OUTLOOK - Outlook's most prosperous times may still be ahead in the years to come, but Ryan Husband is enjoying the here and now as he looks ahead to the next chapter of his life.
The newest mayor of the town of Outlook, who sat acclaimed when he threw his name into the hat and was officially declared Mayor as Civic Election Day came and went on November 13, says the future is looking bright for the riverside community and he's looking forward to the work that he and the rest of Town Council hope to carry out as things appear to be on an upward trajectory moving forward.
Moving to town in the spring of 2013 with his wife Alicia, Ryan originally hails from Dauphin, Manitoba. Many people locally may know him and his wife from Husbandry Farms, the farming operation that the pair run, but he also keeps himself involved in the local irrigation sector, recently taking up a new role of which he finds himself very invested.
"I'm the executive director of Irrigation Saskatchewan," explained Ryan, sitting down with this reporter. "There used to be the Irrigation Crop Diversification Corporation and the Saskatchewan Irrigation Projects Association; they amalgamated into Irrigation Saskatchewan and now I'm the executive director there. We really do two things; we kind of advocate for irrigators and we also do research on irrigated crops, so that if irrigated producers go looking for, 'What type of wheat should I grow?', we've done variety trials under irrigation, so we can say that one variety grows better under irrigation than THIS variety, even though Variety X might actually do better under dry land. I just started there in September, but I've really been enjoying it so far."
Upon his arrival in Outlook back in May 2013, Husband ended up seeing the same thing that many others do; people who intended on only staying 'for a spell', but who eventually called the town home with no intentions to depart. In the decade that has since passed, he's also come down with a case of community pride that makes it difficult to foresee an exit at any point in the near future.
"I remember driving down for my interview when I came to work for the government and seeing the irrigation pivots and wondering what this town's going to be like, and it's been a good place to be," said Ryan. "There were people when I first moved here that said, 'We moved to Outlook and we were only planning to be here for a few years and we were going to go on to our next job, but we really liked it and we've been here thirty-some years!' I was thinking, 'Oh yeah, that's cool, we'll see how long we'll be here,' but you know, Outlook's been so good to us in these last 11 years that I don't foresee us leaving anytime soon."
Husband's path to the seat of Outlook's mayor started when he was first inspired to run for town council in 2020, stemming from a conversation he had with another local councillor who said he'd be a good fit for the town. As someone who says he was looking for more opportunities to be a leader in the community, it seemed to be a good fit.
"I was working for the government and there was an RM councillor who I worked with and one day he came along and said something," he said. "It wasn't on my radar, but he said, 'You know what, Ryan? I think you should run for council'. At the time, there was some friction between the RM and and the town council, and this was right when they were moving to their own administration building. He said, 'I think you'd be great on there.' I gave it some thought, talked to some friends, and other people thought I could probably do that. At the time, I was looking for some more leadership opportunities, so I threw my hat in the ring and I think I snuck in as the 6th councillor, so I was happy to do that."
Sitting on Outlook's town council for the past four years opened Ryan's eyes to the position that the town finds itself in and the opportunities that may lay ahead, so when the term was nearing its conclusion, he says that it was two specific things that inspired him to put his name up for the position of Outlook Mayor.
"Well, a couple things. One, I had an inkling that Maureen wasn't going to run, so as that became clear, there was discussion about who might be the next mayor, and there are other people in the town who I think would have done a great job as well," he explained. "A lot of them didn't seem that interested as it's a big time commitment; not a huge one, but you have to be committed to it. I was fortunate when I knew I was taking on the Irrigation Saskatchewan job that I'd have that ability to be flexible with my time. And both roles, they really work together; often times I'm talking to the same people from the Irrigation Saskatchewan side or from the town side, whether that's like MLAs or other administrators from different areas and districts, towns, and all that kind of stuff. I thought that would be a good way to do it and a good opportunity to do both of those things together. And then the last thing was when I was out at our orchard this summer, and there was somebody who had come to pick berries and I was chatting them up. And they said, 'Oh yeah, Outlook's a great town to be from.' And I was like, 'What?' That actually kind of makes me mad if you think it's a great town to be FROM. I thought, 'You know, it's a great town to be in NOW!' That was the moment where I thought if I'm that passionate about Outlook being a great town now - and they were from a nice place too as they were from BC - but I thought if that's the emotional response that I get when people say, 'Oh yeah, I grew up here but I'm happy I left', that's kind of when I knew I should run for Mayor. If that's the way I feel about people leaving, then being the mayor might be the right role for me."
