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Photo by Curtis Galbraith.
By Curtis Galbraith
City Hall

Grande Prairie mayor, council sworn in

Oct 28, 2025 | 6:00 AM

Grande Prairie’s new council was sworn in at a ceremony Monday afternoon at the Montrose Cultural Centre.

New Councillor Len Auger says being sworn in is “just the first part.”

“I do know there’s a lot of work. There’s a lot of onboarding. There’s a lot of training that’s got to happen, and then actually just getting to know and working with all the other councillors. I think that’s going to be big.”

Auger says there are several concerns that came up during the campaign and “those need to be addressed.”

“I think most people heard (that) taxes, every year, seem to go up. That seems to be a common theme that I heard, and I think we need to do something about that.”

He says one thing that could be done is reducing costs.

“We’ve got to try and find ways to save money. We need to look at all the different ways and possibilities, and what it’s all being spent on and are there areas where we can control costs better.”

The other new city councillor elected last Monday is Jenna Flach.

“We’ve got a really good council and I’m excited for the next four years, working with Jackie (Clayton) as mayor and my fellow council members. I’ve been getting to know them, and I think we’re going to do a lot of really good things.”

Flach says one thing she would like to do is improve communication and education.

“It’s about engagement and, maybe, finding new ways to talk to people and finding out how they want to be communicated with, having more open conversations, things like that.”

She adds raising taxes is “not something we want to talk about.”

“They talked about (that) the budget (for) 2025 is mostly put together. We’ll get a look at that soon, so I’m excited to look at it and see where we can maybe find some efficiencies, maybe save some money.”

Council held its organizational meeting Monday evening (Oct. 27). Committee appointments and meeting schedules were approved.

Council also approved the nomination of Councillor Dylan Bressey for a vice-president role with Alberta Municipalities..

The first regular meeting for the new council is on November 10.

by Curtis Galbraith