After losing a portion of its provincial funding, Startup Lloydminster could be transitioned to Community Futures Lloydminster and Region as the City of Lloydminster looks to restructure the program.
“Over the years, the organization has relied on multiple funding sources, including the City of Lloydminster community funding,” said Dion Pollard, city manager. “In recent years, the funding model, the revenue model in particular, has changed for Startup. (The organization) used to rely on two sources of funding: the City of Lloydminster as well as Alberta Innovates. That Alberta Innovates funding is no longer available.”
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Pollard says they did have a concern regarding how the funding would be spent.
“We had a number of concerns addressed at the administrative level to ensure the funding does remain for the intended purpose and that we wouldn’t be funding Community Future type activities,” he said.
The current agreement between the city and Startup Lloydminster expires at the end of this year.
“What we’re looking for in this transition is, to agree upon transitioning the funding to Community Futures for the remainder of this year’s program,” Pollard explained. “From this point forward, it would have to come back to city council for approval again for a new agreement moving past the current year we’re in.”
Councillors Michele Charles Gustafson and Jim Taylor sit on the Startup Lloydminster and Community Futures boards, respectively, and were able to give some insight into how discussions on this topic have been going.
“At the board level in these discussions, it was very apparent from committee members that what was most important was the delivery of the service would remain the same,” said Charles Gustafson. “They wanted to make sure that the end user, as the entrepreneurs, would not notice any difference walking through those doors in terms of the service delivery.”
Taylor echoed the comments regarding services being unaffected by this proposed change.
“From somebody that’s used the service in the past, there is some overlap already,” he said. “The doors are open between the two services already. It’s important for people to know that nothing is going to change. It gives us time as a city with our funds through this period to track it and be transparent with how the money is being spent.”
Mayor Gerald Aalbers highlighted the importance of having councillors sit on these various boards.
“I think it gives an opportunity to bring that message right back to the council table,” he explained. “I think having councillors first-hand experience, either being on the board or having worked with those organizations (is a good thing).”
The two boards, Community Futures and Startup Lloydminster, both voted in favour of the transition.
“I think it’s going to be a positive thing. You get helped from everybody involved with both organizations already,” Coun. Taylor explained. They’re so closely tied together already, I think it will be an easy transition and we’ll have the time to figure that out between now and the end of this term.”
There was some worry about municipal dollars being put into a federally-run program, something Taylor was quick to dispel.
“I can tell you from seeing the books and where the funds are, Community Futures’ wise, you can be guaranteed that it’s going to be spent locally with businesses and the help that it needs for programming,” he said. “Everything will be separated.”
No jobs will be impacted by this change as work was already being done to save money.
“There was already work being done to try and find cost-saving measures before the funding ended,” said Aalbers.
Pollard also gave a breakdown of the funding they give to Startup Lloydminster.
“Our contract with them had us contributing $115,000 to the end of the year,” he explained. “They reduced their incubator program, which stopped running downtown (and saved $15,000). I believe our contributions for 2026 is just under the $100,000 mark.”
He then gave some 2024 stats from Startup’s year.
“We haven’t got their 2025 report yet, seven out of 10 clients are from Lloydminster, so an average 70 per cent,” he said. “There were 302 unique clients served, 84 new clients, 47 companies formed and 29 events hosted with over 340 attendees.”
The item will return to a future council meeting for approval.
“This will come to council for an official approval because we’re changing who we’re giving our money to,” said Pollard.
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