don't want to just barely be making it every year — and the way it's going, you know, if we don't eventually, we'll be either taken over by another municipality or we will dissolve," said White.

"I don't want to see any of that happen."

White said that as smaller communities, Murray Harbour and Murray River miss out on a number of government funding opportunities that a merged municipality could use to improve local infrastructure and serve basic needs in the area. 

"The goal of the study is to see what kind of funding we will get with a bigger municipality," White said. 

"There's a lot of benefits to it, I guess... but it's not going to happen if it's not good for all of us." 

Study to explore impact, lost opportunities

Robert Hughes, the acting trustee in Murray River after the province dissolved its council in July, said the study will look at the costs and benefits of amalgamating the two areas.

That will include how taxation might change, how much new infrastructure funding will become available, and whether opportunities could open up for local tourism with a unified body to manage it. 

"There's very little in the way of programming offered or services, and our community has really struggled financially to do very much," Hughes said. 

"We also asked the consultant to look at lost opportunity cost — so what is not coming here in terms of economic development, in terms of tourism development, in terms infrastructure funding, because there is no larger municipality to look at those things."  

Hughes said now that both municipalities have passed resolutions in support of the study, they can apply to the province for funding and put out a request for proposals from consultants interested in tackling the study.

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He said the process is in the early stages, and he imagines it will be a year or two before the communities get the results of the study.

The trustee said the entire process is being done with the goal of setting the area up for success.

"I'm certainly concerned, [from] what I've seen in the short term here, about the long-term viability of this community," Hughes said.