2025 Edmonton city election critical to our future but FPTP unlikely to give us good results (Millwoods Mosaic article September 2025)

my views on the city election in two versions -- the second one is much more wordy!

Edmonton's city election will lay base for Edmonton's future

by Tom Monto

As you likely already know, Edmonton is in the midst of the kind of excitement that comes around only every four years - a municipal election. As the future path for Edmonton will be blocked out in the next few years, the Edmonton city council and the school boards have important decisions to make. For instance, homelessness has emerged as a major issue, and council must decide on whether to fund housing mega-projects, defend Edmonton’s established communities by allowing only modest redevelopment, or allow massive development within the established old neighbourhoods? 

Although Mill Woods is younger than many parts of the city, it has passed the half-century mark. Likely redevelopment, if allowed by council, will not have an immediate mass impact on Mill Woods, but almost certainly any mass development of the Northlands  or the land that Edmonton has acquired towards Leduc would restrict the level of services that the city provides in Mill Woods. And the school boards, which oversee the places where our children are being educated, also play an important role in forging Edmonton’s future. 

As we look at those who have come forward to run as candidates in this election, we see the positions of mayor, city councillor and school board trustee are all being contested by committed and qualified candidates. In each district, Mill Woods voters have the choice for voting for a new face or for the incumbent, except to fill the mayor's chair. Mayor Amarjeet Singh, former Mill Woods MP, is not running for re-election. 

For the election of  city councillors, Mill Woods is split between two wards. 50th Street is the dividing line between the Karhliio ward and the Sstomitapi ward. This demarcation determines the options available to voters. West of 50th Street they cannot vote for sitting councillor Jo-Anne Wright; east of 50th Street they cannot vote for sitting councillor Keren Tang. This is because Tang is running for re-election in Karhliio, and Wright is running for re-election in Sstomitapi.

Edmonton deserves credit for having a multi-racial city council, where women hold more seats than men. White men have historically dominated the council chamber. But that has changed in recent years. Mill Woods voters, whether in Karhliio or Sstomitapi, have a wide range of types to choose from among the candidates.

In Karhliio (lying west of 50th Street), Keren Tang, the incumbent city councillor, was first elected in 2021 with 7400 votes, about 40 percent of the votes cast in the ward. None of her competitors at that time have so far registered to run against her this time. She also ran in 2017 but was not elected that time. 

Since she has been on council, she brought community-based budgeting to Karhiio, putting decision-making power and funding in the hands of its residents. Community leaders, young and old, created public art projects, installed little libraries and public benches, planted trees, and launched Mill Woods Dining Week. She also claims to have supported the mapping of hundreds of kilometres of bike paths to help people pedal the city. 

Candidates running against her include Jason Bale, who was a staffer for former pro-business city councillor Mike Nickel. Yogesh Garg and Manny Bautista are also in the running.

Atiq Rehman says if elected, he will fight for policies that “empower small businesses and make our neighborhoods safer.”

Hali Kaur Kahlon,  of the  "Principled Accountable Coalition for Edmonton" (PACE) party, is said to be a candidate but has not finalized her registration. Party labels are being used in this election, signifying a return to the old days, when the pro-business "Citizens' Committee" dominated the chamber for decades over the opposition of the Labour Party and the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation party.

Joti Buttar is running under the flag of the “Better Edmonton Party” (a slate led by sitting councillor Tim Cartmell). Party leader Cartmell has said he will encourage development outside of the established communities, large-scale developments in “big one spaces,” such as the old Northlands site. He decries others on council today who, he said, have an “ideological focus” on established neighbourhoods. 

Another perspective is that the other councillors are have taken a fiscally-conservative approach that is relatively easy on the city’s chequebook. Small-scale development (backyard suites and other infill) is self-financed by individual homeowners or builders and requires only a moderate amount of new infrastructure, unlike grandiose projects.

