“Don't be a one-trick pony.” That was one of the biggest pieces of advice Mayor Nolan Crouse received upon running for office in 2007 and it is a message he continues to carry with him today.
“Don't be a one-trick pony.”
That was one of the biggest pieces of advice Mayor Nolan Crouse received upon running for office in 2007 and it is a message he continues to carry with him today.
He certainly had a great example to follow in the person of Anita Ratchinsky – St. Albert's first full-time and only female mayor to date.
“Don't run on a very narrow agenda. Make sure you run on a broad agenda, because that's what people expect of a mayor,” Crouse remembers her saying.
Throughout her 12 years on council – nine of them as mayor – Ratchinsky lobbied for the Anthony Henday and Ray Gibbon Drive; saved the grain elevators from demolition; built the city's iconic clock tower; moved the St. Albert ‘Ducky Dome' Arena out of downtown and replaced it with the Troy Murray and Mark Messier arenas, now located within Servus Place; and erected the spray and skate parks, to name but a few of her accomplishments.
Although not everyone agreed with those initiatives – there were petitions to save the Ducky Dome, pre-stardom home of NHL players Troy Murray and Mark Messier, and Ray Gibbon became the hill she chose to die on – Ratchinsky can be credited for shaping much of the way St. Albert looks today.
Ratchinsky first moved to the then-town of St. Albert in the early 1960s with her three young sons and husband Vince, who was transferred to open the Grandin mall location of the Bank of Nova Scotia.
“On Nov. 26 of this year it's closing, isn't that interesting,” she said.
At the time Grandin Road was being developed and the town counted around 4,500 residents.
Ratchinsky worked with her husband for a while, before transferring to an Edmonton branch and becoming a manager herself. She opened three locations in the Capital Region, including the one at Village Tree in St. Albert. She was also chairwoman with the St. Albert Chamber of Commerce in 1985 and 1986.
That's when someone asked her why she didn't run for council. “They said we need a business voice on council,” she recalls.
Bored on medical leave she thought why not. During this time she also convinced her husband they should invest in five Orange Julius locations around town because she “needed something to do.”
“Sometimes my mind gets bored and takes a walk out my mouth and gets me in trouble,” she said with a laugh.
She ran in 1986 and was elected as alderman under Dick Fowler, who went on to become MLA for St. Albert before the end of his third term in 1989.
When it came to the end of that first term, Ratchinsky found that she loved what she was doing and the way she was able to make things happen for the betterment of the city.
She decided to run as mayor and was successful in being elected for three consecutive terms from 1989 to 1998, at which point Paul Chalifoux defeated her over the issue of Ray Gibbon Drive.
“That's the hill I chose, because it was important to me and it was important to the city. You choose the battles. Sometimes you don't win the battle, but you want to win the war,” Rachinsky said.
The fact that the western bypass is still a major priority for both the city and the province and that the environmental concerns that were cited at the time were moot makes her feel “vindicated” she said.
The thing Rachinsky is most proud of – aside from the farmers' market, which started up during her time at the chamber – is the Red Willow Trail system.
Along with a strategic plan that stressed contiguous development of new neighbourhoods, this urban park initiative centred the city on the river and gave this natural feature back to the residents of St. Albert to enjoy.
“It's a major reason why people choose to live here with their families,” she said, while also boasting the city's compact footprint despite continuous growth.
At the end of her third and last term as mayor St. Albert's population hit 25,000 residents.
“I'm hopeful over the years, considering all the progress we made with how the city grew that the administration that I was in charge of didn't disappoint (the people who elected me). I don't think we did. The economy grew; the population grew. We must have done something right,” she said.
Ratchinsky was St. Albert's first full-time mayor and is still the only female to have sat in that “lofty, lonely spot” – to use her own words.
Luckily a few good friends on administration made it “an absolute joy and pleasure to serve the citizens of St. Albert.”
Friends like then-city-manager Norbert Van Wyk, who returned the sentiment.
“She was a pleasure to work with during those years,” he said. “She was there to do an important job for the city and provide the political leadership for the city and she carried that out very well.”
These days the former mayor spends half the year as a snowbird – keeping busy through the Rotary Clubs in both St. Albert and in California.
She was honoured with a key to the city during an Aug. 7 club meeting – two days after her 80th birthday.
Crouse, who presented her with the honour in front of her Rotarian peers, described his predecessor as a “bold” and “opinionated” individual.
“She is seen and she is known as someone who has a strong opinion and who's willing to voice it, and she does that to this day,” said Crouse.
Pleased, but humbled, Ratchinsky half-jokingly said she wished there hadn't been so much ado – mostly because she wishes she hadn't hit the big 8-0.
“You're just about finished your life, and I'm not done,” she said.
