Trail-Warfield Amalgamation seek steering committee members

Trail-Warfield Amalgamation seek steering committee members

Published 3:00 pm Thursday, September 24, 2026

Trail and Warfield amalgamation consultants put the call out for residents to join the community Steering Committee.

The Steering Committee will be comprised of residents and council members from both communities and is responsible for guiding the Amalgamation Study.

“The process will give people the opportunity to understand the potential impacts of amalgamation, including what it could mean for services, costs, property taxes, and the long-term future of our community,” said acclaimed Warfield Mayor Frank Marino in a release.

The Committee serves as an objective, fact-finding body established to oversee the study, and ensure all collected data is presented to the public in a neutral, balanced, and transparent manner.

Four Warfield and four Trail citizens will be selected for the committee as will two council members from each of the respective municipalities.

Following the selection, two co-chairs will be nominated and selected by the committee from the eight residents, not council members. The role of the two co-chairs is to ensure that order is maintained at the meetings, all items on a meeting agenda are addressed, and that the study process as a whole is executed in a timely and orderly manner.

Backed by an independent consulting team, the committee will guide the technical analysis, approve the community engagement plan, and actively participate in public events.

The committee’s purpose is not to decide whether it supports amalgamation, instead, its ultimate responsibility is to listen to the community and make a final recommendation to both councils on whether there is enough rationale and public interest to request a provincial amalgamation vote.

To maintain public trust, individual members must participate in good faith, remain strictly impartial, and act as stewards of an open process.

Members are expected to keep personal views separate from the committee’s official stance and must not present personal opinions, including on social media, as positions of the committee or either municipality.

All committee meetings will be open to the public, and all materials produced by the committee will be available for public review.

The first orientation meeting is tentatively scheduled for Dec. 8, with public engagement planned from May to July.

At the end of the study, the Steering Committee will make a recommendation to both councils on whether the two communities should hold a referendum on amalgamation. Final committee meetings are scheduled for mid to late September and possibly October, 2027.

Application forms are available on the study website at www.trail-warfield.ca and must be submitted by the October 31 deadline.

Residents can also sign up to receive email updates and access study materials as they become available at the same project website.