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Alberta Politics

Alberta’s electoral map is being redrawn, here’s how to participate.

The process of redrawing the electoral map for Alberta’s next provincial election will begin in a few weeks. The Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission will propose a new map of provincial constituency boundaries to reflect changes in population since the last time the map was drawn in 2009/2010. (Here is a link to the current maps)

The Commission has launched their website and released the dates of the first public hearings to collect feedback from Albertans about how their provincial constituencies should be shaped.

The Commission has announced eleven locations where public hearings will be held. Public hearings in Calgary have not yet been announced but I expect they will be soon.

  • January 16 and 17 in Edmonton
  • January 18 in Fort McMurray
  • January 19 in Peace River and Grande Prairie
  • January 20 in Red Deer
  • January 23 in Wainwright and St. Paul
  • January 24 in Drumheller
  • January 25 in Lethbridge and Olds
  • January 26 in Medicine Hat

The Commission is also accepting written submissions until February 8, 2017.

An interim report will be available by May 31, 2017 and the final report by October 31, 2017.

The Commission’s membership is made up of a neutral chairperson, Justice Myra Bielby​, two government appointees, Bruce McLeod of Acme and Jean Munn of Calgary, and two official opposition appointees, Laurie Livingstone of Calgary and Gwen Day of Carstairs.

I have more thoughts about how Alberta’s electoral boundaries are drawn that I will share in the coming weeks, but in the meantime, I encourage all Albertans to participate and provide their feedback into this important process.

10 replies on “Alberta’s electoral map is being redrawn, here’s how to participate.”

Hi Greg – Thanks for the comment.

I would be surprised if there is much significant change to the electoral map with this redistribution. If anything, I expect the changes will lead to increased representation for suburban and surrounding commuter communities – areas where the NDP will certainly be on the defensive in the next election. But ‘gerrymander’ I doubt it.

– Dave

Who are you trying to snow? It will cost Southern Alberta 3 seats which are currently held by conservatives and split MY riding making it and many others huge areas to cover. I heard our MLA was told he could hire a driver or fly. He asked in reply if he looked like Alison Redford. Its not broken nor will the “redistribution” do anything other than rig the election for the NDP.

Actually, electoral boundary revisions in Canada are remarkably free of political distortions, unlike those in the US. In the past, Alberta redistributions have tended, IMHO, to give undue weight to “constituency service” and geographic accessibility in contrast to relative equality of electors, leading to disparities between large, sparsely-populated rural constituencies and densely-populated urban ones, but this has not been overly driven by partisan politics.

I’ve seen two letters in the mail about this work, as well as a number of other advertisements that it is happening.
Nobody can claim that the Government is not trying to consult broadly on this issue.
I actually know one person on this committee, and I am sure that they will not allow any funny business.
Nay sayers gonna nay.
(Two pipelines approved, lower small business tax rate, praise from the oil industry re Carbon tax and other things that they have been doing, supports to economic diversification through business grants etc, but still to some they are “anti-business”. )

We are experiencing the best leadership this province has seen in over 30 years, people should wake up and smell the successes

We’ll have to see. It’s not like gerrymandering has not happened in Alberta before – 1993’s redistributions, I recall, raised a few eyebrows in Edmonton. I recall someone mentioning to me that Canada is usually about five to ten years behind treads in the US. So, if one is expecting to see a divisive, polarizing, and downright destructive election in Alberta in 2019, the timing couldn’t be more perfect. Personally, it’s about time politics become more a vicious bloodsport. I’ve never liked politicos anyway, so watching the mayhem should be entertaining enough.

It’s actually Liberals who typically intervene in electoral boundary commissions. Liberal governments in BC and Ontario have intervened in commissions to protect rural power enclaves at the expense of growing cities in need of new infrastructure.

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