The voting and counting process will be slower and more expensive in the upcoming municipal election in Calgary. The City of Calgary has unveiled more details of how the election will work, amidst several legislative changes imposed by the provincial government. Elections Calgary officials say they hope to have the bulk of mayoral ballots tallied by the end of the night, after polls close on Oct. 20. But voters and candidates will likely not know who won councillor and school board trustee races until the next day. Counted by hand A major change is that ballots will be hand-counted, because the province has banned the use of electronic vote tabulators. Some Alberta municipalities have used tabulators for decades, saying they saved time and money. Calgary used them in the 2018 Olympic plebiscite and the 2021 municipal vote. But in May 2024, the UCP government banned their use, maintaining that hand-counting will improve voters’ trust in election integrity. Multiple ballots The changes mean that Calgary voters will cast up to three separate ballots, instead of the one-page ballots that were scanned by tabulators in 2021. Each voter can receive a ballot for mayor, councillor and public or separate school trustee. On Friday, Elections Calgary staff offered media the chance to take part in a practice ballot-counting exercise, using dummy ballots, to demonstrate the slower process. (It took the media teams about 12 minutes to inspect and count ballot boxes of 30 dummy ballots). Counters will manually inspect each baIlot and tally the numbers for each candidate, under a system that uses sticky notes to separate piles of votes. They will then report the results from each ballot box, and Elections Calgary will disseminate the results to the public through its electionscalgary.ca website. Media will also have electronic access to the results as they come in. Mayoral ballots come first Elections Calgary says it will prioritize the counting of mayoral ballots. After polls close on election day, workers will start counting mayoral ballots at the 261 polling stations across the city. After that, they will start counting councillor and school trustee ballots that were cast on Oct. 20. Also that night, workers at a new “counting centre” at the Big Four Building at Stampede Park will open advance poll boxes, and count mayoral ballots only (the counting centre will also count votes from mail-in ballots, care facilities and shelters, post-secondary institutions and hospitals, and the City’s vote bus). The next day, Oct. 21, counting centre staff will start counting advance ballots for councillor and trustee races. It’s estimated that councillor vote counting will last until 2:30pm, and trustee vote counting until 8:00pm. Since a large number of Calgarians (36 per cent in 2021) prefer to vote in advance polls, that means the winners of councillor and trustee races will not likely be clear until the day after election day. “The process is significantly different,” said city clerk and returning officer Kate Martin. “We are certainly going to look to our media partners and Calgarians for some patience.” “We have prepared significantly. We have increased the number of voting stations. We have increased the number of election workers, and we, collectively, as Elections Calgary, will be working as efficiently as we possibly can, to deliver those results with integrity. But yes, it will take some time.” Other changes Another new element for 2025 is the permanent elections register. Municipalities are required to maintain this list of residents who are eligible to vote. The date to register with Elections Alberta has passed, but Elections Calgary stresses that if you are not on the list, you will still be able to vote by presenting identification at the polls. Acceptable voter ID requirements can be found here. Other changes for 2025 include new campaign contribution rules, close vote recount procedures, local political parties and criminal record checks for candidates. New carts for election workers The City has purchased 320 metal cabinets on wheels that will be used to deliver and store all election materials at polling stations. The carts will be secure and GPS-tracked. The returning officer says the changes are aimed at making the voting process as smooth as possible for Calgarians. “We’re increasing (voting stations) to 261,” said Martin. “That is an approximate 40 percent increase over what we had in the 2021 election.” All the changes mean the election budget is $11.944 million dollars, up from $8.4 million in 2021. Final costs will not be known until the election is over. Important dates Numbers at a glance
