Never count out Calgary's ability to rebound
Mark Twain is quoted as responding to a newspaper columnist with the words, “The rumours of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”
In the late 1950s, my father made a good living selling CMHC houses that had been foreclosed because of the recession. Calgary, it was said, would never recover. In 1973, my late father-in-law told me that we should move to another province because “all of the recoverable oil in Alberta will run out within a decade.” Calgary will never recover.
In the 1980s, under a prime minister with the same last name as our current one, the national energy program disrupted the energy industry to a degree that had never been experienced before. Until that year, it was always assumed that low unemployment, low taxes and increasing revenues were something to be celebrated, but that turned our province into a target for the folks in Ottawa. Calgary, it was reported, would never recover.
Last week the Calgary Chamber of Commerce put on an excellent meeting outlining the future of Calgary. The panel included Industry Minister Doug Schweitzer, Mayor Jyoti Gondek and Brett Colvin who described in enthusiastic detail ideas for transforming the downtown as a centre for commerce and community.
The demand for industrial land has reached record proportions. The investment in our community by tech companies exceeds multibillions of dollars and the amount of construction, especially residential, continues to grow. In the meantime, our much-maligned energy industry is earning record profits as global affairs serve to make Alberta's oil and gas the gold standard for the world.
We learned that unemployment in Alberta is at 5.5 per cent and that there is a continuing
Calgary will recover . ... This is a city of ingenuity, tenacity and commitment.
influx of population from other provinces and from outside Canada. Alberta and Calgary are seen as lower-cost places that offer great opportunities for young families.
We all know that the slogan “Calgary is a great place to work, live and build a life” might be truer today than it has ever been, and there is little doubt that as the downtown returns to life there will be opportunities for entrepreneurs and startups.
Later that day, Bow Valley College recognized nine outstanding students with a Premier's Scholarship. Premier Jason Kenney talked about the balanced budget that Alberta will experience this coming year, new business inquiries that the province is receiving on a daily basis and the expansion of ICU facilities and the University of Calgary's veterinarian school. Bow Valley College is having great success finding employment for its graduates and has become a magnet for new students arriving from other countries who need to enhance their employment skills.
Finally, the Business Council of Alberta will soon release its Define the Decade report on the future of Alberta, which will lay out a road map to prosperity in the years ahead. These are exciting times and we are again an economic engine for Canada.
Oh yes, then there is a little battle called the Stanley Cup involving our beloved Calgary Flames. As I write this, we have just won the first round of playoffs in what had to be the most amazing hockey game I can remember. Now we tackle Edmonton, but what really matters is that an Alberta team will emerge victorious and a Canadian team will reach the next round of the playoffs.
Calgary will recover. In many ways, it already has. This is a city of ingenuity, tenacity and commitment. The men and women who built this city at the confluence of the Bow and Elbow rivers could never know what it would be 150 years later. Once again those who have said so often “Calgary will never recover” have been wrong, and it is up to all of us to determine just how wrong they actually are. I wish that I could be here in 50 years to see what Calgary has become. But no matter what it looks like in 2072, it will still be a city with a future that will always be a great place to “work, live and make a life.”