Mayor Naheed Nenshi spoke to members of the Chamber of Commerce on Thursday about the state of business in Calgary and says he remains optimistic despite falling oil prices.

The mayor told the crowd that Calgary is still the best place in Canada to start and grow a business.

“According to fDi Intelligence, Calgary is the second most business friendly city in North America and the third in economic potential. And let’s not forget, that once again this year, the Economist Intelligence Unit, and they know what they’re talking about, ranks Calgary as one of the top five cities in the world in which to live,” said the mayor.

He says that it was clear by the most recent Citizen Satisfaction Survey that the majority of those surveyed said they are proud to be Calgarians and to live and work here.

Nenshi says that no one knows how the price of oil will affect the economy for sure but that we have weathered the storm before.

“Yes we’re a little bit nervous about what’s going forward, about what’s going to happen but I’ll remind all of you that we were also nervous at the end of 2008. And this city and this region, although we certainly had some pain, got through that better than just about anywhere else in the world. And I think that has a lot to do with the confidence and optimism of the people that live here,” he said.

The city recently approved its first ever, four year budget and business plan and the mayor says he was worried that they would not be able to find a plan that reflected what the community needed.

“I was actually worried I wouldn’t be able to get eight votes for any budget and I was thinking about what that meant for us as a community. In fact, in the end it passed 14 to one, which means I spent a lot of time this year worried about nothing or it means we spent a lot of time together as council trying to find out what the community really wanted, what your objectives are, what your needs are, what your hopes and fears and dreams and challenges for our community are, and coming up with something that I think makes a lot of sense.”

He says that Calgarians consistently tell council that they want more and better service and that the city has saved over $135M in inefficiencies over the last three years and that there is $50M more to be saved in the next four years.

“Whether it’s longer hours on transit, or a change to how we do snow removal, or more rec centres or more parks in the city. Calgarians also tell us that they’re proud of having the lowest property taxes of any large city in Canada.”

The mayor says Calgarians can expect to see a number of changes in the community over the next four years including:

  • Start of four-car train service to alleviate congestion in peak hours
  • Introduction of the Green line transit way and seven more rapid transit routes
  • Investment in flood resilience and natural disaster readiness
  • Building new fire stations and a 911 system
  • Hiring new police, fire and bylaw officers
  • Widening McKnight Blvd in the northeast and repairs to three major intersections in the city
  • Phase out stand-alone business tax and create consolidated non-residential property tax
  • Continuation of the Cut Red Tape program

He says Calgary continues to have a labour crunch and that about 200,000 more workers will be needed here by 2020.

“Last year, one in ten jobs in Canada was created in the Calgary region, mostly in the City of Calgary. And issues like changes to the Temporary Foreign Worker program, like poverty, like inequality, like the crisis we’re currently facing in housing, like the increase in cost of living in Calgary, can only exacerbate this problem. And so we as a city and as a community need to take this time and if this time means a short pause in our unrelenting growth then let’s take the opportunity to exhale, to take a deep breath and work together to figure out how to keep building this great city.”

He says the best way to solve the worker shortage problem is for businesses to hire new Canadians and give them the opportunity to set themselves up in that first job without worrying that their skills and qualifications won’t be valued here.

Nenshi says he will continue to be a strong advocate for reforming the program. “Every single one of those persons deserves dignity and they deserve a path to citizenship and the changes to the foreign workers program do the exact opposite. They hurt business and they hurt the temporary foreign workers.”

He says more also needs to be done to employ more aboriginal people in Calgary and Canada.

Nenshi then asked business leaders to take these issues to their human resources departments and to also look at where and how they are purchasing their supplies in order to support investment in local small businesses.

He addressed the issue of inclusiveness and equality and says the discussion over Bill 202 and Bill 10 over the last couple weeks in the legislature does nothing but enforce negative stereotypes.

 “Two weeks ago, a member of the legislative assembly got up and proposed a bill that said, any kid in school can set up a club, and suddenly our provincial legislators, in a time when the price of oil is dropping, in a time where our infrastructure needs are extraordinary, in a time when we have urban and regional issues that we’ve got to get worked on, spent two weeks talking about what club in school a kid can join or not. How ridiculous is that? How additionally ridiculous is it that we know that these clubs help kids stay safe? We know that these clubs prevent suicide, among a group where one third of the kids attempt suicide, and we have the gall to say, we have to balance off your rights, that your right doesn’t include the right to be safe, to have support to prevent you from committing suicide, what kind of a world do we live in here? So thank you very much, to the premier, who is a good guy, for putting the brakes on this thing and putting this thing on pause, because what was happening was dangerous. By saying not all rights are absolute, the government seemed to be saying that we don’t have the right to be safe, that’s not right. That’s not fair,” said Nenshi. “If we say that we live in a city where we were thinking it would be okay for a fifteen year old to appear before a judge to ask the judge if the fifteen year old can start a club in his school, a club that no one will be forced to belong to, well folks that would be the Scopes Monkey Trial of Alberta. We would end up having international attention towards what kind of hillbillies we are, none of us need that.”

Affordable housing has been a problem here for a number of years and Nenshi says there is no question that we have to legalize secondary suites. “There can be no more dithering, there can be no more fighting about this, it has to be done.“

He says council will have a serious discussion on Monday around making secondary suites a discretionary use in communities that do not currently allow them.

He says he hopes to have a new bylaw in place by next year.