More than one bombshell was dropped at the Jan. 28 Calgary city council meeting, but all were connected to Calgary’s multi-billion-dollar Green Line project.
Ward 3 Coun. Jasmine Mian, first elected in city council’s 2021 overhaul, told councillors during the Green Line debate that she would be deboarding from council after this term, largely based on how this project has unfolded. Calgary’s municipal election is scheduled for Oct. 20, 2025.
In an interview Wednesday with LWC, Mian said that her decision not to run for re-election didn’t come down to that single vote on the province’s revised alignment. It was, however, a reflection of her experience with the project during her time on council.
She said seeing the project devolve from a city-building exercise to a “political football” for a fight between the UCP and former Calgary mayor, now Alberta NDP leader Naheed Nenshi, and then being backed into a corner on a downtown alignment that was at five per cent design and the city holding all the risk on cost overruns was “an untenable place for me to be as a governor.”
“I just actually can’t justify saying yes to the project, other than you just don’t want to see the product die. That just really was the final nail in the coffin of what is a difficult job,” Mian said.
“But really, I just cannot continue to do this job when I feel that the decisions that we’re making are purely political in nature and that the world of governance is completely taking the back seat.”
Mian was elected among a group of young Calgary councillors back in 2021. She won handily over second-place candidate Brent Trenholm in an eight-candidate race in Ward 3.
It was her first term on Calgary city council in a ward that was vacated by Jyoti Gondek, who was elected mayor.
Concurrent crises a challenge amid populism, Mian said
One of the biggest challenges facing Calgary city council is the need to provide good answers to citizens on big issues like climate, affordability and housing, where there’s a need for real facts and real things.
“There’s just this real tendency for council and for politics in general, to just divulge into… emotional things and for populism to take over and for people to grandstand,” she said.
“It’s just really exhausting when you’re someone who wants to get things done and feels like you’re constantly fighting an uphill battle.”
She said she wants to be surrounded by other great leaders all growing in the same direction. There are a lot of headwinds in that regard, Mian said. There’s negativity.
“There isn’t that much upside to doing it and I think the downside of doing it increasingly goes up,” she said.
“I’m not sure that being a thoughtful, deliberative leader as much as is needed is really something that is valued as much as it ought to be. So, I’m just going to take those skills elsewhere.”
With that said, Mian said she’s incredibly proud of what’s been accomplished in spite of the barriers. She notes the zoning reform, the tax shift, free transit for kids under 12, affordable housing investments as citywide wins.
Mian said she also cherishes the ward accomplishments like the Nose Creek Park Strategy, the Sandstone MacEwan rink project and a record number of traffic safety improvements.
“You can absolutely make a change. But I think you have to know what you want to do. You kind of have to come in and execute it and then get out. You’re here for a good time, not a long time,” she said.
“I think as the leadership challenges continue to mount in any level of government, people are likely going to be in for shorter periods of time.”
Exceptional public service in Calgary
Looking back, Mian shares some of the same sentiment as fellow councillor Evan Spencer who also announced he would not seek re-election after only one term in office.
Fresh off a 2021 election victory, Mian envisioned bringing people together to build bridges and to collaborate.
“That’s really difficult to do in politics, and there’s a lot of incentives for people not to work together, for people to fight,” she said.
“If you have that perspective of wanting to bridge gaps and bring people together, you can really get burnt out. I think that that is something that I faced.”
Mian said the one thing that stands out to her in four years in office is how dedicated the civil service is in Calgary. She holds tremendous respect for the thousands of people who make the city operate on a daily basis.
“Things are not perfect, but I don’t think that the city is heading in the wrong direction, or that democracy is going to hell and a handbasket the way that all the headlines seem to suggest these days,” Mian said.
“I am leaving with a lot of confidence in our civil service. The systems and institutions that people are often trying to tear down, I think, are robust and, generally speaking, doing their job.”
Mian said there’s a need for the next representative to continue advocacy for transit improvements in the north, along with more amenities — including green spaces — that are needed for the Ward 3 communities to welcome more residents.
Someone also needs to continue advocacy for the Multisport Fieldhouse. That’s one disappointment she said she has – that they weren’t able to get other funding partners to commit, and shovels in the ground on the much-needed project. It wasn’t for a lack of effort, she said.
She said she’ll miss the job when things wrap up later this summer. The variety, the people you get to meet and even speaking to people in public were exciting, she said.
“I don’t think that there’s a job in the city that gives you such a unique snapshot into everything that’s happening, because you get to deal with business owners, you get to engage with nonprofits, sport and recreation folks like, it’s just such a unique job, and it really will be a highlight of my life,” Mian said.
Mian said she wouldn’t rule out a return to politics sometime in the future, perhaps at the municipal level, maybe provincial or federal.
