Municipal affairs minister touring the region

It was a first-time visit for Shaye Anderson. But the province’s minister of municipal affairs didn’t have a lot of time for sight-seeing.

After taking part in the WhoopUp Days Parade, he spent the rest of Tuesday meeting with elected officials and community groups. The Lethbridge sessions, Anderson said, are part of a tour across southern Alberta — a region he’s just getting to know.

The MLA for Leduc said he’s looking for feedback on a number of issues. While he’s expecting to get the final updates to the Municipal Government Act approved this fall, Anderson is also aiming at getting more cities and towns to collaborate with their neighbours.

Work is also continuing on the city charters for Calgary and Edmonton, he said.

His department will post the last round of regulatory changes to the Municipal Act shortly, he said.

“We still have a lot of feedback coming in,” he says.

The MGA remains the secondlargest piece of provincial legislation, he points out. It lays out the powers and responsibilities taken on by cities, towns and rural areas across the province.

The review and updating process began several years ago, under the previous administration. Once the revised Act’s regulations have been approved or modified, Anderson expects to bring the process to an end.

“I hope to get it finished and proclaimed this fall.”

One of Anderson’s objectives, he said, is to get neighbouring jurisdictions to work more cooperatively together. While Lethbridge now supplies drinking water to communities east, west and north of the city, that kind of interaction isn’t found in every part of the province.

That kind of collaboration should also extend to adjacent reserves, the minister said.

“First Nations and native people should be included,” even though that could require working with federal officials as well.

Local officials should focus on working with neighbouring jurisdictions to promote their region’s economic development, he added.

“They should work for what is best for everybody.”

Anderson hailed one of his department’s initiatives, city charters for Alberta’s metro areas, as a step forward for those steadily growing communities.

Much work remains on that file, Anderson said, including discussions on environmental and climate change issues as well as more political issues like fiscal arrangements and taxation.

Calgary and Edmonton will be receiving charter status much later than older but smaller cities like Winnipeg and Halifax, he noted.

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