Each sitting of the Alberta legislature features dozens of statements and exchanges. Following is a small sampling of what was said, announced, discussed and sparred over on May 22-23
The roar of the asphalt has no place among critically important wetlands in the Rosebud Valley near Drumheller, the NDP’s tourism, sports and recreation critic charged May 22.
Sarah Elmeligi, the member for Banff-Kananaskis, pointed to water conservation, protection from drought and protection of species like the bank swallow as reasons to reject a controversial, 425-acre motorsport complex.
The project will fill in two wetlands and modify three others, yet still the Environmental Appeals Board and a government ministry approved it.
“Why is the minister allowing precious wetlands to be drained for a private racetrack?” Elmeligi asked.
Rebecca Schulz, environment and protected areas minister, said the process did its job.
Environmental Appeals Board hearings took place in 2022 and 2023, resulting in approvals with conditions that build upon a 2020 Water Act approval from Schulz’s department, said the member for Calgary-Shaw.
“Any time we look at a project that comes to our department, we absolutely have to look at impacts of economic growth and development as well as protecting and upholding our environmental standards,” Schulz said.
Schulz said the Environmental Appeals Board looked at merits and concerns of the project and amended the approval to include further wetlands monitoring.
“We respect the decision of that independent board,” Schulz said.
Elmeligi quipped that “monitoring a drained wetland is kind of a waste of time.”
Free Kananaskis
The government should remove “yet another strain on family budgets” by living up to a campaign promise to ditch Kananaskis Country tolls, an NDP member said May 23.
Marlin Schmidt, deputy chair of the province’s resource stewardship committee, said Premier Danielle Smith promised two years ago to remove a toll instituted in 2021 by the earlier UCP government.
Since the inception of Kananaskis Country, entrance had been free to the 4,000 square kilometre collection of provincial parks and other amenities southwest of Calgary.
“Albertans aren’t thrilled. One such Albertan called the scheme totally ridiculous,” said Schmidt, the member for Edmonton-Goldbar. “That Albertan was our very own premier.”
But Todd Loewen, the minister of forestry and parks, said money raised by the so-called K-pass is serving a valuable purpose because it goes exclusively into supplementing provincial spending to maintain and improve the area.
“The NDP, of course, didn’t maintain the parks,” said Loewen, the member for Central Peace-Notley. “They didn’t maintain the trails. They didn’t do the good work that we’re doing.”
Kananaskis spending is an investment in tourism from within and outside of Alberta, Loewen said.
It makes sure visitors “have something great to do when they get there, so that they can go home and tell other people, and more people will come to visit our great areas here in Alberta,” Loewen said.
Kananaskis Country boasts about four million visits a year.
A day conservation pass for $15 registers one personal vehicle, a yearly pass for $90 registers up to three.
Commercial vehicles are charged between $22.50 a day and $180 a year, depending on how many people they carry.
Zero plastic plan
A federal plan to end plastic waste by 2030 will drive agri-business investment out of Alberta, the UCP charged in the legislature May 23.
The plan will place an unfair burden on food producers and manufacturers, destabilize food security and increase food prices for all Canadians, predicted R.J. Sigurdson, the minister of agriculture and irrigation.
“As Albertans and Canadians continue to battle with high food prices, you’d think it would be obvious that the federal government should be supporting the ag industry, the people who produce that food,” said Sigurdson, the member for Highwood. “Yet the feds are doing the exact opposite with their zero plastic waste initiative.”
Sigurdson said he and Rebecca Schulz, Alberta’s environment minister, have sent a letter to the federal government about the issue.
Grande Prairie MLA Nolan Dyck of the UCP said that the costs of packaging and labelling will increase under new federal requirements, countering the positive effects of an agri-processing investment tax credit that’s attracting large-scale agricultural manufacturing to Alberta.
Responded Sigurdson: “The member is absolutely correct. This initiative will negatively affect the growth in value-added agricultural processing we’re seeing right now in the province. It will mean Alberta food manufacturers providing the same product for large retailers in the United States and in Canada — they will be forced to carry two types of packaging to satisfy the requirements in each country. Alternatives are also either not available or incredibly costly.
“Ultimately, this will decrease their competitive advantage. This will drive away investment all across our value-added agri-processing industry.”
The government provides a 12 per cent, non-refundable tax credit when corporations invest $10-million or more in a project to build or expand a value-added agri-processing facility in Alberta.
Up to $175-million in credits is available for each project, and corporations have 10 years to claim credits against their provincial income tax.
Media reports have pegged food manufacturing sales in Alberta at $20.1-billion in 2021, making it the largest seller in the province of manufactured goods by sector.
Food manufacturing employed 22,400 Albertans, the reports said.
