Having spent more than three decades working for the City of Airdrie, Director of Community Services Michelle Lock is the municipality’s longest-serving employee. Throughout the years, she said, she’s learned important lessons on how to build and strengthen a community.
“As a community grows and changes, you gain experience,” Lock said. “I've worked with five different mayors and an untold number of elected officials in different capacities. It's been both a privilege and an honour to serve this community.”
After growing up in Pincher Creek, Lock attended the University of Calgary and hoped to eventually work as a physical education teacher. In the 1980s, however, she said, there was a shortage of teaching jobs.
Instead, she said, she held various recreational positions in Calgary, working at the YMCA and the City of Calgary’s recreation department before landing a job in Airdrie.
In 1984, Lock made the move to the city to take a job at the public swimming pool in Airdrie, but said the City was having financial difficulties at the time and she was forced to take on more responsibilities when another employee was let go.
“I [did] my job and my departed colleague’s job,” Lock said. “It gave me an opportunity to do more than I [ever] would have done. I learned so much about community building.”
According to Lock, the position – and being given the freedom to create change – encouraged her to continue working with the City years into the future. She said the best part of her job has been being a part of the community, watching it and its services grow.
As Director of Community Services, Lock said, her role today is to make sure Airdrie residents are being represented.
“We are public servants. I certainly believe that we're not decision-makers,” she said. “We facilitate and make sure City council, as a decision-maker, has as many facts or evidence from what we've heard [from residents].”
When she started working with the City 35 years ago, Lock said, there were fewer than 10,000 residents. Today, Airdrie boasts almost 70,000 people, and she said it still feels like a tight-knit community.
She recalled a spring snowstorm in 1986 where she was sent to the Town and Country Centre to take in stranded drivers who were being brought in by bus. She said she and other community members were summoned to come together to warm up and feed the stranded motorists.
She said, the City employs plans for action in similar situations now, but added she knows the community would stand up like that again.
“We actually have emergency response plans and people have roles they're trained in to fill those roles,” she said. “And if another event happens like that, the same thing [will happen] – we would put our heads together to solve it.”
One of the biggest differences from when she started is the process the City and its departments follow to make decisions. Today, she said, everything is more carefully planned.
“My experience has been that when you're small, you do what you think is right at the moment,” she said. “As you get bigger, you become more sophisticated, organized and formal in your approach.”
After all the changes, the countless number of coworkers and stories throughout the years, Lock said she has had the opportunity to work alongside some amazing people and do some incredible work in the community.
“[I’ve been] fortunate to have worked with a number of councils who were focused on what's in the best interest of the community," Lock said. "I think that that's been pretty outstanding.”
