Alberta bill on municipalities branded ‘crazy’

— Former Calgary mayor and current NDP leadership candidate Naheed Nenshi says the Alberta government is operating out of spite with a bill that would grant it sweeping powers over municipalities, including the right to fire councillors, overturn bylaws and postpone elections.

The proposed law would also allow political parties to run on municipal ballots in Edmonton and Calgary as soon as next year.

“It’s so crazy. It’s very clear that this government is now operated on spite and arrogance,” Nenshi told reporters in Lethbridge on Thursday. “They’re clearly doing this out of revenge on the voters of Calgary and Edmonton who didn’t vote the way they wanted them to.”

Nenshi, 52, was elected mayor of Calgary in 2010 and won three terms before bowing out before the 2021 municipal election.

He and MLAs Kathleen Ganley, Sarah Hoffman and Jodi Calahoo Stonehouse, as well as Alberta Federation of Labour president Gil McGowan, took part in the NDP’s first leadership debate.

Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister Ric McIver said the new powers are justified to ensure fair elections and accountability from municipal leaders, and they would be used only as a last resort.

“My most fervent wish is that this authority is never ever used. We don’t want to intervene in municipal matters,” McIver told reporters before the bill was introduced in the legislature Thursday.

Nenshi said councils are democratically elected. He said current Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek probably received more votes than every United Conservative Party MLA in Calgary.

“To me, that is no way to run a government. This really highlights that this government is fundamentally disinterested in governing as a government, but actually only working on their whims and their needs, their self-indulgence.”

The board of directors of Alberta Municipalities said political parties in local elections is a bad idea and something most Albertans don’t want.