Voters in the Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills constituency are going to have a busy year.
On the heels of the recent federal election and ahead of the municipal election this fall, a provincial by-election is now imminent.
Premier Danielle Smith’s government appointed Nathan Cooper on May 7th to be the province’s new senior representative to the United States. It will take effect in June and he will be based in D.C. at the Alberta Washington Office in the U.S. capital. Cooper’s new role is aimed at advocating for Albertans and building relationships south of the border.
Cooper accepted the appointment and explains what will happen now. He says “so I will resign as the MLA for Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills on the 1st of June and that will trigger a vacancy. The Premier has up to six months to call a by-election and there will be a new Member. Whatever way I can support that new Member of the Assembly I look forward to providing and encourage them in advancing the issues and the policies that are important to the good people of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills.”
In the legislature on Wednesday, Cooper announced that his time as the 14th Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta will conclude when he resigns from that role on Monday at midnight and a new Speaker election will be conducted on Tuesday (May 13th) at 10am. His tenure as Speaker began in 2019 and Cooper states that he is leaving as the 8th longest serving one in Alberta’s history.
This month also marks a decade that Cooper has been MLA for this constituency. He says “being the Speaker of the Legislature allowed me to leverage relationships to best represent the constituents of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills. This government in the past six years has been more generous to the constituency of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills than the previous combined 12 years. So we saw a widespread investment all across the constituency from the announcement of a new school in Acme to over $60 million invested into Olds College to hundreds of millions of dollars invested in transportation projects all across the constituency, so I’m proud that the Speaker’s job was able to help me best represent the good people of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills.” Cooper was first elected as an MLA in this riding May of 2015.
