Beer Review: Folding Mountain Kolsch

Recently, I visited Avenida's "Collective Beer Market" along Macleod Trail here in Calgary. They are a special liquor store, with a twenty tap rotating growler station and a huge selection of craft beer from around North America. Since the Craft Beer Revolution took off in Alberta in 2014-2015, the province has seen an explosion not just in the number of breweries, but in the variety of beer as well, and that store is perhaps the best way of experiencing what Alberta has to offer today.

In spite of the size and scope of the Alberta beer scene, there was a lack of beers in the category of Kolschs, Pilsners and Lagers, as they require too much time to brew properly. Only in the last year or so have Alberta breweries expanded out of ales and stouts to these brews, with some exceptional offerings from Fahr or even Grizzly Paw.

As it's summer time, a nice kolsch sounded great, and Folding Mountain, of Hinton, Alberta, has a good reputation, so I gave this one a chance. The beer has a great smell, but doesn't present like a standard kolsch, being cloudy like an NEIPA. It also has more "kick" than one might expect. However, it remains a pleasant tasting, smooth beer with a nice finish.

Rating: 4 out of 5
Would recommend to Kolsch fans. Would have again.

Lots of Hats but no Cattle: the UCP unveils its Transformative Plan!

Yesterday, the United Conservative Party, led today by Jason Kenney and Finance Minister Travis Toews, provided the province with an economic update and unveiled their plan for relaunching the Alberta economy. What I saw was reminiscent of Jim Prentice’s update, delivered following a crash in the price of oil and subsequent recession in late 2014. Once more we had “Alberta Shock and Awe,” delivered by a Conservative premier to his heretofore fans and supporters. They claimed 330,000 unemployed in a province of just over four million people. The Finance Minister, in a 180 degree turn from the party line, spoke of “good debt” vs. “bad debt.” To complete the announcement, the Premier declared $10B in infrastructure spending to kick start the province’s recovery, among other things.

                The most significant declaration though was that the provincial Corporate Income Tax rate was being lowered immediately from 11% to 8%. This, in conjunction with the infrastructure spending, was claimed to cause the creation or support of a combined 100,000+ jobs. It’s easy to say why it’s significant – it isn’t just an immediate, apparently giant move, but it’s actionable. Of all the things discussed yesterday, this one can and is happening.

                I had the distinct pleasure of not watching the press conference in toto. However, I did skim through the short “plan,” published on alberta.ca. The premier promises that the ideas don’t stem from ideology, a popular refrain of his, but are rooted in good common sense. I suppose that’s half true, in that looking at the details, this transformational plan is nothing new. Common sense at work, I guess. Expectedly, much of the plan isn’t anything at all, being vague, or simply plans to make plans. This deserves some elaboration, but I’d like to focus on the main themes.

The Unemployment Perspective

                330,000 unemployed is a massive number. It warrants an asterisk, though. It needs to be kept in mind that in the first year of the UCP, Alberta lost 50,000 jobs – all while cutting corporate income taxes. Furthermore, during the crisis, the UCP took the unprecedented and unrivalled step of “letting go” of tens of thousands of education assistants and supports – all just to “save” a figure slightly north of $100,000,000 (a cost that was simply uploaded to the Federal government’s CERB, more or less). Of course, to these numbers we can add the dozens of doctors shutting down their practices and moving away, resulting in further losses throughout rural Alberta.

                Next, who is getting work? Notwithstanding the hope that the corporate tax cut will attract a variety of white collar workers back to Calgary (“they’d be negligent not to” – Kenney), this plan at best supports jobs in the construction sector, which, while hard hit by the completion of the build out of the Oil Sands several years ago, was not overly affected by COVID-19. In fact, hiring signs have been up along the Stoney Trail expansions as one example. These are jobs that haven’t been filled, regardless of unemployment, for ages.  Moreover, this money, invested wholly in infrastructure construction and maintenance overwhelmingly helps men, when we know that women have been the sex hardest hit by the pandemic. This isn’t to say that infrastructure spending is unimportant – it’s very important – but this move clearly ignores the biggest group of victims from the pandemic. It certainly raises eyebrows what influence the 15 women UCP MLAs have had on their overwhelmingly male caucus.

The Capital Spending that Wasn’t

                The UCP declared they were spending $10B on infrastructure, a move, which in their words, was the biggest investment in Alberta history. This is false on a variety of levels – private investment in the Oil Sands was far greater, often for individual projects. Government infrastructure investments under Manning or Lougheed, adjusting for inflation, were no doubt greater. Lastly, and more embarrassingly, it falls billions of dollars short of what the Trudeau Ministry in Ottawa has provided just for the Transmountain Pipeline, no less their direct aid to Alberta municipalities.