Cartmell’s position is different from the position taken by Jo-Anne Wright, the sitting councillor in the Sstomitapi ward. Since 2021, Jo-Anne Wright has been the councillor in Sstomitapi Ward  (which covers the part of Mill Woods lying east of 50th Street and The Meadows). She won in 2021 with 6,000 voters, and none of her competitors at that time have so far registered to run against her this time. She ran in 2017 and was unsuccessful at that time. She raised her family in Wild Rose where she volunteered with the community league.

Wright believes Edmonton should not spread out. "By reducing urban sprawl - building up, not out - we encourage development in neighbourhoods that already have the desired infrastructure in place. That translates into reduced costs."

Wright is proud to say she has used her position on council to support the environment and to limit the impact of development on it. She opposed a proposal to move a natural creek bed to allow industrial development, because it might have meant the loss of 7000 trees.

Also running for the seat is Annie Chua-Frith. For a time in 2024 she had her name in for the Conservative Party nomination for Edmonton Southeast but was not chosen as the party’s candidate. She was long-time president of the Philippine Bayanihan Association. She spearheaded the naming of Mabuhay Park, a "Filipino Park" located north of 14th Avenue east of 29th Street.

Ashok Sui is also competing for the seat. His website gives his priorities: Safe & strong communities – Support for police, youth services, and public safety; Better roads & public transit; Affordable housing & smart growth. If he can do that without losing us other existing services, then more power to him.

Sukhi Randhawa is a candidate in Sstomitapi. He may be remembered as the fellow who won the Conservative nomination in 2004 in Edmonton-Gold Bar and then withdrew his candidacy due to charges he had bought votes at the nomination meeting.

Sandeep Singh is running as well. Steve Van Diest is said to be the candidate of the "Principled Accountable Coalition for Edmonton"  party in Sstomitapi  but has not yet registered as a candidate.

In addition to the city council contests described above, voters in Mill Woods and The Meadows also have the chance to cast votes for school board trustees.

The public school board wards are different from city council wards. The part of Mill Woods and The Meadows north of 23rd Avenue  is in Ward G, while the rest is in Ward I. 

Jan Sawyer, the trustee for Ward I, is running for re-election against two other candidates. Sawyer is a respected member of the board, and when the seat in neighbouring Ward H became vacant, she was appointed to handle that ward as well as her own ward. Her performance in this dual role shows that there is no actual need to restrict members to just small districts. If Sawyer can handle two wards, surely two councillors could do the same, and such a "grouped district" would allow a fairer election system than winner-take-all first past the post.

The incumbent trustee in Ward G, Saadiq Sumar, is running for re-election against three candidates. 

For the Catholic school board, Ward 77 covers the entire Mill Woods and the Meadows. The incumbent trustee, Laura Thibert, is up against Santo Chines.

 To my mind, it is a sad thing that we rely on the flawed first past the post election system to determine who of these fine candidates gets the say in what will happen. But until a new election system is adopted, this is what we have, and with luck, everything will come out okay in the end.

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Edmonton's city election will lay base for Edmonton's future

by Tom Monto

(longer version -- about twice as long as above)

As you likely already know, Edmonton is in the midst of the kind of excitement that comes around only every four years - a municipal election. It is the one time when voters have some say, and the rest of the time the city council does pretty much what it wants. Between  elections voters have no power. And once elected, the mayor and councillors are really beyond our control.

It might seem this is the only way for representative democracy to work, but  if we look at Switzerland, we see voters being asked to give their opinion on public spending and policy questions, wit hte voters input used to guide the way the city operates. 

And even in our past, voters weighed in directly on such questions as the retention of the downtown airport, the construction of a sports Omniplex and the massive Edmonton Convention Centre. Property-owners were asked whether they wanted their tax money spent on what now seem as tiny expenditures - $30,000 for a new city hall and the like. Some of these votes were held at election time, and others were brought up for a vote once a new council got going the spring after the election.

And this election, we see voters asked to endorse sitting councillors or a group of pretty much unknowns. 

