A proposed law that would embed the Capital Region Board into law sends a strong message to municipalities, says St. Albert's mayor: co-operate, or else.
But that message could change radically now that the province has hit the pause button on the law in order to talk it over with municipalities.
Bill 28, the Modernizing Regional Government Act, passed second reading on Wednesday.
After opposition parties attacked the bill as "draconian" and "paternalistic," Premier Alison Redford announced that the province would hold off on the bill to allow for more consultation with municipalities.
The bill, if passed in its current form, would enshrine the Capital Region Board (CRB) into law as part of the Municipal Government Act (MGA), and let the province create similar boards elsewhere in Alberta.
The bill would empower the province to create "growth management boards" throughout the province, and gives it the power to determine the members, mandates and voting rights of those boards, as well as the goals, contents and timelines of a board's growth plan. It also allows the province to appoint an interim leader for the board.
It also allows the province to penalize any mayor or reeve who fails to provide information to a growth management board with a fine of up to $10,000 and/or jail time of up to a year. (The province already has these powers over CRB members, but has never used them.)
Municipal Affairs Minister Doug Griffiths said earlier this week that these powers could be used to force municipalities to work together, sparking outrage in opposition leaders.
But that wasn't the intent of the bill, said St. Albert MLA Stephen Khan. All it's meant to do is take the regulations that empower the CRB, make them law, and make them available to others.
"If there's other regions in the province of Alberta where they want to work together, we have some legislation that helps them come together," he said.
The bill certainly sends a strong message in its current form, said St. Albert mayor and CRB chair Nolan Crouse, one that could be directed at tense relations between Calgary and its neighbours.
"They're saying, 'We're serious. You will act, you will behave, you will plan as a region and you will get on with life."
Lawsuit counter
The bill's current draft appears to directly address a lawsuit filed by Parkland County in October against the province about the CRB. Parkland has challenged the Capital Region Board Regulation (which empowers the CRB) in court, arguing that the province exceeded its authority by creating the CRB through regulation instead of through a formal MGA amendment.
Bill 28, if passed as it is, would establish the CRB through a formal MGA amendment. Several sections of it also say that the board, and almost everything associated with it, are legally valid "despite any decision of a court to the contrary made before or after the coming into force of this section."
Edmonton Coun. Ed Gibbons, who has served on the CRB since it started, agreed that this part of the bill was a direct response to Parkland's lawsuit.
"The province had to come in and start to do something," he said.
Parkland County is still waiting for the court's ruling on its case, said spokesperson Jackie Ostashek. County lawyers are reviewing Bill 28 to see if it would affect their case.
Redford also said that her government would amend Bill 28 to include a formal appeal process for growth management board decisions.
The current draft allows the province to create such a process, but doesn't say what it looks like.
There's currently no body that municipalities can turn to if they want to appeal CRB decisions, Crouse said – any disputes go before the board itself, followed by a mediator or arbitrator.
This bill gives you a little bit of an opening if the board oversteps its bounds, he continued.
"There's a door open for a review to take place."
The bill itself won't have any affect on CRB operations, Crouse said, but probably won't reduce tensions between its members. Still, every region has such tensions.
"They (the province) are basically saying, 'Stick with it,'" he said.
The current draft of the bill does extend the expiration date on the CRB's regulations to Nov. 30, 2018, from April 1, 2014.
The text of Bill 28 is available at www.assembly.ab.ca.