                Infrastructure is an incredibly important asset to have in any society. Sanitation systems reduce the incidence of death and disease. Power systems make everything move faster, more reliably and safely. Transportation systems enable the more efficient movement of people and cargo. All of these make society richer while lowering the costs of living and business. There are few places in the world where this investment is as essential as Canada, a nation with great expanse and few people; great resources but great barriers to extraction, such as the climate and geology. Within Canada, there are few places as poorly situated as Alberta, which is effectively an island of rich people separated from civilization by 1000 km of mountains, lakes, forests, and bad weather. Look in any direction: the nearest major population centres to Calgary are over a 1000 km away – either west, south, or east. Edmonton is even more isolated. We need connections.

Unfortunately, the Alberta government of the 1990s took the fantastically neo-liberal position that the Private Sector could and would provide the province with the infrastructure it needed. This failure in historical thinking resulted in the notorious infrastructure deficit that afflicts the province to this day as the market failed to deliver them. But I digress; the Klein government, then his successors, may have paid off the provincial debt (how consequential was that), but at the cost of putting much of the province’s infrastructure decades in arrears – all the while the population grew from 2,500,000 in 1991 to an estimated 4,500,000 today, and its needs grew, too.

Now, Jason Kenney, leader of a province that could soon pass British Columbia to become the 3^rd most populous (it already has in terms of GDP), has boldly declared his government will spend $10B on infrastructure. We must always ask, regardless: on what are you spending this money? When are these amounts being spent? Is this an action, a promise, or an intention? The UCP have promised schools, hospitals, roads, long term care facilities. This is good. Now, when? Who can say?

The Relaunch Plan fails regarding these questions quickly and comprehensively. Don’t mind the details – since there aren’t any outside of Alberta’s new public investment hotspot: Peace River. Focus on the numbers. Is this really a new investment of $10B? Apparently not. First, the government already earmarked $7B for infrastructure spending in its catastrophically short-sighted first budget in March (the “oil at $58/barrel” budget), which is consistent with previous NDP budgets. This number is included in the $10B, however, so the response to COVID-19 is reduced to $3B – less than 1% of Alberta’s GDP. That’s not all: also included in that figure is the $1.5B given away to support the passage of the Keystone XL pipeline – money that is likely going to be written off when the Democrats win in the USA in November and finally put that white whale to rest.

If you’ve been following, that leaves the government proudly leading our revival with $1.5B in new infrastructure spending. For perspective, that’s as much as the New Cancer Centre at the Foothills Hospital costs. This amount could build two new “Grande Prairie” hospitals. It could build 2/3 of the Stoney Trail ring road. In fairness, this amount could build, potentially, 50 new high schools modelled after All Saints in Calgary. Or, more fantastically, a single new arena for the Flames in the West Village. As you can understand, this amount of cash, likely representing less than 0.5% of the Alberta economy, in the face of the greatest economic challenge since the 1930s simply isn’t significant or remotely world changing.

Even this paltry amount isn’t even new either. The Alberta government, on April 9^th, announced a $2B investment in infrastructure in response to COVID-19. Is this a separate amount? If it is, why not roll it into the announcement of yesterday? $12B is a larger figure than $10B, and it almost equals what the Federal Liberals have committed to Transmountain. Given that the UCP already included two previous announcements in yesterday’s, why not a third? Oversight? Possibly, but more likely that it is included – the half billion-dollar discrepancy could very well stem from elimination of duplication or redundancies.

As a last – yes – last component of this issue: the Calgary Green Line. The provincial government promised $1.5B in funding for the Green Line, yet issued a letter to the city immediately after the municipal government voted to go forward with it. Basically, the letter threatens to remove that funding. A project whose can has been kicked as long as I’ve lived just might have got its final, Jon Ryan-punt into the red zone. Ottawa save us.

So, is $10B a lot? Yes. Is it needed? Yes. Is it a lot? Maybe. Yet, there remain many questions concerning this plan: when will that money be spent? On what? Is it even $10B? What of the Green Line? Is this $10B the end?

So, we have a big announcement: the biggest infrastructure investment in Alberta history, and none of it is new or anywhere as significant as alleged. It may be more aptly declared the biggest non-event in Alberta history since Aberhart’s recall election. So why include it at all? First, probably because without it, the plan doesn’t look like a plan, but a number on a napkin. Second, because that number on a napkin: corporate tax cuts, is a tired, Hail Mary pass to Toronto, Canada’s business capital.

The Corporate Income Tax Cut

                This is the centre-piece of the whole plan, and it echoes throughout the pages of the short document. As of Canada Day, Alberta’s CIT will be immediately reduced to 8% - 2/3 of the CIT in British Columbia. We aren’t even out of the pandemic yet, but the government’s only real decision in their whole plan was to speed up the pace regarding their planned cuts to big business taxes. It seems a little crazy that with insurance rates increasing, liability growing, uncertainty reigning, a pandemic raging, that any private enterprise would decide to gamble on Alberta, but there goes the UCP. As economist Dr. Andrew Leach has pointed out, this cut isn’t even news to business, who would have been making plans about the 8% CIT since the last election – so their moves or non-moves would already be planned or decided. Really, this smacks of a last desperate attempt by neoliberals to right the sinking ship of their ideology. It has to work, this time, it has to!

