The Town of Ste. Anne is gearing up for a busy 2025 with three major projects in focus: completing the lagoon expansion, pushing for a new hospital, and advocating for a vocational high school. Mayor Yvan St. Vincent says these initiatives are essential to the town’s continued growth and addressing community needs.
“I didn’t think 2024 would be this busy and look at us now,” St. Vincent said. “As our growth continues at a pretty steady rate, I’m assuming we can keep that same busyness going. We are focused on getting that lagoon open and lobbying for our hospital and school. So those are for sure our big three projects in 2025.”
The lagoon expansion has been a long time coming. Originally scheduled for completion by September 2023, delays pushed the timeline to summer 2024. This project is crucial for accommodating the town’s growing population and supporting future development.
Meanwhile, the Ste. Anne Hospital has been struggling to meet demand for healthcare services. In December 2024, Southern Health-Santé Sud reported that the hospital had been running over capacity at times since summer. Mayor St. Vincent and the town council plan to continue lobbying the province for regional status and improvements to healthcare in the community.
Education is another pressing issue. Overcrowding at the Ste. Anne school complex has been a concern for many years. Deputy Minister of Education and Early Childhood Learning Brian O’Leary visited the site on November 8 to see the challenges firsthand. A new vocational high school was approved in 2023, but the project was put on hold by the provincial government in spring 2024 with no clear timeline for resumption. The town is determined to see progress on this front.
Beyond these three key projects, Town Council is starting to explore the idea of a town water system.
“We’re also starting to explore the idea of bringing town water in,” St. Vincent explained. “That’s a multi-year, multi-million-dollar road to go down, but it is something that we’re going to start to explore because we see the need for that in the not-too-distant future. If we want to continue our commercial growth and all those areas, then it’s obvious to us that there’s a need for a town water system or a co-op water system where we’re tied in with other communities and sharing. That’s probably the most feasible way of approaching this because it’s so expensive. But if we can partner with neighboring municipalities and communities, then that’s something we’re starting to explore.”
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