From left to right: Travis Toews (UCP, GP-Wapiti), Shannon Dunfield (NDP, GP-Wapiti), Jason Jones (Alberta Party, GP-Wapiti), Terry Dueck (Independent, GP-Wapiti), Tracy Allard (UCP, Grande Prairie), Grant Berg (Alberta Party, Grande Prairie) Bernard Hancock (Freedom Conservative Party, Grande Prairie), Todd Russell (NDP, Grande Prairie), Ray Robertson (Alberta Independence Party, Grande Prairie)

By Shaun Penner

All-Candidates Forum

All-Candidates Forum gets voters thinking ahead of Provincial Election

Apr 9, 2019 | 11:21 PM

It was a packed house Tuesday night at the Douglas J. Cardinal Performing Arts Centre, as the All-Candidates Forum for the Grande Prairie and GP-Wapiti ridings was held ahead of next Tuesday’s provincial election.

Nine of the ten candidates in both ridings were in attendance (Rony Rajput was not present), and took turns answering a total of 18 questions, which were written by attendees on their way into the theatre. Some of the topics discussed included the new hospital in Grande Prairie, the twinning of Highway 40 and the completion of the Highway 43X by-pass, health care, education and of course, the economy and the energy sector.

The forum was hosted by the Grande Prairie and District Chamber of Commerce and was so heavily attended, that Chamber Chair Dan Wong said the theatre couldn’t hold the amount of people that wanted to attend.

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“I was really excited about the fact that, one, we had so many people attend this event that we had to turn them away,” said Wong. “It’s never great having to turn people away, but… we hit capacity.”

Wong further adds that he believes that the demand and desire to attend an event such as this shows that people in this area are getting more involved in provincial politics and issues.

“It’s great to see that people are really engaged,” said Wong. “I might even say that people are more engaged than I have ever seen them before, on provincial topics.”

Though it was not held as a debate style forum, each candidate was given one minute to answer each question unimpeded. It allowed each candidate to present their platform individually and gave those in attendance plenty to think about ahead of next Tuesday’s election.

“I was just impressed with the calibre of the candidates and I thought that they all had some really good points and made me think about a lot of subjects that I hadn’t thought that much about,” said one lady in attendance.

“I wouldn’t say anybody won and nobody lost. There was some good applause for all the candidates, and everybody had some good points,” explained another attendee.

Advance polls are open from now until Saturday at a number of locations throughout the Peace County. Election day is April 16.

To learn more about each candidate’s platform in the Grande Prairie, GP-Wapiti and Central Peace-Notley ridings, check out EverythingGP’s special 2019 Election page.

The forum, in its entirety, can be seen from the recorded livestream on the Grande Prairie and District Chamber of Commerce’s Facebook page, or as attached below.