                Because, if we remember – it didn’t work from 2019 to 2020. The UCP were in, the NDP were out, the CIT was cut, and yet companies still moved away. 50,000 people were laid off in just that year (granted, many were public service employees), but making Alberta cheaper for the most successful didn’t make anyone want to come here. At the sacrifice of hundreds of millions of dollars every year in revenue – compounding year after year – the UCP have doubled down on this strategy that has failed since its introduction to the world almost half a century ago. Toronto Banks and Vancouver video games companies aren’t going to rush over to fill our empty office space. They probably don’t want to fill office space anywhere, honestly.

Prospects

                In a world economy shackled by fear of the Coronavirus, it’s highly unlikely that the UCP will achieve success in its goals of attracting major businesses to Alberta. This was a failure, after all, before the virus, and was a failure for the previous NDP too. The risks from moving a business are simply too complicated for the foreseeable future, on top of being difficult in the best of cases. At worst, it is simply old-fashioned thinking.

Further, the virus has depressed the value of Alberta’s premier natural resources – oil and gas – in a period where many fossil fuel assets are at risk of becoming stranded. The current temporary collapse in demand for fossil fuels is a taste of what the near-future holds as the world weans itself off traditional oil and gas energy systems for renewable energy. Alberta, which has some of the highest marginal costs for oil extraction in the world, is in no condition to compete in a shrinking market. Ultimately, this means the province loses billions in lost royalties and bad investments, and not just this year, (AIMCO), but in perpetuity. However, in a more immediate sense it is the royalties and their impact on the deficit that will have the greatest effect.

This deficit risk is further compounded by the sacrifice of revenue to cut the CIT permanently. This feeds into a structural Alberta deficit situation that no amount of wage-rollbacks or spending cuts can correct, as much as it may pain Conservatives or the general public to admit. However, we can all look at the Relaunch plan, past UCP habits (mid-year budget changes, by which I mean cuts) and guess that when public service contracts expire at the end of August, the UCP will be seeking grotesque quantities of wage and spending cuts both.

In summary, we can anticipate a milquetoast, if not negative reaction from the private sector (Fitch has already downgraded the province’s credit rating, releasing a re-assessment of the province’s finances less than 24 hours after Kenney spoke). The infrastructure spending, though sounding big, is too small and too shallow to impress investors, no less aid even a small fraction of Alberta’s unemployed under the plan’s own wildest dreams. Lastly, a spiralling deficit situation only ensures that a belligerently and dogmatically anti-labour, anti-public service UCP government attacks Alberta’s already lean public sector in the near future, ensuring the last years of the 30^th Alberta Legislature is punctuated by lots of business-attracting public labour conflict. None of this is transformative in a positive sense.

The premier’s plan is just a big hat and a big blue truck. The cattle have left for BC.

A Trip Into Fantasyland: New Provinces for Canada?

As friends of mine know, to their dismay, I'm a fan of First Past the Post. I know its hardly perfect, but one of the problems it has that we can fix is scale. I don't believe it was ever meant - nor should it mean, an election with hundreds of thousands of voters, or even many more than 100,000. For FPTP to be representative and effective, I think riding sizes need to be as limited in size as possible (by population).

One can further examine the issue, and find that FPTP hides regional differences within provinces. Now that Canadian provinces, in some cases, are the size of small countries, why not encourage more representation, and more regional specialization, but dividing some of the largest ones into new smaller provinces?

As the title implies, it can't possibly work. But, it's fun to think about! To make this at least statistically grounded, I will try to use recent census data to estimate populations for these new provinces. Maybe, some of these proposals sound fun enough even for the government to try. To dream!

To begin, let's look at the more serious side of the exercise. Here's the one I think most likely:

1. The Province of Toronto. No constitutional protections for cities? Worry no more, Toronto. You get to be a city/province. Powers of taxation are yours. Expanded to include the whole inner ring of the Golden Horseshoe, this new province would have a population of 7,826,367 - second only to Quebec. This should translate to a comfortable 78 seats in the House of Commons, and to placate Alberta, given them six of Ontario's senate seats. Voila!

Now, the following are less likely, but could be entertained seriously, beginning with a division of Ontario into further provinces, like this:

2. "Ontario," with a capital at Kingston; follow Yonge Street north to the Ottawa River. The Canadian Shield forms the northern border. Based on the last census populations of Central and Eastern Ontario (less the population of Parry Sound District), this new province would have a population of roughly 2,950,000. That's 29 seats in the House of Commons, and let's say six senate seats.

3. "Huronia," with its capital at London; follow Yonge Street south to the St. Clair River. This roughly corresponds to the current region of Southwestern Ontario, which had a population of 2,583,544 in the last census. Here we would have 25 seats for the House of Commons, and six more senate seats, though, this comes with a realization that we've already blown through Old Ontario's total of 121 seats. Under-representation is bad, in my view, so let's start making more!

