Alberta First in Red Tape

Maybe it’s an April Fools’ joke? Nope, it’s just politics in Alberta.

Government House with a repossession notice attached on April 1, 2024 (source: michaeljanz.ca)

“FINAL NOTICE. PROPERTY REPOSSESSED FOR SALE (Effective April 1st, 2024).”

Anyone walking by Government House in Edmonton’s posh Glenora neighbourhood on April 1 might have noticed a white paper sign attached to the grand mansion-turned provincial government conference facility.

The sign was put there by Edmonton City Councillor Michael Janz, and as far as April Fools’ Day jokes by politicians go, it was pretty good - and it made a good point.

The Government of Alberta currently owes the City of Edmonton around $60 million in unpaid property taxes that have accumulated since 2019. That’s a point that Janz first wrote about in a December 2023 op-ed in the Edmonton Journal and that Mayor Amarjeet Sohi raised in a public letter to Premier Danielle Smith this week.

Sohi’s letter might have been the capital city’s first real salvo in response to a provincial government intent on increasing its political control over Alberta’s municipalities.

In his letter to Smith, Sohi rebuked the Premier’s condescending offer to audit the City’s administration after City Manager Andre Corbould resigned last month. The City’s administration has been in a certain amount of bureaucratic turmoil in recent years, but the tone of Smith’s offer gives the impression she is more interested in embarrassing the NDP-voting city’s former Liberal cabinet minister-turned-mayor than actually helping the city face its challenges.

Sohi was quick to point out in his letter to Smith that per capita provincial funding for municipal infrastructure has plummeted over the past 13 years:

“…provincial funding for local infrastructure dropped from about $424 per Albertan in 2011 to about $154 per Albertan today — all while demands for municipal infrastructure continue to grow.

The drop in provincial funding came as Edmonton, and most municipalities across Alberta, continue to see significant population growth. Provincial projections say Alberta will grow from around 4 million today to more than 7 million in 2050, but Smith is fond of predicting she believes it will actually reach 10 million in the next 25 years. 

Smith’s United Conservative Party government has taken great interest in municipal politics recently, which is a big difference from previous governments.

Yesterday afternoon, Smith herself introduced Bill 18: Provincial Priorities Act, which would let the UCP government play gatekeeper to any federal money flowing to municipalities and all other provincial entities.