That is not to say anything against the candidates either generally or individually – they did not invent the particular brand of democracy used in Edmonton.

They might prefer an election system where a large percentage of votes are actually used to elect the winners, a system where if a majority of voters want more money spent on police or on public housing, they are sure to elect a council that reflects that opinion. They might appreciate the democracy of having a system where the voters’ opinion on just a specific topic is polled, and where the voters' registered opinion guides the council in its decision making.

But in the 2025 Edmonton municipal election we are given unclear choices. Many candidates promise better roads and transit; and some promise lower taxes; and some promise both. And once elected, there are really no ties that would force the elected politicians to do what has been promised if it is even financially possible.

Meanwhile, houses and empty lots are held for speculation profits; social problems seem to proliferate; bicycle paths and even sidewalks are being inundated with motorized bikes and scooters. The justification is they are active transportation but simply standing on a racing scooter as it races around is not what I call exercise.

In part I blame the election system. When a person can be elected with only 6000 or 10,000 votes, as happened in 2021, when  the margin between winning and losing in many of the wards was less than 2000, a politician needs every vote they can get and the politician votes in the city chamber in a way to please even a small lobby, to satisfy a few for whom the question is a major issue even it is at the expense of the many for whom the topic is not a major issue, who are mostly in other wards anyway and can’t vote the member out.

Up until the 1970s, Edmonton’s city councillors were elected, like the mayor, to represent the interests of the whole city. Now the job of an elected councillor is to try to get as much as he or she can for the ward that he or she represents. And of course, the elected councillor must seek to satisfy the groups that elected him or her in the ward  - which is often just a third of voters in his or her ward.

But despite the weaknesses of the system, many capable people step up and put their names in the contest.

I will not tell you who to vote for and frankly don’t know that whoever is elected to represent your ward might not be voted down on every vote in city hall. Unfortunately in this winner take all system, if an unfortunate choice is made, the ward has no other person from the ward to represent it.

Those who have read my column likely know my affection for muti-seat districts, where the range of opinion in each ward actually can be represented. Edmonton's present single-winner structure seems so hit or miss. And more often than not, a vote cast will be a miss, it will not be used to elect anyone.

They tell us that we have only ourselves to blame if an unfortunate choice is made, but when more than half the votes are ignored, who is really to blame?

And then we come to the districting. Mill Woods, which is a popular identifier of residency, is now split over two wards for election of city councillors and split over two different wards for election of public school board trustee. In each district, likely only half the votes or fewer will be satisfied with the election result.

Voters living west of 50th Street cannot vote for Jo-Anne Wright even if they like her. And those living east of 50th Street cannot vote for Keren Tang even if they think she is doing a good job in city hall.

Why is this? Because 50th Street is the dividing line between two different wards - the Karhliio ward and the Sstomitapi ward, and Tang is running in one and Wright is running in the other.

And when it comes to voting on improvements in the Sstomitapi ward, Tang’s vote is just as powerful as Wright’s. But only one (Wright) actually is dependent on voters’ support in Sstomitapi ward. The mechanism of city councillors mutually back-scratching may work, but how much more transparent if both actually were job-defined as representing all the city and each owed that little bit of their prestige to each part of the city.

Edmonton deserves credit for currently having a multi-racial city council, and one where women hold more seats than men. White men have historically dominated the council chamber. 

But when only one member is elected in each ward, ethnic or race identification actually counters the common myth that each member represents everyone in the ward. For if the councillor represents all, can the ethnic group or race that they belong to expect any special benefit?

If the voter had the chance to vote for his or her preferred mixture of race, gender and ideological perspective (for instance, trees versus highways, social programs versus heavy policing), then the voter would have the kind of choice that they currently make when they buy their coffee - which country of origin, what topping, what topping on the topping, etc. But when only one Anglo-Saxon or Filipino or Francophone candidate is running in the ward, to vote for the ethnic group of preference means putting aside those other types of categories.

If candidates ran in a city-wide district, the voter would have a choice of any candidate running in Edmonton, with a much wider range of possible permutations.

