Positions are already being staked as the new Calgary city council has a short time to prepare for one of its biggest annual tasks: The City of Calgary budget.
Fresh off their Oct. 20 election, Calgary’s largely new city council will have to get up to speed on at least the 140-page plain-language version of the preliminary 2026 budget before it comes to city council for debate on Nov. 24. There are dozens more documents and conversations if freshly minted councillors want to go into the discussion with a solid foundation.
According to city budget documents, the period between the election and budget deliberations will be used to get councillors up to speed.
As it stands, Calgary residential property owners will see a 5.4 per cent property tax increase and non-residential property owners will bear 1.3 per cent, for a combined property tax increase of 3.6 per cent.
A slight majority of the respondents to LWC’s 2025 candidate survey suggested a property tax approach that fluctuated year-to-year based on needs. Two of the elected councillors, Ward 12’s Mike Jamieson and Ward 13’s Dan McLean, wanted a property tax cut, while others suggested inflation-only increases.
Mayor Jeromy Farkas responded that his property tax position was that it should fluctuate year-to-year based on need. When asked on Wednesday after his swearing-in, Farkas said that they’ll bring “sharpened pencils” for this upcoming budget.
“We’re going to be coming into that with some sharpened pencils, as well as some greater advocacy for some of the needs that we heard during the election,” he told reporters.
“Then the real work really begins in terms of addressing some of the challenges around, say, blanket rezoning, around housing affordability, around the budget going forward.”
Budget almost fully baked: Coun. Chabot
Long-time Ward 10 Coun. Andre Chabot, who was part of the last council that participated in discussions around the current budget, said there may only be room for tweaks in this budget.
“We simplified (the budget) to make it easier for the general public to understand, and also to make it less complicated for members of council to understand, but more often than not, the devil’s in the details,” he said.
“In order to be able to dig deeper into the specifics of any particular line item takes a lot of time, and I don’t know that we necessarily have that much time in this particular budget cycle.”
Chabot said there likely wouldn’t be a wholesale change in this budget. However, the next four-year budget, which they’ll build over the next 12 months, will be where bigger shifts might happen.
“The next 12 months will be that opportunity to dig deep into the budget, to look at what we can do from a more strategic and long-term planning perspective,” he said.
“Right now is not the time to try and make over the entire budget, because it’s pretty much fully baked.”
Mayor Farkas said that changes to this year’s budget will be part of the upcoming discussion. The new mayor also said he wants to hear from Calgarians during public submissions to ensure that their voices are reflected in this year’s budget.
He understood that it’s more difficult to make fundamental changes in Calgary’s 2026 budget.
“With a year four of a four-year process, there’s less ability to make changes than a completely new process that starts next year,” Mayor Farkas said.
“But we’re not going to wait. We’re going to get it done. We’re going to advocate for residents, and we’re going to make sure that the spending is reasonable, that the tax burden is reasonable, and that Calgarians see movement on those important files around housing, around affordability, public safety.”