4. Northern Ontario, "Keewatin," with a capital at Sault Ste Marie. This is obviously the most possible of the three, being grounded in historical and curling experience. Without the district of Muskoka, it would have a population of 720,000. It would likely have French as an official language, and possibly Cree and Ojibwe. They would have 7-8 seats (special districts!) in the House, and the remaining six seats from Old Ontario's senate region.

We continue our journey of the imagination into more politically unlikely, but geographically sensible territory. After all, why base our new borders around old, arbitrary political decisions? Why not let geography decide?

5. "Keewatin:" a union of northern Manitoba and northwestern Ontario (west of Lake Nipigon). Manitoba census division 19 awkwardly crosses Lake Winnipeg, but to include it, and divisions 21, 22, and 23, plus Ontario's Northwestern region, would create a province with roughly 320,000 people. English would be the dominant language, while Cree and Ojibwe would be significant enough to demand equal recognition. Thunder Bay would make for the most obvious capital, though Kenora would be more central.

6. "James:" a union of northeast Ontario and northwest Quebec (Abitibi-Temiscamingue). This would be a trilingual province with English, French and Cree recognition. The population of the region of Northeastern Ontario was 443,000 (less Muskoka District) in the last census, while the Quebec region of Abitibi-Temiscamingue had 146,717 inhabitants. I can't say how many people might be in adjacent lands worth including, but you'd likely get a province with 600,000 people - just more than Newfoundland.

7. "Peace:" a union of Northwestern Alberta with Northeastern BC. Census data for the BC regions of Peace River and Northern Rockies give a combined population of 68,000, while the Alberta census divisions 17, 18, and 19 have a population of 196,000, for a combined population over 260,000. It would have an economy based around farming, forestry and oil and gas, and seemingly already possesses a lot of cultural similarity.

8. Vancouver Island: once its own colony, Vancouver Island is a politically distinct, geographically separate part of British Columbia. Currently it has a population of 870,000, which is fast growing.

9. Interior British Columbia: what if you decided to make a province out of the parts of BC that lie between the Rockies and the Coastal Range? You would have a culturally and politically similar province with a population over a million. You could give Vancouver to Vancouver Island, say. 


Now, our journey isn't over. Last we will visit things that make sense but are politically impossible for one reason or another...

- Nunavik: a separate Territory for the Inuit of Quebec. The region, Nord-du-Quebec, has a population of roughly 45,000. Would probably have French, Inuktitut, and Cree official languages. Quebec would never dream of giving up the majority of its land mass and hydro power, however.

- Labrador: a separate Territory from Newfoundland. They would never countenance losing it and the hydro revenue. It would have a population of roughly 30,000, and would likely have Innu and Inuit, in addition to English, as recognized languages. To unite the Innu in a single territory, one could extend Labrador south to include the Quebec counties of Minganie-Le Golfe St Laurent and Sept-Rivieries-Caniapiscau, which would create a territory with 80,000 people - just smaller than PEI when it joined Canada as a province in 1873.

This concludes my trip into possible provinces. Maybe some of them make more sense than one would think. If so, leave me a comment.

A Dream of Sports

Though this is normally a politics blog, I have decided to release you ever so temporarily from your torment and suffering to indulge another passion of mine - thinking about Canadian Sports! Oh bliss! Oh sweet release!

Those of you who know me personally know I'm a Canadian sports fan. The CFL is my favourite league to watch, and in my life, I've enjoyed the success of Canadian teams and athletes in other sports. I have been especially struck by patriotism when Canadians have decided to start their own sports leagues. The first I can recall was the Canadian Baseball League, which, for one of my teenage years, flashed in and out of being, folding before the finish of its first and only season.

More inspiring has been the recent success of the Canadian Premier League. To my regret, I have been unable to attend a match yet, but I look forward to walking down 194th to the stadium at Spruce Meadows when the league plays again. If, the league plays again.

In this post, I would like to discuss the obstacles to the success of Canadian leagues, and how, I think, they can over come them.

To me, the biggest issue in Canada is our geography. Our major centres are separated by hundreds of miles - each - and the cost of travel between them is incredibly expensive. However, to be a "national" sport (and taken seriously), one needs a presence spread across multiple time zones. Otherwise, you are regional, or provincial - not to be taken seriously by the national media - and all media is "national." So, we had the example of the Canadian Baseball League, which had eight teams in five provinces, three time zones, two languages, and, technically, separated by an ocean (fine - it's just the Salish Sea, or as they called it back then, the Strait of Georgia).

Due to the presence of established ball clubs in Vancouver, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Toronto, and Quebec City, the CBL's premiere franchise cities were in Montreal and Calgary. All other CBL cities had populations below 400,000 - sometimes 200,000. To make matters worse, the Montreal franchise was never able to actually play in Montreal, instead spending its half-season in Sherbrooke. In theory, there is no problem with the selection of cities the league found itself in. They were all reasonably sized, regional centres with airports and a history of baseball fandom. However, the league couldn't attract sponsors, viewers, or fans, and collapsed after only a few dozen games.

