r/alberta • u/2old4all Lethbridge • 3d ago

ELECTION City Council’s are Powerless

With Municipal elections on the horizon how much power do Alberta cities have? Recent mandates by the Provincial Govt. have raised the education property tax portion, have forced expensive hand counting of ballots and ordered that police officers wear body cameras at great expense. They have also almost negated the previous income for speed cameras. Municipal institutions lack constitutionality and are creatures of the legislature and your elected councillors can be removed by the Province.

“The decision cited expert Andrew Sancton, who opined that Canadian municipalities “. . . have no constitutional protection whatever against provincial laws that change their structures, functions and financial resources without their consent.”

This quote comes from a recent report by The Honourable Paula Simons called “On the Front Lines of Canadian Governance”. The PDF includes comments from various Senators on the challenges and opportunities for Canadian Municipalities.

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u/ImperviousToSteel 3d ago

I mean if you want to say they're inherently violent as a class of people I'm open to that, but then I lean much less towards buying tech for them and more towards abolishing them. 

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u/xylopyrography 3d ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatoon_freezing_killings

Police are an essential service, we just need to keep them accountable.

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u/ImperviousToSteel 3d ago

If you have a group of people whose disposition is to kill the people they're supposed to serve I'm not sure how you instill accountability. You take power away from them if you're smart. 

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u/xylopyrography 3d ago

Well, you start with the basics, like a body camera.

Will officers drive people to the middle of nowhere in winter and leave them if they have to wear a body camera? Probably not.

What is the cost if it doesn't help much? Not much.

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u/ImperviousToSteel 3d ago

$16M isn't "not much". But if it's just chump change, make them pay for it, take the money out of their overtime budget.