A pair of decisions made by Calgary city council during the tenure of then-Mayor Naheed Nenshi became leadership campaign issues during the second Alberta NDP leadership debate.

That debate, held in Calgary on May 11, saw council decisions to request a letter separating union collective agreements from successor rights for the potential sale of city units in 2019, and end tenancies at the Midfield Trailer Park in 2014, become debate attacks against ABNDP leadership candidate Nenshi.

In the candidate one-on-one debate portion of the afternoon debate, ABNDP candidate and leader of the Alberta Federation of Labour Gil McGowan spoke directly to that 2019 letter.

“In order to win in Calgary and anywhere else, we have to address this letter. In the letter as Mayor, you asked the UCP to help the city of green sidestep worker rights, privatized services and quash a duly negotiated contract with thousands of City of Calgary workers,” said McGowan.

“So Naheed, I have to ask this question, why did you sign that letter? And how is this not a trust buster?”

Nenshi, in response to the question, said during the debate and afterwards to the Calgary media, that he appreciated the question—saying that he had to take tactics to stop what he characterized as a then “super right-wing” council that aimed to privatize city golf courses and waste collection services.

“I was able to stop the privatization of golf courses. I was able to minimize the privatization of waste collection in the city, because I believe people deserve decent jobs and decent pensions. So let me just say this, I would never rip up a collective agreement. Collective bargaining is sacrosanct. Those are hard-won, and we have to support them always,” Nenshi said.

Nenshi takes heat on social media from leaked letter

On Nov. 18, 2019, Calgary City Council heard a number of motions put forward to address what councillors Sutherland, Davison, Chu, Farkas and Magliocca believed was a cost crisis brought on by City of Calgary employee wages and the costs of providing benefits to those employees.

Mayor Nenshi voted for a notice of motion that required him to ask the Government of Alberta to alter current pending union contracts, but against motions to request bargaining units consider wage rollbacks, and for the city to prepare legal analysis for imposing mandatory wage rollbacks.

During that same council meeting, council debated asking city administration to scope out an RFP to sell off city owned golf courses and to contract out a portion of city waste collection services.

“A few labour leaders did reach out to me when that came out after the UCP leaked it, and I really appreciate those conversations. In each of those conversations, the folks that came up to me said ‘huh I get what you were doing,'” said Nenshi.

“I strenuously objected to, and managed to win on both of those over the series of next months. There was a bunch of tactics that needed to get us there, and frankly, one of those tactics was we needed the province to say no so that the councillors stopped asking, because they were just wasting time and causing labour stress by asking the same question.”

McGowan said that he raised the issue of the letter, despite it being said to have been leaked by the UCP, because people had to know what he stood for as a leader.

“I’m the president of Alberta’s largest worker organization. I’ve spent my entire adult life standing up for worker rights, and so when I see a letter like that, which Naheed as the mayor of Calgary, asking a UCP minister—and I emphasize the UCP minister—for a special exemption to allow the City of Calgary to basically quash a duly negotiated collective agreement, that raises all sorts of red flags for me,” he said.

“I know that there are a lot of people who wish I hadn’t, and I acknowledge that the letter was leaked by the UCP in order to make Naheed look bad. But talking about this kind of letter is necessary during a leadership debate, because in order for someone like Naheed to lead the party, he has to have the trust of not just voters in general but also party members.”

Nenshi said that if McGowan had not raised the issue of the letter, he would have done so himself.

“If Gil McGowan, the president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, had not taken that moment to talk to me about that, I probably would have in that 90 seconds said, “Gil let’s not talk about this, let’s talk about what’s on your mind.” Because that is important and I’m happy to stand on my record,” Nenshi said.

Midfield Trailer Park decision contrasted with housing affordability crisis

Leadership candidate Sarah Hoffman, who has made affordable housing a major component of her bid for leadership, brought up the 2014 City of Calgary decision to evict residents of the Midfield Trailer Park.

“I’ve mentioned housing is one of the biggest crises here in Calgary and there were 170 affordable housing homes in Midfield Park and I need to know from Naheed why you closed that park? Why you evicted those folks? I’ve talked to many of them and they are still paying their mortgages, and many of them experienced homelessness,” she said.

The response from Nenshi during the debate was a pushback against Hoffman’s assertions about the park.

“I don’t know if you ever went there. I don’t know if you ever saw those so-called affordable homes, I’m sure you didn’t, but the decision was a hard one. It was an incredibly difficult one,” Nenshi said.

“We ensured that every single tenant who was there had the opportunity to move into a Calgary Housing Home with priority, and every single one of them who needed to be rehoused in a better place, got that better place.”

At the time of the decision to evict residents in 2014, the City of Calgary said that aging infrastructure installed in 1968 made it cost prohibitive to maintain the Midfield Trailer Park.

A decision by the original developer to place water and sewage infrastructure under the mobile home pads, as opposed to placing it in the streets next to the pads, meant that the cost estimated to repair water works for the site was in excess of $20 million.

Residents who fought eviction from the park lost a court battle against the City of Calgary in December of 2017, after courts upheld that the city did not violate residents’ Charter rights.

“I was really hoping that we’d hear an apology today. I’m going to be very frank, I’m going to start with that: anyone who wants to lead our party, I think should own the decisions they made in the past,” said Hoffman after the debate.

“I didn’t think somebody who identified as a New Democrat would justify taking people out of their homes, and not take ownership for that and apologize. I will say that it doesn’t matter if you’re being offered cheaper rent if you’re still paying a mortgage for a home you don’t even get to live in anymore.”

Nenshi said after the debate, that it was totally right for his record in office to be questioned by Hoffman.

“It’s absolutely right to ask me questions, because I’ve got a very long record in public office now is very public, thanks to a lot of you. People know this story, and you know, it was a bit weird to talk about Midfield Heights, which has been very, very well litigated.”

“It’s sort of it feels a bit grasping, right? To go and look for these things. But in reality, it’s absolutely legit to talk to me about my record. I don’t take offence at it at all.”

Reverse course on UCP decisions towards municipalities

Although the afternoon focused on broad issues over Calgary-specific ones—or the direct discussion of Calgary—one of those issues that all of the leadership candidates did agree on during the debate was that the Alberta Government needed to take a different approach to municipalities.

McGowan spoke to the need to make greater investments in municipalities, as part of an overall program to invest in workers to build Alberta’s economy.

“We can reduce municipal taxes by actually supporting our municipalities with adequate infrastructure spending from the province so they don’t have to increase the tax.”

Calahoo Stonehouse, in short remarks, called Bills 18 and 20 “terrifying” for municipalities.

Nenshi speaking to those bills, claimed that municipalities have seen unprecedented attacks from the UCP, and promised significant legislative change in favour of municipalities.

“What this provincial government has done is so out of sync with what Albertans need, that if God willing, I am elected premier now in the fall of 2027, Bill 1 will be repealing all,” he said.

“I will be looking for things that this government has done that we might want to keep.”