By Ashley Wiebe

Mayor disappointed with provincial budget

Mar 17, 2017 | 4:45 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB — The mayor of Medicine Hat is disappointed with the NDP’s budget and says that not being able to show clear signs of how to balance the books is frustrating for many Albertans.

“I don’t know how you can run deficits like that,” he said. “How can you run $10 billion deficits year after year?”

It’s a statement that’s not lost on Jim Groom, a political science instructor with Medicine Hat College.

“It definitely is not a balanced budget and there’s no projection to attempt to make a balanced budget out of it and there won’t be for a number of years,” he said. “It’s just not the approach the NDP wants to take.”

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The $10 billion shortfall wasn’t the only thing being criticized.

While major infrastructure projects were announced for Calgary, Edmonton and Red Deer, only $4 million will help the college here and $12 million has been set aside for the hospital this year.

“I don’t even know why there’s extra money for the hospital,” Clugston said. “I mean, we just had a hospital expansion. I don’t know where that money’s going.”

But Groom said the issues around funding may run deeper.

“We do have a little bit of a feud going on between the mayor, perhaps, and the province,” Groom said.

“There’s two schools of thought on this. As a municipal politician, you shut up and take your lumps … or there’s this maybe second school of thought, that I do represent almost 63,000 people,” Clugston said.

The mayor said he’s only fighting for the city’s fair share, including funding for berms.

While money for flood protection hasn’t been doled out yet, Clugston said he’s still hopeful the city will benefit from it.

“There’s nothing in there that we can tell yet,” he said. “However, we are hoping for some more announcements, perhaps later on this month. We do have applications in for funding.”

Groom said the bad blood between the mayor and premier may be a factor in whether the city sees any funding, but he said he doesn’t believe it’s a direct dig at our city.

“I don’t think there’s a real intent to punish the forgotten corner here,” Groom said. “I think it just happens that this is how it’s laying out and we have to look at the demographics and the population.”

“I will take a lot of criticism for speaking out, but I do believe that I shouldn’t be muzzled and I shouldn’t be threatened to, basically, shut up or you don’t get the funding you deserve,” Clugston said.