Local lawyer, chamber president named to MHC board

By Medicine Hat News on October 19, 2019.

The chamber of commerce president and a local lawyer have been named to the board of governors of Medicine Hat College by the provincial government.

Sarah MacKenzie and Luke Day were named in this week’s order’s in council list, published Thursday. They will serve until their terms expire in October 2022.

Current board chair Graham Kelly said the announcement fills two vacant seats and will round out the expertise of the seven public members on the board.

“The board hasn’t had a presence from the business community for several years,” said Kelly.

He called MacKenzie, currently the president of the Medicine Hat District Chamber of Commerce, an “active community presence” in a number of areas.

Day, who practises law with the local office of Stringham, LLP, is “enthusiastic about Medicine Hat College and its importance to this community,” said Kelly.

Mackenzie’s term as chamber president is set to end in November, and she was looking for new challenge, she said.

“I’m looking forward to sharing that experience,” she told the News.

Day said he is looking forward to adding to the “wealth of experience” on the board.

“It’s an important part of the fabric of this community,” he said, adding that MHC mandate could evolve over his term.

“(The province is) looking through the eyes of the MacKinnon report and they’ve said the No. 1 thing is to consult (with post-secondary institutions) on goals and have a discussion.”

Also this week, the province named a new chair of the board of Grande Prairie Regional College, and named three new board members for NorQuest College while “rescinding” three previous additions.

In Medicine Hat, all five public members’ terms will end over the next 12 months, including two in March 2020, and the remaining three in October 2020.

Members with an education background include Pat Cocks, former Prairie Rose School Division treasurer, and Kelly, a retired high school educator better known as a longtime city alderman up to 2013.

Other current members are Kelly Garland, a union official, Brooks-based community worker Mohammed Idriss, and Petra Mauerhoff, the head of the Shortgrass Library System.

The board also includes members representing students, academic staff and non-academic staff.