And so it came to pass that as of November 13, Husband became the newest Mayor of the Town of Outlook. He may also be the youngest mayor in the history of the riverside community at the age of 34, and if so, he joins a club consisting of himself and Maureen Weiterman, who made history herself in 2020 by being the first female elected mayor in town history. It's only been a couple of weeks since it became 100% official, but Ryan's starting to get a feel of what's in store for him over the next few years.
"It's been good," he said. "I don't know if I fully comprehended the work that it's going to take. When we knew that nobody else was going to run after nominations had closed, Maureen had given me a sense of like, 'You should go to Remembrance Day ceremonies and some of these other things', but I don't think I fully understood what kind of commitment that would be. Now, that said, I really enjoy getting out to those things and it's been a lot of fun, even in the short time since the election day. I've been out to a number of those events already and really enjoyed getting out and talking to people and and kind of getting a bit better understanding of where the town's at. And actually, different groups that I'm not normally involved with as much and getting to know some of those people has been a lot of fun."
Having just wrapped a four-year term as one of Outlook's six members of town council, Husband says it feels different being in a new position that requires more of a leadership role. It feels different, but it's a good kind of different.
"Yeah it does," he said, when asked if it feels different from his role as a councillor. "Even in our first meeting yesterday, I like to be prepared for things and I like to have a plan, even what I'm going to say. On Council, you need to read and be prepared and have that knowledge of what's on the agenda so you can speak to it, but in terms of how things are going to flow and on the agenda, like, 'Okay, here I'm going to make this statement about being prepared and in this part of the agenda, we need to make sure we're rolling through that', and that people are focused and you've kind of got a plan in your head of what you're going to say and and to me, that's been the biggest change. Even though we've only had one meeting, it's just the prep time needed for those things. I went out and gave a short speech at provincial volleyball out at LCBI, and it's just the time. Even though it's not a long speech and actually going there doesn't take that long either, it's just the time to think about it and plan on what you're going to say. People don't want to hear you blabber on forever, but you might want to make one point or something that they can relate to. With that one, I found a quote from the Paris beach volleyball at the Olympics and tried to relate that to them, so it's just the extra prep that's required."
Husband says that building relationships that foster partnerships over time and getting to know the community inside and out are things that he's anticipating in the time he serves as Mayor. One of his goals is reaching out to key levels of governance, including provincial and federal governments, in order to keep Outlook in conversations regarding grants that can be awarded to either the Town or to local organizations so that the benefits can be shared around the community.
"One of the big things that I'm really hoping to focus on personally is building relationships," he explained. "I think that really will help Outlook and as the mayor, I feel like that's one of my main jobs; to go out and meet those people, to learn more about the town, and what's going on within the town but also what other mayors are facing. There are probably people who are facing the same types of challenges we are and they've figured out ways to navigate them, and I want to go learn and figure out how they did that, and then also with the provincial or federal government, trying to get out and meet those people so that we can help bring attention to the town. We've been very fortunate that we've gotten a lot of grant money through various different programs, and trying to work with the organizations that have those grants so that we know about them and so we can improve our chances of getting them. To me, it's all about relationships. I'm really looking forward over the next four years to just trying to meet people and getting to know people better."
