From Climate Emergency to Water Blunder
You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.
- Henry Ford
Jyoti Gondek became the Mayor of Calgary in November 2021. Upon being elected, she declared a "climate emergency," which had barely registered in her communications and policies during her campaign. The campaign comms had buried the topic on her website.
The price tag for implementing Gondek's climate emergency is a staggering $87 billion. This outlandish plan, titled Calgary Climate Strategy—Pathways to 2050, sets the goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 and promises a greener, more sustainable future for Calgary. You know the spiel! It wants to push a range of initiatives, from transitioning all vehicles to zero-emissions, constructing all new buildings to net-zero standards, and promoting walking, wheeling, and public transit for 60% of all trips (Global News and Common Sense Calgary).
The funding for the contrived emergency would come from various sources, including increased property taxes, franchise fees, municipal climate taxes, and contributions from provincial and federal governments. However, as we know, there is only one taxpayer, so the source is the same. The plan claims that the potentially high costs of inaction, estimating that without their emergency action, Calgary could face annual expenses of $2.6 billion by the 2050s and $7.8 billion by the 2080s due to severe climate events affecting (they like to say impacting) infrastructure, the economy, and health (Common Sense Calgary).
This week, the principal water line that brings 60 percent of the city's water supply in from Bearspaw burst, forcing an emergency message to everyone's telephone that morning (see image below). The water main trunk burst in Calgary caused significant property damage in the affected areas, particularly in the neighbourhoods of Bowness and Montgomery. Millions of gallons of water have been wasted. Reports indicate that parts of 16 Avenue NW were underwater, affecting nearby businesses and residences, including Shouldice Park and several schools, which had to rely on portable toilets and bottled water due to the water shutoff. Residents experienced substantial flooding, which covered baseball diamonds and streets and caused water intrusion in homes and businesses.
The Mayor's reaction, already under the pressure of having faced a recall vote and being the least popular mayor in the city's history, was immediately to blame the governments in Edmonton and Ottawa—all other governments but her own. She could have also blamed Indigenous governments and student governments around the province, but she probably could not think about them at the moment.
In her desire to escape accountability, the mayor forgets that the City and her employees inspected the same water pipeline in April of this year, scarcely two months ago. Neither Smith in Edmonton nor Trudeau in Ottawa had anything to do with what appears to have been a botched inspection. Interestingly, Gondek blamed the other levels of government for not giving her enough money to fix the infrastructure. Still, as the Alberta premier quickly pointed out, Gondek had not requested any funds for infrastructure repairs.
Without breaking a sweat, Gondek dreamed up a "climate emergency" plan costing over $87 billion three years ago. Calgary's total budget for 2024 is $4.9 billion, or less than one-sixteenth of the cost for Gondek's grand climate emergency. That $4.9 billion budget comes with the promise of a 7.8 percent tax raise for Calgarians. This year's service plan budget for water infrastructure is $101.22 million. While I could not find exact figures for Pride Season spending at City Hall, the City sponsors a programme to encourage children to explore…who they are through its libraries. These figures tell the tale of where the mayor's priorities are, and as Stephane Dion famously asked Count Michael Ignatieff in a debate once: "Do you think it's easy to make priorities?" It is not.
However, establishing priorities is at least one of the significant features of being in public life at the head of a city of over a million people. For example, mayors must choose between spending money on water infrastructure or roads, sidewalks and snow clearance. However, international affairs and the planet's fate are not even close to being part of the job description. As Gondek's climate emergency ironically points out, inaction has a significant cost.
In some ways, the main question about water has been exaggerated, and in some ways, City Hall is trying to minimize it. But lots of Calgarians know about building and maintaining pipelines. Put it this way: What would the public and Mayor Gondek say if an energy company's gas line had burst in a Calgary neighbourhood just months after being inspected? One can only guess, but no one would dismiss it as an accident. There would be an expectation of accountability.
The time to ask more questions will come after the water trunkline is repaired, hopefully within a week. Gondek has also called for a thorough investigation into the incident to understand the causes of the water main failure. That includes examining the inspection processes and maintenance protocols that were in place before the burst and identifying any potential lapses or areas for improvement. I am sure Calgarians will also be interested in learning who decided after inspection that repairs for that stretch of pipe could wait and for what reasons. Was it a technical decision, or was it a political decision?
Once the reports are written, it is unlikely anyone would say that looking to solve a nonexistent cosmic crisis while ignoring the necessary and immediate has probably been the greatest oversight.
In the meantime, let's be thankful that City Hall isn't in charge of the energy pipelines in and around Calgary.