But despite the weaknesses of the election system. many qualified candidates are running for city council and school boards in the wards that cover Mill Woods and The Meadows.

Karhliio Ward (includes the part of Mill Woods lying west of 50th Street)

Keren Tang, the incumbent city councillor for Karhliio, was first elected in 2021 with 7400 votes, about 40 percent of the votes cast in the ward. None of her competitors at that time have so far registered to run against her this time. She also ran in 2017 but was not elected that time. 

She is proud to say that in the time she has been on council, she brought "Community-Based Budgeting to Ward Karhiio, putting decision-making power and funding in the hands of local residents. Through this initiative, community leaders, young and old, created public art projects, installed little libraries and public benches, planted new trees, and launched Mill Woods Dining Week." She also claims to have supported the mapping of hundreds of kilometres of bike paths to help people pedal the city. 

Candidates running against her include Jason Bale,  a former staffer for pro-business politician Mike Nickel, the city councillor for Ward 11 several years ago. Yogesh Garg and Manny Bautista are also in the running.

Atiq Rehman says if elected, he will fight for policies that “empower small businesses and make our neighborhoods safer.”

Hali Kaur Kahlon,  of the  "Principled Accountable Coalition for Edmonton" (PACE) party, is said to be a candidate but has not finalized her registration.

Joti Buttar is running under the flag of the “Better Edmonton Party” (Tim Cartmell's slate). Party leader Cartmell was quoted as saying that he would encourage development outside of the established communities, large-scale developments in “big one spaces,” such as the old Northlands site, while those on council today, he said, have an “ideological focus” on established neighbourhoods. Another perspective is that the present council is pursuing a fiscally-conservative approach tht is realtvely easy on the city chequebook – small-scale development (backyard suites and other infill) is self-financed by individual homeowners or builders and requires only moderate amount of new city infrastructure, while grandiose projects would require considerable financial outlays by the city.

Cartmell’s position is different from the position taken by Jo-Anne Wright, the sitting councillor in the Sstomitapi ward.

Sstomitapi Ward   (covers Mill Woods (east of 50th Street) and The Meadows)

Jo-Anne Wright has been the councillor in that ward since 2021. She won in 2021 with 6,000 voters, and none of her competitors at that time have so far registered to run against her this time. She ran in 2017 and was unsuccessful at that time. She has deep roots in the ward having raised her family in Wild Rose where she volunteered with the community league.

Wright is a lobbyist for planning for the future. "By reducing urban sprawl - building up, not out - we encourage development in neighbourhoods that already have the desired infrastructure in place. That translates into reduced costs to provide desirable amenities like parks, pools and skating rinks while increasing revenue from a broader range of property taxpayers."

Wright is proud to say she has used her position on council to support the environment and to limit the impact of development on it. She opposed a proposal to move a natural creek bed (Fulton Creek) in favour of industrial development. The proposal might have meant the loss of almost 7000 trees.

Also running for the seat is Annie Chua-Frith. For a time in 2024 she had her name in for the Conservative Party nomination for Edmonton Southeast but was not chosen as the party’s candidate. She was president of the Philippine Bayanihan Association for the last 6 years. Recently, she spearheaded the naming of Mabuhay Park, a "Filipino Park" located north of 14th Avenue east of 29th Street.

Ashok Sui is also competing for the seat. His website gives his priorities – Safe & strong communities – More support for police, youth services, and public safety; Better roads & public transit; Affordable housing & smart growth; Support for local business & jobs.

All noble goals and likely repeated by each other candidate. However there is only so much money and Edmonton’s twelve city councillors have a large task overseeing the expenditure of more than 3 billion dollars. By comparison, Ottawa has 25 city councillors to oversee the expenditure of $2B.

Sukhi Randhawa is a candidate in Sstomitapi. He may be remembered as the fellow who won the Conservative nomination in 2004 in Edmonton-Gold Bar and then withdrew his candidacy due to charges he had bought votes at the nomination meeting.

