In 2016, the Advisory Panel on Metro Edmonton’s Future delivered a report entitled Be Ready or Be Left Behind. The panel had been tasked by nine regional mayors with providing advice on what it would take to ensure the metro region had a resilient, globally competitive economy and remained a desirable place to live and do business. After the requsite research and consultation, the panel concluded that, while the nine municipalities each had specific attributes, success would require them to plan and act as one in these key areas: economic development, public transit, land use planning and infrastructure development.
Edmonton Mayor Andrew Knack, who was on city council at the time, recalls the report when he talks about the need for collaboration among the new crop of regional mayors. “The report sent a clear message: it showed everyone in the region that if we are too focused on competing against each other for scraps, we’re missing out on a much larger pie of economic development where we all benefit together,” says Knack. “I don’t want to see that message lost.”
There has long been regional collaboration, with an interest level that has ebbed and flowed. Most recently, the Edmonton Metropolitan Region Board (EMRB) was a regional planner and sounding board for the communities of Parkland County, Spruce Grove, Beaumont, Devon, Edmonton, Fort Saskatchewan, Leduc, Leduc County, Morinville, St. Albert, Stony Plain, Strathcona County and Sturgeon County.
But the province sounded the EMRB’s death knell in November 2024, when it announced that it would stop funding the board and that participation by communities would switch from mandatory to voluntary. By the end of January, St. Albert, Strathcona County and Fort Saskatchewan had left the fold.
Knack has a lot of good things to say about the work of the EMRB, but he says it also came with concerns from some members about voting structures and relative influence. He says any reboot should require partners to talk through their experiences and make the necessary adjustments to ensure as many partners as possible are willing and committed to participation.
Former Minister of Alberta Municipal Affairs Doug Griffiths — now the president and CEO of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce — has long worked on regional economic development, and he stresses the need for collaboration and a unified vision. As a cautionary tale of likely opposition, he tells the story of one session he attended with representatives from two towns and a county. “A guy from the county stood up and said, ‘Doug, I know you say we’re supposed to work together, but we’re not going to work with those people in town. They just want our money for their bike paths and their sidewalks and their swimming pools,’” he says. “Then another guy stood up and looked at him and said, ‘Doesn’t your mom live in town?”’
Most of us in the region care little for borders drawn a century and more ago. We might live in St. Albert, work in Edmonton and want to buy an acreage in Parkland County, and all of us fly out of Edmonton International Airport. Our governments need to recognize that reality while also playing to each community’s strengths. “They have different types of housing; they have different qualities of life; they have different walkability,” Griffiths says. “Every municipality has its distinct value proposition.”
As for provincial support, Griffiths says money will follow a plan. “I’d like to see the metro region collectively come up with a plan and then go to the province and say, ‘You’re going to want to support this,’” he says. “I do believe they will come to the table once we give them the solution.”
This article appears in the March 2026 issue of Edify
