Unofficially, the majority of voters in two of Alberta’s 87 electoral divisions favoured option two which would be to commence the process to hold a binding referendum on whether or not to separate from Canada.
All 60 polling stations have reported in for the Central Peace-Notley riding in northwest Alberta and 50.4 per cent of the votes there were in favour of option two by a margin of 100 votes – 6,515 to 6,415.
Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre is now complete as well with all 85 polling stations reporting and voters there were 51.2 per cent in favour of option two by a margin of 615 votes – 12,762 to 12,147.
Overall, counting had been completed by 3pm on Thursday, October 22nd at 98 percent of the polling stations with 75 per cent of the votes province-wide going to option one – for Alberta to stay in Canada. The total is down to 74 polling stations that have not reported yet.
Mountain View County Reeve Angela Aalbers says for them, the most important thing is that the outcome suggests that there may be a limited impact – based on the vote results – to the way that municipalities govern themselves. Aalbers says “so MVC, Mountain View County, will continue to function as we always have and provide the services that we are tasked to deliver under the Municipal Government Act to the best of our ability for our ratepayers.”
Alberta Municipalities President, Dylan Bressey notes that he was impressed by the voter turnout for Monday’s referendum. Elections Alberta says that nearly 20 million votes were cast. According to Bressey, a few things really stick out to him. Bessey says “number one there is a lot of difference of opinion on nine of the questions between rural Alberta and the big cities and I’d suggest that is where local councils become so important. So when you have a government that doesn’t have elected MLAs in every part of the province, you do have local councils that are excited to work with government.”
The official results for all 10 of the referendum questions are slated to be published by Elections Alberta on October 29th.
With files from Thomas Robertson, Vista Radio.
