Visitors planning to overnight in Black Diamond’s campground can now stay as long as they like.
Black Diamond town council voted on June 17 to remove restrictions on how long campers can stay in the Bob Lochhead Memorial Campground after the Province implemented Stage 2 of its economic relaunch strategy on June 12.
“We are no longer under a public health emergency and the Town of Black Diamond is no longer under a local state of emergency,” Sharlene Brown, Black Diamond’s chief administrative officer, told council.
Before the 51-site municipal campground opened June 1, Town council agreed – in consultation with the Foothills Lions Club which operates the campground - to a minimum 30-day consecutive stay in an attempt to help reduce the spread of COVID-19 in Black Diamond.
Following a barrage of phone calls in late May from potential campers requesting that the restrictions be lifted, council voted on June 3 to amend the agreement to reduce the minimum stay to seven consecutive days.
With new guidance from Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, Deena Hinshaw, regarding municipal and private campgrounds, the Foothills Lions Club campground committee requested that council remove the length of stay restrictions.
“If the public health emergency is not renewed and the guidance is being adhered to, then there is no reason that restrictions should be placed on the operations of the campground,” said Brown, adding many municipal and private campgrounds don’t have restrictions.
Campground chairman James Lee said council’s decision is great news for the community.
“There are so many positives for so many people in so many different ways for this decision,” he said. “It’s good for the community, it’s going to really help some of the businesses and it certainly allows us to move forward and be able to meet some of the challenges we’re going to be presented with this year with requests coming in for funding.”
Lee said the Foothills Lions Club typically puts $60,000 to $80,000 of its campground proceeds back into the community each year, but that amount will be less this year due to the campground opening late and the visitor restrictions that were in place the first two weeks of the season due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We’re down about $50,000 from what we normally take in at this point,” he said.
Lee said the campground had been running at about 40 per cent capacity since opening on June 1, but he expects that to change following council’s most recent decision.
“People are chomping at the bit to go camping,” he said. “This COVID-19 outbreak has forced them to stay at home in many cases and people want to recreate and get out a little bit.”
Lee said about 80 per cent of the approximately 100 calls the campground has been receiving each week are requests for short-term camping.
The majority of visitors to the Bob Lochhead Campground this season have been from Alberta, with a small number from Saskatchewan and even fewer from British Columbia, he said.
Safety measures have been put in place since the campground opened for the season.
Although all campsites remained open due to adequate spacing between sites, Lee said the washrooms have been closed, signage has been posted stating Alberta Health Services’ regulations and personal protective equipment is being supplied to patrons.
“We really haven’t had any problems in the campground,” he said. “People are very respectful of what’s going on in the world and provincially. They realize that things aren’t totally back to normal.”
Lee said he expects the washrooms will open in late June.
“The washrooms will remain closed for at least another couple of weeks until we make sure that we’re out of the danger zone,” he said. “It will impact tenters for another two weeks or so.”
The Bob Lochhead Memorial Campground is scheduled to close for the season in mid-October.
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