For more info on this, here's an article from the Tyee: https://thetyee.ca/News/2004/04/05/Empty_Field_of_Dreams/

Anyway, one of the cardinal sins of the CBL was its ignorance of Canada's fundamental geographic problem: you need big money to overcome our great distances. The CBL had money, but nowhere near enough to cover business and baseball. It was the marquee Canadian business flop until Target. The Canadian Premier League, seemingly, has money, and is decentralized enough so that losses aren't overwhelming or concentrated.

The CPL has also had success luring "minor" Canadian soccer teams on-side; Edmonton played in a rival league, once, and Ottawa disappeared from a rival league, folded, for another club to replace them, and this time in the CPL. Their ambitions have been both higher and humbler, too. The CPL knows it can't bring Vancouver, Toronto or Montreal onside (yet), but its choice of host cities has been a top-notch complement to the MLS clubs. Further, they didn't go overboard with their choice of cities - though Halifax is distant, it is by a major airport, and all of its rival club cities are major regional hubs. Further, the Halifax club has been a raging (business) success.

Further, soccer teams are relatively cheap in terms of roster size, support staff, and equipment relative to many other sports. Hopefully, this will help ensure their long term success. Another element to this success will be further expansion - not just to promote the league in more cities, but to reduce travel costs between games, as well. The Canadian Junior Hockey Leagues function as well as they do thanks to: low salaries; long season; and low travel cost from short distances. Any successful Canadian league will have to have some combination of those three to make it.

So, on to the next indulgence: expansion discussion!

Here's how an expanded CPL could look to take advantage of geographic density. This could apply to start-up leagues in sports like Rugby, baseball, or just about anything else. You want geographic proximity and density to succeed. They give you a fanbase, and they give you rivalries. The CBL, for all its hype, lacked any natural rivalries. The following combination of cities or divisions may provide it. As a last note, which Soccer purists may hate, but relegation is an expense Canada simply cannot afford. Anyway:

Atlantic Division
This region is densely populated, but the most rural region of Canada. There aren't many cities that possess the combination of a large population, good demographic and economic prospects, or transportation connections. That leaves us with the following conclusion, that a professional league could have four teams in the following cities:
1. Halifax: the region's largest city and most important centre. It's growth is cancelling out the decline of the rural parts of the province, and may soon feature half the provincial population (undoubtedly, it is already home to the majority of the provincial economy).
2. Moncton: third largest regional city; fast growing centre of the Acadian population and New Brunswick's most significant city. Connected by land to Halifax and Saint John, and features a great, new stadium.
3. Saint John: largest centre of southern New Brunswick, and fourth largest in the region. It has been stagnating for some decades, but remains the business capital of the province.
4. St. John's, NFLD: second largest city in the region, and fast growing. Already about half the provincial population is within its CMA. Also, St. John's is fairly wealthy and home to a shocking amount of large, successful businesses. It's main issue is that it is expensive to fly to, though, and the ferry is long and expensive. Historically, teams in Newfoundland (hockey, especially), have had tonnes of support and still flopped, though the ongoing success of their Rugby team, the Rock, should inspire.

The relative "weakness" of other Atlantic cities, in terms of population stagnation/decline, size, economic power, and geographic isolation, mean there are few opportunities for feeder clubs in the region. However, should a league be a success, Prince Edward Island, Fredericton, King's County (NS), and Cape Breton may make sense as feeder club locations.

Quebec Division - East
Quebec is a large province, but its population is large and concentrated along the St. Lawrence River. This concentration has allowed the province to enjoy excellent, road, rail and air links - and all within a few hours drive from one end to the other. Further, the population is large enough that there remain numerous population centres, each with local identities, that are large enough to support teams outside of Montreal. This could allow for two competitive divisions operating in the lower end of Lower Canada, and another around Montreal. Let's look east, first.

1. Quebec City: second largest city, fast growing in population and economic power. There's a void the Nordiques left that needs filling.
2. Saguenay: though stagnant for the last few decades, it remains a major regional centre. Also, investments in hydro, natural resources and aluminum should keep the area viable for time to come.
3. Sherbrooke: the largest city in the Estrie region, it's a hub of over 200,000.
4. Trois Rivieres: also relatively stagnant, but still a major hub. Proximity to Quebec City and Montreal is an incredibly strong asset. During the last federal election, local politicians desired a high speed rail link to connect them to those centres. If Spain is an indication, such a link would dramatically revitalize the city and ensure its long-term prosperity.

Quebec Division - West
1. Blainville: representing the North Shore communities around Montreal
2. Laval: technically Quebec's third largest city, it is well connected to the rest of the province and has a good local identity.
3. Longueuil: represent the population of the region to the south of Montreal. 
4. Gatineau: large, growing, and would make for an awesome rivalry with Ottawa.

