Further to the St. Albert Gazette article or June 14th regarding the Proposed Provincial Electoral Divisions, I express deep concern regarding the Interim Report boundary recommendation of the new provincial St. Albert-Redwater constituency. There seems to be no logic to the proposed boundaries, which would place nearly 18,000 St. Albert residents in a new constituency that extends some 187 kilometres. This vast region would extend east to Redwater, Waskatenau, Smoky Lake, Vilna and includes the smaller communities within Thorhild and Smoky Lake counties.
As a former MLA for the St. Albert constituency from 1979-86, I know the challenges of serving the needs of a large diversified constituency. At that time, St. Albert constituency borders extended north into the Municipal District of Westlock, east to Gibbons and west to Calahoo and the Alexander First Nation. We had a diverse population of rural and urban but the boundaries were primarily based on the trading patterns of this growing region.
The recent electoral boundaries report does a great job of population distribution in each constituency. However, the proposal for the St. Albert-Redwater Electoral Division does not take into consideration distance and diversity. The natural trading areas and the linkages the residents have within the boundaries was certainly not considered for the proposed St. Albert-Redwater constituency.
I submit that the boundaries in this new electoral division do not make sense. For the nearly 18,000 residents of St. Albert, the citizens of Namao, Lancaster Park and the many voters residing to the east as far as the County of Smoky Lake, I suggest they may want to look at the report, which can be accessed at abebc.ca.
There are logical changes that can be made to the boundaries that would keep the population count within the guidelines but at the same time respect the natural linkages that residents would expect for their new electoral division.
Myrna Fyfe, St. Albert
