Shaye Anderson reaches out to Alberta’s rural voters
SANGUDO It just might be the toughest job in Alberta politics — convincing skeptical rural politicians that the city-centred NDP government is their friend.
It is a crucial job for the government this summer as political attention is focused on the unification forces trying to merge the province’s two opposition conservative parties into one NDP-killing conservative party.
When it comes to complaining about the government, there is some grumbling in Edmonton, a lot in Calgary and virtual howls of outrage in rural areas that feel ignored by the NDP.
Enter Municipal Affairs Minister Shaye Anderson, an affable former Telus installation technician who sports a beard straight out of the American Civil War.
He’s the guy with the toughest job. Anderson won’t be in every one of Alberta’s 344 communities this summer, but he seems to be giving it a shot.
When I asked the government for a list of ministerial appear- ances during the first two weeks in July that didn’t include the Calgary Stampede, they offered up Infrastructure Minister Brian Mason in Leduc and Labour Minister Christina Gray in Banff.
And then there was Anderson, who was apparently travelling via Star Trek transporter with scheduled appearances in Strathcona County, Vegreville, Vermilion, Fort Saskatchewan, Whitecourt, Fox Creek, Red Deer County, Olds and Drayton Valley.
The list failed to mention he’d be in some really small communities such as the hamlet of Sangudo (pop. 299), where I caught up with him Wednesday.
“In a lot of the rural areas, you have to get out and meet people face to face and word of mouth goes a long way,” said Anderson.
“We do need to be better at communicating. It’s huge. We’ve done a ton in this government to help citizens in Alberta and not a lot of people are getting those messages.”
The message people tend to hear is centred on the devastating oil-price-driven recession that has gripped Albertan over the past two years, creating deep pockets of unemployment, especially in rural areas.
The economy is starting to turn around, but the price of oil remains fragile and the government has so far run up a $33-billion debt as it borrows money to keep government services running and keep construction crews working to build roads, schools and hospitals.
That debt, fed by record-high annual deficits, is an easy target for critics in the Wildrose and Progressive Conservative parties as they lobby Albertans to join either party, or both, to vote in favour of a political merger July 22. (If they join both parties, they get to vote twice.)
As Wildrose Leader Brian Jean and PC Leader Jason Kenney increase their anti-NDP campaigning, Premier Rachel Notley was doing some counter campaigning of her own.
Thursday, on the eve of the Calgary Stampede, she announced $1.53 billion over eight years toward Calgary’s Green Line LRT expansion project. Good news for Calgary.
But it will no doubt irritate people in rural areas.
One of those is Rimbey Mayor Rick Pankiw.
“The biggest issue facing our town is infrastructure dollars,” said Pankiw, who attended a unite-the-right rally in Rocky Mountain House this week. “We have a hard time getting the government to listen to us, to listen to our needs. It seems like it’s catered to the cities, Edmonton, Calgary, Red Deer, Lethbridge. And unfortunately we’re in the same need or in greater need than a lot of them. Our infrastructure is a lot older.”
The culprit responsible for crumbling infrastructure is arguably not the NDP government that has only been in power for two years, but former PC governments, notably Ralph Klein’s, which ignored infrastructure upgrades in favour of paying down the province’s debt.
But don’t mention that to conservative politicians, who are happily using debt-killing Klein’s name as a rallying cry ahead of their unification vote to form the United Conservative Party in advance of the next provincial election in 2019.
It is an effective strategy in a province where rural areas still hold Klein in awe.
Pankiw, who has supported the Wildrose in the past, feels the PCs and Wildrose better understand the needs of rural areas.
He has memberships in both parties, so he can cast two votes in favour of forming the new conservative party.
The unification vote has provided a unique form of quiet protest for rural Albertans who feel forgotten by city-centred politicians.
The NDP is trying to counter that sense of rural alienation. But it’ll be a tough job.
Just ask Shaye Anderson.