Calgary Minute: Municipal Mandates, Inhospitable Restrictions, and a Barron Building Plan

Calgary Minute - Your weekly one-minute summary of Calgary politics

This Week In Calgary:

• There are two meetings at City Hall this week, starting with a Combined Meeting of Council at 9:30 am this morning. The meeting has a massive agenda, as it is likely to be the last full Council meeting before the election. Notably, Council will receive a report on changes required to avoid repeating the problems the City saw at the 2017 election with insufficient ballots and long waits. The report was prepared by the City Auditor, who will be retiring after the presentation of this report.
  
  
• On Thursday, at 1:00 pm, there will be a meeting of the Calgary Planning Commission which will deal with a large number of land-use amendments.
  
  
• Finally, we have just released the final round of candidate videos on our Election Candidate Database website, bringing the total to 56 full-length, in-depth interviews now. We also continue to add more biographical and voting information to the database on a daily basis. Check it out!

Last Week In Calgary:

• Many in Calgary's hospitality industry are feeling unfairly targeted after the province announced their latest round of restrictions aimed at curbing the increase of active COVID-19 cases in the province. Calgary's restaurant and bar industry says it's a slap in the face, 18 months into a pandemic that has seen many in the industry face permanent closures.
  
  
• Instead of cutting taxes and reducing spending as a way to make Calgary a more attractive city for investors, the City is once again opting to whip out the public credit card and spend, spend, spend. This time, City administration are asking City Council to spend $7.5 million converting the historic Barron Building into residential units. Housing development is definitely not the job of a municipal government.
  
  
• It appears the City's plans to require all City employees to be fully vaccinated or face possible disciplinary action caught many union leaders by surprise. The heads of two of the City's largest unions say City Hall's recent announcement runs counter to all the discussions they had in the previous months.

-----

Donate:

Common Sense Calgary doesn't accept any government funding and never will. We think you should be free to choose, for yourself, which organizations to support. If you're in a position to contribute financially, you can make a donation here.

-----

Share:

If you're not in a position to donate, we understand, but if you appreciate our work, you can help by spreading our message. Please email this post to your friends, share it on Facebook or Twitter, and help make sure every Calgarian knows what's really going on at City Hall.