Grande Prairie voters will hit the polls on October 20th for the 2025 municipal election, and city administrators are hard at work to ensure the process is as seamless as possible.
City Manager Shane Bourke says while the election does require his staff to prepare for some extra work, city services will be maintained, and administration is well equipped to handle regular service levels before, during, and after the election.
“ We consider this part of the four-year cycle in that the new council sets strategic plans for the four years, and I review that every year, but also, they set budgets every year, and we have a rolling four-year budget,” he says. “For us, the business of the city continues, even through the election period, this council has set their strategic plans and approved a budget for this year, and it’s now up to administration to deliver on that, so that work continues, the roads will still get plowed, and the parks will get mowed.”
The city has already appointed numerous officials to help run the election, including Director of Executive and Legislative Services Kim Pinnock, who will soon occupy the role of Returning Officer for this year’s election.
Bourke maintains that election staff like Pinnock serve a critical role, along with the rest of city administration, to ensure the election runs smoothly. He says administration has already been working on orientations for new candidates to make sure they understand what the job of city councillor entails.
“ I’ve worked in a few municipalities, administration’s job is to run the election process and make sure that goes smoothly, working on orientation for the new council, and setting up the processes for them to set those new priorities, so for us, this comes back to the four-year cycle of work that we know is coming,” he says. “ It’s helping the new council understand how the city operates, but then also how they set priorities, and that’s a big focus of post-election for us for sure.”
“ We learn every time we do it and different councils need different information.”
The City Manager adds that this year, administration is committed to providing candidates with several pre-election resources.
“This year, we are committed to doing some pre-election orientation, things like- what does this job entail, we want candidates that are coming forward to have a full understanding of what the job is and how the city operates,” he says.
When it’s all said and done, and candidates become councillors, Bourke says the focus shifts heavily to get candidates up to speed regarding their responsibilities as city councillors through programming like information sessions.
“ Post-election, it is a requirement by the province that orientation sessions are mandatory for those that have been elected, so we have some certain criteria on what we have to provide in the basic administration pieces,” he says. “Then it’ll be budget, so we still have to set our budget by the end of the year, so it’s a fairly tight timeline going from election, some orientation, and then council goes right into budget.”
As Bourke indicates, the new council will still be tasked with setting a budget for the next year; however, he suggests the “strategic planning” side of things typically gets started in the new year.
“Traditionally, we’ve done more strategic planning with the new council early in the new year following an election, so usually January is when they start to set their four-year priorities for administration,” he says. “Our hope is that they can get an understanding of the complexity of our organization, like I said, we have over 300 services and have a little over 1,000 people, depending on the time of the year, working for the great city of Grande Prairie.”
The municipal election is set for October 20th of this year, and residents can find candidate information online on the city’s website.