Ontario
Southern Ontario is Canada's economic and population heartland. It is densely populated and old. In the Canadian Premier League, there are three clubs: Hamilton, York and Ottawa, which is similar geographically to the CFL which has clubs is roughly the same locations. Even the NHL has considered teams in those three cities (substitute York for Toronto) or has, historically. Growth spilling out from Toronto, plus the development of the tri-city region means Ontario could host a multitude of clubs in large centres, all in close proximity - a luxury enjoyed in few parts of Canada.

North Division
1. Ottawa: National capital, second largest city in the province.
2. Kingston: relatively stagnant, but still vital.
3. Barrie: fast-growing exurb of Toronto.
4. Sudbury

Centre Division
1. Brampton
2. Missisauga
3. Scarborough
4. York

South Division
1. Hamilton
2. London
3. Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge
4. Niagara

Prairie Division
The Canadian prairies are the largest geographic region that any league will have to face. A drive from Edmonton to Winnipeg is roughly fourteen hours. It's another twelve to either Vancouver (from Edmonton) or Thunder Bay (from Winnipeg). Also, its population is very highly concentrated in the cities of Calgary, Edmonton and Winnipeg (according to Statistics Canada estimates, at least half of the region's population lives in these three cities and their metropolitan areas). Also, there are only five cities with populations above 200,000, meaning expansion possibilities are very limited.

However, the good news is that this area is rich, young, easy to traverse, and its major cities aren't major enough for major league teams outside of the NHL. Plus, ethnic diversity may enable lots of varied sports to thrive.

In a four team divisional set-up, you could have:
1. Calgary: largest city, richest city, and features a great airport and road connections. Sports teams have thrived here for years, with the exception of our ABA teams.
2. Edmonton: second largest and second richest, Edmonton is even better connected overland to all cities in this division. City has passionate sports fans.
3. Saskatoon (Saskatchewan): fourth largest city, but very fast growing, Saskatoon is becoming the metropole the province has always needed.
4. Winnipeg: third largest city, and featuring very stable and reliable economic and population growth, Manitoba's capital is a transport and business hub full of sports fans.

Possible Feeder Cities
1. Calgary = Lethbridge
2. Edmonton = Red Deer
3. Saskatoon = Regina
4. Winnipeg = Brandon/Westman 
I know Thunder Bay is bigger, but it's very isolated, and suffering a long-term economic and population decline. A team there may not survive long, whereas Brandon has a large rural hinterland to support it. 

British Columbia Division
British Columbia is large, with a strong economy and a growing population. It has three major population centres: Vancouver Island, Fraser Valley, and the Okanagan. Due to its mountainous Cordillera, the population density in the centres is very high for Canada, while also having allowed the development of some regional identities. Vancouver itself features teams in most sports leagues, but is only one of 20(?) cities in the Fraser Valley, many of which have different cultures and histories. Keeping with the four team divisional make up from earlier, I would place teams in BC (and outside of Vancouver) in:
1. Abbotsford: the hub of the region east of Vancouver, with a large, growing population and a distinct local culture.
2. Kelowna: centre of the fast-growing interior region of the Okanagan.
3. Surrey: the second city of the Fraser Valley, with a distinct local culture and identity.
4. Victoria: provincial capital and second city, hub of Vancouver Island.

Possible Feeder Cities
1. Abbotsford = Kamloops
2. Kelowna = Prince George
3. Surrey = Richmond
4. Victoria = Nanaimo

In conclusion, you have here the framework for a 32 team, 8 division league set up focusing on Canada's strongest economic, population and cultural centres - all while ignoring the centres of Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal!

It may seem very pie-in-the-sky, but the survival of our junior leagues can attest that this could work. One day...

A Big Week!

My wife and I just had our first child.

She spent the first 40 hours of her life in room 7, Unit 76, of the South Health Campus here in Calgary. We were able to sneak in just a few days before the unit was shut down because of Coronavirus (not that it had it - but that the hospital was being re-rolled).

She had her first drive on the Deerfoot, and her first radio station was 660AM, because "daddy likes the news."

Our baby has had lots of trips up and down Macleod Trail for appointments.

Her first visitor was my father, who watched her from outside the parlour. Her maternal grandma, grandpa, and aunt soon visited. Her aunt had driven all the way from Saskatoon just for the occasion!

Her first trip was a social distancing visit to the same, by the river. Then she got to meet my sister over by the new Costco on the Tsuu-T'ina.

Her first music, aside from some pre-loaded ambient stuff on her bassinet, was country 95.3, but not for very long.

The first show she listened to (rather than watched), was Joe Pera Talks with You. Very calming. Then came the news, which generally isn't.

The first album she listened to, was Manual's "The North Shore: Bliss Out v.2.0." Very calming.

Baby's first explosion was the RV in Legacy yesterday, which she and her mother both slept through. I felt it strong. I thought somebody had hit our house!

When mommy eats beans, baby gets gas. No more beans for mommy.

She is healthy and perfect. We love her so much, and her whole family does too.

