The City of Moose Jaw won a pair of awards earlier this week from the Economic Developers Association of Canada (EDAC).

They won awards for their 'COVID-19 Recovery Project and Plan' and for Brand Identity for their Notorious Theme.

Mayor Fraser Tolmie said the recovery project award is for the economic development office, the Chamber of Commerce, and local businesses, with projects like the still-ongoing Think Tanks.

“This is an effort of the community, and I think in my personal opinion, it should be recognized that this is not just the City of Moose Jaw that’s in City Hall receiving this award, this is the city of Moose Jaw and the businesses. It goes to everybody that’s been participating in these calls,” Tolmie said.

The other award they received was for branding awareness following the February 2020 reveal of their new logo with 'Canada’s Most Notorious City', which made its way on the ice at the 2020 Scotties Tournament of Hearts at Mosaic Place.

“We were very proud in February (2020) when we rolled out our new website, our new app, our new logo, and the Scotties were here, to be able to get that brand identity and the Notorious brand out there, it really is working,” Tolmie said. “And we’re reaping the reward of it through accolades from our fellow communities who have recognized us.”

Tolmie said awards like these raise the city’s profile in people’s minds and identifies the city as a destination as the city becomes a topic in people’s minds.

“There’s a method to our madness in what we’ve been doing recently, and that’s to attract people to our community,” he said. “We know that in order to get over the February blues is having people spend a little bit of green around here…. That helps our small businesses and even our big businesses.”

The city also won an award from the national EDAC organization last year for their 2019 'Moose Feud' with Stor-Elvdal; a town in Norway.