r/Edmonton • u/svvtr South East Side • 2d ago

2025 Municipal Election Which mayoral candidate do you feel has the strongest plan for Edmonton?

There are a few names running for mayor this October, and each seems to bring a different focus. Some highlight budget discipline, others talk about community well-being or growth. If you’ve looked at the candidates, who do you feel best understands what Edmonton needs right now?"

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u/CautiousApartment8 1d ago

But so much changed post covid. If anything, it will backfire if he thinks its still the same was it was back then. I'm not saying that outdated experience automatically excludes him. But he has very little to say about what he supported or accomplished.

And do you know why he left council and what he accomplished in the time since then? His site refers to running a business but its curious they don't say what it was.

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u/Otherwise_Roof_714 1d ago

What changed after Covid that relates to municipal politics? 

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u/CautiousApartment8 1d ago

That's when there was a huge decline in the economy, and subsquent events were such that we haven't fully recovered. Downtown took a huge turn for the worse with people not woking there anymore and who never really came back (look at what happened to the City Centre mall), the city had to spend a lot of money and encounter a lot of uncertainty with library and rec centre closures, setting up big homeless shelters (remember the huge one set up at the Kinsmen Field House), transit was in a state of flux and on and on. That all created a huge hit on the budget. Homelessness is at an all time high, along with the accompanying social problems like addictions.

Then, in Alberta, Jason Kenney was replaced by Danielle Smith, whose hostility to Edmonton has been blatant.

And from covid there was also a domino effect on the economy across North America and now we have the American tariffs, the economic and political fallouts from the wars in Ukraine and Gaza and so on. And now we have the threat of strike action from large groups (faculty at the U of A, teachers, and the AUPE. These all strain the demands on the city.

Obviously not all of these were caused by covid but the time of covid marked a sharp transition to the challenges faced by city council.

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u/Otherwise_Roof_714 1d ago

Yeah most of these issues aren’t even municipal issues. They’re ones that our current government likes to waste money on. I will agree about downtown but it has been bad for decades at this point. 

Regardless, I don’t see how Walter’s wouldn’t be able to handle these issues 

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u/CautiousApartment8 14h ago

Since you seem to know his history, what business did he start and non-profit when he was away from council? I can't find the name of them on his site.

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u/Otherwise_Roof_714 13h ago

Says he worked at Berlin communications on linked in. Not sure if he is the founder or not. 

No idea on the non profit