Sandeep Singh is running as well. Steve Van Diest is said to be the candidate of the "Principled Accountable Coalition for Edmonton"  party in Sstomitapi  but has not yet registered as a candidate.

In addition to the city council contests described above, voters in Mill Woods and The Meadows also have the chance to cast votes for Edmonton mayor and for trustees of public schools and separate (Catholic) schools. School board wards are different from city council wards. The part of Mill Woods and The Meadows north of 23rd Avenue  is in Ward G, while the rest of those areas are in Ward I. 

These contests, like the council contests, are conducted using first past the post where there is no guarantee that even half the votes will be used to elect the winner.

Of course the mayor has to cover the whole city, but meanwhile the justification given for the single-member wards used to elect the others is that a single person can only cover so much territory. But we see an exception to this practice just in Mill Woods. 

In the 2023 provincial election, the school board trustee in Ward H was elected as an MLA so he resigned as trustee. Instead of holding a by-election to fill the seat, Jan Sawyer, the trustee for Ward I, began to serve as trustee for both wards H and I. This shows that an area the size of two wards is not too much for one person to represent, so it can be assumed that such an area could be as easily represented by two persons. Having a multi-member ward allows for more fair elections, where more votes actually are used to elect the winners.

And if a two-seat ward works, then surely three could represent a district the size of what is now represented by three, and that would be the same size as four wards used to elect four councillors today. So it is natural to think that if we group the four council wards into one ward, we could allocate four council seats to it and also give it three school board seats.

Such a scheme would allow multi-winner contests and fair, balanced representation (through STV if ranked votes are used). Voters would not be sliced and diced in five different ways as they now are with school board wards, city council wards, mayoral races, provincial districts and federal ridings.

Plus instead of as little as a third or a quarter of votes used to elect the winner as we see in our city elections these days, three-quarters of votes cast in a new ward would be used to elect the winning school board trustees and even a larger percentage used to elect the ward’s councillors.

But as it stands, regarding seats on the public school board, two wards split Mill Woods and The Meadows. Ward I covers the parts of Mill Woods and The Meadows lying south of 23rd Avenue, and Ward G covers the parts of Mill Woods and The Meadows lying north of 23rd Avenue.

The incumbent trustee in Ward I, Jan Sawyer, is running for re-election against two other candidates. The incumbent trustee in Ward G, Saadiq Sumar, is running for re-election against three other candidates. 

For the Catholic school board, Ward 77 covers the entire Mill Woods and the Meadows. The incumbent trustee, Laura Thibert, is up against Santo Chines.

In each ward, the most-popular candidate will be elected even if that popularity is only a third of the vote. And there is no overall fairness - perhaps in one ward the successful candidate will be elected with 12,000 votes while in the other ward a person with just 6000 votes will be elected.

Such disparity would be more visible if two parties ran in each ward. But on questions concerning the future path for Edmonton, whether parties are used or not, the Edmonton city council and the school boards have important decisions to make, and Edmonton’s casual approach to seat allocation is likely to give a more-popular party or perspective fewer seats than a less-popular party or perspective. With parties involved, we would more easily see if the result is unfair. But whether or not we can measure the unfairness, if the council chooses to do something that the bulk of voters oppose, it will evoke general dissatisfaction, even if we can’t measure the fairness or unfairness of our elections.

Our present scheme of electing the city council through 12 different sub-battles with no overlying balance will be used to elect a council that must decide on whether to fund a housing mega-project council, defend Edmonton’s established communities, or allow massive development within the established old neighbourhoods? And only a transparent election system can ensure that the opinion of the most voters are actually reflected in the make-up of the council. And that sort of careful representation is not accomplished by the first past the post system that we now use. 

We can but hope that whoever is elected will give some thought to how the city can better ensure that the opinion of city’s residents are reflected by the make-up of the council and by the future course for Edmonton that the mayor, the councillors, and the school boards choose.

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