MOOSOMIN — Once again, Moosomin has a reason to be proud as results from the annual Communities in Bloom competition were released. Moosomin was named a provincial winner in the 2,001-3,000 population category, awarded five blooms with a special mention for Commitment to Cultural Heritage Preservation.
“We tried to do a few things a little bit different and took some of the suggestions of the judges, and I think everything worked out pretty well,” said Mike Schwean, Director of Parks and Recreation with the Town of Moosomin. “Jasmine (Davidson, Moosomin Communities in Bloom Project Manager) and her team did a great job.
“To get five blooms, it moves our project ahead. It’s like anything else when you see improvement, it’s a lot easier to move ahead on things, so we’re excited for next year.”
Moosomin returned to the nationwide beautification campaign in 2023 after a few years’ hiatus. That year, the town was feted with four blooms, sparking the desire to continue with the project.
“It’s awesome that we finally could get to five, we were so close last year,” Jasmine Davidson said. “By doing it last year, we had a better understanding of the concept of Communities in Bloom, and then with having our new gateway sign, I think that helped a lot, too.”
One of the things the CIB judges noted was the community-wide clean-up that Moosomin holds, earning the town the Environmental Action Award. While something that many communities participate in, Schwean noted that the annual cleanup is “something I think we do very well.”
The community-wide clean-up has many volunteers each year, with businesses also pitching in, such as Nutrien donating gloves, Moosomin Dairy Queen providing garbage bags and ice cream treats, Borderland Co-op supplying water, and Tim Horton’s keeping everyone warm with coffee. The town also encouraged participation by awarding Moosomin Bucks to participants who submitted a picture documenting their involvement.
Moosomin also picked up an honour for Trees and Urban Forestry, relating to work on the town’s urban forest and highlighting The Labyrinth in particular, which was a project spearheaded by Carol Adair. The original vision of the labyrinth was to establish a tranquil environment, but it has become quite meaningful to residents.
“The labyrinth is something really unique and different that our town has to offer,” Davidson explained. “They were really impressed that we had something like that.”
“In addition to the labyrinth, she’s really taken an initiative to have memorial trees put in there,” Schwean said of Adair. “She’s got quite a few memorials with signage and different kinds of trees and notes and stuff like that. It looks just amazing; it looks better every year. That’s full credit to Carol and her crew.”
The judges evaluate communities on several factors, including community appearance, environmental action, heritage conservation, tree management, landscape and plant and floral displays. This year, Moosomin scored 827 out of 1,000 points, for an 83 per cent bloom rating. A detailed report from the judges not only applauded efforts from the local CIB committee but offered valuable recommendations the group can take into account in planning future years’ participation.
“They give us a really thorough report of what we could do more and better, which is really nice to see it from a different perspective,” Davidson said. “So it helps a lot.”
One huge key to success is the continued partnership between the Town, Moosomin Regional Park, and the Pipestone Hills Golf Course. The three entities began their partnership in 2023, and it worked so well that the groups decided to continue into this year’s competition.
“The park just looks amazing, and the golf course is probably the nicest it’s ever been,” Schwean said. “There were the three of us working together on the project, but we all have our own committees outside of each other. This is almost like three entries in one.”
On the note of collaboration, Schwean added that the CIB committee would like to include rural municipalities to the list of partners.
“There’s a lot of absolutely beautiful farmhouses and yards in the area,” he said. “So that’s something we’d like to do, and we’ll work towards doing next year for our application.”
The idea to draw in participation from surrounding RMs was something the team wanted to do this year, but there is a bit of a process to include farms.
“We have other things—not public right now—that we want to do as well for the project going forward,” Schwean said. “Next year, we’ll probably start a little bit earlier because once May and June hit, there’s not really a lot of time for some great ideas.”
The Moosomin CIB committee has 15 members, but both Davidson and Schwean said more are always welcome.
As for advancing from the Provincial level to Nationals, there are no firm plans as of yet.
“You have the option to compete at the national level, or you can just do the regular level,” Davidson said. “I’m sure they would, you got this far, you might as well try!”
