Central Peace--Notley MLA Todd Loewen (Photo: Todd Loewen / Fscebook)

By Abby Zieverink

Provincial Police Referendum

Loewen calls on Kenney to give impacted Albertans final say on provincial police force

Aug 11, 2021 | 8:06 AM

Central Peace-Notley MLA Todd Loewen is hoping Alberta Premier Jason Kenney will limit any referendum on potentially creating a provincial police force to only those residents living in municipalities who are currently served by the RCMP.

“I think it only makes sense that the people that are affected are the ones that should be the ones making the decision or having their input on it,” said Loewen, referring to the fact that cities like Calgary, Edmonton, Lethbridge and Medicine Hat are served by their own municipal police services..

“Obviously, there are many municipalities that don’t have RCMP, and they’ve already had that opportunity to have that decision. Now, it’s time for the rest of Alberta to have that same opportunity.”

Loewen says after recommendations from the Alberta Fair Deal Panel that the RCMP should be replaced with a provincial police force, he says he is disappointed Kenney did not include the topic among other referendum items on the October municipal ballot.

“Jason Kenney had promised that it would come on this fall, so I think the next opportunity would possibly be at the next provincial election, but maybe something can happen before that.”

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Kenney said back in July that the reason for leaving the topic of a provincial police service off the October ballot was that more time was needed to conduct a complete analysis of creating the potential service.

Loewen suggests that while he is glad to see them closely combing through all the details, he thinks the government has already shown its hand.

“The Premier already said if we went to a provincial police force, there would be no increase in cost, so the government has been doing that analysis already, so I presume they have that information now.”

Related: Madu says no Alberta police force if it means a tax increase

Loewen adds he believes residents in rural areas and smaller communities can determine their own policing priorities, suggesting he agrees with a provincial police force.

“I think there’s a lot of Albertans that would like to see a provincial police force and have their issues dealt with on a provincial basis, and I think that would be really interesting to see the input from Albertans on that.”

However, he knows many communities want to keep the RCMP, which is why he believes a referendum vote would allow Albertans in municipalities with RCMP could express their opinions.

“I think Albertans can make that decision in a referendum vote then they can have their choice to put forward whether they want to have provincial police or not.”

Kenney was asked about the possibility of limiting a referendum to only those communities served by the RCMP back in July.

He says the Referendum Act does give the province the power to hold referenda in specific regions

“So, one possibility, no final decision has been made on this, would be to only invite Albertans who are policed by the RCMP, and who would be directly affected by this to vote on it.”

Provincial referendum topics that will be on the municipal election ballot on October 18 include whether or not to eliminate seasonal time change in Alberta, as well as the topic of equalization.

READ MORE: Ending seasonal time change among provincial referendum topics added to municipal election ballot