The new electoral boundaries decrease the voice of rural Alberta: Smook

It was a busy meet and greet for local politician and Beaver County councillor Kevin Smook as he hosted an evening on Tuesday, Nov. 6, at the Tofield Arena meeting room to launch his campaign; to seek nomination to the Alberta Party for the new Camrose riding.

According to Smook, one of the main reasons he decided to run was because of the new changes to the electoral boundaries, which has “greatly reduced the voice of rural Alberta.”

“The decision was made to eliminate three rural ridings, and add them to the cities, and that decreases the voice of rural Alberta,” Smook said. “That bothers me, I didn’t think that was necessary. I thought the right way to go would be if you were trying to increase the number of MLAs in the city because of the population, it would be better to increase the number of MLAs, but don’t do it at the expense of rural Alberta, as now there are three less rural seats.”

One of the reasons why Smook wishes to run for Alberta Party is because his values are well aligned to theirs.

“I don’t think Alberta needs to be about Left or Right, and kind of polar opposites as we see, I think there’s room for a party in the middle; a party that’s big on social programs but also paying for them . . . having a strategy to pay for these things,” Smook explained. “And right now there doesn’t seem to be . . . contd.