Council Candles
The youngest Edmonton City Council candidate turned 18 this week. Happy Birthday, Haruun!
Vaccines Work, Here’s More Proof
Justin McElroy, a municipal affairs reporter for CBC British Columbia, shared a vaccine success story from Prince Rupert this week. McElroy explains in a tweet thread why the city’s new COVID-19 case number is hopeful news to us all:
For those outside B.C., there isn't a city with more than 15,000 people within 500 km of Prince Rupert, and it's effectively surrounded by water on three sides. It's an ideal place to measure mass vaccinations in an urban setting. And the evidence is wonderful.
Mayors Team Up For Economic Growth
Thirteen Alberta municipalities have signed a memorandum of understanding to promote co-operation and economic growth.
Participating municipalities are: Beaumont, Devon, Edmonton, Fort Saskatchewan, Leduc, Leduc County, Morinville, Parkland County, St. Albert, Spruce Grove, Stony Plain, Strathcona County, and Sturgeon County.
Not everyone is convinced:
Candidate Calls for Mayoral Debate, Forgets Other Candidates Exist
This week, Calgary mayoral candidate Jyoti Gondek seemed to narrow in on who she feels her opponent is with this tweet calling for a debate:
Our take? There are 11 people running for mayor in Calgary and we want to hear all of their ideas. It’s too early for political attack strategists to attempt to narrow the field this way.
The Role of Municipalities
If you’ve ever wondered what happens when your provincial representative and your local government disagree, we dug into it a bit this week as we examined a disagreement between Banff-Kananaskis MLA Miranda Rosin and the mayors of Banff and Canmore. The disagreement? Restrictions to prevent the spread of COVID-19. Read about how the ‘COVID 18’, which Rosin is a member of and which doesn’t want the restrictions, is affecting municipalities.
For paid subscribers, we continued our series explaining the basics of municipal governments. Co-editor Tim Querengesser wrote about how our third level of government isn’t actually in the Constitution. Find out why that’s a problem.
This week, we also had an independent media chat on our Facebook Page with folks from LiveWire Calgary, Taproot Edmonton, and The Sprawl. We talked the 2021 municipal elections and the benefits of independent media during the campaign. Check out our page — Rage Municipal — for the video.
Grande Prairie Transit Talk
A council candidate for Grande Prairie has a transit survey open and is looking for feedback:
And current Grande Prairie City Councillor Dylan Bressey is also sharing his views on transportation — active transportation:
Earth Day
This week, candidates celebrated Earth Day, April 22, by doing what candidates typically do on special days — posting door-knocking and community-service tweets:
Curriculum Fightback
Edmonton City Council candidate and Edmonton Public School Board Trustee Michael Janz announced that the Edmonton Public School Board is going to vote no confidence in the new controversy stricken curriculum released by the United Conservative Party.
The last education no confidence vote of record was in 2014 when the Alberta Teachers Association passed a vote of no confidence for Minister Jeff Johnson after a committee recommended teacher evaluations every five years.
PAC Watch: Look Forward Calgary
Look Forward, which has rolled out as a political action committee (PAC) or third-party advertiser, is launching a campaign on identifying candidates interested in tackling climate change. Our friends at LiveWire Calgary wrote more about this group and their aims:
This post was updated, April 24 10:21 AM to include more details about the third-party advertising period opening May 1.
Correction: April 24 5:23 PM the original post misspelled “Grande Prairie”.