Wildrose assigns CPS veteran to take down Prentice in byelection

It’s a battle of experience vs. youth in the Calgary-Foothills byelection, as the Wildrose Party introduced their candidate for the riding who will go up against Alberta Premier Jim Prentice on Oct. 27.

Joined by caucus members and supporters at the Edgemont Community Association Tuesday morning, Wildrose Leader Danielle Smith introduced Kathy Macdonald, a 25-year-veteran of the Calgary Police Service to run in the riding.

Macdonald is a fresh face to the political scene, having never run for public office before and she was candid in her feelings about the difficult task ahead of her.

“I know what I’m up against, I know this fight will not be easy,” she said, adding the PCs have represented the riding since she moved to northwest Calgary back in 1971. “On top of that I’m taking on the premier, but I’ve never been afraid of a challenge.”

“I am not a seasoned career politician, however, I have 25 years of community and public service, and I think those skills translate very well into public office,” she said.

Macdonald said she has seen the increase in classroom sizes first-hand with her husband as a teacher and touching on her career, she wants more focus and resources on cyber-bullying and protection of children online.

She also brought up her personal life to address health care.

“Coincidentally, today would’ve been my mother’s 90th birthday, I experienced first-hand our broken health care system in taking care of her in later years,” she said.

Smith said there had been consideration for several candidates – as well as in Calgary-West – but Macdonald’s resume speaks for itself.

“I don’t think that the only way to get public service is to be elected,” Smith said, adding her candidates don’t want to be career politicians. “They want to get in there and they want to fix a few things and then get back out into the private sector and I would say that Kathy is very much along the lines of the kind of candidates that we’re going to continue to recruit.”

Smith also addressed the party’s goals for the four byelections.

“The story will be if the PCs lose any of them quite frankly, because these are four ridings that have historically gone nothing but PC, I would say that Albertans have a huge opportunity to send a PCs a message,” she said. “We’re going to be fighting them to win them, but we are under no illusions that these are PC strongholds.”

“If he (Prentice) loses a single one of them, I would say that that is actually a judgment of his leadership.”

Other candidates in Calgary-Foothills include Jennifer Burgess for the NDP, a strategist at a Fortune 100 consulting firm and Michelle Glavine for the Alberta Party, a local teacher and ATA representative.

The Green Party has put forward environmental education specialist Polly Knowlton Cockett and the Liberal Party hasn’t nominated a candidate yet.

The Wildrose will reveal its candidate for Calgary-West Wednesday afternoon at 2:30 p.m.

Top Stories

Top Stories

Most Watched Today