On Oct. 19, the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission released their final report, recommending that Athabasca, Westlock, Smoky Lake, Thorhild and Barrhead counties join to form one constituency.
At first glance, it looks huge. The drive from Swan Hills to Smoky Lake is about two-and-a-half hours at the best of times.
But that said, only 46,920 live across that huge expanse of land. Should our votes matter more than the vote of someone who lives in a more populated area, simply because we choose the spacious rural life?
That’s the question at hand for the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission. They have the incredibly hard job of trying to redraw the lines in the sand that divide the votes in this province.
Though difficult, it is one of the most important tasks as far as our democracy goes. It has not always been done well in the past.
The most recent edition of Alberta Views magazine points out that until 1969, Alberta MLAs redrew the maps themselves. It also writes that in 1992, when the AEBC could not reach a consensus, “the premier had a PC-dominated legislature committee draw the map instead.”
The amount of travel involved in the job of the MLA of the new suggested Barrhead-Athabasca riding will have a lot of driving to do. Unfortunately, that is one of the things about being a representative of a government – our MPs have large swaths of land and people to represent, too, and their governmental home base is much further away.
As a voice for the Athabasca region, we indeed would like to see a smaller riding that makes it more likely we will see our MLA at the local schools’ Christmas concerts. As an objective voice, we also see the populations of rural areas decreasing, and urban areas increasing.
We do not have all the answers. We can raise concerns, just as constituents and MLAs did during the last round of the AEBC’s public consultations.
As one local MLA put it, we do not envy the job the AEBC has to do.
