'We have incredible potential': Chamber CEO expects major growth in Edmonton business sector

Doug Griffiths, Edmonton Chamber of Commerce CEO, discusses the organization's efforts to bolster the Alberta capital’s business sector with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: Let's start on hearing from both Danielle Smith and Naheed Nenshi. How different were their two messages? What was the takeaway for your members?

Doug Griffiths: I think each member of different sectors will have a different take away, but what was interesting was they're still both saying we need to achieve our full potential.

They talked about the value of Edmonton to Alberta's overall economy and how we're going to grow, but they do have very different perspectives on what the core issues are that need to be addressed.

I don't think our goal is necessarily to assess which leader is better, obviously our goal is to make sure that we put political leadership in front of our membership, and in front of the Edmonton business community. And our team that we rebuilt over the last year has just done an incredible job of pulling in some of those key leadership, political leaders, economic leaders, and put them in front of our members.

I've had a lot of people say it's nice to see the Edmonton Chamber back and at full strength again. So we're pretty excited about being able to expose our members to these leaders.

MH: Mayor Sohi met with the premier this week to discuss what he terms ‘equitable treatment for Edmontonians’, including the restoration of grants in lieu of taxes. How does the business community view that term of equitable treatment and how the provincial government interacts with Edmonton?

DG: I think I remember reading and hearing this a long time ago, when Edmonton was doing really well and Calgary was sort of the second cousin of Edmonton, and decided new investments needed to go into the University of Calgary and into the downtown, and you see what it's done to Calgary. I would argue it is time for Edmonton to get some of those investments too.

We have incredible potential, we just need some support for some of that infrastructure. I think the short talking point I always make to the premier when we finish our conversation is, if you want a high-speed train going between Edmonton and Calgary, we've got to make sure that Edmonton is achieving its full potential or there's no reason to ride a train one direction.

I think we're sitting on the cusp of so much of that potential. We've got the two rails through here with the flattest line going out to the Pacific coast, we've got the closest access to the port of Prince Rupert, we've got an incredible airport for passenger flights, but also for cargo.

We've got some of the best post-secondary institutions in the entire country, we've got a skilled workforce that is about getting things done, and we've got a great quality of life with a beautiful river valley and a growing and changing downtown that's improving its safety and improving its livability and its walkability.

Our Downtown Investment Plan, that was brought forward by the DRC (Downtown Revitalization Coalition) and led by groups like that, and the Edmonton Downtown Business Association ourselves, are showing how we can lead the way in making this city achieve its full potential and I'm pretty excited about that.

MH: You told the media following the Premier's address that you're putting all levels of government on notice. What did you mean by that?

DG: I've never seen a jurisdiction, a municipality, that decides it's going to be successful, stopped by any government. But I also know how important it is to have partnerships with governments to make sure that we can achieve it as quickly as possible. We don't really have time to wait.

The City of Edmonton had 100,000 people added to its roles in the last two years. That's like adding the city of Red Deer, but with none of those people. I remember a former premier used to say, ‘None of those people bring their houses, or their streets, or their sidewalks or the recreation centres’.

So we need appropriate investment and supports from the federal government and from the provincial government to make sure that Edmonton achieves its full potential and can address the growth challenges that we have, and that our municipal government is prepared and understands about the full potential of Edmonton and focuses on what we're going to be 20 years from now — not what's what we're going to do in the next two months, or what the issue of the day is.

We need long-term strategic thinking from all three levels of government. As a growing chamber, because our goal is to be the largest, most influential and modern chamber in Canada and we're already achieving many of those goals, I wanted to let governments know that you better get on board because Edmonton is going to have massive success and you're going to be part of it, or we may go around you.

MH: Calgary Chamber has joined a consortium of organizations in the wake of the Trump election, to push an Alberta perspective on contending with protectionism, the prospect of blanket tariffs, and bringing reform to the North American Free Trade Agreement.

When that comes up for review in 2026, how engaged do you expect the Edmonton Chamber to be in any of that conversation?

DG: We're going to be very engaged. The building we're in right now is called the World Trade Centre, but it's a building and we are actively working on turning it into a functional World Trade Centre to bridge some of the gaps and the offerings that the provincial and the federal government have in helping our businesses reach the rest of the world.

We're going to make trade a central issue in helping Edmonton, the Edmonton business community and the regional economy grow substantially. We're going to be actively engaged in working on those trade and tariff issues, because protectionism, it's going to hurt us if the U.S. does that, but it's going to hurt them as well.

We're going to continue to work with Alberta’s ambassador into Washington, which we meet with regularly. They did a presentation to our members about some of the risks and challenges and threats, and how we anticipate those. We're going to work with everybody. We need to have a strong, shared, collective voice about how important trade is and keeping those borders barrier free.

MH: Let's finish on the bombshell announcement that Randy Boissonnault has stepped away from his employment minister portfolio under a cloud of controversy over shifting claims of Indigenous heritage. What are your thoughts on Edmonton, and Alberta for that matter, no longer having a voice at the federal cabinet table?

DG: It's unfortunate about Randy’s circumstances. I'm not delving into any of those details but we've taken it upon ourselves at the chamber to form strong relationships and partnerships and focus on our advocacy at the federal level, at the provincial level and at the municipal level.

Randy was an asset. If he's not there anymore, it's not going to detract or detour any of the efforts that we've made working with the federal government. We advocate on behalf of Edmonton and the Edmonton region to the federal government. I think we've said many times that we need more direct support to this municipality because our cities help showcase our country.

We're going to carry on those efforts, working with the other large Canadian chambers of commerce, the other provincial chambers of commerce across the country in our collective advocacy efforts. Many of our urban issues are the same, it's not like Edmonton has a lot of distinct ones, but we'll just carry on.