Obsessing over BC Riding Sizes

Since I discovered the controversy around the last BC Electoral Boundary Commission, I have been obsessing about the consequences for that province when the next Commission convenes in a few years. Certainly, the proverbial S will hit the F. I thought I should really dive deep and quantify the issue, based on Elections BC's public data (from 2011).

The last Commission was forced to leave three regions encompassing seventeen ridings alone when it last issued its report. It was working with census data that gave BC a population of 4.4 million, while its report allowed for the creation of two new ridings to account for growing populations around Vancouver. Dividing the population of 4.4M by 87, one should see an average population per riding of 50,574. According to my understanding of the Canadian Supreme Court's 1991 decision about electoral representation, in special circumstances, a variation of 25% from the average is permissible. This would create a "floor" of 37,931. However, no province declared more ridings "special" than BC did prior to its last redistricting, the aforementioned 17.

Below, I will present the three protected regions, their seventeen seats, populations, and winners in the last BC provincial election. NDP wins will be in italics and bolded, to stand out. Ridings with a population below the 25% threshold set by the Canadian Supreme Court will be marked with an asterisk.

North Region
1. Nechako Lakes*
Population: 27,055
Winner (2017): Liberals (54%)
2. North Coast*
Population: 22,320
Winner (2017): NDP (57%)
3. Peace River North
Population: 39,330
Winner (2017): Liberals (66%)
4. Peace River South*
Population: 26,330
Winner (2017): Liberals (76%)
5. Prince George-Mackenzie
Population: 45,300
Winner (2017): Liberals (57%)
6. Prince George-Valemount
Population: 46,575
Winner (2017): Liberals (58%)
7. Skeena*
Population: 29,570
Winner (2017): Liberals (52%)
8. Stikine*
Population: 20,240
Winner (2017): NDP (52%)

Total Ridings: 8
Total Riding Population: 256,720
Average Riding Population: 32,090
Ridings Below 25% threshold: 5
Ridings Below Provincial Average size: 8/8
Number of Ridings Allowed under Supreme Court (1991): 6.76

Thompson-Cariboo
1. Cariboo-Chilcotin*
Population: 33,140
Winner (2017): Liberals (59%)
2. Cariboo-North*
Population: 29,255
Winner (2017): Liberals (51%)
3. Fraser-Nicola*
Population: 33,630
Winner (2017): Liberals (42%)
4. Kamloops-North Thompson
Population: 52,545
Winner (2017): Liberals (48%)
5. Kamloops-South Thompson
Population: 54,625
Winner (2017): Liberals (56%)

Total Ridings: 5
Total Riding Population: 203,195
Average Riding Population: 40,639
Ridings below 25% threshold: 3
Ridings Below Provincial Average size: 3/5
Number of Ridings Allowed under Supreme Court (1991): 5.35

Kootenays
1. Columbia River-Revelstoke
Population: 31,565
Winner (2017): Liberals (45%)
2. Kootenay East
Population: 39,545
Winner (2017): Liberals (57%)
3. Kootenay West
Population: 41,100
Winner (2017): NDP (60%)
4. Nelson-Creston
Population: 36,600
Winner (2017): NDP (42%)

Total Ridings: 4
Total Riding Population: 148,810
Average Riding Population: 37,202
Ridings below 25% threshold: 2
Ridings Below Provincial Average size: 4/4
Number of Ridings Allowed under Supreme Court (1991): 3.92

With the exception of the two Kamloops ridings, all of the protected ridings fall below the provincial average size. Further, ten of them fall below the 25% threshold. Six of these are even close to or exceed a 50% variation from the average. A variation such as this can be justifiable on the basis of geography - but just this number alone exceeds the number of protected ridings in all other provinces, combined.

Were the BC Electoral Boundaries Commission allowed to make changes based around average riding size, or even maintaining the 25% deviation, these protected regions would lose seats. The North Region could be reduced to as many as seven, or as low as five seats. The geographically smaller region of Thompson-Cariboo could be reduced to four, and the Kootenays to three. Altogether, it would be a reduction in seats of anywhere from one to five.

As the population and representation balance in BC skews ever more towards Vancouver, Victoria and the Okanagan, it seems only the infusion of a great number of seats in those regions could stop the more dramatic reduction of these protected areas.

Looking forward to the 2021 Census

The 2021 census is coming! Oh boy! Our first full census since the last Conservative Prime Minister axed it! Oh joyous!

Here, in this time of Corona, I would like to examine a few questions and possibilities I'm looking forward to being answered - or raised, with the census results next fall.

Starting from East and going West:

1) Can Nova Scotia reach 1,000,000 people?

2) Are the Atlantic Provinces going the way of Manitoba? Based on Statscan estimates, the CMAs of St. John's, NL, Charlottetown, PEI, and Halifax, Nova Scotia are already over 40% of their respective provinces' populations. Will the hit 50% or more? How will this re-balance the distribution of power in those provinces?

