'We need an overhaul': Coun. Andrew Knack on why he's stepping down, and what's next

Edmonton city councillor Andrew Knack discusses his decision not to seek re-election, and what his political future may look like.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: Edmonton city councillor Andrew Knack made a recent announcement that he will not be on the ballot in the next municipal election set for the fall of 2025.

Councillor Knack joins us now. Councillor, your announcement comes roughly a year before the next election. So, why now?

Andrew Knack: A few reasons. I think why I've done it this early is because if we're going to have new people running, I want to make sure they have as much time as possible to learn everything that they can, to try to get themselves ready for that, because it takes a lot to learn every little in and out of this role.

Hopefully they'll take the opportunity to maybe connect with me and engage with me. I'm happy to share my feedback and thoughts.

But I think overall, why I'm deciding to make this decision, is that I think it is time. It'll be 12 years by the end of next year that I've been on council, and there is that desire to have new perspectives to try to tackle some of the complex issues we're dealing with.

MH: Was there something in particular though, that cinched the decision?

AK: I think it's the fact that there have been a few people I've talked with that I think would make incredible city councillors, who have said that they don't want to run if I'm going to run.

I hate the idea of holding up space when you have these passionate Edmontonians, who are incredible people who I know could accomplish great things, who will have a different way of looking at things.

The last thing I want to be thinking about is, “Have I been sticking around too long?”

We've seen some of this in the U.S., and even in federal politics here in Canada, where maybe there are times where elected representatives stick around a little longer than they probably should.

I don't want to be at that point where people are asking that question of themselves and saying, “Why is he still here after so long? What is he really adding in terms of contributions?” Versus being able to leave on a really high note and hopefully help support good people to become successful in this role.

MH: Much continues to be made over the changing provincial-municipal dynamic, and the degree of control the Smith government is taking in that relationship - How much did that factor into your decision?

AK: It plays a bit of a role. It's certainly much more challenging today than it was 11 years ago to be in this role, especially with the current provincial government's approach. They very much seemingly want to control most of what we're doing as much as they can, and technically it is their legal right to do so.

We are creatures of the province, but I think, up until two years ago, it was very common for municipalities across this province to have more local autonomy; to be able to make decisions and to be ultimately accountable to the people that elected them, not to the provincial government.

So that is making things much more challenging. We're seeing the provincial government consistently pull away funding from municipalities, not just the city of Edmonton.

We're seeing them not take the role that they need to in things like housing and homelessness, which is their jurisdiction, but the municipalities bear the brunt of that.

So that is a challenging dynamic that I think we need to really carefully consider as we go forward, because if it continues, it's going to make every municipal councillor's job very tough in the future.

MH: How much of a difference do you think it would have been made if there had been both NDP and UCP MLAs elected in Edmonton?

AK: I'm not sure that would have made much of a difference. Quite honestly - and this is the challenge with partisan politics as a whole, is that the party tells you what you do.

So it doesn't matter if you were elected by your constituents in your riding, the party has said, “You're going to vote this way. You're going to use this type of key message when you're communicating on social media”, if you're allowed to communicate yourself at all.

I think there's been so much of a centralization of control in provincial and federal politics by the leader and the party establishment, that it's really hard for individual MLAs or MPs to represent the constituents that they that were they were elected to serve.

MH: What do you make of the introduction of party politics to municipal ballots in the next elections in Edmonton and Calgary?

AK: I think that's a really big concern. Look no further than the bill that introduced this ability - Bill 20.

If you actually watched that debate in the legislature – and it was the first time I really genuinely watched the legislature for a steady and ongoing period -- the Minister of Municipal Affairs, who was leading that bill, was essentially the only person that talked from the provincial government.

When there was the opportunity to speak to the bill and why they felt it was important to support, it was just the Minister of Municipal Affairs. There was no other MLA from government that spoke to that bill.

So I think this goes back to the point – if we want party politics, why bother electing individual people? This is my comment about Bill 20: if the provincial government has the desire to have their own people on city council, just get rid of the ones you don’t like and put the ones you want there. I mean, they literally have that ability through the Municipal Government Act.

MH: Had you run again, would you have aligned with a party?

AN: No. I would have run as an independent. There's no doubt in my mind, in part because I think Edmontonians are going to soundly reject partisan politics.

I don't think there's any person who looks at what's happening in either the legislature or parliament - again, I'm going to pick on both orders of government -- I don't think there's anyone that looks at that and says, “Oh, yeah, that's working really well right now.”

I think they look at their municipal councils in their council chambers across all of Canada, and what they see are people from across partisan lines working together on issues - sometimes voting against one another on one issue, and then on the next issue voting in the same way -- because politics is nuanced.

People aren't only Conservative or only New Democrat or only Liberal, they are nuanced. They have positions that might align on the right side on one day and align the left side on the other day. At city halls, we're able to navigate that nuance and actually engage people in thoughtful dialogue.

MH: Bringing it back to you, now that we’re talking about different levels of government, it’s been widely reported that you’re not necessarily closing the door on an extended career in politics.

What will you rely on in your decision-making process when deciding whether to run provincially or federally, and how to navigate the partisan element?

AK: That would be the most important thing to resolve before I would ever consider moving into another order of government. I don't want to go into provincial or federal politics only to be told to do every little thing this exact specific way - and if you don't then you can't be part of it.

I think we need to see a few changes. Actually, I've gone further and will say I think we need an overhaul to how partisan politics works.

There needs to be more individual freedom for MLAs and MPs to do the job of representing their local constituents while recognizing you are still part of a team - you never are going to eliminate that entirely.

I also think there needs to be a civility and respect brought back. I've touched on this a few times. If I were to start heckling my city council colleagues, reporters would cover that – it would be a meaningful story, because that's not what happens on a day to day basis.

Yet we've chosen to accept that, provincially and federally, when folks walk into the legislature or into parliament, we almost just assume it's going to be a situation where people start yelling towards one another; calling each other names, behaving in a disrespectful way, behaving in a way that if your kid was doing that in school, they would get a call from the principal saying your child is misbehaving.

Yet we've accepted that as the normal. So we need to see that overhauled in order for some people to want to be part of it. And I think we've got to try, because the system is so dysfunctional right now, it's not producing good governance.