Calgary city council voted to include a criminal record check for candidates in the 2025 municipal election, saying that potential elected officials need to be held to a higher standard.

The item came to Tuesday’s Regular Meeting of Council as an amendment to the recommended approval of the annual Election Bylaw needed to conduct the 2025 municipal vote.

Councillors were informed of changes coming to the 2025 municipal election as a result of the Alberta government’s Bill 20. This included no tabulator voting (now hand counting ballots), no more composite ballots, potential changes to voting hours, criminal record checks and no electors list created by a municipality.

A new bylaw would be brought to Calgary city council for Dec. 17.

Councillors heard that other Alberta municipalities have voted against adding it to their respective election bylaws, and Saskatchewan allows criminal record checks, however, no municipalities have adopted it.

“I’d like to emphasize that it should be noted that the requirement to submit a criminal record check with a candidate’s nomination papers will not delay the ability for a candidate to raise campaign funds or to incur campaign expenses, provided that they have filed a notice of intent to be nominated with elections Calgary,” said returning officer Kate Martin.

Shawn Swinn from the City of Calgary legal department cleared up the potential misconception that an offence appearing on a police criminal check would disqualify a candidate. 

“Having a criminal record check does not disqualify a person from being a candidate,” he told councillors.

Swinn also advised council to be aware of potential privacy concerns, as typically police checks aren’t public information. Approving this makes those potential offences public.

“There may well be a chilling effect that is the consequence of such a requirement,” he said.

“Many people out there do have criminal records for various offences, some major, some were minor. They could have happened many years in the past. I would just offer up for consideration the possibility that such a requirement might dissuade, or otherwise deter people from putting their name forward as a candidate.”

Honesty the best policy: Councillors

Ward 8 Coun. Courtney Walcott said that it’s fair to have a broader conversation about who a candidate is. However, it could impact who wants to step up to run for office. Particularly if they have charges for something like cannabis, which only a few years ago was illegal, but it’s legal today.

“I also think about the ways that all of the different the justice system is over-represented by marginalized populations, and a lot of those charges stem from poverty,” he said.  

“The rate of crime is directly attributable to poverty rates within a community. So, if we’re still allowing people to be suffering in that degree, it’s something I’m very concerned about, that we are at the same time going to use the state that we’ve put people in as a reason for them not being able to take office.”

Ward 3 Coun. Jasmine Mian said that this doesn’t disqualify someone from running for a council position, and increasingly citizens are looking for build better public trust.

“I think honesty is the best policy, and I think there are legitimate concerns, but I think that if you own your past and just talk about it transparently with the public, they appreciate that,” she said.

“I think we might end up being the only municipality that does this, and I think it’s because we’ve had questions in the past about people’s conduct, and people want to have that information. At the end of the day, (citizens) can still vote for that candidate, and they probably will, and but at least that candidate can then actually own that story.”

Ward 12 Coun. Evan Spencer said he understands that this creates complexity for the intake of nominations, and for potential nominees themselves, perhaps dissuading people who may be quality city councillors. This, however, helps the City of Calgary move forward on the question of trust.

“We’re in a time where the reputation of our public institutions is at an all-time low, and gestures such as this and work such as this, I have to believe is part of us repairing that and moving forward on a better foot,” he said.

There was an attempt to add an amendment to make voting hours 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., as was done in 2021 (due to COVID). It would have cost an additional $2 million and admin said it presented recruitment challenges, and they would have to factor in the fatigue of workers.   It did not receive a seconder and failed on the floor.

The revised bylaw will come to the December regular meeting of council.