3) How big is the decline in the rural population, and why? Are they dying out, or is it out-migration, or a mixture of the two to blame? No Canadian region is as rural as Atlantic Canada - which carries significant cost to business and government. How quickly is it urbanizing?

4) Canada's next-most rural region: Quebec. Is it also urbanizing quicker? Is Quebec City taking more of a share in population growth?

5) Just how big is Ontario? and how big is the golden horseshoe?

6) How big is Winnipeg relative to Manitoba?

7) Is Saskatchewan joining the rest of the west with a more urbanized population?

8) What proportion of Albertans live in Calgary and Edmonton?

9) What proportion of British Columbians live in Vancouver?

10) How many people are now identifying as Metis or First Nations?

Why it Matters

1) Population growth in Atlantic Canada seems, unexpectedly, to be happening. This is a good thing, but through the lens of electoral politics, a bigger population in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick should bring their riding sizes more into the national average. The same is true of Manitoba.

2) Electoral Boundary Redistricting (Federal): the federal government will be obligated to look at Canada's federal electoral boundaries. Given the grandfather clauses which restrict the six smallest provinces from losing seats, and the fact it would be politically impossible to reduce seats in Quebec, I expect Canada will go about adding dozens of seats again. Ontario and Alberta are significantly under-represented, but so is BC, and possibly even Quebec.

Even should Canada stick to the arbitrary 111,166 quotient from the last redistricting, based on current (not next year estimates), we should see:
- BC gaining 4 seats to give a total of 46;
- Alberta gaining 6 seats, to give a total of 40;
- Ontario gaining 10 seats, to give a total of 131; and
- Quebec gaining 0 seats - unless politics intervenes.

So we have a total of twenty new seats - minimum, going all to regions west of the Ottawa River. More than that though - where do those seats go within those provinces? Without checking, I would wager all the BC seats go to the Greater Vancouver area; all the Alberta seats to Edmonton and Calgary; and all the Ontario seats to the Golden Horseshoe. We may see boundary re-alignments in the other provinces to reflect urban growth in the preceding ten years. Winnipeg, for example, has 7.5/14 of Manitoba's seats. It would not be hard to see that increase. The same may be likely in the Atlantic Provinces and Quebec, where the increasing weight of their major cities should cause the consolidation of a number of rural ridings.

My modest proposal: the previous electoral boundaries commission, in my esteem, was much too conservative. Thirty new seats was a significant increase - but was so insufficient to keep up with population growth in the four gaining provinces that it was obsolete before voting started. Why do we have such a random quotient of 111,166 persons to riding? We always discuss riding sizes as being 100,000 people, so why not make that the aiming point for the ridings of the big four provinces (and it should even work for Manitoba, soon, too). Were we to do this, a new Canadian parliament would see:
- BC: nine new seats (42>51);
- Alberta: ten new seats (34>44);
- Ontario: twenty-six new seats (121>147);
- Quebec: seven new seats (78>85);
- For a new Canadian parliament with 390 seats.

This, I would think, would better reflect where the Canadian population lives, is moving to, and is doing business, without reducing the number of rural seats in the parliament. In fact, this could even result in an increase in rural ridings in Alberta, BC and Ontario, which are often joined with large urban areas due to dumping too many people into too few districts. Further, this new parliament would stand the test of time better than a more modest increase. Canada has faster population growth than most developed nations, and it tends to go to the larger provinces. Why not future proof the parliament?

3) Provincial Electoral Boundaries

The 2021 census will lead to provincial boundary re-alignments throughout Canada, and this promises to be controversial!

As parties have become divided, at least in the west, along a rural-urban axis, there will be massive opposition to change, which will be seen as partisan (even though resisting change is partisan, too). Perhaps no province better embodies this possibility than British Columbia.

2021 isn't just the census year, but it's also an election year. The BC electoral boundary commission protected a significant swath of the province from changes following the 2011 census. Accordingly, the governing BC liberals won 13 of the province's smallest 17 ridings. BC even added fewer seats to its legislature than Alberta - two compared to four, to compensate for population growth. As things stand now, urban BC ridings are very large, especially compared to those protected ridings (a spreadsheet is available on elections BC). It is clear the BC NDP needs to win the election to ensure a more equitable seat redistribution. This shouldn't be lethal to the BC Liberals - they did garner the most votes, after all, but they clearly have a lot to lose by losing a rigged system. They could certainly lose big - based on Elections BC data, and Statscan estimates, it's not hard to assume many urban BC ridings are twice the size of the worst protected ridings. BC's next electoral boundary commission may have to add many seats, re-align many, or a combination of both, to accommodate the growing population of the Fraser Valley.

Similar experiences are sure to occur throughout the country. One can only imagine how receptive the Ontario PCs will be to either expanding the Ontario Parliament or sacrificing a number of their rotten burroughs. The same is true of Alberta, where the UCP will undoubtedly be hesitant to lose seats in small-town Alberta, regions that they swept in 2019.