With the town becoming busier as business development along Railway Avenue is becoming more and more visible, the local daycare is seeing expansion, and more home-based entrepreneurs are popping up, Outlook is seen by many as being a community on the cusp of real and significant growth. Not only is the town and its business sector experiencing this growth on its own, but the irrigation expansion project announced by the provincial government in 2020 targeted Outlook as a community that would see high levels of prosperity and economic benefits.
Husband says that such growth in that aspect may be something that's seen gradually over time, but there's certainly a track that Outlook may find itself on that will signal notable levels of prosperity in the years to come.
"The thing about irrigation and agriculture in general is it's not going to be like an oil boom, where there's a huge amount of money coming in really quickly but then it could also disappear quickly," he said. "It's going to be a slow, gradual increase over time and irrigation development takes time for it to happen. It's a big investment and it takes a huge infrastructure to do that. I do think Outlook is going to grow, but it's not going to be like an overnight 'Let's flip the switch' sort of thing; it's going to be a nice and slow sustained growth over decades, probably. I think when we're talking on council, we're talking about this year and the next four years, but we also want to make decisions so that we're well prepared for 10 years or growth in 20 years because with that, people need to eat and they always will, and so I don't think agriculture is ever going to go away; that agriculture industry is going to keep growing, and so from our perspective, we want to be on that track where we're just consistently growing at a reasonable and sustainable pace."
That said, Ryan says he'd love to see the town reach a point in the next decade or so where Outlook finds itself with many more residents, but it also manages to sustain its levels of growth.
"I'd like to say that we'll be close to that city status, about 5,000 people or so, and that'd be basically doubling Outlook as it is now," he said, on the direction he'd like to see the town headed over the next decade. "I see that sustained growth, but I don't know if I see that within the next 10 or 20 years, but we need that growth. If you're not growing, you're shrinking, and when you're growing, you get to bring services to town that people need. For example, with seniors, we want them to have the health care options that they that they need or we want to have the banks. We saw a bank leave town, but if we're growing, those companies are going to say, 'Outlook's the place to be, we want to move there', and so for our citizens, that's what we want. We want to have the services in town and really, the only way to do that is to keep going up. I don't think there's any going back to a smaller size as we want to keep growing, but like I said, we got to do it sustainably and I think we're actually in a really fortunate spot that we can probably do that. Will there be growing pains? Absolutely, but I think the benefits in terms of the services and those kind of things as we keep growing will certainly be worth it."
The present day positivity coupled with the future possibilities that lay ahead for this community are making Outlook a desirable place to call home for many people. With that in mind, Husband says people love living here because it's always retained that small town feel and he's proud to have seen people make things happen for themselves through dedication and hard work, like the Small Steps Early Learning Centre or the Van Raay and Community Swimming Pool, both of which didn't exist when Ryan and Alicia moved to town 11 years ago. It's things like this that make him excited about the direction Outlook seems to be headed as time goes on.
"There are so many things," he said. "It's hard to even put it into just a few sentences, but for me, I've had a number of different jobs in this town that have all been very different but the jobs are available and so that's one of the reasons that we call Outlook home. We've got three schools in town, so there are places for your kids to go to school and they're not being bussed half an hour out of the next town over. We've got all the grocery stores, farm equipment stores, hardware stores, and actually, they're almost like services for us by this point. You don't have to go to the city if you don't want to. We've got pretty much everything we need here. And that's one of the reasons that I'm still here. Lastly, I think we still have a small town feel. When people are getting stuck in the snow, their neighbors are coming out to help push them out or shovel their driveway, or you'll see people waving to everybody as they're walking down the streets. People will help each other out when things aren't going well, and we've also seen them chip into community projects like the fire hall, which is a great example. The daycare is another good one, and same with the swimming pool where people have chipped in and tried to build that community. Even looking back in the last 11 years, we didn't have a daycare and we didn't have that swimming pool, and those are all amenities that as we grow we're acquiring, and it's making Outlook an even better place to live. It's great now, but it's getting even better, and that's what I love about Outlook."
