Seven candidates were off and running Monday in St. Albert and Morinville-St. Albert as they raced to win votes in the upcoming provincial election.
Alberta Premier Danielle Smith kicked off the 2023 provincial election May 1 by asking that the legislature be dissolved and writs of election be issued. Election signs sprung up across the St. Albert region later that day.
Seven people had stepped up to run for office in the St. Albert and Morinville-St. Albert ridings as of May 2. More may emerge prior to the close of nominations on May 11.
Three in St. Albert
Seeking a third term in St. Albert is New Democratic Party (NDP) candidate Marie Renaud, who has served as St. Albert’s MLA since 2015 and lives in northwest Edmonton.
“We are poised with an incredible range of candidates that are focused on what Albertans want, and I want to be a part of that,” she said, when asked why she was running again.
Renaud said she has experience managing hundreds of employees and millions of dollars from her days with LoSeCa in St. Albert, and a deep understanding of disabilities and the non-profit sector. She said her work in office helped fund four new St. Albert schools, the twinning of Ray Gibbon Drive, and a neonatal intensive care centre at the Sturgeon Hospital. While in opposition, she helped draw attention to how changes to the government’s Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped program were impoverishing people and gave voice to those opposed to coal mining in the Rocky Mountains.
If elected, Renaud said she and her party will work with the City of St. Albert to service the Lakeview Business District, which could bring thousands of jobs to the region. The NDP will also double Family and Community Support Services funding to municipalities, which should bolster preventative social service groups such as the St. Albert Food Bank and Outloud and reduce stress on the justice and health care systems.
Renaud said the top issues she’s heard at the doors as of late have been health care and leadership. St. Albert residents have told her about long, painful waits for hip replacements and cancer surgeries, and have expressed outrage at Smith’s public remarks.
“I’m hearing people say, ‘I want a return to a government I can trust and that I can be proud of and that represents me, and that is not this current government,” Renaud said.
Seeking to oust Renaud are Angela Wood of the United Conservative Party (UCP) and Green Party candidate Cameron Jefferies.
A St. Albert resident since 2019, Wood is training to be a lawyer and came second in the 2021 St. Albert mayoral race.
In an email, Wood said St. Albert residents have told her they want a government that has the real interests of Albertans at heart and a representative that will listen to their concerns.
“St. Albert needs strong representation, and strong representation begins with an MLA who knows and understands the needs of St. Albert. Someone who lives here, works here, and is raising their family here.”
Wood said this election is about families and the hard-working people of St. Albert who deserve world-class health care, safe communities, low taxes, and an affordable cost of living.
“I am working hard every day to earn the that [sic] trust so we can make sure we have a voice in the legislature. We do not want to bring Edmonton to St. Albert. We want to bring St. Albert to Edmonton!”
Jefferies is a law professor at the University of Alberta who lives in St. Albert and ran for the Greens there in 2019, earning 0.9 per cent of the vote. Jefferies said he decided to run for the Greens in St. Albert once again to ensure residents had a truly progressive party on the ballot.
Jefferies said his priorities if elected will be health care and education funding, universal access to mental health and pharmacare, and the introduction of a proportional representation voting system. He didn’t plan to do much door-knocking this election but hoped to participate in the upcoming electoral debates.
Four in Morinville-St. Albert
First elected in 2019, UCP candidate and St. Albert resident Dale Nally is seeking a second term as the MLA for Morinville-St. Albert.
In an email, Nally said he had about 20 years of experience in the private sector managing business units that earn $50 to $80 million in revenue a year. He has a master’s in education and was the volunteer co-chair for Diversity Edmonton.
In 2019, Nally served as Alberta’s associate minister for natural gas and electricity, where he helped craft the province’s natural gas strategy and Hydrogen Road Map.
“This translated into six world-scale clean hydrogen production facilities in Alberta,” he said, four of which are coming to the Industrial Heartland region, bringing many jobs to Morinville-St. Albert.
Nally noted that Dow Chemical announced in 2021 that it will build the world’s first net-zero ethane cracker just outside of Fort Saskatchewan, which will be the biggest private sector investment in Alberta in 15 years and employ up to 8,000 people during peak construction.
Nally also served as the province’s minister for Service Alberta and red tape reduction.
“Our government has eliminated 31 per cent of red tape across all departments within the provincial government,” he said, saving taxpayers some $2.5 billion since 2019.
Seeking to unseat Nally are Karen Shaw of the NDP, Wayne Rufiange of the Alberta Party, and Kurt Klingbeil of the Green Party.
Shaw served four terms on Sturgeon County council and runs a cow-calf operation near Gibbons and Redwater. She said she made the jump to provincial politics because she respected Rachel Notley as a leader and, like her, wanted to build communities.
“I want to be the voice of the people and I want to build a better future for Alberta,” Shaw said.
Shaw said her time on county council saw her stand up for the rights of Industrial Heartland residents and gave her experience working with area governments through various regional boards and commissions. She also helped get traffic lights installed at the Hwy. 825/643 intersection and worked to get a rail crossing at Opal Road. Shaw said she volunteered for many community groups in Gibbons over the years, and continues to serve as a provincial judge for 4-H Alberta.
Shaw said she had been out door-knocking since May 2022 to get to know residents of her very large riding, with most residents telling her that they were concerned about the dismantling of public health care. She said she will ensure the long-defunct X-ray machine at the Morinville Clinic gets replaced if she is elected.
A teacher and past principal of Morinville Public School, Rufiange is a St. Albert resident who ran for the Alberta Party in the Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock riding in 2019, where he won 9.1 per cent of the vote.
“We’ve got a lot of good ideas in this province,” Rufiange said, and it is important for leaders to actually listen to each other and co-operate instead of just opposing whatever the other side suggests.
Rufiange said his time as principal of Morinville Public saw him work with families, governments, and community members to grow the school to 800 students from 90 in just six years. If elected, he said he would focus on improving hospital funding and teacher training.
“We need to invest more in our kids,” he said.
While he would love to win, Rufiange said he faced stiff competition from Nally and Shaw, and was mainly focused on building support for the Alberta Party. He did not have the budget for campaign signs.
A Bon Accord resident, Klingbeil is an electrical engineer and environmental activist who put his name forward to ensure the Green Party was on the ballot.
“The current party in power has demonstrated a very close alignment with the petroleum industry,” he said, alleging that they supported a “conspiracy of silence” around recent leaks at the Kearl Lakes tailings pond in northern Alberta.
Klingbeil described himself as a “paper candidate” who did not plan to do much actual campaigning. The Green Party will not realistically form government, but he said it was important to have Greens in the legislature to create a more informed policy discussion.
Albertans will get to hear from these candidates at a pair of free election forums organized by the St. Albert and Morinville chambers of commerce later this month. The St. Albert forum is May 16 at the St. Albert Inn and Suites, while the Morinville-St. Albert one is May 17 at the Morinville Community Cultural Centre. Doors open for both events open at 6 p.m., with audience members able to submit written questions to the candidate on site.
Election Day is May 29. The Gazette will have details on where and how to vote later this month.
